We'll be hearing this all season

Marty:
6 in a row Callaghan and gaining fast. Prepare to meet your maker, Masshole.

 

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Bill:
Oooooooo, veeewee scaaawee!

 

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Marty:
You can joke, but 4 back in the loss column isn't a laughing matter for you Sux fans.

 

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Bill:
Mahty, puh-leeze. It's mid-June. Act like you've been to Octobah, Mahts. You're sounding more and more like sycophant for a first year franchise club.

 

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Marty:
A-Rod is on fire. Johnny Damon (remember him?) also on fire.

 

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Bill:
Ah, jeez, Mahty, enjoy those flames while they flickah, because let's face it, most of your guys are held together with cocktails of Praecis and Viagra.

 

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Bill:
And your fahm system is so depleted that your having to go out and sign the Sidney Ponson's of this world.

 

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Bill:
Meanwhile, we are so fucking stocked that we're wearing a rut on I-95 shuttling guys back and forth from Portland and Pawtucket. Why? Because we fucking can, Mahty, that's why.

 

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Marty:
Hey, Ponson was pitching well in Texas this season.

 

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Bill:
Mahty, listen to yourself fercrissakes.

 

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Bill:
While you're getting wood for a washed out has been and general club house cancah, we've got a guy like Charlie Zink in AAA who is ready to step into a Majah League rotation right now but we've already got a knuckballah stahting.

 

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Bill:
I mean, there's depth and then there's motherfucking depth, know what I mean, Mahty?

 

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Marty:
You're going to need it all to handle the Yanks.

 

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Bill:
Mahty, you know I'm kinda busy, so do you think you could spare me your drunk dialing and maybe call the Psychic Friends Network instead?

 

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Comments

[da kine]

My own personal Mahty (MOPM) hasn't been answering my mocking texts lately, but when the real Mahty shows up, that means Skankees fans are feeling froggy. I put the over/under at 3 days before I start getting texts back.

[David Pinto]

I still don't understand why Gary Grant is a Yankees fan. :-)

[David Pinto]

Sorry, Cary Grant.

[ruby02138]

Thanks, h.b. Hilarious strip today. But, kinda fuels the paranoia in its own perverse way...

[Jason O.]

Pinto, you're baseball analysis is good, but your look-alike sense? B-A-D.

Here's the match:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00002469O.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

And hold the fucking phone...be proud of your team, but don't go overboard...Baseball Am. ranks the NYY 2008 farm system at #5 in MLB...depleted? You're high.

[therev]

Nice work, h.b. I thought there would at least be a mention of their ace Wanger going down for awhile. Once their bats slow down I have a hard time seeing the MFY doing much with their staff of senior citizens and babes hanging from the teet. Too old and on the other end too young. It will be interesting to see the second half of the season. Our guys healthy and ready to roll.

[Jason O.]

Of course that's your, not you're.

[Bob]

I've maintianed for years that Marty bears an unholy resemblance to Teddy Ballgame.

I think it's H.B.'s way of freaking us all out.

[Follower of Tito]

So much "sound and fury..." from Marty, other MFY fans, and the NY media is actually humorous these days...payback, she is a bitch. Welcome to the 21st century, Marty et al.

[Natalie]

I've always thought Mahty looks like Dean Martin...

After the world's shittiest week at work, I needed the laugh, and the last panel had me cracking up at my desk. Thanks, hb.

[yazbread]

I can hear Suzy Waldman blubbering now - 'the Yankees have just signed Sidney Ponson' ...

[Jason O.]

Waldman, Ponson and blubber.

An obvious theme, but well put, I admit.

Since you lost Colon, we sign Ponson...NYY/BOS even compete in a "fat race."

[RationalSoxFan]

Don't forget, the Yankees are prepared to set Joba loose now! That should put a scare into everybody.

But, seriously, I do think the Yankees have enough talent to float back up in the AL East. The way things have gone for the Sox, there is no way the Yanks should pose an overly serious threat, but the Rays should get worried.

[Scott]

Great strip as usual. Thanks for the link to Zink. I was wondering what happened to him. Glad to see he is ready to make the jump to the majors. Does this mean Wakefield will "retire" after this season. How can they have (2) knuckleballers on the same rotation? Why would they spend so much time developing him only to trade him?

[Kaz]

We need middle relief. When our 8th and 9th inning guys are coming in early or facing more than 4 batters, the situation gets ugly really fast. Either Wake or Zink should be in the bullpen. Then you could have knuckles for breakfast AND lunch followed up by Papelbon-bombs for dinner. A healthy way to win a game. I loved Tito's Wakefield-to-Fastballer connection that he started to utilize a lot more often around 2004. Just as a hitter is getting used to slowing down for a 70 mph "fastball" mixed with butterflies for 3 ABs, then he's gotta readjust for 2 innings of 95 mph heaters zipping by. Only the best hitters in the game can work that kind of magic (and they're on our roster, not against us).

