ThreeStrikesandOut

This has been everywhere, but it’s still pretty funny. A high school pitcher and catcher combo, apparently tired of the way that the home plate umpire was calling the game. So they decided to plunk him.

According to the AJC:

Those two, the pitcher and his brother, the entire game had been riding the umpire about balls and strikes, and [Ethan Martin] got rung up in the top of the fourth, so that was payback in the bottom of the fourth,” Singer said. “I don’t know what was going through their heads, but when you see a catcher go to his right, it’s like ‘Good God!’

This is some stuff that you would expect to see in Major League 4-Back to the Sandlot.

Pitcher: “The ump is an asshole, he’s not calling anything!”

Catcher: “Throw high and fast. Aim for his noodle.”

Pitcher: “What good will that do?”

Catcher: “Alot when I duck.”

SportsbyBrooks

Not sure that the best way to convert people to Christ is by whoopin’ their candy asses, but I’m Baptist and I’ve seen some pretty strange things in churches in my time. Although I have to say, a preacher that enters toughman competitions because that’s what JC would want him to do, is a new one on me. Unless you count George Foreman. And I don’t.

If Elite XC really wants to go WWE on us, they should get this guy to fight Kimbo Slice. The pastor could be managed by God and they could do a whole angle about how Kimbo will have to defeat the pastor and the Lord to prove his greatness. Of course, that could only happen if MMA was fake, and written by the people who brought us Cavemen and Carpoolers; but, I guess they’re on the wrong network, eh?

The Reverend Custer would be proud.

Talk about a match made in heaven; Jose Canseco has found someone to take him up on his $5000 challenge. It’s this guy:

According to Fox:

According to multiple published reports Tuesday, former Eagles kick returner and two-time Pro Bowler Vai Sikahema will fight Canseco in a July 12 bout at the Atlantic City Bernie Robbins Stadium.

Though Canseco, 43, has a size advantage on Sikahema (6-foot-4, 240 pounds compared to 5-9, 190 pounds — according to their variously recorded playing weights), Sikahema, 45, may have more boxing experience. The Tonga native famously did a goalpost-punching celebration dance after scoring a kick return touchdown against the Giants in 1992.

You know what would be great here?  It would be great if some old-school celebrity deathmatch stuff happened during this fight, and Kimbo Slice came out and ripped both of these two clowns in half.  Then, he should immediately be given a medal and the key to the city.

I don’t know which is worse, the fact that Canseco made this challenge and got someone to bite on it, or the fact that I’m actually taking the time to write about it.  Probably the second, but hey, I never claimed to be particularly original.

Canseco better be careful; dude really wore out those goalposts.

Every once in a while there is a baseball story that makes you think that Bull Durham didn’t tell you half of the stuff that goes on in the minor leagues.

A minor league player got traded for 10 bats. According to MSNBC:

For now, (John) Odom is headed to the Laredo Broncos of the United League. They got him Tuesday from the Calgary Vipers of the Golden Baseball League for a most unlikely price: 10 Prairie Sticks Maple Bats, double-dipped black, 34-inch, C243 style.

“They just wanted some bats, good bats — maple bats,” Broncos general manager Jose Melendez said.

Well, as long as they were good bats. Nothing beats the feel or good wood in your hands. Did I just write that? Damn.  This story would have been much funnier if Odom had been traded for two balls.  That would have been a blogging dream.

Odom, in an attempt to cling to some shred of personal dignity, is trying to make the best of it:

Odom said he was supposed to be traded for Laredo’s best hitter. But when that player balked at moving to Calgary, the bats entered the deal.

Yeah, because that’s the natural progression of any trade conversation.  I bet it went just like this:

“Hey we want to trade Odom for your best player?”

“No.”

“Mmmm. Okay.  How about Odom for that Louisville Slugger and some Big League Chew?”

“Deal on the bat.  No go on the chew, it’s my personal stash”.

“I understand, it’s a deal.  You coming to the Tonya Harding fight?”

“Nah, too low-brow, I’m going to the topless mud-wrestling at Joe’s game instead”.

“Classy, Bob.  Classy”.

“Yeah, the missus has really improved my culture, she graduated community college you know?”.

MSNBC

What are the chances of this happening in an MMA fight?

The above knockout(s) happened at an LOF (Legends of Fighting) event, and the fighters are Tyler Bryan and Shaun Parker. If I had been the referee, I think that I would have awarded myself the victory and left both of them laying on their backs. I don’t see the UFC in either of these guys future, they appear to be the MMA versions of Randy and Bill Mulkey (if you get that reference, you watched entirely too much wrestling in the ’80s).

I still prefer this kind of double-knockout: