On Being a Bleacher Creature

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

1.Man, Jose loves sitting in the bleachers. He forgets how much he loves it sometimes, what with the fancy grandstand seats he sits in most of the time these days, but for sheer borderline alcoholic excitement, nothing beats the bleachers.

Jose imagines that returning to the bleachers must be a little like getting behind the wheel of the 1981 Dodge Omni he drove in his youth after driving a BMW for a few years. At first, it would seem like a major come down, but pretty soon those old pleasant quirks would start to feel as comfortable as venerable sweatpants. Jose loved that Omni, or “Oni” as we called it because the “m” had fallen off. It had everything: wheels, a transmission, a gas tank, an engine that sometimes worked—everything. Sure, it wasn’t as nice as a BMW, just as the bleachers aren’t as “nice” as the grandstands, but have you ever had a BMW where a hard right turn with the AC on would give a Christ-like footbath to the passenger side occupant in the form of a good gallon of condensation? Didn’t think so.

And have you ever been in a BMW that struggled so hard to get up hill that you got passed by bicyclists, allowing one to get a glimpse of hard working female posteriors one might have otherwise missed? Again, Jose thinks not.

No, for all the glitz and glamour Jose will take the inexpensive, chaotic fun of the bleachers or the Oni over the elite and refined comfort of the grandstand or a Beamer. Of course, Jose currently drives a 1991 powder blue Toyota Corolla that is technically owned by a bear with a long connection to Transcendental Mediation, so what does he know.

2. Another nice thing about sitting in the bleachers is that more people are drunk and therefore likely to chat than in other sections.

In about the second inning last night, Jose and his brother Sam, saw a fellow in an A-Rod T-shirt sitting between two charming lasses. Now our initial thought was that he wasn’t having sex with either of them, as one can reasonably assume that someone wearing an A-Rod shirt is, like his hero, into more mannish ladies, and both of these ladies were all woman. But he seemed awful friendly with both of them, so our opinions changed quickly.

But which of them was this fellow with? That was a matter of considerable dispute. The brunette with the warm eyes to his left was wearing Yankee white and blue, which would seem to make her a likely target, but she was waving a Sox flag, which convinced Jose that she was not his beau. After all, not only would no Yankees fan ever bring a Sox flag to Fenway, pretty much no Sox fan would either. Flags are a pain in the neck. You can’t put them on the ground while you two-fist beers, you have to fold them into little triangles, and who can remember which flies higher, the Red Sox flag or the U.S. flag? Pain in the neck.


Still, Jose’s brother, based on the blue and white, or perhaps his contrary nature, assumed ol’ soft eyes was the one.

And it was a choice that made sense, as soon as one saw that the curly-haired blonde to the A-Rod fan’s right was wearing a red Sox shirt with blue lettering. What Yankees fan would ever wear that? But then, Jose noticed a problem. It was a Damon jersey. Who in God’s name would wear a completely undesecrated Damon Red Sox shirt to Fenway in this day and age? A die-hard Damon loyalist, who remembers what he did rather than who he has become? No, no! A Yankee fan seeking to taunt her neighbors. (Note: Though why this would be a taunt is unclear. Jose is glad that the Yankees have the ever increasingly arthritic Damon and not us.)

After marinating on the question for a few innings (note: yes that was a veiled reference to the film “Kissing Jessica Stein”), Jose made his move. He took advantage of a few fans getting up for refreshment, to jump down two rows to behind the A-Rod Guy.

“Hey A-Rod Guy,” Jose bellowed.

His head whipped around, surprised to be summoned in the bleachers with anything other than “Hey *sshole.”

“Yeah?” The A-Rod Guy responded nervously.

“Jose is wondering if he can ask you something to settle a bet?”

“Why are you talking like that?”

“Given that they both have Red Sox stuff, which one of these girls are you with?”

The girls laughed… hard. Jose suspected he had his answer.

“Neither,” he answered sheepishly. “Though this one has the blue and white on. My girlfriend’s at Villanova.”

“Is she a Yankees fan?”

“She probably doesn’t care, but would lean Yankees. Though she’d be too smart to wear a jersey here.”

“So you’re really not hooking up with either of these girls,” Jose pressed.

“Nah,” riposted A-Rod guy. “She’s a Sox fan,” he said pointing to the blonde, “And she’s a Pirate’s fan or something,” he said indicating the brunette.

“Well if you do sleep with either or both, you’ll let Jose know right?”

“You’re creepy,” pointed out A-Rod guy.

So Jose gave A-Rod guy his URL, told him to respond to today’s KEYS and then left him be. Of course, he said he wasn’t going with either of them, but Jose has his suspicions. Jose thinks he was just lying because intercourse between Red Sox fans and Yankees fans is illegal in this state. Jose thinks the Massachusetts General Laws call it “The Unspeakable Unnatural Act” When the game was over and Jose and his entourage waited to escape the bleachers, Jose saw the A-Rod Guy with an arm slung casually over each woman’s shoulder. A sign of things to come, perhaps?

Well, we’ll have to see if A-Rod Guy responds. He promised he would, but if he’s anything like his hero, he won’t deliver in the clutch.


3. Mike Lowell is the oldest looking 33-year-old Jose has ever seen. And it’s not just the gray hair, the dude looks grizzled.

This is an interesting factor in whether the Sox are willing to offer him a three-year contract after this season ends. On the one hand, he’s playing great this year, but on the other hand, it seems absolutely possible that if current aging trends continue, by the end of a three year deal in 2010, he will look slightly older than the mummy of Ramesses the II, which is 3,200 years old. Jose says older, because Ramesses, even in his current state still has his natural hair color. Mike Lowell has no such luck.


Will Lowell look this good in three years?
I’m Jose Melendez, and those are my KEYS TO THE GAME.

Let's Go to The Video Tape

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

1. Over the weekend Jose saw a nifty little indie flick called “King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters,” about the battle to be the all time Donkey Kong champion.

In the film, challenger Steve Wiebe, a middle school science teacher breaks the Donkey Record set by Holyoke native and hot sauce Billy Mitchell in 1982, but the record breaking performance, videotaped at Wiebe’s Redmond, Washington home, is disallowed because it is a video tape of an uncertified machine. Also, because of corruption. It was like Tim Donaghy was refereeing.

Yet, when Wiebe breaks Mitchell’s record at Funspot in New Hampshire, a video tape sent in by Mitchell with an even higher score is played immediately after Wiebe’s record setting performance and is validated by officials as the true record. So in one case, a video tape is disallowed, while in another case it is allowed. The most remarkable think is that Tim Tschida wasn’t even the official making the decisions.

But Jose does not mean to relentlessly and needlessly summarize for you a movie that you should all go see. No, Jose is trying to make a point here. As it becomes clearer that the Red Sox and Yankees will both make the playoffs and a meeting in the ALCS becomes possible, we need to prepare for a Yankee bid to skip the ALCS games and send in video tapes instead.