Imagine facing Beckett for 6 innings and then having to swing at 2 innings of knuckleballs before getting Paps for a lights-out return to speed pitching.

[silverdg2]

Kaz,

I wonder if it would be practical to use a roster spot for Zink or Wake as a reliever.

Knucleballers are notoriously difficult to catch. Having them as a reliever depends on being able to bring them in at the start of an inning or if there are no men on base.

[yazbread]

Wake as a reliever? Bad idea - ref: 2003 ALCS. Not his fault - but there is literally no margin for error and you never really know what the knuckler will do (humidity, temperature, wind, etc.)

[BBB]

Ponson, in a pinch due to Wang's injury is a mistake, but Colon is a genius move??? Only a SAWX fan can look at the world in such a way....

[Kaz]

And it takes a Yankees fan to not understand the difference between a Cy Young-winning, two-time All Star with a bum shoulder who regularly pitches complete games (11th among actives)...

...and a raging drunk (thrown out of the Orioles because of it) who had just gotten thrown out of his last club where the owner (Tom Hicks) had this shining praise for him:

"We don't feel Sidney deserves to be here or wants to be here. We're not going to get into details other than to say we're clearly trying to put together a team here, in a true sense of the word. Based on some recent comments and other such things, it was pretty clear that he did not want to be part of that, and it's something we're not going to tolerate."

Yeah, they're exactly the same situation. We're just crazy that way.

BB(B), you're such a chode.

[h.b]

//Only a SAWX fan can look at the world in such a way....//

Wow! I've never looked at it like that before.

Almost makes you wonder if that is the entire raison d'etre for this site's existence?

But, no, that would just be too unambiguous wouldn't it? I mean, c'mon, it's not like the site is called "The Soxaholix" or anything.

[Kaz]

Yaz, don't let emotion get the best of you when judging Timmy out of the pen.

Wake's BABIP (batting average on balls in play) as a career starter: 0.275
His BABIP as a reliever: 0.275

His tOPS+ (lower is better) is actually 10 points better as a reliever than a starter over his career (91 vs 101). Add that to the fact that last year, he had a 78 tOPS+ in his first 3 innings of work and a whopping 124 tOPS+ in innings 4-6!

Some stats from here and here.

[Kaz]

Oh, also, Yaz, forgot to include this thought:

Sure, 2003 Wakefield gave up that homer in the playoffs that knocked us out, but is that any worse than what 2008 Timlin is doing to us currently?

Besides, I just want to have the only major league team with 2 knuckleballers on roster at the same time. That just seems cool.

[Natalie]

Ponson's last stint with the Yanks lasted just under 2 months. Hope it works out just as well for them this time around.

Kaz, chode is such a funny word. Thanks for the giggle.

[yazbread]

I love Timmy. But I would rather see him eat up innings as a starter than put in any type of relief role (other than perhaps long relief).

[sonomasox]

It appears bigbri is too much of a douche to appear and now just sends his bitch: BBB.

[BBB]

Actually, these last couple of years have been like going to the zoo. I'd never observed SAWX fans in their natural habitat. But watching you guys here gives me a real insight into how your minds work. Amazing, really. And a little sad...

[soxdownunder]

Did someone just fart?

[h.b]

BBB,
This isn't a "natural habitat." It's the fucking internet. Not real.

You should show up some day in your Yankees gear to a blue collar bar anywhere in the greater Boston area and star spouting the same bullshit you spout here.

They'd give you a real swell welcome.

And you'd learn the difference between virtual worlds and real worlds pretty quickly I expect.

[BBB]

Oooooo! It appears I've alarmed this particular species of Red Ankled Blowhard (Many who study you use the latin term Rutilus Crur Garrio). He appears to be beating his chest and challenging me to physical combat in his sad excuse for a habitat. Should I engage? Or perhaps..... invite him down the Boogey Down Bronx.Extend an offer to show up at Stan's Sports bar, directly accross the street from THE Stadium. That invitation should include the stipulation that you wear some form of SAWX head gear (maybe a pink SAWX hat to keep the "swell welcome" to a minimum)? And maybe a T-shirt that questions the manhood of Derek Jeter. Yeah...I'm sure that would work out just fine.

Face it h.b.- Yankee fans are Star Belly Sneetches. And SAWX fans. Well, SAWX fans have none upon thars...

[h.b]

My comment wasn't a threat, dumbass. It was only to point out that this site/community is just one puny, tiny, infinitesimal piece of Red Sox Nation and that we treat you and tolerate you with far more sympathy than you'd get in most meat space (as opposed to virtual) places where Red Sox fans gather.

And as it has been pointed out to you probably 100 times now, none of us ever troll around Yankees fan sites the way you troll around Red Sox ones.

I more and more suspect you are obsessed with us in a way that is neither healthy nor natural.

[soxfaninbravesland]

BB, Theodore Geisel would be saddened to see that you totally did not get the moral of the story of "The Sneetches," which was that star-bellied sneetches were mistaken in thinking they were superior to the sneetches who had no stars on their bellies. That said, Yankee fans suck.