Wily Mo's Space

It’s time for Jose Melendez’s KEYS TO THE GAME.

1. Jose was originally going to use this space today to talk about Khe-Sanh Gabbard’s remarkable complete game shut out against the Royals last night. He was going to discuss the silent lefties grace under pressure and his surprising success in the big leagues. But that was before and astute reader sent Jose Wily Mo Pena’s Myspace page.

Is it real? Who knows? But sometimes it’s fun to just crack out the old jump to conclusions mat and get hopping and this is one of those times. At this site you can learn important facts, such as that Wily Mo has never cried (note: Does that means he thinks Wade Boggs is a sissy?) and that his favorite movie is somehow Man on Fire.

Moreover, it includes some interesting tidbits, such as the fact that Wily Mo, would end the sentence “Let’s walk on the” with the word “phone.” Presumably, he misread, and thought it said “Let’s talk on the,” but still, Jose suspects that even had he read it properly, his answer would not have been “base paths.”

There is good news though. The site reveals that Wily Mo has never done a drug (note: go screw George Mitchell), hates pitchers when they get him out and regards baseball as the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

So good for Wily Mo. After all, the only think we ever got from Balki Arroyo were some sketchy pictures in a Northeastern University dorm room.

2. As part of his rehabilitation program, Curt Euro pitched a simulated game against Alex Cora, Eric Hinske, Doug Mirabelli and Wily Mo Pena. This leads Jose to ask the a question: Who, exactly, was being simulated? The worst line up in baseball history? Are there four straight batters in any major league line up who would be as bad as those four?

Jose supposes this was a simulated game in the same way astronaut ice cream was simulated ice cream, that is, not at all.

3. As some of you may have noticed, Jose has added a neat little widget to KEYS on the lower right hand side that shows exactly how many visitors from each country and city Jose is getting to his little corner of the internet. Jose would like to offer a big KEYS welcome to his three readers in Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan. He would like to say howdy to his three new friends in Pomorie, Bulgaria. And he would like to make a gracious welcome to his trio of fans in Santo Domingo, in what baseball indicates is the greatest country on Earth. Heck, Jose would like to welcome you all. Whether you’re from Bombay or Boca del Rio, Jose is happy to have you here. Unless you are the reader from Cranbury, New Jersey, in which case you stay the hell away.

It just goes to show, that baseball has become a truly international phenomenon and the KEYS right along with it. Who’d have ever thought we would reach a day where shepherds in Gabon could join with German factory workers and Jordanian shopkeeps to together share a love of baseball, professional wrestling and jokes about park benches.

Yes, Jose knows that most of you are actually Americans working, soldiering or playing abroad and trying to keep abreast of your beloved Red Sox, but that’s not going to keep Jose from enjoying the fantasy that KEYS has become a kind of virtual “Small World” ride. He prefers to imagine Indians in Saris, Japanese in kimonos, Arabs in galabeas, and Americans in Megadeth T-Shirts sitting down at internet terminals to bask in the gentle glow of Jose’s wisdom,

Because, no matter whom you are, it is a small world, after all. It’s a small, small world.

I’m Jose Melendez, and those are my KEYS TO THE GAME.