Jose can see it now. The Red Sox show up for Game 1 at Fenway. The crowd is jumping, the national anthem is electric, but where are the Yankees? They are absent, too smug to even take the field. Instead, there is only a video playing on the jumbotron of the Yankees crushing the Orioles 15-2, or some such lopsided score. The officials consult and Tim Tschida rules that since there is no way the Red Sox would have gotten 15 runs off of Wang, the Yankees will be awarded the game.

Alternatively, Jose could see a situation where the Red Sox are up 3-2 going to the ninth and the Yankees demand to play a video tape of A-Rod’s game winning home run off of Papelbon earlier in the season rather than actually playing the inning.

Jose is not saying that this is going to happen. Jose is just saying that there is precedent and we should keep our eyes open.

2. Jose has thought a lot about the whole Michael Vick dog fighting thing this summer and it keeps bothering him. While dog fighting is brutal and wrong, Jose cannot help but think that there are a lot of folks out there who care way more about animals than humans. This is f’d up. For instance, Jose went to a Darfur fundraiser over the weekend and listened to Harvard Professor Samantha Power recount a story of why Colorado Congresswoman Pat Schroeder had claimed that there wasn’t more interest in the Rwandan Genocide even as hundreds of thousands were slaughtered. Schroeder, a smart lady, pointed out that her office got hundreds of calls on endangered species in contrast to the few they got on Rwanda. Nothing happened not only because of political cowardice, but because of the will of the people—the people cared more about animals that Rwandans.

Jose is not saying it’s necessary, but he would gladly let bald eagles clutching maces in their talons fight nunchuck toting whooping cranes to the death in order to stop genocide. If you care more about people than whooping cranes, call 1-800-GENOCIDE and tell your representatives to support intervention in Darfur.

There is one addendum to this though. Jose is not totally convinced that this is about animals in general rather than dogs in particular. People seem to really like dogs, way more than cats. And unlike ferret ownership, Rudy Giuliani does not regard dog owning as a form of mental illness.


So Jose asks you this: If Michael Vick was not running a dog fighting ring and instead was running monkey knife fights would he still be in the NFL? Jose says yes. While monkey knife fighting is only legal in international waters, as indicated by The Simpsons, it is not harshly punished in the U.S. In 2006, two Missouri men were arrested for organizing monkey knife fights, but did you ever hear about it? Nope.

3. In other news, contrary to published reports former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will not be visiting DRays starter Scott “Disputed Province of” Kazmir prior to this evening’s game. Sharif’s plan to visit Kazmir and advise him on taking a more aggressive strategy against the Red Sox were thwarted when he was deported to Saudi Arabia this morning.

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

Jose is a Wasteful Glutton

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

1. As he does whenever there is an event of historical important at the little gem in the Fenway, Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy pulled out the “fans will lie and say they were there” card in his Sunday column about Clay Buchholz’s no-hitter.

“Years from now, there will be hundreds of thousands of folks who'll say they were there,” wrote the curly-haired human recycling center. “Memories will dim and wannabes will exaggerate and it will be impossible to prove who really sat in Fenway Park Sept. 1, 2007, and who watched it on television or heard it on the radio.”

But Jose will not be any wannabe whose claim is in doubt. Jose will be able to prove he was there. When threatened with well-honed accusations of lying, Jose will unsheathe his two section 17 tickets, in what the comic book collectors call mint condition, from their Mylar scabbards and wave them like a sword of truth at any who dare call him a wannabe. These tickets, a part of Jose’s duly purchased cut of a local notable’s season package, are proof of Jose’s slightly obstructed view of history.

Yes, for all those empiricists who believe in truth, Jose will rebut your most deeply cherished ideas when he proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he was at a game he never attended.

Jose should have attended, sure. He had the tickets; he had the time. What he did not have was the good sense to check his calendar on Friday to see whether he had tickets for the weekend set. Oops. Jose knew he had no remaining tickets for August. But what he did not know was that as of Saturday, August had gone the way of the mastodon. Thus, for the second time this year, Jose missed a game for which he had purchased tickets-- the Mother’s Day Miracle and the Buchholzno-hitter. Jose must, like so many natives of Baltimore, be desperate to avoid seeing the Orioles.

Jose’s behavior is inexcusable. It is a failure of the over-privileged. Like a great, large gourmand throwing a leftover pound of veal to the dogs while children starve outside his door, Jose’s waste is a sin.

Jose has always thought of himself as a modest and humble man, not prone to excess or waste, but he has proven his self-image is not more than that, an image, a pleasantly twisted reflection of the wasteful glutton he has become. Whatever he believes now, the instant Jose wins the lottery, it will be gold-plated toilet seats all around, except Jose will pay for them and then not even bother to pick them up front the gold-plated toilet seat store.

There are, at day’s end, only two legitimate excuses for twice forgetting one has tickets in a single season: if one has Alzheimer’s’ or if it is 1997 and Steve Avery is the Red Sox prized free agent acquisition. And, for better or for worse (note: for better), Jose has neither excuse.

2. With Clay Buchholz having pitched a no-hitter, this seems as good a time as any for Jose to remind everyone that he came up with the term “claymydia” (note: or clay-mydia) first to describe the burning… umm… competitiveness of the rookie pitcher and the fever and discharge… of emotion he may cause in people exposed to his pitching. Of course, in many people claymydia presents no symptoms, which makes it even scarier.

The only exception to Jose’s ownership of this term is, arguably, scientist Kerry R. Buchholz, who shares the name Buchholz and seems to write an awful lot about a disease called Chlamydia, which Jose assumes is some weird strain of Claymydia.

There is also an identically named, yet completely unrelated disease called Claymydia, which presents in patients becoming fans of androgynous singer Clay Aiken. It is unrelated to the Buchholz disease and is classified as a mental illness.

3. In the sixth inning of yesterday’s Yankees-Mariners game, the Bronx crowd, reports the Boston Globe, began to chant “Let’s go squirrel” in response to a squirrel climbing on the screen attached to the right field foul pole. This was all well and good until rodent-faced catcher Jorge Posada took this as a call for him to come out and tip his cap.

This was the most embarrassing mix up for a Yankee since third baseman Alex Rodriquez insisted that the entire musical genre known as the “blues” was about his freakishly colored lips.

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.

Jose Fogets to Drop Off the Dry Cleaning

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

1. Okay, today’s game means something now. Are you happy?

After being completely indifferent to the first two games of the series, Jose has now decided that this third game is actually important. Now mind you it isn’t really important or consequential, not in the sense that remembering to pay your taxes or not to drink drain cleaner is important— no matter what happens today the Red Sox are going to win the A.L East. Rather, it is important in the same way that remembering to take clothes to the dry cleaners is important. If the Red Sox win today, we will all have utter peace of mind, nothing to worry about and no distractions, whereas if they lose we will all metaphorically be a little anxious about what to wear tomorrow. Do those pants have a stain on them? Do we have an ironed shirt? That sort of thing. But regardless of the many small inconvenient details we will be forced to deal with, we still know with certainty that while dealing with the lack of fresh dry cleaning may be stressful and agitating, we will not be forced to show up to work naked.

