Ask a Stupid Question…

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

1. When Jose switched on sports radio this morning, the primary topic of discussion was whether it had been appropriate for Dolphins GM Jeff Ireland to ask Oklahoma State wide receiver Dez Bryant, eventually drafted by the Dallas Cowboys, whether his mother was or had been a prostitute. Now, this particular host, maybe it was Colin Cowherd, was arguing Ireland had every right to ask the question, as there was huge money at stake, but Jose thinks that’s utter nonsense. Jose doesn’t want to live in a country where someone can be denied a job just because his mother is a whore. That’s like saying Debbie Clemens shouldn’t be able to sell weird sequined pillows on the Internet just because her husband is a statutory rapist.

But now that the proverbial can of cats had been opened out of the bag of worms, it seems like perhaps it’s fair game to ask anyone affiliated with professional sports anything. Here are the questions Jose would really like to ask.

To Derek Jeter: Who did you get herpes from? Who did you give it to? (Note: This is not to stigmatize those with herpes, which is really not big a deal, according to an infectious disease specialist who yelled at Jose the last time he made fun of Jeter’s herpes. Jose just thinks that if Jeter was spreading herpes simplex around, it may be indicative of bad judgment that could harm his play as he ages.)

To Manny Ramirez: What city to the Los Angeles Dodgers play in?

To Pedro Martinez: Now that Sandra Bullock is single, will you pursue your life’s ambition of ing her?

To Mike Lowell: When Adrian Beltre took a liner in the groin and had one testicle swell up to the size of a grapefruit, did you consider asking him for half?

To Adrian Beltre: You really don’t wear a cup? Are you out of your mind?

To Kevin Youkilis: Why is this night different from all other nights?

To DJ Dru: When you think about your swing, does it excite you sexually?

To Theo Epstein: Does DJ Dru’s swing excite you sexually?

To Allan Embree: Are you aware of data linking chewing tobacco to mouth cancer?

To C.C. Sabathia: Would you like another doughnut?

To Bill Hall: You suck.

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

Celebrate Good times? Come on.

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

1. Lost amid the hubbub of the Yankee Stadium closing is the news that the Red Sox will clinch their fifth playoff birth in six years tonight. Jose is excited about this because it means an insane celebration that will make Jose love this team.

But what if that doesn’t happen?

What if this group is so much more professional and serious than teams past that they refuse to cut loose? Millar is gone, Manny is gone, Pedro is gone, Damon is gone. Hell, we’re down to one Jew, so seeing anyone dance the Hora is unlikely. (Note: Who would lift the chairs?) All that we have no is Papelbon who, in fairness, may be crazy enough to compensate for all of them. But one lunatic does not an asylum make. Jose’s fear is that Papelbon will, like last year, celebrate by stripping down to his jockstrap, but that Sean Casey will quickly hand him a towel and tell him “Put on some God damn pants and quick making an ass of yourself.”

Will DJ Dru just celebrate with an understated fist pump? Will Mike Lowell party with a glass of chilled Chablis? Perhaps Dice and Oki will do nothing more than offer a simple bow. Maybe Mark Kotsay will do…well, whatever it is that Mark Kotsay does.

Frankly, Jose is worried. This is not the gang of idiots, so perhaps they need a more structured way to celebrate. So Jose will step in and offer a suggestion for a fun yet responsible way to celebrate.

Here’s what Jose has come up with: An arcade party at the Dream Machine in the Watertown Mall followed by pizza at Papa Gino’s. Jose knows this may sound like it lacks in drama, but trust him, it’s super fun. Jose did this for his birthday like five years. For an hour you can play all the video games you want for free. Like Curt Euro isn’t going to be in to that? Also, as a plus, there’s an Old Country Buffet there, so Mike Timlin will be good. On the down side, it seems absolutely possible that DJ Dru could injure himself playing skee ball.

2. Yankee Stadium is not the only New York institution to fold this week. The musical Rent also left Broadway after a 12-year run. Despite the fact that the 5,124 performances of Rent, greatly exceeds the number of games played since this Yankee Stadium finished construction in 1976, the close of Rent has not gotten nearly the same press attention. Thus, Jose presents a list of reasons why the closing of Rent is more important than the closing of Yankee Stadium.

• Rent is not being replaced with a new, $1.3 billion publicly funded musical.
• Rent only made Jose want to slit his wrists on one occasion in 1999. Events in Yankee Stadium made Jose want to slit his wrists annually from 1995-2003.
• While Rent includes many long annoying songs, it has never featured a 45-minute rendition of God Bless America.
• Amazingly, far less slapping in Rent.
• If a 12-year-old kid, had interrupted a performance of Rent, he would not have been put on television and given really great seats to the next performance.
• In Rent, the rich guys are the villains.
• If the star of Rent’s vocal repertoire can barely reach one octave, he is not praised for his amazing range.
• Even though Rent is a remake of an old opera called La Boheme, people don’t count performances of La Boheme in Rent’s run. Yet, people do count games at the old Yankee Stadium in the new Yankee Stadium’s run.
• Rent addresses many adult and disturbing issues, but nothing as disturbing or perverse as Wade Boggs on horseback.
  

3. They called it the House the Ruth Built, even though George Hermann Ruth never played in the iteration of Yankee Stadium that closed last night.

Still, there is a certain appropriateness to the appellation. The big, ugly concrete bowl does look like something that a fat alcoholic might have built. (Note: Actually, given that it was built by contractors in New York, it probably was built by a fat alcoholic.)

No, the architecture, the aesthetics were never what made Yankee Stadium great. What made it great, what allowed it to transcend its structural mediocrity, were the events that transpired there: A-Rod’s slap, Beckett’s gem, D battery night. There are probably some good things that happened to the Yankees there too, but they were so long ago that Jose can’t really remember them.

By contrast, Fenway Park, despite its innumerable flaws, is remarkable for what it is, an uncomfortable yet quirky gem. If Fenway is the Eiffel Tower, an elegant proof of its own importance, Yankee Stadium is Tokyo Tower, a gaudy affront to elegance made important only by its own self-importance. If Fenway is a Pollock painting, discordant yet somehow lovely, Yankee Stadium is a work by Thomas Kinkade “Painter of Light,” widely liked while completely lacking in merit.

It will be easy for critics to say that Jose is just bashing New York, and that is certainly the case. But, Jose would say the same thing about the Boston Garden. It was a dump that was important for what happened there, not for what it was. In that regard, perhaps Yankee Stadium is more like the 99 Restaurant in Charlestown. It’s not famous because it’s beautiful or interesting but because some bad, bad stuff went down there.

