Let's Bring David against Goliath to Baseball
"Martyrdom... is the only way in which a man can become famous without ability."--George Bernard Shaw

The FA Cup brought a bit of romance to football yesterday. It was a glaring contrast in size, pay and talent when the mighty millionaires of Chelsea, who ranked 104 places above the semiprofessional Scarborough, traveled this weekend to that Northeast seaside resort town to hold an important fourth round FA Cup match. The kind of stunning mismatch that invites giant-killing and mythological heroics that live forever in the minds of fans everywhere. Scarborough, a financially strapped club with ramshackle facilities and a run-down stadium, got about ? 400,000 from live television broadcast, which is enough to keep the non-league club running for two years, but comparatively would scarcely cover a weekly salary for Chelsea. This gives you an idea of the interesting and huge disparities that evolve out of the FA Cup tournament. If it were baseball, this would have been like the Idaho Falls Chukars of the Pioneer Rookie League facing Steinbrenner's millions and the New York Yankees at the 2,928 seat McDermott Field in Idaho Falls.

Another fascinating aspect of the match was in thinking of how the pampered superstars of Chelsea were going to fare in the rather spartan accomodations of Scarborough's lean offerings. How to feed and entertain the visiting officials from Chelsea proved to be another pressing issue. Normally, Scarborough-style hospitality consists of serving soup and sandwiches for about 12 people in the club's cosy boardroom, but the estimated they'd need to provide for at least 86 on Saturday.

The showers are third world quality in Scarborough's lockerrooms. So the news that a bobbly pitch and a set of dressing room showers that feature just one temperature lie in wait for them doubtlessly warmed their hearts.

"I don't think the Chelsea players will have ever come across showers like ours", Scarborough's Irish defender Colin Cryan confirmed. "This is a great little club and the people have been fantastic to me since I came here so I wouldn't want to slag them off, but I cannot pretend that the showers are anything other than minging. They have one temperature - boiling hot. You come out of them with dry skin and a stinging sensation and we all have a good laugh about it. I'm not sure how Chelsea's superstars will react though!"

Imagine how the millionaires of the Yankees would react to the spartan accomodations in Idaho Falls.

Anyway, all the FA Cup excitement got me to thinking how nice it would be to see a similar tournament in professional baseball involving all 243 teams into the struggle in a single-elimination tournament that carried on throughout the regular season.

England holds a nationwide tournament every season involving every football team who is a member of the FA (Football Association) in the country called the FA Cup. England's FA Cup is the tournament of folklore and fun. The folklore could fill sports history volumes for the foreseeable future. The fun comes from the random draw that forces millionaire Premier League and First Division giants to humble themselves and visit the home grounds of small clubs. The pressure can be a great equalizing factor, and the big clubs are forced to take the games seriously to avoid legendary upsets. And the small clubs are on a roll because they have to win several games before the bigger clubs join the party. This season more than 600 teams took part.

It isn't impossible for baseball to do the same thing and if you think there's electricity in rooting for a Little League underdog, just imagine what it might be like to see a Class A team take on it's benefactors in tournament that allows for the possibility of major upsets and bizarre pairings.

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Selfish vs Selfless

We've got one guy who has NEVER won a world championship more concerned with attaining a trivial record for career homeruns by a catcher than he is with helping his team. Outright refusal, flustered avoidance of the subject, grudging participation has marked the results of a request for Mike Piazza to lay down his mantle of selfishness and do what was best for the team by learning how to play first base. Forget that Piazza has been a huge defensive liability behind the plate. Forget that the Mets have spent in Kaz and Cameron to bolster the up-the-middle spine of the Met defense. With Piazza still behind the plate it's like a locomotive running on fumes. What good is the shortstop/second base combination of Kaz and Reyes, what good is the addition of Cameron when Three Hop Piazza is letting baserunners steal at will every time they get on first base? A walk is almost an automatic double when Piazza is behind the plate. Does he make the effort to move to first base where not only is there an opening but a need crying out for help, not to mention the enormous relief it would be on the Met pitching staff if the biggest defensive liability on the field outside of a dangerous Cedeno playing right field is out of harm's way playing first base where he can do considerably less damage?

Contrast Piazza's selfish and boorish insistence on catching even though he sucks as a catcher with the attitude of Jose Reyes: Chief operating officer Jeff Wilpon and general manager Jim Duquette traveled to Reyes' home in the Dominican Republic to personally request that their prize prospect agree to move so the team could sign Matsui, who left the Seibu Lions as a free agent after the 2003 season.

"No, I'm not mad,"Reyes said. "If that's what is best for the team, it is OK. They [Duquette and Wilpon] came down to tell me, 'We have to sign Matsui. You two can be the best combination in baseball." Hear that Mr Piazza? That wasn't Reyes whining about how he wanted to set the record for homeruns by a shortstop at the expense of his own team, was it then?

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+ Free-agent pitcher Ugueth Urbina has been arrested after police accused him of shooting into the air in an upscale neighborhood in Caracas, Venezuela.

Police arrested Urbina early Friday for firing a gun out the passenger window of an SUV, Chacao police chief Leonardo Diaz Paruta said in comments published yesterday in El Nacional newspaper.

+ Sports Illustrated's cover jinx just claimed Donovan McNabb of the Philadelphia Eagles, who got hurt, missed the fourth quarter of the NFC title game and will miss the Pro Bowl next.

This month's Men's Fitness magazine cover, meanwhile, features "The NBA's Fittest Man," Karl Malone of the Lakers, who, as the issue went to press, got seriously hurt for the first time in a long career

Have a listen to WFPK based out of Louisville. I've been able to spend my morning whilst reading the tabloids listening to some excellent old blues within tunes like "Let me put my banana in your fruitbasket" ---

Normally don't like reading or listening to pro-Dukie, pro-Shytown Wilbon but his piece in today's WaPo is dead on:

"Their departures have been even more stunning than their arrivals. How is it possible that Michael Jordan, Steve Spurrier and Jaromir Jagr came to Washington to so much fanfare, with so much promise, and left on such disappointing terms?