2. According to the New York Post, Major League Disciplinarian Bob Watson (note: aka the MLB Vice Principal) came into the dugout last night to warn Sox manager Terry Eurona that wearing his trademark red pullover was a violation of the uniform code and that he should put on a jersey forthwith. Eurona firmly told Watson to leave the dugout during the game. The way Jose sees it there are a few separate problems here.


A. Tito wears the comfy red fleece because he is always cold due to circulation problems stemming from the blood thinners he takes to combat blood clots. If they don’t let him treat his condition, there’s got to be an Americans with Disabilities Act case in here somewhere.

B. Bob Watson’s past edicts on dress code have been questionable at best. Let’s look at the history:

• 923: Bob Watson invents the Burqa and demands that all women cover themselves under God’s law.
• 1542: A young Bob Watson introduces pants as the fashion standard for men. The world’s men will never be as comfortable again.
• 1776: Bob Watson insist that the British Army where lobster red uniforms to battle upstart colonists. “You want them to see that you’re coming,” he explained.
• 1952: Watson advises schizophrenics that tinfoil hats are the best way to keep the government out of their brains.
• 2003: Watson orders Demi Moore to wear bicycle shorts to the Oscars. “Dresses are for prostitutes and drag queens,” insisted the rotund fashionista.

C. If one looks at several pictures of Bob Watson, one starts to wonder if he is really the guy who should be issuing sartorial edicts. Paisley ties? In this day and age? And Jose sees some evidence here that the man doesn’t even tie his ties long enough.

Would you take fashion advice from this man?

Look, Jose is not saying that Bob Watson is a bad man. He is just saying that allowing him to rule fashion by fiat is like giving Julian Tavarez a television therapist program or making Grady Little the host of Jeopardy It’s just not something he has the skills for.


3. And now a little self-promotion. In the four years Jose has been writing this blog a fair number of really neat things have happened to him. He’s appeared on ESPN.com; he’s been insulted by Bill Simmons and he has even, inexplicably appeared in the acknowledgements of a book about the New York Times. But nothing tops what has happened this week.

In a column called “Cyberloafing” on the Web site of The PostStar, a reporter named Todd Kehoe wrote a nifty little review of KEYS that offered such splendid tidbits as

Tossing out historical references, political jokes and
sometimes raunchy humor, Melendez crafts his own story behind the story. In a discussion of the Red Sox’s recent poor form, with the Yankees looming right behind them, he invokes Tsar Lazar, Newtonian laws and George Santayana ... in two paragraphs.

Nice right?


But it’s not the kind words from a writer who, while clearly talented, Jose has never heard of, that excite him. Rather, it is the fact that this appeared on the Web site in Glens Falls, New York, which means that it is possible, just possible that the greatest citizen of Glens Falls in history might have read the review. No, Jose is not speaking of former Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes nor hockey commentator Barry Melrose, nor even that b*tch Rachel Ray. No, Jose’s heart is aflutter at the possibility, just the possibility, that the great “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan might have read the review.

For those of you who are ignorant, “Hacksaw” Duggan is a wrestling legend known for hitting people with a 2X4 and yelling “Hooooooooooooooo.” Yes, he is as great a man as he sounds like. And Jose is honored by the chance, however slim that Duggan has taken even one moment from his brilliant life to read about Jose. This is, of course, assuming he can read.

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

Off to St. Helena

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

1. Jose supposes it had to end sometime. Napoleon had his Waterloo, the Empire had its Ewoks, Bruno Sammartino had his Superstar Billy Graham, and now Jose has his 315 foot BS Johnny Damon short porch home run. Such are the cycles of history.

But before Jose is taken in manacles to his own St. Helena to spend out his days writing standing up and being slowly poisoned with arsenic, he’d like to take a moment to reflect on his five glorious days on top of the world.

Remember when the Red Sox scored more than 10 off the White Sox?

Then remember when the Red Sox scored more than 10 off the White Sox again?

Then remember when the Red Sox scored more than 10 off the White Sox a third time?

And then recall how the Red Sox scored more than 10 runs off the White Sox for a fourth straight game?

Good times, happy days.

But Jose’s happiest memory of the whole galloping adventure was last night when the Red Sox lost to the Yankees and it did not matter at all. Was it mildly annoying, sure? Did it create feelings of anxiety and perhaps even a tinge of resentment, yup. But these are conditioned responses, and as soon as you realize that it no longer is your burden, that the bulk and mass of a century is no longer on your shoulders, the stress evaporates. It’s like running into an old girlfriend while she’s arm and arm with a new beau. Perhaps it feels weird and uncomfortable at first, but as soon as you accept the fact that her decision has no relevance whatsoever to your life going forward, that your responsibility has long since ended, that feeling of calm like valium mixed with gin spreads from your heard to your hands. In fact, Jose would advise against operating heavy machinery under these circumstances.

Consider this example. Jose is going to the wedding of his college girlfriend in a few weeks. And do you know what? He doesn’t feel weird about it at all. She’s a good friend, her fiancé is a pleasant chap and she is far happier with him than she ever was with Jose. Super good. Moreover, Jose is happier too. And thus Jose will go to the wedding full of joy for the happy couple and unburdened by the overfull rucksack of past emotional turmoil.

That is sort of how Jose feels about the Yankees winning last night. He’s over it. It is no longer relevant to his life, because it is no longer relevant to the Red Sox. The Red Sox are going to the postseason, and the Yankees? The Yankees are not our responsibility. Of course, there are some critical differences. Jose genuinely wishes his college girlfriend and her soon to be husband happiness. By contrast, even though the Yankees are equally powerless to cause Jose emotional distress, he still wishes pain and agony upon them. That said, Jose and this bride to be have been split up for seven years, so it’s easy. Maybe in 2014 when the Yankees are in their seventh season of finishing behind the Red Sox and 14th season with out a championship, Jose will be able to feel good for them if they get a wild card so they can get swept by the Angels. Who knows? Time heals right?

2. One of the quirky consequences of Jose’s meteoric rise to borderline relevance is that PR flacks send him press releases on events that he has no interest in and will never go to.

The latest example is the Captain Morgan sponsored competition between Red Sox and Yankees legends.

Captain Morgan: Drink like a pirate and wake up feeling like you’ve been keelhauled.

