Loser's Roll Call
Every now and then when your life gets complicated and the weasels start closing in, the only cure is to load up on heinous chemicals and then drive like a bastard from Hollywood to Las Vegas ... with the music at top volume and at least a pint of ether." Hunter S. Thompson

Sometimes, a team gets hot at the right time and pulls away from the pack while other times, teams go stone cold and drop completely from a playoff race into oblivion. I don't know if it's the season, if it's the parity, or if it's just that everyone's bullpen sucks and no lead in anything is ever safe in baseball anymore, but there are quite a few teams in the thick of a playoff hunt and few, if any of them, seem capable of putting anything together.

Let's take the Phillies, for example. The Phillies dropped yet another game to the Montreal Expos last night, this time by 9-6 margin, despite a seventh-inning grand slam by Marlon Byrd which should have changed the momentum of the game once and for all. Late-inning grand slams, like Earl Weaver's infamous "three run homer" fundamentals, should seal a victory in a tight game against a team like the Expos, who have no real business mucking up the NL Wildcard race in the first place.

Late-inning grand slams shouldn't produce another version of Dan Plesac coughing up another lead in the bottom that same inning.

Then again, as you take a look at the NL standings and see who is in this wildcard race, you begin to understand why no one seems capable of winning enough games to take a definitive lead in the race. The Phillies have won only 2 of their last ten games and stand a full FIFTEEN GAMES BEHIND the Atlanta Braves in the NL East. The Marlins, losers of 7 of their last 10, including yet another miserable performance by getting three hit by Kip Wells of all people to lose 4-0 to the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates, are also FIFTEEN GAMES BEHIND the Atlanta Braves in the NL East.

Now, I love the wildcard edition for the postseason but hopefully, in most cases, the wildcard goes to the kind of team that should have won their division and had a better record than almost everyone except whomever won their division. It shouldn't go to lamentably low-grade teams like the Phillies and the Marlins who lose game after game against lower-grade teams, who fumble and stumble and do nearly everything in their power to blow their seasons only to have the mutual incompetance of their competition reciprocated night after night.

Nor should it go to the Arizona Diamondbacks who, nearly decapitated by the adversity of injuries to their stars, somehow remained in the race for the wildcard, but sit a grisly 12 games behind the San Fransisco Giants in the "hunt" for the NL West. The Diamondbacks have blown more than their fair share of chances. While the Marlins and Phillies have both become leperous losers over the last several weeks, the Diamondbacks could have made their move. If they'd even managed to play at a feeble .500 pace over the last month, they'd be so far ahead of the Phillies and the Marlins by now the race would be over.

Instead, they too are afflicted with this loser handicap, blowing the obvious wins. What else explains how they lose to the last place San Diego Padres by a 10-2 margin with their ace, Curt Schilling on the mound?

You know who has been the hot team of late? The Milwaukee Brewers. They've won 9 in a row! Now THAT is how a team in the thick of a pennant race is supposed to seize control of the race. It was only Saturday when I asked The Burning Question of whether or not the Brewers, five games behind the Cincinnati Reds at the time, could move out of last place. Now they are a mere game behind the Reds. THAT is the kind of excitement you want to see in a playoff race. Not this sort of lugubrious shuffle we see toward a loser's horizan performed by the likes of the Phillies, Marlins and Diamondbacks.

On the other hand, you could take the Cubs, whose bullpen, and in particular, Kyle Farnsworth, single-handedly destroyed a beautifully pitched game from Kerry Wood, who, after going a miserable 2-4 since the All-Star break needed a beautifully pitched game to reassure Cubs fans he wasn't on his way down for the season. He isn't. He stepped up on national television and gave up only four hits and no runs while striking out 11 over seven masterful innings only to watch Kyle Farnsworth give the farm away the first chance he had in the 8th inning in a pathetic, demoralizing display as the Cubs lost to the Cardinals 4-2 to drop a full game and a half from the Astros lead in the NL Central.

At least the contending NL Central teams have an excuse for why they are losing more than winning: they're beating up on each other. They aren't losing to teams like the Cincinnati Reds or Milwaukee Brewers or San Diego Padres.

Do you realize that the only team in the playoff hunt not currently leading their own division who has a winning record over the last ten games is the Montreal Expos? They MUST be doing well. Last night, not only did they manage to humiliate the Phillies again, they somehow managed to attract a crowd of 20,105 fans at Olympic Stadium without giving away free hot dogs! 20,105! That's like double the average Marlin home crowd when the D Train isn't pitching.

An exquisite thought to ponder: How about the Expos AND the Twins make it into the playoffs? The Bud Selig Contraction Series. Certainly a more compelling story than trying to figure out who, among all the losers in the National League, are going to cough up the fewest games the rest of the season.

As they're beginning to learn in Montreal, Laissez les Expos Roulez!

*****

The American League has its own up and down forms of the Loser's Roll Call. A little over a week ago, it was the Boston Red Sox blowing those games at home to the Oakland A's and looking for all intents and purposes like this was the beginning of their annual swoon.

Now we've got the Seattle Mariners: After spending 133 days at the top of the division, the Mariners tumbled into second place Wednesday night when they dropped an 8-4 decision to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Athletics beat the Baltimore Orioles in Oakland. With their fifth loss in a row, they look more like they're vying for the NL Wildcard spot than the AL wildcard spot.

But at least the Mariners are consistent. The losing, choking pattern is repeating. A year ago, the Mariners led from April 9th until Aug. 23rd. This year, they made it from April 13th to August 27th. Wow. That's uncanny.

Perhaps even more uncanny is that the Mariners lost to the second-worst team in baseball. The Tampa Bay Devil Rays started a 20-year old Chad Gaudin who has been in the Major Leagues such a short time, ESPN doesn't even have a photo for his player profile. Just a blank space. The Devil Rays walked eight and made two errors, usually enough miscues in one game to assure a loss but the Mariners are currently reveling in snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. They are now tied with the Red Sox for the wild card spot, out of first place with another night of AA pitching to look forward to.

Yesterday, I showed you what a loser's rotation looked like when I showed you the gruesome numbers for the Phillies starting five during the month of August. The news for the Mariners is no better. Here's a grimace at their own starting rotation during August:

Jamie Moyer 2-1 4.83 ERA
Ryan Franklin 2-2 5.14 ERA
Gil Meche 2-3 5.93 ERA
Fred Garcia 2-2 5.00 ERA
Joel Piniero 0-5 8.31 ERA

Those are your losing numbers for August, sportsfans.

*****

Lastly, it's been a giddy few days for we Yankee haters this week. First, we are treated to Roger Clemens giving up a grandslam on a night his mother throws out the ceremonial first pitch. This was pleasing because frankly, whether she's got some cause to carp about or not, there's no reason some jerk's mother deserves to toss out a ceremonial pitch at Yankee Stadium. Supposedly, she was out there as a part of some half-wit promotion by the American Lung Association to raise awareness for her emphysema, which was caused by smoking ALOT of cigarettes. No one needs to raise awareness about something that derives from smoking cigarettes in New York because you can't smoke cigarettes in New York anymore! With draconian, legislated morality on smoking, New Yorkers need reminders of how bad smoking is for you about as much as they need reminders that terrorism is bad for you.

Oh, ok, watching Roger's old lady toss out the first pitch was good for baseball because it brought us this quote from Clemens:

"It's a bad night," the Rocket said, "when your mother has better stuff than you do."

Indeed, Roger. How many of us can vouch for that?

And then, icing on the cake, those glorious White Sox turn around and POUND the Yankee machine once again, this time by an 11-2 margin. That means that over the last two games, the White Sox have crushed the Yankees by a total of 24-4. Plenty of fodder for those hysterical Henny-Penny Yankee followers who have collective aneurysms every time a Yankee sneezes or they fall behind by a run in the middle of a game. This should give them plenty! Cry on! Sign another fifteen relievers off the waiver wire! What, are there no more Mike Fischlin-types to sign?

The chaos is so rampant in YankeeLand these days, even Mel Stottlemyre is speaking his mind:

"He's not in as good a shape as he was early in the year because he's not throwing in between starts," Stottlemyre said of David Wells, who has not won in his last six starts. "I would not say anything if he was pitching well."

I would not say anything either, but I just read a few days ago that Boomer was out getting zero-eyed with a loser like Carson Daly. No wonder Wells sucks. Look at the company he keeps.