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

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

1. Today is opening day at Fenway, and as such, the start of the game will be delayed by the ring ceremony.

As you know, the ring ceremony is an ancient and honorable rite forever binding player with team. Jose did a little historical research on the ring ceremony, and strangely enough all he could come up with was this stuff about rings sealing a marriage. Still, given that this is Massachusetts, Jose is pretty sure that it is legal for a man to marry an entire corporation, so he just adapted some of the man-woman vows for today’s occasion. (Note: Think of Sox owner John W. Henry as the giver of the rings.)

• This ring is a token of my enormous, ungodly wealth. With this ring, I consecrate the fact that you were part of my weird, vicarious obsession of living out athletic glories through millionaires. Response: I will forever wear this ring as long as I am not at an occasion where I have to shake a lot of hands and it will cut into my skin.
• I accept this ring as a symbol of your love and my faithfulness. When I am a free agent and other teams come calling for me, I promise to remain eternally faithful to you, as long as you offer at least four years at $13 million per.
• Special for DJ Dru: I give you this ring to wear with love and joy. As a ring has no end, neither does your contract. I am pretty much stuck with you from this day and forevermore, so I might as well make the best of it.
• For Tim Wakefield: I give you this ring as a visible and constant symbol of my promise to be with you as long as you are still competent, because I have you under a never ending contract...
• With this ring, I thee wed, and with it, I bestow upon thee all the treasures of my mind, heart, and hands, but not my wallet. I’m going to keep that.
  Because this ring is perfectly symmetrical, it signifies the perfection of last season. Wait, I borrowed that vow from Bob Kraft…
• For Kevin Youkilis: Harey at mekuddeshet li b'taba'at zo k'dat Moshe v'Israel (Translation: Behold, thou art consecrated unto me with this ring according to the law of Moses and of Israel).
  

2. The latest news from Fenway Park today is that Bill Buckner will throw out the first pitch. Let Jose be the first to say that this is kind of cool. Buckner was a great player who took a lot of crap for an error and never, even once blamed in on jet lag.

Jose welcomes this outstanding news. However, it does come with a hint of sadness, as it means that previously scheduled first pitch tossers Dennis Eckersley and Mike Brumley will be throwing out the first pitch for the Cubs.

3. This year’s championship ring features two Red Sox made out of rubies in the center. While this looks cool, it is going to be a disaster for Manny when he inadvertently throws his ring in the washing machine and it turns his uniform pink.

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

The Euphoria is Wearing Off

Buy the 2007 KEYS BOOK—THEY WIN IN THIS ONE!

It’s time for Jose Melendez’s KEYS TO THE HOT STOVE.

1. The euphoria is finally wearing off.

Jose’s blood pressure is down, the adrenalin in his blood has thinned to watery broth and the pleasant fog that has cloaked and soothed him for lo these many months is finally lifting.

Yes, the ecstasy of winning the 2004 World Series has at long last dissipated.

Thank God we won another one. Now Jose can be assured of another three years of low-level elation.

But in all seriousness, Jose is no longer constantly giddy, and the benign sense that all is well with the world is gradually giving way to the melancholy that comes every year at this time as surely as the leaves glide to the ground.

It really is better this way. Ecstasy, it turns out gets boring eventually. (Note: No, it doesn’t.) Pain. Now that’s the ticket. Pain and ennui, ennui and pain, those are the rich loam in which decent writing germinates and blooms.

Strangely enough it was last night, as Jose strolled the streets of Denver, that the melancholy descended. One would imagine that the sight of so much Rockies NL Champion merchandise would start the endorphins flowing, but it was not to be. No he could not even muster the energy to make a bankruptcy joke to a guy he met named Jack Clark. There are lots of good things going on, but none of them could counter the little slip of paper in the breast pocket of his jacket.

The paper was marked 11/14/2005. Exactly two years ago to the day yesterday, how odd. How odd it is that two years after the occasion, Jose would find this little reminder of the last time he had certainty in his life. Without going into what the paper represented (note: no, it was sadly not a lottery ticket), it was the seeming guarantee of a clear path in Jose’s life, it was the phone ringing with his calling at the other end, it was the lead blocker opening that seam for him to sprint though. But soon after that date, too soon, Jose saw his future, then so neatly laid out, disintegrate as surely and as painfully as Andy Yount’s at a graveyard so long ago. Yount’s future was shattered by glass and Jose’s by red tape, different, yet so, so the same.

And then came the uncertainty. Who was Jose? Who was he going to be? It is frightening, this uncertainty. Just ask Alex Rodriguez. He was brave. He chose uncertainty. He dove headfirst into the churn, but then made a horrifying discovery. He didn’t much care for it. It turns out that he did not understand that uncertainty is, well, uncertain. While Rodriguez left the trail clear and true to go off into the brush, he somehow failed to grasp that there might be snakes there. Rodriquez chose the uncertain path confident that it would lead to a certain outcome, but as soon as it turned that first dark corner, he got scared and ran back to the safe embrace of Steinbrenner Inc and their $275 to $300 million arms.

What a shame. What Alex doesn’t understand is that certainty secure and comfortable though it is, is boring. And even worse, it is limiting. Jose lost the certainty of his calling, but after the initial anxiety, he has embraced it. He can do anything; he can be anything. And he will be.

Alex Rodriguez, by contrast, will know exactly who and what he is the moment he signs this deal. He will be a Yankee; he will be a Hall-of-Famer; he will even be the greatest player of all time. But that’s not all. He will also be unloved, forever made to somehow look small by inferior teammates with superior shadows.

It is a good choice, perhaps, for the weak, for the cautious, for poor, lonely Alex, but not for Jose. Jose is made of sterner stuff. Jose welcomes the uncertainty. He embraces the stress, and the anxiety and the… Opportunity?

So let the melancholy come, let it sound smooth and dark like Scottish rock. Let is crash to the earth in sheets. Jose is ready; Jose is intoxicated by the melancholy. And unlike Alex Rodriguez, he is not afraid

2. Congratulations to Kevin Youkilis for winning a gold glove for his errorless season at first.

Now, a lot of you may not know why they give out gold gloves to the best defenders. You probably think that it is symbolism, that because gold is valuable they give it to the best fielders as a way of honoring them. Of course, that doesn’t make any sense. If that were the case they would give them platinum gloves, as platinum is more valuable than gold.

No, what the gold glove is actually about is equity. The original concept of the gold glove was that it would create more parity by burdening the best fielders with snazzy, but painfully heavy and inflexible gloves made literally out of gold. By forcing Willie Mays to play with a gold glove, you could level the playing field between him and say, Pete Incaviglia. Of course, over time, this gave way to the current, metaphorical gold glove, which doesn’t really do the job, because, as everyone knows, metaphors are not very heavy.

This is why Jose is so excited about the presidential candidacy of Ron Paul. Sure Paul is an ultra-libertarian who is convinced that everything would be great if only government did nothing, which is, of course, crazy, but Jose does think he is brining an important issues to the table by calling for a return to the gold standard.

By calling for every gold glove to be made out of actual gold, Paul will return sanity to the gold glove process and fight the absurd defensive inflation that has lead to Derek Jeter winning the award.

Be honest, doesn’t that make a lot more sense than just having so-called “gold gloves” that float freely against foreign currency backed up by nothing?

3. The other big news in Red Sox nation is that Curt Euro has resigned a one year deal with the Red Sox that will pay him $8 million plus as much as five million in incentives tied to performance and his ability to report to camp in shape. In fact, he can get $2 million just for showing up to camp at weight.

If this works, Jose imagines we will see a proliferation of diet plans wherein you give a contractor $2 million and they give it back only if you meet weight targets. In honor of Curt, they’re going to call it the Mouth Speech Diet.

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

World Series Game 4: Thus Spake Nietzsche

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

1. “God is dead.”

Thus spake Nietzsche.

Of course, Jose doesn’t believe that God is dead, he’s something of a Pascal man, determining that the potential benefits of belief are a far better gamble than atheism.

But the Colorado Rockies must be wondering this morning if Nietzsche wasn’t right after all? Because if God is alive, why oh why would the Rockies be down three games to none?

Jose wants to be clear. He is not mocking God. He is not mocking religion. Heck, his parents just went to church two minutes ago. Sure, it’s a Unitarian church so it doesn’t count, but at least they’re going through the motions.

What Jose is mocking is the incredibly foolish and self-indulgent notion that God is the equation changer in baseball games. It is nonsense, and it holds one’s faith up to ridicule and doubt. If one proclaims as Rockies Chairman and CEO Charlie Monfort did that “I believe God sends signs, we're seeing those" or as Team President Keli McGregor told Time that God is "using [The Rockies] in a powerful way," does it not follow inevitably that should the Rockies lose this series one of two things is true: either a) the Rockies have done something displeasing to God or b) if God really does care about baseball games, He is not powerful enough to actually win them?

The way Jose sees it the Rockies have put God in a terribly awkward position, and if Jose were God (note: he is not) he would be really resentful.

This is why God is best left out of baseball. Jose decided long ago after praying for Celtic playoff wins, that athletic victories were too small, too unimportant in a world of suffering to waste valuable prayers on.

We do not need religion in baseball; the intermixing of the two demeans them both. What we need in baseball is what we have—superstition. For decades, forever really, the true faith of baseball has been the soft animism of superstition. When Curt Euro hops over the base lines is he not appealing to some mysterious force in the universe? When Wade Boggs shoved chicken after chicken down his curious gullet was it not a form of prayer?

When Jose crosses his fingers, or kneels on the floor or rocks back and forth or visualizes base hits, is it not an appeal to some troublesome spirit? (Note: Or possible signs of an anxiety disorder?)

That said, the funny thing is that Jose has become a baseball atheist. Out in the world he is a deist, but with his eyes on the ball field, he has come, albeit slowly, to reject the heathen gods of bat and ball. It does not matter if he crosses his fingers. It is irrelevant if Curt Euro steps on a baseline. What matters is having the best players, the best preparation and the strongest minds. Now ritual can play a role in that. Simple repetition can focus the mind and relax the body, but it is vestigial, nothing more than the token remains of a rite that once had meaning.

Perhaps this is the legacy of 2004, the lesson at last learned by Red Sox fans, that one wins or loses not on the strength of one’s superstition, but on the strength of one’s bats and arms, and on the competence of one’s management.

Superstition would demand that Jose now, yell out “UNO!!!!” as he did three years ago, to proclaim, as in the card game, that there is just one win remaining. But he no longer feels the need. What he says and what he does are irrelevant to the outcome. What matters are the men on the field and the minds in the dugout.

UNO! UNO! UNO! UNO! UNO! Of course, Jose did say he tends toward Pascal’s Wager, so let’s not anger the baseball gods, just in case they are real.

2. As the seen shifted to Denver and National League rules, there has been an absolutely appalling amount of silly talk about how the Red Sox should rejigger their defense to keep David Ortiz, Kevin Youkilis, and Mike Lowell all in the lineup. While the solution last night was to sit Youkilis, that is not particularly creative. We have heard calls for Youk to play right field, for Mike Lowell to play shortstop, and for all Jose knows, for David Ortiz to catch. (Note: David Ortiz has bad knees. He should not catch.)

But no one has come up with the most obvious solution—let Mike Lowell pitch. Jose knows it sounds crazy at first, but this could totally work. The guy’s got a gun for an arm, and… well, that’s about all Jose’s got. Maybe it isn’t such a good idea.

Okay, let’s try a variation on that. Mike Lowell should be on the lineup card as the pitcher and should bat in the nine hole, but Jon Lester should do the actual pitching. How would this work? Disguise.

How hard can it be for Jon Lester to pass for Mike Lowell? They are both cancer survivors, so if Lester just constantly chats up the ump about “When I had cancer,” and remembers not to say it was lymphoma, as Lowell had testicular cancer, that’s a start right there. Then all you need is some modified Groucho glasses that keep the eyebrows but shrinks the nose a little bit, and some makeup to make Lester look 50 years older and presto—Mike Lowell is your pitcher.

Now, Jose knows what some of you are thinking “Hey, that’s cheating!” But come on, it’s not that bad. It’s not like they’re doing something really reprehensible like video taping the game or hitting umpire Chuck Meriwether with a steel chair or anything.

3. As Jose searched desperately for material for this Game 4 KEYS, he naturally looked back to Game 4 of the 2004 World Series for inspiration, and what he found surprised him. Three years ago yesterday, Jose in his second KEY relied heavily on the Transformers, the cartoon about robots that transformed into vehicles, comparing Derek Lowe to Megatron and St. Louis starter Jason Marquis to Bumblebee.

Cut to today and Major League Baseball has finally caught up with Jose, flashing Transformers logos throughout the World Series in efforts to move DVDs of the ho-hum summer blockbuster. The result, naturally enough, is that Jose needs another shtick. As an aspiring hipster Jose cannot keep using Transformers references once they get in vogue any more than he can keep drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon once they start underwriting National Public Radio.

Ergo, Jose will now explain to you how the 2007 Colorado Rockies are exactly like Go-Bots, the Tonka equivalent of Transformers.

Like the Go-Bots, the Rockies entered the series with a lot of hype and to significant excitement, but ultimately they were simply defeated by a vastly superior product.

Also, Jose is almost positive that there was a Go-Bot that changed into a bird called Latroy Hawk-Ins and one that was a three-way changer from a robot to a diet book to a TV maid named Garret Atkins.

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

Which Jared Diamond Book are the Red Sox?

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

1. Grow up people!

Seriously, grow up.

“The Sox are collapsing,” you whine. “It’s 1978 all over again,” you complain. “It’s like they’ve surrendered,” you lament.

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

The Red Sox are not collapsing, they are not reliving history, they are not surrendering—they are retrenching. It’s totally different. Let’s put in this way, if the Red Sox were a book by noted geographer Jared Diamond they would not be Collapse. Rather, they would be Guns, Germs, and Steel. Their future will be determined by the strength of the big guns in the middle of the lineup, their ability to overcome injury and disease, and whether their will is strong like steel.

If it were a different year, it would be 1918 not, 1978. And if the Red Sox were a Cheap Trick song, they would be I Want You to Want Me, not Surrender.

For all of the complaining, for as disappointing as it would be to lose the division after holding a lead so large and so long, it does not matter. Not at all.

Ask even the most dimwitted of elite military theorists, and he will tell you that selecting the ground for one’s battle is a critical advantage. Do the Red Sox want to fight now on the mine riddled battlefield of the last week of September to secure a minor tactical advantage for the future—home field? Or do they want to dig their trenches atop the hills of October, conceal their artillery and martial their strength for the decisive battle to come?

Jose concedes that it has been painful to watch for the last week or so, that he has cursed the players, the manager and even the grounds crew. But for all of his rage, all of his angst, he knows that Tito is making the right decisions. He is healing his stars, he is setting his rotation, and he is testing his relievers. Tito may be many things, a manager with a slow hook, a man who cares too much for his players’ feelings, but one thing he is not is Pyrrhus at Asculum securing today’s victory at the cost of the grand campaign. No, perhaps these Red Sox will not win their Asculum, but rest assured, the borough of the Bronx, the Apulia of modernity, shall harshly, and inevitably fall.

2. Still, as the lead grows slimmer and slimmer, it is fair to ask: Who are these Red Sox? Clearly they are not the band of jovial idiots of 2004. But who are they?

The Red Sox are infantry beating a strategic retreat in order to gird for the battle to come.

The Red Sox are masters of jujitsu, little men standing firm against the charging behemoth, waiting until the last moment to step aside and use the behemoth’s strength against him.

The Red Sox are brokers, buying as the market crashes, picking up cheap assets while everyone else is selling.

The Red Sox are boxers taking punch after punch, secure that their chins will last longer than their opponents’ lungs.

The Red Sox are swordsmen, dueling left handed and preparing the switch to the right.

The Red Sox are cryptographers, allowing Coventry to burn such that the information from cracked codes may continue to flow for the greater good.

The Red Sox are roadrunners, allowing the coyote to indulge his insatiable hubris in preparation for his eventual humiliation.

The Red Sox are robots, making cold, rational calculation of maximum benefit, not feeling the emotion that drives men to weakness and folly.

The Red Sox are musicians, striking a stunning fortepiano before again building to a raging fortissimo.

The Red Sox are wrestlers, pretending to hobble such that their inevitable recovery will be all the sweeter.

The Red Sox are grifters, hiding their true identity to pull off the one big scam.

The Red Sox are surgeons, sacrificing the leg to save the body.

The Red Sox are cats, seemingly lazy and nonchalant, yet always scheming.

The Red Sox are all of these things. They are all of these and more. But what will define them, ultimately is what they are not. They are not losers, they are not chokers. You will see. Just wait until October.

3. A lot of you, okay one of you, have been wondering where Jose has been over the course of the last three days as the Sox began to crumble. The answer is he’s been busy.

He’s got stuff to do, important stuff. Fine, fine, it’s stuff to get ready for the playoff race, and just like Tito Eurona, he’s not going to get all anxious and fly off the handle because we might get the wildcard rather than the division. What Jose is focused on right now is healing up, resting up and getting prepared for the postseason.

You all remember 2005 don’t you. It was unclear, even on the last day of the season if the Red Sox were going to make the playoffs, so Jose had to keep throwing everything he could into KEYS right up until the final game.

As a result, when the playoffs started, Jose had to resort to the comedic equivalent of throwing Antipope Matt (In)Clement XV in Game 1— doing jokes about how Carl Everett doesn’t believe in dinosaurs. Jose was gassed, absolutely exhausted, and it showed. Jose doesn’t want this to happen again, so he’s been resting and restocking, trying to fight through the “dead brain” phenomenon that has hit him hard in recent weeks.

What has he done to rejuvenate in his time off? He’s had text messages on scores sent to him right up until the start of a wedding? He’s rambled and ambled from Holyoke to Pittsfield to New Bedford in search of renewal, you know basically all of the stuff Manny is doing to recover from his sore oblique.

And you know what? It’s paying off. It’s paying off big time. When the Red Sox get to the playoffs Jose is completely prepared for either the Angels or the Indians. Jose is prepared to parody either of C+C Music Factory’s hits, in the event that we draw Cleveland starter C+C Music Sabathia. Jose is equally prepared to joke about how Angles hurler Kelvim Escobar is so cold that he is at 0 on the temperature scale created by someone who’s last name is sort of close to Escobar’s first name. See? Degrees Kelvin jokes! Gold! You don’t even want to hear Jose’s Garrett Anderson material!

So don’t you worry. Manny will be healthy and rested. Youks will be “wrist strong” as Stephen Colbert would say, Okajima’s arm will be undead, zombie-like really, and Jose will be ready to go, fresh, rested and ready to kick some *ss.

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

The Ethicist

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

1. Following yesterday’s heartbreaking 5-0 loss that completed the utterly meaningless sweep at the hands of the Yankees, Jose was asked to way in on an ethical question.

Now, you folks out there in internet land may be surprised to hear this, because you just think of Jose as the sort of fun loving faux Puerto Rican who entertains you day in day out by making keen observation such as the fact that tonight’s match up pitches Tim Wakefield vs. the First Lady of Wrestling, the lovely Miss Elizabeth. (Note: Reader City of Rosie Palms insisted that Jose include this because the Orioles are starting a guy named Liz, and let it be never be said that Jose does not pander to his audience.)

But Jose is so much more than that. As a person obsessed almost to the point of madness with being good and doing good, Jose is constantly asked questions about the thorniest ethical issues of the day. Thus, Jose is proud to rip off the New York Times Magazine’s Randy Cohen, with KEYS’ new feature The Ethicist. (Note: Ethics lesson one. Because Jose said he was ripping off Randy Cohen it’s not plagiarism or unethical, it’s an homage. Keep this in mind. Under the same principle, if you tell a store owner you are going to steal a television set from him and then do it, it’s not stealing—it’s a homage to his fine wares. Unless it’s Best Buy where stealing from them is always okay because they’re jerks.—sub note to scummy Best Buy lawyer— Jose is not actually encouraging people to steal from Best Buy even though they are jerks, so don’t get all litigious. Similarly, since everyone knew Dave Roberts was going to steal in Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS, he is not actually credited with a stolen base. Rather, he was credited with an homage to Rickey Henderson.)

On to this week’s question. One of Jose’s softball teammates, let's call her Bettor In Cambridge (BIC), made a wager on the outcome of the Red-Sox Yankees series. She and a Yankee fan friend agreed that if either team swept the supporter of the losing team would be required to wear the winning team’s T-Shirt to an upcoming softball game. They do not play on the same team or live near to each other, thus verifying the payoff is difficult.

Here is the ethical quandary. Is BIC obligated to follow through on the wager? Could she just send a picture with a Yankees shirt on and then not wear it to the game? Could she ignore the thing all together?

It is a tough nut to crack and must be approached from several angles.

First, Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative would dictate that she must fulfill the terms of the wager. The categorical imperative, in the simplest terms, insists that any behavior that would screw up the world if everyone did it, must always be avoided regardless of circumstance—no exceptions. If she did not wear the shirt, Kant would argue, Presidents could lie about wars, CEOs would lie about corporate finances and civilization would end. Ergo, Kant is a total *sshole.

In a criticism of Kant, Swiss philosopher Benjamin Constant pointed out that the categorical imperative was total BS by citing the example of a murder looking for the person he is trying to kill. If a murderer asks you where the person he wants to kill is, Kant would say you have to tell him. Constant would point out that that is crazy and that at most you should say “Manager’s Decision.” Jose would argue that the Yankees shirt example is analogous. Fulfilling one’s commitment will lead to great evil. Kant would say that moral value does not derive from the expected consequences, but rather from following the imperative so do it, but what does he know. If he’s so great, why is he dead?

So what is the right course of action? Jose has thought and mulled on the wisdom of the sages and concluded that the most ethical action is to go double or nothing. This avoids deception and thus a violation of the categorical imperative and also creates the distinct possibility of not having to wear the f’ing shirt. Now, what if she loses on double or nothing? Keep going on with double or nothing for ever and eventually the law of averages will save the day.

Next up: Jose will rip off William Safire’s “On Language” column and explain how “there,” “their” and “they’re” are basically the same word so people should stop sending Jose emails about his crummy usage.

2. Perhaps the decisive moment in yesterday’s game came when the Red Sox had men on first and second, no outs and DJ Dru at the plate. Dru grounded to third but Kevin Youkilis ducked under A-Rod’s tag and was called safe by umpire Earl Hebner. A-Rod then completed the throw to first to get Dru. The result was runners on second and third with one out, a prime scoring opportunity. But something was amiss. While A-Rod, Derek Jeter, and Yankees manager Joe Torre screamed at Hebner, keeping away from the action, as best Jose could tell, Yankees General Manager Brian Cashman came out of the stands and tore off his suit to reveal an umpire’s shirt. Cashman then made the out signal, changing the ruling and killing the rally, before jumping back into the stands.

Though Jose will confess it is possible that it didn’t go down quite like that. It is conceivable that somewhere during the conference of umpires, Earl Hebner was knocked out and replaced by his twin brother Dave, who everyone knows is in George Steinbrenner’s pocket. The upside of this scenario is that even if the Yankees somehow go on to win the championship they will surrender the title to The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase in return for fistfuls of cash.

3. When Jose got home last night he had a reply in his inbox from Todd Kehoe, the Weekend Editor at the PostStar in Glens Falls who did the terrific write up on KEYS featured in KEY 3 yesterday.

The reply read

Well, now I’ve really made it. My name on Jose Melendez’s blog.
I, too, hope Hacksaw can read and now is a devoted fan of your site.
And don’t worry about the dry cleaning. The Yankees remain a flawed and self-destructive team.
Todd Kehoe

Jose has decided that he is sufficiently interested to email Mr. Kehoe and try
to do an impromptu interview. Jose sent this email this morning.

Dear Mr. Kehoe:
Congratulations on having really made it. You have now joined presidential candidate Mitt Romney and superhero Rocket Racer among the dignitaries featured in KEYS. It is not quite as good as winning a Pulitzer or a Slammy, but it is significantly better than winning a daytime Emmy or God forbid an ESPY.

Jose would like to put the shoe on the proverbial other foot and ask you a few questions. How do you like that Mr. Reporter?

1. How many people does the PostStar have on the Hacksaw Duggan beat? Jose guesses four. A full time reporter, a night shift guy, a weekend reporter and then a Hacksaw Duggan editor.

2. How did you discover KEYS and why would people in Glens Falls care? Is it one of those weird random pockets of New York where the Sox broadcasts are stronger than the Yankees broadcasts?

3. Do you ever see Rachel Ray walking down the street? If so, how many times do you kick her?

4. Does the Iron Sheik ever visit Hacksaw Duggan up there? Jose knows
they’re friends because they got busted together with drugs in their car once.

That’s about it for now.
Thanks.
Your pal,
Jose

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

Eric Gagne's Middle Name is Serge

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

1. Following yesterday’s KEYS, wherein Jose assigned Eric Gagne the middle name Heathcliff because he couldn’t figure out his real middle name, a number of Jose’s astute (note: know-it-all) readers let him know that Gagne does in fact have a real middle name. It is “Serge.”

This raised an obvious question: Does the President know this?

Jose confessed he was not thrilled by the idea of using a serge in Iraq when he thought the President was talking about sending more troops there, but to send Eric Serge Gagne? That just seems crazy. For starters, he’s Canadian, so Jose is pretty sure the President of the U.S. has no authority over him. But just as importantly, is Gagne really the man for the job? What Jose has seen in Gagne’s brief stint in Boston has left him with deep concerns about his ability to preserve a win. If he can’t preserve a win in Camden Yards, how on Earth is he going to preserve one in Baghdad? Even worse, before Gagne came here, Jose was always hearing about how filthy he was. Filthy fastball, filthy change. Is someone so filthy really equipped to deal with Baaths? (Note: KEYS TO THE GAME, winner worst Iraq War pun three years running. No, not really.)

If we were going to hinge our foreign policy to a relief pitcher, Gagne would not have been Jose’s first choice. A far better option would have been Mike Timlin, as he is proficient with small arms and likes to wear camouflage. Of course, the President may be saving Timlin until we have four more years of war. You know, Timlin in the eighth. Then Scott Williamson would take over the war in year nine. Who says Bush can’t learn from past mistakes.

2. Jose loves pork chops. He just loves them. Maybe the best thing about the modern, lean pork chops is that they are at their absolute best with no seasoning more exotic than salt and pepper. From time to time, Jose will lose his senses and sprinkle a pork chop with some exotic rub designed to accentuate its fatty deliciousness, but the result is invariably disappointing. When it comes to pork chops, Ockham’s Razor presides.

Last night, Jose thawed out a couple of pork chops for dinner. Summer grilling, you know. As he prepared to salt and pepper them, he noticed that one of the chops was kind of strange. Rather than having the white-pink hue and smooth texture Jose is accustomed too, it was redder, the grain thicker. At first, Jose was concerned that there was something horribly, cataclysmically wrong with this pork chop, but then he realized the awful truth—it wasn’t a pork chop at all. Instead, it was a piece of sirloin steak cut in a shape that vaguely resembled a pork chop. When cooled to freezing the vast tundra of Jose’s ice box, the slab of cow was indistinguishable from the swine upon which Jose so gleefully digs.

The reason Jose brings this up is that he’s been thinking that Kevin Youkilis is a lot like that steak that appeared to be a pork chop. Maybe he wasn’t exactly what you thought he would be, an everyday third basemen, but what he turned out to be, a slick fielding first baseman is pretty good, though maybe he needed a bit more seasoning than he would have at first. Also, like the steak he is conceivably, though not certainly kosher, while Pork Chop Lowell, most clearly is not.

3. The WWF is working an angle right now wherein it is revealed that Vincent K. McMahon has an illegitimate child and that this, as yet unidentified child, works for the WWF. (Note: Jose bets it’s not someone who works in marketing.)

Jose would sort of like to see the Red Sox try something like this. It would be kind of fun if John W. Henry went down to the pitcher’s mound pregame and declared that someone on the team was his son and that he wouldn’t rest until he identified who it was.

Jose figures it would have to be DJ Dru, because the only way that contract made sense, at least knowing what we do now about Dru being overshadowed by the awesome power of Doug Mirabelli, is if it was some kind of paternity settlement.

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

Building Up an Immunity

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

1. Do we have to play the DRays?

Now?

This is not the right time for the Red Sox to go into Tampa. Jose is rooting for a weekend of rainouts. Wait the DRays play in a dome don’t they, so that will involve some holes being cut in the roof, but whatever it takes.

The Red Sox are playing great right now. They just took three of four on the road from an excellent Cleveland team. Manny, Lugo and Crisp are hitting. Papi is back. Lester, Mr. Matsu and St. Josh a Beckett all pitched beautifully. Why in God’s name would we play Tampa right now? Everything is great, we don’t need Tampa right now.

Playing Tampax Bay this weekend is like slurping antibiotics when you’re healthy. Tampax Bay and tuberculosis don’t share initials without good reason. In both cases, they more you attack them the stronger they get. If you take antibiotics when you don’t need them, when you actually do get tuberculosis, you’re screwed. Similarly, if you play Tampa when you don’t need to, you might find that you struggle when you play them later in the season after a four or five game losing streak.

Actually, never mind that’s crap. Tampax Bay is nothing like tuberculosis because they never get stronger no matter what.

Rather Tampax Bay, as the name suggests, is much more like a tampon. If you have one when you don’t need it, no harm done, but if you do need it to stop the bleeding after a few bad days, it’ll absolutely do the trick.

Okay, so Jose is pretty sure he used that line all the way back in 2004, but you know what. He doesn’t care. Why should he stop? It still works doesn’t it? Still gets the cheap laugh, right? The bottom line is that if the people of Tampax Bay want Jose to stop making tampon jokes, they should change the name of their city/region, or at least their “baseball team” to something that doesn’t make it so easy. For instance, if they changed the name of the team to the St. Petersburg Trojans, then Jose wouldn’t make tampon jokes anymore would he? No, then he’d say things like “playing the Trojans is a lot like using a Trojan, they both stop bad things from happening.”

2. After a great deal of thought, Jose has decided that he is completely in favor of the Red Sox acquiring Mark Teixeira, even if the costs are high.

There are a lot of reasons not to go after him. He’s been injured this year, Scott Boras is his agent and the Rangers are asking for a ton. But there are two big reasons to go after him. First, he’s a 30 home run, 130 RBI sort of guy with a pretty slick glove, which is nice. But far more importantly, his name can be phonetically broken down into Te-She-Ra, which is Spanish for “Your She-Ra.”

For all of his skills, Kevin Youkilis has never lent himself to anything much better than Jewish jokes, and Mike Lowell has peaked with missing testicle humor. Picking up Te She-Ra, by contrast, would open up an entire line of She-Ra/He-Man universe related references that have thus far been almost completely untapped by this humble feature.

A good fit for the 5 hole?

Consider the opportunities:

• During a prolonged slump, Te She-Ra, could be called “Princess of Power.”
• Jose always thought “By the Power of Grayskull was a reference to Terry Eurona’s head anyway.
• She-Ra’s arch enemy Hordak is an acronym for K A-Rod H. (Note: Jose’s got no idea what to do with that H.)
• Synergy as Te She-Ra and Man-E-Faces Ramirez go back to back it order
• She-Ra has a healing touch. David Ortiz could totally use that.

3. In encouraging news Curt Euro pitched five scoreless innings for the Paw Sox as they battled Maxwell Klinger’s beloved Toledo Mudhens. The successful rehab start came even as Euro generated more controversy with a scathing attack on steroid users in a conversation with Bob Costas. Euro suggested that user Rafael Palmeiro should be stripped of his 3,000th hit and that Jose Canseco should be required to return his MVP award.

But the timing could not have been worse for Euro. The news came on the same day the Boston Globe did a feature on his life as an online gamer, including a photo of a curiously buff Euro in the game Everquest. Canseco used the opportunity to attack the Sox pitcher’s credibility.

“Curt Schilling (sic) is a liar and hypocrite,” said Canseco. “I admit that I used steroids. But when is he going to admit that his Everquest character is digitally enhanced. I have never used a computer to increase my skills or improve my physique. Can he say the same?”

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

Are You Fitter Than...

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

1. It was at Jose’s gymnasium that he met his old enemy.

The 4x4 white oak tag card, stamped with the outline of a green apple, a granny smith, Jose supposes, lay there on the check-in desk mocking him.

Jose had known this day would come. Ever since he saw the signs around the gym asking “Are you fitter than a fifth grader?” he knew that conflict was inevitable. After 20 long years, across 34 countries on five continents, the President’s Physical Fitness Test had finally tracked Jose down like the furies of myth.

But its victim was a different Jose Melendez. The pudgy ten year-old with whom it had last done battle was gone. In his stead stood a man, stood a broad shouldered, well-pectoraled, moderate exercise machine. Jose took the measure of his old rival. 45 sit ups? Ha, Jose can do that after six or seven beers. 22 push ups? Even easier. +4.0 V Sit Reach? Jose has no idea what that is, but he’s sure he can vanquish it like a soft tossing lefty going through the Sox line up.

That’s when the troubles start. On mile run, 7:57 seconds. Hmm… that might be a problem. When Jose ran cross country in high school, he was the king of the ten minute miles—12 if he was feeling lethargic. Jose had only joined cross country to get in shape for wrestling, which he then quit upon discovering that wrestling mostly involved not eating, and had little or nothing to do with hitting people with chairs. Thus, he took a laid back approach to running. Also, he’s really slow. Could Jose pound out a 7:57 mile now? Maybe, but will he try? Hell no. His knees would rebel faster than Gary Sheffield at a clubhouse meeting.

From there, we move from the improbable to the impossible. There is no way Jose is doing six chin ups. None. These days he could probably do two or three, but six? He couldn’t do six if you gave him a week. The chin ups always seemed unfair. Even the best athlete in Jose’s fifth grade class, a fellow who shared a name with one of the Monkees couldn’t do it. It was a cruel and vindictive goal set by Ronald Reagan in order to shame the nation’s youth into a more aggressive stance towards communism. Jose’s couldn’t do it then, and he can’t do it now.

Thus, Jose must except that he is not fitter than a fifth grader, at least not fitter that this Nietzschen über –fifth greater that the President’s Council on Physical Fitness has pressed upon us like a crown of thorns or batting helmet of nettles.

But Jose will not be defeated. Rather he will stand strong, and in the finest American tradition, he will not yield to the unreasonable demands of lofty goals. No! He will insist upon the soft bigotry of low expectations. He will demand it. Prepare to limbo friends, because Jose is lowering the bar

Instead of offering this foolish “are you fitter than a fifth greater promotion” the problems of which begin with it referencing a Jeff Foxworthy vehicle and spiral from there, Jose offers a different question “Are you fitter than Curt Euro?”

Now there is a reasonable standard, fit enough to be a professional athlete, not fit enough to look good in a tight t-shirt. Even better, since Curt is a big supporter of the President’s perhaps he can get through to the increasingly isolated fitness guru in chief.

In order to meet this more reasonable standard, one would still have to pass five tests.

• See your feet: 1 inch or more.
• Strike out Wily Mo Pena in a simulated game: 2 or more times.
• Write about baseball on line: 10,000 words in one hour.
• Stay awake playing Everquest: 36 consecutive hours.
• Fit into a suit for weird wine commercial: 1 time

If you can do all of those, congratulations, you are as fit as Curt Euro. The President salutes you, and invites you to enlist. If not, perhaps you can receive a lesser commendation for being as fit as Rich Garces.

2. A musical tribute to tonight’s Royals starter to the tune of “Oh Mandy” by Barry Manilow.

Come on, sing along! Cue up the youtube video and join in.

I remember in LA
You pitched great and came to play
You picked up 15 wins
Were on the All-Star team
2002 goes by
And slides into

Year 2003,
What kind of season will it be?
Your ERA got high
And you began to cry
Because you realized
How crappy you’re playing, Odalis

Well you give up home runs, we’re not taking
Pitches for strikes today, Odalis
Well you know that our bats, they are waking
We need you today, Odalis

You’re on the worst team in the game
Missing all your long lost fame
Caught up in a world of nickel and diming
Kaufman’s waterfall like tears
And nothing is rhyming, Odalis

Well you give up home runs, we’re not taking
Pitches for strikes today, Odalis
Well you know that our bats, they are waking
We need you today, Odalis

Well you give up home runs, we’re not taking
Pitches for strikes today, Odalis
Well you know that our bats, they are waking
We need you today, Odalis

3. Jose has a new role model. It’s Yi Jianlian, the Chinese basketball player drafted by the Milwaukee Bucks with the sixth pick in this year’s NBA draft.

What Jose loves about Yi isn’t his size, his soft hands, or his much celebrated ability to post up a folding chair. (Note: Bill Simmons has gotten a lot of mileage out of that joke, but he shouldn’t diminish the accomplishment. Beyond Al Jefferson, do the Celtics have any big men who could post up a chair? Jose is pretty sure that the chair would stuff Kendrick Perkins.) No, what Jose loves is that Yi is refusing to play in Milwaukee because there aren’t enough Chinese people living there.

Actually, Jose is amazed that there is anyplace without a lot of Chinese. Jose once had a friend who came from the Czech Republic near the border with Poland. Jose asked him if there were many Poles who lived in his town and his friend answered “No, but there are a lot of Chinese.” Anyway, someone should let the Czech leagues know that they may be a good fit for Yi.

Buy Yi’s defiance has gotten Jose thinking. Is it really appropriate for Jose to be devoting himself to the Boston Red Sox? Sure they have two Japanese and one Jew, but do they have even a single Japanese-German-Jew? And if so, does that person have a Puerto Rican alter ego? And the city writ large is just as bad. In his 30 years in the region, Jose hasn’t seen a single Japanese-German-Jewish American social club, ethnic festival or awareness day. Have you ever seen gefilte fish sushi with sauerkraut? Nope. This city does not have adequate representation for Jose’s ethnic group, and it is starting to piss him off.

So here’s an ultimatum. Find Mr. Matsu and Okajima some nice Jewish girls or get Youks a Japanese girlfriend and let’s get them banging or Jose is out of here faster than Wily Mo on three straight sliders.

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

First Game

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

1. Interesting fact. Did you know that there are people on this good Earth, who have never seen a baseball game? Really. There are. But now there is one fewer.

Last night, Jose gave a Kosovar Albanian the greatest gift that an American can give a Kosovar, you know except for freedom from tyranny and pending, genocide, a chance to see a major league game. In 2005, while visiting Kosovo, Jose had tried to explain the great American game to this fellow, let’s call him Jack, but despite the innate Albanian love of all things American, he struggled to follow Jose’s lovingly hand scratched diagram.

“Where are the other eight men?” he asked when Jose explained that the batter was the only offensive player on the field. It’s all in the 2005 KEYS, you should read it. It’s excellent.

But a mere diagram is no substitute for the actual experience of attending a baseball game, much less a major league game at Fenway Park. As the emerald turf stretched before him as he emerged from the tunnel, Jack got that look that we’ve all seen in four year olds attending their first game, that we remember having ourselves when we first entered Fenway. But seeing it on a 33 year old man, dressed in what can best be described as a Miami Vice getup, is a different experience entirely. Wonder on the face of a child is beautiful, but common, wonder on the face of an adult, by contrast, is as rare as an inside the park homerun.

And that’s when the questions started.

Why is this guy going to the base? Why is a foul a strike sometimes but other times not a strike? How come the Japanese guy doesn’t pitch every day?

Some of the questions were easier to answer. Jose can explain the strike zone or the ground rule double, but others such as why Casey Blake was out after getting hit on the fingers on a swing, or why in God’s name we play Sweet Caroline in the eighth, reminded Jose that there are many things in this game that remain opaque, hidden beneath cloaks of time and behind walls of dusty tradition.

2. Jose loved Amelie Benjamin’s piece in today’s Globe Red Sox Notebook about the feud between Kevin Youkilis and Dustin Pedroia about who is slower. The centerpiece of the article was Youks claiming that his inside the park home run last night proved that he is faster. This, of course, proves nothing, as Steven Hawking could have rounded the bases on that ball.

Jose likes it because it reminds him of his feud his freshman year of high school with his friend Dan over who would be the slowest cross country runner not only on the team , but in Belmont High School history. Dan tried his best. Despite his long legs and lanky frame, he managed to run truly pathetic 10 minute miles throughout the 3.5 mile course. But Dan couldn’t compete with Jose. Jose’s inferior conditioning and general unwillingness to exert too much effort gave him the edge he needed to run 10 minute 30 second miles, allowing him to still be chugging away, long after Dan had crossed the tape. Jose’s specialty was lollygagging his way through the course and then going into the high kick down the final stretch, once everyone who had finished 10 minutes prior could see him, thereby demonstrating his grit and determination.

Only once, in the entire season, did Jose outpace another runner. Sadly, one competitor from Lexington out-slothed Jose running an astonishing five minutes behind him. Jose figures either the guy got hit by a bus while running or it was one of the Molina brothers, either way, Jose has to tip his cap.

3. Let’s be honest. As happy as we all were to see Mosey Nixon back at Fenway last night, to stand and shout and give him his due, weren’t we even happier that he was the guy up with the bases juiced in the eighth against a lefty? (Note: Yes, he did have a long sac fly rather than his more traditional “struck out swinging on a changeup away.”)

As hard as Nixon played for us, and as well as he played, there are few things in Red Sox history that Jose will miss less than watching Mosey face lefties in critical situations. On the list of things at bats has hated to watch over the years, it’s pretty much any Cesar Crespo at bat, Jim Rice with a runner on against a groundball pitcher in his last few years and then Mosey versus a lefty.

You’d think Wily Mo Pena would be making the list, with his remarkable ability to get so far ahead of an off speed pitch that he actually swings before the ball leaves the pitcher’s hand, but even if it’s futile the chance that he might inadvertently start World War III by knocking the ball to Red Square makes Jose not hate his at bats.

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

Reality Check Please

It’s time for Jose Melendez’s KEYS TO THE HOT STOVE.

1. In times of foment and struggle, in days of uncertainty and turmoil, now and throughout history, it is common, perhaps inevitable for governments, for the grasping assemblages of the powers that be to attempt to reassert their increasingly tenuous grip on power.

The leadership of Red Sox Nation is no different.

With the bowels of Red Sox Nation’s body politic rumbling after consuming the tainted shellfish of a third place season, the leadership, the terrible triumvirate of Henry, Lucchino and Werner, is attempting to clog the diarrhea of our discontent with the chalky Imodium of control.

They want to make us register.

They want to make us register because information is control.

It started out unassumingly enough didn’t it?

“Become a registered citizen of Red Sox Nation, and get a 10% discount at our store.” It seemed innocent, so innocent. But it always does doesn’t it? What slow sulk into totalitarianism hasn’t begun with a 10% discount?

And now there are tiers of registration, each with its own insidious set of inducements and price tag, designed not only to track us but to classify us, to divide us. What is the answer? Resistance.

In Marvel Comics today, there is a series called “Civil War” wherein the destruction of Stamford, Connecticut as the result of a battle on a super hero reality show leads to a push for the registration of all super heroes. (Note: Yes, Jose knows that the premise that the destruction of Stamford would get people all riled up is a bit far fetched, but remember, we’re talking about comic books here.) The world of super heroes is quickly divided into those who favor mandatory registration and those opposed. Well, this is no different… except there are no super heroes, it’s happening in the real world and no one cares, not even comic book reading geeks.

But still, Jose sounds the clarion call of resistance, bright and clear like a bell in the night. Burn your registration cards. Resist the machine. Today, they offer you discounts, tomorrow failure to register will make you ineligible for college loans.

People of Red Sox Nation, we have nothing to lose but our chain of sold out games.

2. A few days ago it was announced that NESN is developing a Red Sox reality dating show.

The concept is that a fan will spend two innings each with three lucky ladies (note: or gents, this is Massachusetts) and then decide who they will throw up on in the final three innings. While a lot of “real fans” condemn the project, entitled “Sox Appeal,” as mindless drivel for the pink hat crowd, the sort of project that is an affront to real fans who go to the game to, you know, drink beer and question Derek Jeter’s sexuality, Jose completely approves of this idea. Anything that contributes to the goal, our shared goal, of getting Red Sox fans laid is okay with him. In fact, Jose thinks the Red Sox need to take it much farther and concoct a whole series of Red Sox themed reality shows. A few ideas:

America’s Next Top Groupie: Skanks and star f*ckers compete in a series challenges like sexual gymnastics, shutting up and looking pretty, not getting pregnant and leaving after he’s done, for the right to spend one night with Kevin Youkilis.

Who Wants to be a Closer?: Real fans are brought in to close games for the Red Sox, until Tito gets fed up and moves Papelbon back into the role.

Average Joel: Watch as Joel Piniero struggles to reach his career averages. The catch? He doesn’t know it, but he’s pitching with a torn rotator cuff.

The Amazing Race: Manny Ramirez and a giant tortoise are placed side by side. Who will win the race to first on ground out?

Extreme Ballpark Makeovers: Watch as Janet Marie Smith and her team of experts completely revamp Fenway Park and do some much needed tightening on John W. Henry’s gaunt and creepily loose skin.

Manny 911: Got bratty disobedient kids? Manny Ramirez will come to your house to teach them about responsibility.

My Super Size 16: Which Red Sox will fill David Wells’ XXXXL number 16 jersey? Watch as hopefuls eat nothing but McDonalds in an effort to fill his shirt.

See? The possibilities are pretty much endless. Sure, Sox Appeal may be a stupid idea, but if it ultimately leads to Julienned Tavarez singing “Convoy” in front of a panel of finicky judges, how can it possibly be a bad thing?

3. The Red Sox have released word that additional single game tickets for the 2007 season will be released on Sunday, January 28. Many of you may have heard that the Red Sox will be releasing tickets on Saturday, January 27 in newspapers, on TV and on radio, but who are you going to trust, those “reputable media sources” or a blogger who is only trying to “clear the way” so he will have better access to tickets and less time in the “f*cking virtual waiting room,” where they don’t even have “virtual out of date magazines?”

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