Apparently there was some sort of showdown in Manhattan, among Dave Winfield, Goose Gossage, Dewey Evans and Jim Rice. The four aging gentlemen battled it out in “an obstacle course (including ball toss, dart throw and accuracy bunting), bottle knock-down and Pose Off.” (Note: Jeez, writing really is easier when you just borrow directly from press releases. Back when Jose was a PR guy, everyone always told him that reporters would frequently just run press releases, but he never really believed it. After all, wouldn’t that make them nothing more than corporate mouthpieces utterly without integrity? But it turns out that they really do it. And Jose totally gets why. Because it’s so easy. So, so easy. Never mind that rum is his arch enemy and the only liquor that routinely causes him serious illness. Never mind that Captain Morgan was the culprit in a particularly dangerous batch of hurricanes in 1997. Jose didn’t have to come up with an original third key which is awesome. Jose does have a question though, if the Captain Morgan people want to be accurate shouldn’t the Captain be reconfigured as a Somali guy or an Indonesian. Don’ those guys do most of the high seas piracy these days? Or maybe they should remake him as a pimply teenager pirating music?

In all seriousness, Captain Morgan is apparently named after Sir Henry Morgan a Welsh privateer who, among other activities, burned much of Panama to the ground and slaughtered its inhabitants. Sort of makes you wonder if George H.W. Bush was drinking a bit of the Captain in 1989. Among the possible reasons for his death is—get this—heavy drinking. Seems like an ideal spokesman for an alcoholic beverage to be enjoyed responsibly.)

(Additional note to the PR Flack who sent this to Jose: Put it in your clips file. Jose dares you. Go on, send it to your client. Will you count it as positive or negative media? On the one hand, Jose is promoting your event. On the other hand, he pointed out the dangerous vomit inducing properties of your product and its affiliation with the sack of Panama. Tough call.)

Any way, the Red Sox apparently prevailed in the final event, the pose down. (Note: Why didn’t we send Gabe Kapler to this?) And George Steinbrenner immediately responded by hiring a private investigator to follow losing Yankee Dave Winfield.

The Yankees best chance for a win comes up short.

3. Continuing with his fixation on the complete irrelevance of last night’s loss, Jose cracks out the fake book to and flips to the songs of Lady Ella. Gather round the piano and sing along.

It Don’t Mean a Thing

What good is winning, what good’s a win

If it ain't a meaningful defeat

It ain't the Red Sox, it ain't the Yanks

When you know the Yankees can’t compete

It don't mean a thing, cause we’re gon’ get a ring
Jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-baaaaaaa

It don't mean a thing, Yankees wait until next spring
Jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-ba, jo-baaaaaaa

It makes no diff'rence if the Yankees win

Seven games? They sure ain’t closing in.

Don’t mean a, don’t mean a, don’t mean a thiiiiiiing,
It don't mean a thing, It don't mean a thing, cause we’re gon’ get a ring

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

Sox vs. Yankees: Domination and Submission

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

1. You know the drill.

You should know it anyway. We go through the thing 18 times a year.

Blackout.

Cue Dramatic music. Maybe “Mars” from Gustav Holst’s Planet’s Suite. (Note: If you don’t know it, think of the Imperial March from the Star Wars movies. Pretty much everything in the first trilogy is John Williams ripping off Holst.)

Cue images. Cue voice over.

“Since the dawn of time, conflict has wrought mankind. Great rivalries of tribes of empires and of men. From the battles of ancient Greece, to the warriors of squared circle, battles have been fought, desperate struggles waged to establish supremacy.

Athens vs. Sparta


Ali vs. Frazier.


Russell vs. Chamberlain


Bird vs. Magic


Hogan vs. Andre


Kobayashi vs. Chestnut


Yankees vs. Red Sox


Tonight, the battle is rejoined in the most fearsome gladiatorial arena in the darkest corner of Hades as the Red Sox and the Yankees--

Cut. CUT!!!!

Stop everything. Stop the music. Something’s not right here. Let’s see the music’s pretty dark and tense. That’s good. The pictures capture the moment pretty well. So what is it?

What is it that doesn’t feel right?

Wait. Could it be? Jose thinks he’s got it. The analogy isn’t right. This isn’t a struggle to the death between two evenly matched foes. What was Jose thinking?

Let’s try a different cut.

Blackout.

Cue “Sunshine Day” by the Brady Bunch.

Cue voice over.

In sports as in the wild there are both predator and prey, an uneven match up with inevitably uneven results. From the tiger consuming the gazelle, to the anteater slurping down ants to the lion eating the lion tamer, some contests are inherently and biologically uneven.

U.S. vs. Grenada


Tyson vs. Spinks


Kobayashi vs. Nicole Ritchie


Red Sox vs. Yankees

Tonight the hunt is on, as the Red Sox methodically and inevitably dismantle the New York Yankees.

And… cut.

There we go. Sometimes those stock pieces just aren’t accurate anymore. Good promo.


2. With the struggling Yankees having fallen to eight games behind the eventual AL East Champion Red Sox, the Yankees have turned to the old “anything’s possible” defense.

Yankees Catcher/Little Bitch Jorge Posada told the New York Daily News “It's still possible. We have 30-something games left, so anything is possible.”

Let’s put this in a little bit of context shall we?

The Yankees catching the Red Sox is possible only in the sense that anything whatsoever no matter how absurd is possible. It is possible that the sun will rise in the West tomorrow. It is possible that Mike Gravel will be elected president. It is possible that David Arquette will win a wrestling world championship. Wait scratch that, that happened. It is possible that Jose will win the Powerball.

All of which is to say, the Yankees catching the Red Sox is completely impossible. Actually, this is not totally true. Jose has constructed a few scenarios wherein the Yankees catch up with the Red Sox.

• God, it turns out, is not dead. But He is pissed at Nietzsche for telling everyone he is dead. Unfortunately for God, Nietzsche is no longer around to take revenge on, so he starts looking for surrogates. When he comes across the Red Sox using “Superman” as Jason Varitek’s intro music, he remembers that Nietzsche had this whole “man and superman” deal in “Also Sprach Zarathustra.” So he decides to punish the Red Sox by making them lose the division, possibly due to frogs or boils.
  
• MLB Commissioner, Bud Selig, seeing his beloved Brewers fall to second place, goes mad with power and uses the “best interests of the game clause” to declare that the goal of baseball is to finish with the second most wins in the division.
  
• Laser streams get crossed. Very bad.
  
• Hideki Matsui’s body odor, rumored to be horrible, is so foul that Yankee Stadium is quarantined tonight out of concern that there has been a chemical attack and neither the Red Sox nor the Yankees are allowed out, making Baltimore the AL East Champion.
  
• Two words: opposite day.

So be on the look out for angry God or guys with lasers tonight. Other than that, it’s looking pretty good.

3. The big positive news for Yankees fans is the emergence of relief sensation Joba Chamberlain. Chamberlain has yet to surrender a run in the big leagues and has struck out 15 in just seven innings.

