Bob Ryan Also Sucks –
We’re two days away from the long-awaited two-year anniversary of ethanbooker.com (We’re almost up to a hundred hits! C’monnnnnnnnnnnn!!!). I don’t know if I’m more excited or depressed.
The two-year anniversary is commonly known as the cotton anniversary. To celebrate I’m gonna pick some cotton and then cap the night off with some bojanglin’.
Haven’t attacked middle-aged Irishmen in a week, so let’s gooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
These Times, They Should Be Changing
lolllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll!
In the matter of starting times for sports events, the simple reality is that you can't please everyone.
I’m guessing you’re one of those people, Bob..
Now,
if we're talking
The Pope’s so easy to please. Just give him a white Klan hat & a solid-gold castle and he’s good to go.
No time-zone problems in any of those places that I know of.
They have such cute names for them, too: Poor, Poorer, Way Poorer, Wicked Poor, This Bread Line’s Friggin’ Long, Those Dolls Inside Other Dolls Are Boring, Still Poor, Slighty Less Poor, Mostly Dead, Poor Again & Poorest.
I
mean, geez, we have enough problems here in the continental
Especially the Mexicans! Oops!
Imagine trying to please all those Ivans and Sergeis with a big Russian event.
That’s why they’re so poor!
TOO MANY EVENTS! WHEN WILL ALL THE IVANS BE SATISFIED?!
What
would please the good folk of
‘Cause
those
No matter what an American sports league or network does, flak is sure to follow.
“Well folks, that was a great Game Five. We know join Flak, already in progress..”
“You’re a bad apple, Flak! You’re off the force! Hand in your badge & gun.”
“You haven’t heard the last of Flak, Lieutenant.”
This brings us to the welcome news from Major League Baseball that the 2009 World Series and the American League Championship Series will have a starting time of 7:57 EDT (no word yet on the National League Championship Series).
Who cares about those dorks?
“Derrrrr, let’s let the pitchers hit! I wonder what paste tastes like?”
I say "welcome" because I live and work in the East, so I am very pleased by this development.
Bob was also very pleased by the development of bacon-flavored Brawny paper towels.
“Cleaning up’s never been deliciousyer!”
This
better suits all of us who reside in the Eastern time zone.
Even
"I've wanted this [for] a long time," he said.
You’re moving the start times back a half hour. This warrants an entire article? If an extra half hour is killing you, just don’t watch baseball you old fogie..
But
a headline in Tuesday's
Oh no! The Pope is unpleased!
A
baseball fan from
Oh no, Bob Abernathy isn’t on board. Cancel baseball!
is quoted as follows: "It's the East Coast versus the
rest of the country. How does MLB expect folks in the West with actual jobs
(i.e. the ones who can actually afford baseball tickets, gear, and the stuff
the advertisers want to sell) to get home in time to watch a game that starts
at
IF YOU CAN AFFORD TICKETS, BUY THEM AND GO TO THE GAME YOU DIRTY OREGONIAN HIPPIE!
Pardon me while I wipe away the tears.
He’s got a big face, probably have enough time for a pee break.
The effrontery, the brazenness, the absolute gall of someone in PDT whining about the potential viewing hardship of a late-afternoon start is beneath contempt.
Whoa, Bob Ragin’.
THE GALLLLLLL!!! RARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!
/face explodes, again
Those people have been living charmed sports viewing lives for their entire existences. It's time we EDT/ESTers got a break.
Just call it PST/EST. Get this DT crap outta here. It’s like all that CE/BCE crap they were trying to pull years ago.
Here's the real, actual, irrefutable honest-to-God truth of the matter:
I’m a pompous windbag.
For decades upon decades, people from the East Coast have made all the viewing sacrifices.
So that’s where all my goats have been going. Damn you, East Coasters!
Those West Coast dilettantes haven't been asked to make any.
You hear that, West Coast? You’re all a buncha dilettantes! Dilettantes, I say!
It's time those pampered PDT/PSTers
Almost as annoying as he/she.
had to live with World Series, baseball playoffs, NBA Finals, and Final Four starting times that either a) prevent normal working people from seeing the finish of games
If you’re a true fan, you stay up. I don’t care if you have to land space shuttles the next day. Watch your team.
or b) preclude the youth of
The youth! The youth!!
Aren't they ridiculous?
The youth?
