From SoSH: Re: September 8th - Let's Break Out Those Brooms!!

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

1. Tonight the Red Sox go for their fourth win in a row and poetry advances to four syllables per line. According to Chinese superstition four is an unlucky number because the word for four and the word for death are quite similar. For instance, if Orlando Cabrera was Chinese, there would be a swarm of locusts at his house right now. Similarly, if Danny Ainge, old number 44, was Chinese, he would have traded Antoine Walker for Raef F’n LaFrentz dooming his career as Director of Basketball Operations. Thankfully, he’s a white guy, so that could never happen.

GOD’s ANGRY ARM
By Jose Melendez

God’s angry arm,
Throws in Oakland,
The As are harmed,
Game out of hand.

Umlaut plays third
With Golden Glove
ARod’s a turd,
Gives Jeter love.

Williamson gone
From the DL?
No Tommy John,
Elbow feels swell.

Outcome’s the same,
KEYS TO THE GAME.

2. Jose hasn’t done a Tony Castrati translator in a while. Frankly, it’s been hard to skewer the guy when he’s been so relentlessly positive. Maybe fatherhood has mellowed him, or perhaps he is getting so little sleep that he can’t keep an attack coherent. Still, to quote Woody Allen, the heart wants what it wants, and today it wants to rip TC.

Tony Castrati Loves Fried Chicken

What TC says: “In the top of the eighth, Millar showed why. He homered.”

What TC means: I’m a homer now. I used to rip the Red Sox, but now I love everything about them. I am a changed man. Theo’s a genius. Larry Lucchino is a saint. Black is white. Slavery is freedom!!!

What TC says: “Millar went 3-for-3 in the Red Sox' 7-1 victory at the Network Associates Coliseum. Millar finished with a single, double, walk, home run, three runs scored and an RBI.”

What TC means: Kevin Millar is now my idol. I will do everything just like him. I will eat chicken on television at every opportunity and talk about how much better the team would be with ARod than Nomar.

What TC says: “And so on and on it goes for the Red Sox, who continue to play like the perfect baseball machine.”

What TC means: Actually, when I was gone for three weeks, I was working on a screenplay. It’s about a mad scientist who lives on a spooky island and is a huge baseball fan. After he gets tired of breeding atomic monsters, he starts to construct a team of robotic baseball players who are perfect in every way, all five tool players. That is except for one robotic sinkerball pitcher who is has emotional problems and struggles with a desire to be a real human being. As a result his sinkers keep missing up and in and he gets shelled outing after outing after outing. I call him the Paranoid Android. It’s a completely original idea, one that I certainly didn’t steal from Jose Melendez. Anyway, at the end, they take out the Paranoid Android’s emotion chip and he regains his pitching form, but at what cost? AT WHAT COST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What TC says: “If you are looking for a barometer for the Sox this season”

What TC means: Did you know I really wanted to be a weatherman? Really. I’ve spent the last few days at www.noaa.org following the hurricanes. Did you know that the Miami Hurricanes are named after a meteorological phenomenon? Well they are!!! So are the Tampa Bay Lightning. Baseball doesn’t have any weather names, but they should. When they move the Expos, I hope the call them the Washington 70 percent Chance of precipitations. That would be awesome.

3. Congratulations to the Lowell Spinners on their 194th consecutive sellout. It is hard to imagine anything selling out that frequently with the possible exceptions of Roger Clemens and Ben Afflek.

Speaking of selling out. Jose has posted a KEYS TO THE NICKNAMES on his blog in response to recent confusion about how some of these names came to be. Unfortunately, this only makes 7 5 straight days that Jose has sold out, so he still has a way to go to catch The Spinners.

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