But let’s not be fooled, okay? This is part of a pattern with Chamberlains. You’ve seen it before; we all have. It starts with the impressive resume, followed by the meteoric rise to a position of great importance and then the next thing you know, they’re giving away the Sudetenland.

You just watch. If Chamberlain gets into the game tonight, Jose guarantees you he will be met with a crowd no less ecstatic than the one Neville Chamberlain met at the Heston Aerodome West of London as he waved a piece of paper signed in Munich.

Sure Chamberlain looks tough now, but you know that as soon as he gets in a really tough spot, he’s going to start looking for a way to negotiate it out. He’ll probably cop to some agreement to let Papi hit a homerun off of him provided that it will stop there and Manny will not also hit a home run. Then he’ll go back to the dugout, having left the Yankees in a completely indefensible position and start waving around the manager’s scorecard and declare that he has guaranteed “peace in our time.” And that will be that until his teammates grow disenchanted with him and replace him with Nationals reliever Winston Abreu.

Chamberlain will die a mere six months later. That’s always how it is with Chamberlains.

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

Hot Sox on Sox Action 4: Latin Edition

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

1. You’ve got to be kidding.

Here it is a sticky Sunday morning, Jose is sitting at his kitchen table staring out at morning glories that he has somehow managed to not kill (note: Helpful hint, when morning glories close up in the afternoon, they are not dead. Do not get angry and hit them with a rake as though one is Bob Stanley during beach ball season.) and he has somehow put himself in a position where he has to connect Julian Tavarez to lesbian sex so he can keep making “Hot Sox on Sox Action” jokes in post titles. These are not things one wants to think about before lunch on Sunday.

Jose never wanted this. Jose had envisioned something better. He was going to be Senator Melendez (note: not to be confused with Sen. Menendez of New Jersey) Governor Melendez, but it was not to be. Duty has a way of catching up with you. For some people, it’s taking over the family business. For others it is going off to war. For still others, it is making the ultimate sacrifice and piling into a Winnebago to campaign for your dad for President. (Note: That’s right Ben Romney, Jose knows you read KEYS, and yet you have done nothing, NOTHING, with all of your father’s publicity to promote KEYS. Has he mentioned it in a single debate? Have you or your brothers brought up KEYS when being interviewed by Diane Sawyer or whoever? For shame. Ask not what Jose can do for you, ask what you can do for Jose.) But for Jose the burden is unique, the curse is uncommon. He is bound my oath and by honor to get up before noon, well before noon, on Sunday and write jokes about his odd ethnicity so the Red Sox can keep winning. His reward is modest, a slight sense of satisfaction and the knowledge that if the Red Sox win today, SoSHer ragecage has promised to buy a KEYS thong. But duty calls, and Jose, after placing duty on hold while he goes to take a leak, is morally bound to answer.

2. Jose’s got a great idea. He knows where we can score a ton of Pisco cheap to deliver to the Red Sox after they win this afternoon and the Yankees lose.

Oh, you don’t know what Pisco is? Pisco is the national drink of Peru and Chile. The grape brandy has been the source of intense international dispute over the years as the two nations fight over which is its true home. Jose’s never had it, but it sounds delicious.

Now you are probably asking “Why is this beverage appropriate for the Red Sox?” And it’s a great question, after all, aren’t they more of a Jack Daniels crowd?


The answer is not so much that the spirit itself is appropriate, but that the bottles reflect a certain level of achievement. Pisco, which shares the name of the Peruvian town devastated by a recent earthquake, put out a large number of bottles commemorating the disaster by bearing the words “Pisco” and “7.5” on the labels. 7.5 was the magnitude of the earthquake. This did not go over particularly well in Peru where it was regarded as indifferent to the suffering of the earthquake’s appalling large number of victims.

So what Jose thinks is best for everyone is to reconceptualize the bottles. Send them up to Chicago where the Red Sox can quaff of their goodness this evening as they celebrate the fact that that 7.5 on the label, now represents the size of their lead over the Yankees.

2. Jose played some wiffleball last night, nothing unusual about that. He fielded some grounders, he took some hacks, he drank some beer. Just normal stuff.

But after an inning or two of this, Jose did something unorthodox, something a little dangerous, reckless really—he tried to pitch.

Now, many of you wouldn’t find this particularly odd or noteworthy, but then again you don’t know Jose do you? The reason this is worth recording is that Jose can’t pitch, not at all, not in baseball, not it softball, not even in wiffleball. If given a chance, he could probably be a horrendous cricket bowler as well. Jose throws fine in the field, at least when he’s not having bouts of Knoblauch/Sax syndrome, but put him on even a hypothetical mound and he looks like Brad Pennington or a lion, that is to say, wild. That’s right, Jose pitching is like playing candlepin bowling—no strikes.

Jose began his outing by throwing something like 20 straight balls. On the one hand, this was okay, as there were no walks, it made him effectively wild (note: not to be confused with wildly effective). On the other hand, people with whom he was playing understandably were starting to hate Jose. There’s nothing like standing around watching a guy miss the strike zone by three to eight feet time after time after time. At least they had beer. And that’s when Jose got an idea. He dropped down to a side arm delivery and whistled in a strike. He did it again, and the ball got crushed, but that’s not the point. He was throwing strikes, honest to God strikes.

As he continued his onslaught of arm angles, “coming from everywhere except between his legs,” as announcer Curt Gowdy once said of Luis Tiant, Jose actually began to strike a few guys out. That’s when someone shouted, “What is it with these Asian pitchers and their weird deliveries?”

Of course, Jose is only 1/8 Asian, so his delivers should only be 12.5 % weird, but it gave him an idea. He stretched his arms skyward and arched his back. He turned his eyes to the heavens as he coiled like a cobra and wound back. As he built torque he almost fell, standing dizzily on one leg like Mo Vaughn on the side on I-95 and then he uncoiled, the spring released and he grooved a nasty curve for a strike. The Hideo Nomo motion had worked.

Jose didn’t know why it worked, but it connected with something deep in his being, with something ancient and sublime from the rice patties of Nagasaki or the fishing boats of the imperial fleet. Jose could, at long last, pitch like a Japanese.

Next time, Jose is going to throw lefty and duplicate Sandy Koufax’s wind up. Jose just assumes if he can pitch like a Japanese he can pitch like a Jew too. Or even more so as he is ¾ Jewish. Jose also figures as 1/8 German he could pitch like a German, but as best he can tell that means sitting around and not playing wiffleball at all. (Note: Apologies to son of German immigrants Honus Wagner.)

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

Hot Sox on Sox Action Featuring Kinky "Knuckleballer"

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

1. F you Curt Euro.

That’s right, Jose said it, well he at least hinted at it. This is an upscale feature and Jose isn’t going to work blue. But seriously, F you.

Jose could forgive a lot. He is a forgiving man. He forgave all of the saves you blew in 2005. He forgave the fact that between being a major league pitcher and a Warquest geek you dangerously blur the line between jock and nerd, like you are some foolish Romeo trying to unite two feuding houses of Verona. Jose could forgive the diarrhea of the mouth and your poor play on Celebrity Poker Challenge. (Note: How dare you represent the Red Sox poorly in front of former Kids in the Hall straight man Dave Foley.) Hell, Jose could even forgive you for endorsing George W. Bush. Jose not only could forgive you, but he did forgive you.

But this? Nope. Sorry. A man can only take so much. That’s what Popeye taught Jose, when on break from schilling for the powerful spinach lobby.

Look what you’ve done. 6IP 3H, 1BB, 3K, 1ER. That’s your line from Friday’s nightcap. And do you know what Jose is doing as a result of this little display? He’s writing. That’s right, Jose is squandering precious August weekend hours, as if they are base runners with less than two out, WRITING, and it’s all your fault.

Jose doesn’t write on the weekends-- not since the 2005 playoffs, and probably not in the regular season either since April or May 2005. Jose used to write on the weekends. Surely you remember. Back in the halcyon days of 2004 Jose would write seven days a week if that’s how the games fell, eight days a week if there was a double header. But no more.

Jose got older, he got wiser, and, frankly, crankier. He started to realize he’s only got so much left in the tank. He’s got to conserve. You should understand this. How many pitches are left in that old arm of yours? 1,000? 10,000? 5? 10? You’ve reached a point in your career where this is only so much you can do, so you have to pick your spots and so has Jose.

Jose is writing today because the rules of the game thread demand it. The Sox win Jose starts a thread. Thems the rules. Of course, if the Sox don’t win, no problem, Jose gets to sleep and spend all of Saturday drinking beer and trudging through episodes of Alias’ dreary fifth season. But you had to go out and pitch beautifully. You had to get beyond that early home run to settle into a sweet summer groove. And for what? To pick up a half game on the Yankees? To convince Red Sox fans that the Euro has not gone the way of the Drachma?

The American labor movement battled for generations, people died in Haymarket Square and starved as they marched picket lines in places like Lowell and Lawrence, to give the American people, working people like Jose, the weekend, that precious two days of sloth and gluttony that God had imagined us squeezing entirely into Sunday. And with a fistful of fastballs you have taken that away from Jose, and by extension, the American worker.

Thanks for nothing. (Note: Thanks for everything. Awesome game. Jose loves you!)


2. This is interesting. Jose tries to learn something new every day, it’s just something he does. Sometimes he learns a new word in German, other times he learns a new fact about cranberry farming. Sometimes it’s important stuff, and sometimes it’s obscure, but what matters is that now, even into the dotage of his 30s, Jose is still learning. And yesterday he learned something fascinating.

Did you know that it’s possible to win both games of a double-header? It is. The Red Sox just did. Jose had no idea. As long as he can remember, it seemed like the Red Sox always split double-headers, so Jose guesses he just started to assume that a spilt was the only way it could be.

It made sense and fit in with everything Jose knew about double-headers. For instance, think about that two-headed monster on Sesame Street. The two heads were never in agreement, and were frequently pulling in opposite directions, though they would occasionally work together to spell out words. Alternatively, consider the flag of the fictional country of Grand Fenwick from the play “The Mouse that Roared.” On it was a two-headed eagle with one head saying “Aye,” the other “Nay.” That’s how Jose always imagined a double-header. And a double-headed coin? Well that’s just plain counterfeiting.

Is it any wonder that Jose though double-headers had to be splits?

But Jose is glad to finally know the truth. He suspects this is one of those things that will feel strange for a long time and then he will eventually come to accept it as it becomes more and more familiar, like the monster seats or the Yankees finishing in a distant second place.

A typical Red Sox double-header
3. Among the most amazing things about yesterday’s double-header victory was that they got both games in. The weather forecasters had projected that there was an 80-90% chance of rain throughout the day. And contrary to what one might think, they were not wrong. There was an 80-90% chance of rain. Yesterday, the reality on the South Side of Chicago just happened to be in that 10-20% chance of no rain. And yet we all assumed it would rain. Why wouldn’t we? That was the overwhelming likelihood? That’s the funny thing about percentages. When the imbalance grows, we mortals start to think of the merely unlikely as impossible. The weather forecasters made perfect forecasts, the outcome was simply the improbable one.

We as baseball fans all believe in playing the percentages, at least the wise among us do. But it is worth remembering that even the right decisions, the statistically wise decisions can have negative, or even disastrous outcomes. Grady was a fool to leave Pedro in, and his foolishness led to disaster, but had Pedro slid through the 8th unscathed, the outcome would have been far better, but the decision still would have been nonsensical.

It is not a mathematical law per se, and even if it was, Jose wouldn’t know, he’s sort of dumb about math, but as the gravity of the situation increases, the small risks become much greater. In most situations in life, Jose would be giddy to have a 97% chance of success. But what if he was having an angioplasty? Suddenly that 3% chance of failure would seem huge, and the 3% risk of sudden death would seem far more distressing than the 74% chance that DJ Dru will not get a hit in any situation.

Jose is not really sure what he is getting at here. He supposes he is just trying to remember that good decision-making is no guarantee of success in baseball as in life, that the best team does not necessarily win the contest any more than the best weather forecasts guarantee rain. Perhaps there is luck out there in the universe, perhaps the gnarled hand of fate tugs at the threads of our future and makes the improbable the inevitable, but Jose will leave the luck to the gamblers. He will stick with the National Weather Service, he will stick with Tito and keep playing those damnable percentages.

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

Hot Sox on Sox Action Featuring "Mature" Pitcher

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

1. As Jose writes this, he is going to assume that the Red Sox are going to win Game 1 of today’s day-night doubleheader. Why not? Starting game threads comes pregnant with responsibility, namely the responsibility of starting game threads, and it is not as though Jose can sit around in the middle of the day writing KEYS. Unlike, Cesar Crespo, he has a job.

Thus, he is going to simply assume that someone bought the KEYS thong requisite for a victory and that the matchup of St. Josh a Beckett and Judy Garland is enough to ensure the victory.

But what to write? Jose usually depends on the events of the game the night before to drive the KEYS and with Jose writing this before the first game, that is simply not an option. So instead, Jose thought he would offer a bit of a tutorial on how he comes up with KEYS, sort of a behind the scenes “The Making of KEYS TO THE GAME” piece. Ideally, Jose would do this by watching himself write KEYS and writing about writing KEYS as he writes KEYS, but there is a problem with that, as Jose is only one man. On the upside, that still makes Jose one man more than Roger Clemens.

The process of writing KEYS typically begins the night before a game, as Jose observes the evening’s contest. Much like a reporter, Jose jots down notes for the piece to be published the next day as he watches. However, Jose does not do it exactly like a reporter. For instance, Jose watches without under contempt for the people in the stands. Jose uses a complicated note taking system which involves writing observations on the backs of receipts, business cards or parts of his anatomy whenever he notices something that could be good for the next day. Alternatively, when a writing implement is unavailable, Jose uses a backup system of turning to whoever he is with and saying “remember this.” Jose knows it doesn’t sound too professional but it is exactly the same system used by Carl Bernstein. One of the great untold secrets of Watergate was that Bernstein had “Deep Throat is Mark Felt” written on his arm, only he accidentally used indelible ink, so the great secret was printed on his bicep for 30 years.

Jose, of course, learned from that experience and did not use indelible ink. While this sounds like a good idea, it is somewhat problematic, as Jose typically takes a shower post game and washes off all of the good ideas he has had over the course of the evening. On the upside, it also washes off ideas like nicknaming DJ Dru, DJ Pew. And thank God for that. The other problem is Jose occasionally hands out business cards without always checking what’s on the back, leaving him in constant fear of inadvertently handing an important colleague a card with something like “Bowel cancer: Good analogy for A-Rod?” on the back. On the upside no one would ever figure out what it said as Jose’s penmanship is so poor as to make his normal handwriting a far more difficult code to break than anything produced by the enigma machine.

Thus, freshly showered and shaved, Jose moves into the second part of the routine, combing through evening game stories for new ideas. After reading the stories, Jose goes to bed meditating on the content as he moves through immigration to Queen Mab’s realm.

When Jose is lucky, he has lucid baseball dreams, providing content for the morning’s work. When he is not, he has lucid dreams about needing to complete his senior year of high school or losing his teeth.

When Jose awakens in the morning, he lays in bed for ten minutes or so processing the previous evening’s game, and then it’s time to hit the papers. This is where the serious work is done. Most of Jose’s content emerges during this time as he goes through a simple routine.

• Look through the opponent’s roster and see if anyone has a name who can be made fun of.
• Read the quotes in all Red Sox articles to see if there’s anything that can be taken out of context.
• See if there is any actual news that requires comment.

By the time Jose has gone through this process he usually has one or perhaps even two KEYS in concept. Thus, Jose sits down and pounds out the first two KEYS of the morning as he downs his first three or four cups of coffee.

Then comes the rub. Jose sits there straining desperately to come up with a third KEY, wondering why on Earth he didn’t decide to make KEYS a two part exercise back in May of 2004, and knowing that he has about ten minutes until he has to get ready for work. Feeling as stressed as Calvin Schiraldi in October, Jose works through the following failsafe cycle:

• Can he compare yesterday’s game to Survivor Series 1992?
• Does Mike Lowell have anything in common with The Mighty Thor or possibly the Micronauts?
• What mean can Jose say about DJ Dru?
• What about feminine hygiene? Anything? What about comparing Manny Ramirez to one of those belts women used to hold hygienic pads in place back in the old days “sort of silly, but important?”
• F*** A-Rod.

By then Jose usually has three hastily constructed KEYS and nothing left to do except add in the typos you all love so much. And if he’s not done by then, screw you guys. Jose’s not getting paid, he doesn’t owe you anything

2. Jose has been reconsidering his support of capitalism lately. Maybe it’s not so great after all. Jose has always been pro-capitalist, though not a laissez faire fellow. Communism always seemed sort of stupid and childish to him, but maybe he had it backward.

What has prompted this reconsideration is the fact that Jose learned this week that MonDonald’s has gone out of business. MonDonald’s is a Mongolian knock off of McDonald’s that Jose has written about before and long aspired to visit. But no more. Shielded by the nurturing Stalinism of the world’s second communist state, MonDonald’s was able to grow and thrive, but in the brave new capitalist Mongolia, there is simply no room for a humble business that aggressively poaches on intellectual property. For shame.

Imagine of the Cincinnati Reds were to suddenly shut down the Red Sox on the grounds that the name was nothing more than theft of the Cincinnati Red Stockings brand first used in 1871. Would you feel good about? Would you be happy that the almighty trademark had come above honor and tradition?

Neither would Jose. It’s why he refuses to call the WWF the WWE and why he weeps for Mongolia.

3. The Red Sox signed utility infielder Royce Clayton to a minor league contract. Jose is happy about this on several levels. First, Clayton provides good insurance for the utility spot. Second, it gives the organization two names Jose can make Clay-midia jokes about for the first time since Cla Meredith was dealt to San Diego in the ill fitted Mirabelli deal. Jose likes having that kind of organizational depth. Finally, Jose really likes his versatility. Jose can quip about how we have a guy who is a badass Brazilian dude who always wins UFC or compare him to a luxury car. That’s exactly what you want out of a utility man.

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

Hot Sox on Sox Action

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

1. Sometimes it’s good to get back to your roots. It’s not so much that it’s good to reconnect old names with old faces, or stroll down memory lane, or wallow in the cheap high of nostalgia; it’s just that sometimes it’s good to get down in the mire in which you were conceived so you can see exactly how far you’ve risen above it. Looking down from the treetops, where one spends days swinging from branch to branch, is no match for actually descending from the safety of the canopy and wiggling one’s toes in the primordial ooze.

This wiggling of toes in ooze is what Jose is doing today. On this good day, as Virgo arises from the still warm embers of Leo, Jose has returned to the bosom of the Sons of Sam Horn (SoSH) Game Thread where he was born and grew and came of age.

A few of you who read KEYS on blogspot, perhaps even more, do not know about SoSH Game Threads. Bless you. It is like being blissfully unaware of war or robbery or pain. But blissful though ignorance may be, it is transient, jerking roughly into the sharp steel of knowledge. And this KEY shall be that blade.

Each game day on the SoSH board, an internet misfit starts an electronic thread dedicated to chronicling, in real time, the events of the day’s game. Since this tradition began, thousands of posts, millions of words, have been devoted to the travails of our Red Sox, and 90 percent of them are things like “score” or “f*cking Tito.”

As in so many otherwise meaningless pursuits, complex codes of conduct have emerged to imbue significance to what is fundamentally a squandering of God’s gift of life.

• A game thread may not be started until midnight of game day in Eastern Time.
• A new game thread may not be started until the old game is complete.
• The same poster begins a thread for each game until the Red Sox lose.
• No matter what he does, a poster named “SexyBanana” is not allowed to start game thread—ever.
• All of these rules are periodically invalid when anarchy seems like a good idea.
• If Curt Euro wants to get drunk and start game threads where he talks about the size of his teammates’ testicles, that is fine.
  
  

Once the rules are observed a game thread follows a basic format until the game begins.