I'm asking you, which is worse: missing the first two innings or first quarter or missing the last three innings or fourth quarter? It's not even close.
It’s like making Bob choose between dinner & dessert.
“Give me caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake!”
And this is without even mentioning the plight of the actual EDT paying customers.
Now it’s actually confusing me. Sounds like a cable company. EST, you round pink Darwinian Link!
(rhyme)
At least the people at home can turn off the TV and go to bed as soon as the late-finishing game is over. The people who, as the beleaguered Oregonian Bob Abernathy would put it, actually pay up and go to the games must then file out, get to wherever they've parked, and drive home.
Those poor people who got to attend an exciting playoff sporting event.
THEIR BELEAGUERMENT IS OVERWHELMING ME!
All
this could easily take two hours, meaning that an extra-inning postseason
baseball game might result in some EDTer getting home around
So this is what it sounds like…when doves cry!
So we just don't want to hear about the trials and tribulations of living on the West Coast. Boo bleepin' hoo.
Bob Ryan’s gonna start an East Coast-West Coast beef with Plaschke.
(please get shot on a book tour, please get shot on a book tour..)
The networks are the obvious villains here,
Yeah, fuck you UPN!
but the real enemies of the people are the commissioners and owners, who always, always, always seek every last penny they can extract from the networks, sacrificing the integrity of the game and the best interests of their fans with their greed. They have surrendered control of their own events in exchange for the maximum dollars. They tell you when you'll play, rather than the other way around, so common sense is abrogated.
Thesaurus.com to the rescue!
Exhibit A: Sunday, May 17.
My sandwich. Half-eaten. Shaughnessyyyyyy!
The
Lakers were playing the Rockets in a Game 7 at the
But common sense was abrogated, you doofus.
But nooo. ABC/ESPN had the Western Conference
game, so it had to have it at
It’s the absurdest.
The Absurdist. Tuesday nights this Fall on TNT.
TV.
VCR.
Now let's get back to this baseball business.
Has it ever occurred to the PDTers who are sincerely interested in the baseball playoffs and/or World Series that all games are on this interesting contraption called radio and that there are far worse things in life than listening to an inning or three on radio whilst driving home before plopping down in front of the TV?
Radio puts pictures in my ears, not my eyes. I want pictures in my eyes!
As
a lifelong EDTer, I would gladly take that scenario over the one we endure on
an annual basis, watching games drag on (another story for another day) past
Yeah, no sense in making this meaningless column longer than it already is, you Sphere.
But I have a solution.
Funnel cake in an aerosol spray can! We’ll call it Funnel Foam!
Let's be fair. Let's ask both PDTers and EDTers to give a little.
How's this for a World Series schedule?
Game
1: Saturday,
Game
2: Sunday,
Game
3: Tuesday
Game
4: Wednesday,
Game
5: Thursday,
Game
6: Saturday,
Game
7: Sunday,
GREATEST WORLD SERIES SCHEDULE EVER! ALERT THE SELIG AT ONCE!
Well, yeah, I sneaked those Sunday afternoons in there.
Tee-hee. (wink)
This is an absolute no-brainer.
Probably why you wrote it.
OHHHHHHHH!
/dons shades, headbangs
In fact, it should have been Bud's one non-negotiable, and NFL me no NFLs.
What the fuck. Did Bob just have another stroke?
NFL me no NFLs.
NFL me.
Hey, gimme some football.
..no NFLs.
No more football, please.
I’m an English major and I can’t break this one down. Is there a gerund in there somewhere?
I know Fox has both.
NFLs?
In a better world, it wouldn't.
I’ve read it. I’ve re-read it. And I’m lost.
And there is no reason a Saturday game has to start any later than 7 EDT.
EDT. Your number one cable provider.
And next year you flip-flop the weeknights, giving the PDT/PSTers the Tuesday-Thursday later starts. That's fair.
It’s fair, just as long as you NFL me no NFLs.
Yeah, I know. Makes too much sense. Yeah, I know, never happen. But I can dream, can't I?
Yes you can, Mr. Ryan. About cream-filled hamhocks. All night long.
Bob
Ryan is a Globe columnist and host of the Globe's 10.0 on Boston.com. He can be reached at ryan@globe.com. 
~~~
I was with him, begrudgingly, until the last couple seizure-inducing paragraphs there. Another Bob Ryan classic. Complain, complain, complain, confuse.
NFL me no NFLs.