A. The thread starter posts about how there will be a big winning streak because he is starting the thread.
B. SoSHers desperately search for and post stupid pictures that some how connect to the thread starter’s handle.
C. Borderline pornography gets posted.
D. Pictures that mock the opposing team (note: dead oriole, dead blue jay, dead… athletic) are posted.
E. More borderline pornography.
F. Jose posts KEYS.
G. Still more borderline pornography.
H. Inside joke from SoSH’s elusive Pinsetting and Gutterballs forum.
I. MoVaughn’sTruck posts Red Sox game notes.
J. Lineups are posted.
K. Lineups are complained about.
L. More borderline pornography
M. First pitch.

After the game begins, the thread varies a bit more, as one would expect, depending on whether the Sox are winning or losing, but much of the basic storyline is consistent. So let’s assume it’s a home game and walk through the sequence.

A. Sox take the field
B. Complaint that the Sox pitcher looks bad.
C. Retort that Sox pitcher looks good.
D. Much cursing
E. Demand that the offense start hitting
F. Complaint about whoever is hitting second.
G. Come on Papi
H. Yankees update.
I. 15 posts about how worthless DJ Dru is.
J. Server crashes
K. Server comes back in the fourth inning.

This continues more or less for six or seven innings until the game nears its conclusion. If the Sox are getting killed, the number of posts per minute declines precipitously. If not, the server continues to crash periodically. Let’s pick up the sequence in the late innings.

A. Complaint about the starter being left in to long.
B. Complaint about starter being taken out to soon.
C. Gnashing of teeth about who is warming up.
D. Question of why Papelbon isn’t being brought in in this “high leverage 7th inning situation”
E. Cursing at Mike Timlin.
F. Apology and explanation of how poster has always loved Mike Timlin.

Eventually, for better or for worse, the game ends, but with decidedly different paths depending on whether it was a win or a loss. For a loss the sequence is:

A. We can still come back, only two outs.
B. Come on, come on.
C. F*ck you whoever made the last out.
D. Complaint about how this is a terrible loss
E. Yankees update.
F. Calls for players to be traded/manager fired.
G. Complaint that the sky is falling.
H. Riposte that everything is fine.
I. More complaining until midnight
J. At midnight a new poster start’s the next day’s thread.

Of course, if they win the path is quite different.

A. Water.
B. Pictures of polluted bodies of water are posted.
C. Poster kevlog posts pictures of fireworks.
D. More pictures of untreated sewage pop up.
E. Yankees update
F. Insistence that this was a huge win.
G. Agreement.
H. Predictions that this will start a long winning streak.
I. Agreement
J. Someone talks about how drunk they are.
K. Agreement.
L. The poster who started the day’s game thread starts the next day’s after midnight, usually congratulating themselves for the victory.

2. The reason Jose has gone through the tedious exercise of explaining this is that today, for the first time since 2004, Jose is starting a game thread. These game threads are where KEYS began, where Jose found his voice. He original started KEYS in May 2004 in the SoSH game threads after his first SoSH bash at Copperfield's and then Fenway. Back then, Jose was just trying to find a way to distinguish himself as a poster without the burden of having to become insightful. Thus he started a quippy little daily posting in three parts. It was crap, but you’d know that if you’d bought the 2004 KEYS Book. (Note: Happy ending guaranteed.) It was only a couple hundred words back then, and it was in the first person. Jose must have been crazy. Who talks in the first person?

But within a few weeks, Jose had switched to his popular third person, after noticing how everything Ricky Henderson said was funny because it was in the third person, and those 200 word postings began to swell to 600, 800 1,200 words.

Eventually, Jose built http://keystothegame.blogspot.com to house his KEYS, to give him a year round home, but he never stopped posting in the game threads. Sure he started posting only two KEYS in the threads as part of his ruthless campaign of self-promotion. (Note: That reminds Jose, he is pretty sure that if someone buys a KEYS thong each day Jose is starting a game thread, it will keep the Sox winning. It’s in the Bhagavad Gita.) But today, Jose has returned to his roots, posting not one, not two, but all three KEYS in the SoSH game thread, as he tries to defy Thomas Wolfe’s painful cliché that you can’t go home again.

3. But enough of the narcissistic introspection. That’s not what KEYS is about. KEYS is about cold hard analysis of the games themselves, about providing insights that you will not get anywhere else. Thus Jose offers the following reasons why the Red Sox will win tonight:

• Passed balls by A.J. Pierzynski. The game is at what former Bruins goalie Reggie Lemelin would call “U.S. Cellaller: Field, and we all know that U.S. Cellular has terrible reception.
• The White Sox have a guy named Danks starting, which almost certainly means, which almost certainly means the first pitchers out of the pen will be Dark and Dreary, and those guys aren’t even on the Major League roster right now.
• St. Josh a Beckett is pitching tonight and the White Sox do not have a single player named Fitzurse, de Moreville, de Tracy, or le Breton. (Note: Look it up. You know you want to.)
• The White Sox have a guy named Boone on the roster. He is useless, because, as any Lost fan knows, Boone died in 2004. Also he had sex with his step sister.

See that’s the kind of penetrating insight you only get at KEYS. The factors are all stacked up in favor of the Red Sox. Sure, Danks is a rookie lefty, which makes him Sandy Koufax against this Red Sox line up, but what would you rather rely on for your game predictions, solid historical evidence, or about players’ names? If you’re reading KEYS, you know that how one’s name relates to a saint who’s been dead for 800 years is far more relevant that one’s ERA+, ERA- or ERA*. ERA/ may be more important, but only barely.

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

Filthy Pitches

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

1. Jonathan Papelbon has a new pitch. He calls it the slutter. Really.

It’s too easy isn’t it? It’s like making fun of former Congressman Dick Swett.

This is the sort of thing Jose normally hates, like the name Coco Crisp, because it makes things far too simple for those who are less adept and wordplay than Jose. It just lowers the bar. Still, he can’t help but be enchanted by the name of this fastball-slider hybrid.

Slutter.

Slutter, slutter, slutter, slutter, slutter.

It just rolls off the tongue doesn’t it?

Well, if Paps is going to go the misogynistic route for his new patented pitch, we should probably go that way on a few other famous pitches right?

A friendly note to sensitive readers. This is likely to get unpleasant and make you think less of Jose, a lot less. Consider skipping this and moving on to KEY 2, a delightful little satire on the state of Florida. Please. Jose can’t stand your accusing glances and the sense that you are totally disappointed in him.

• Mariano Rivera’s Cut Fastball: The Nasty Whore(side)
• Tim Wakefield’s Knuckle Ball: The Five Knuckle Shuffle (note: not technically misogynistic, just dirty.)
• Pedro Martinez’s Change Up: The Filthy Martinez
• Dice-K’s Gyroball: The Hooker With the Heart of Gold (Note: Because they both sound appealing, but don’t actually exist.)
• DLowe the Paranoid Android’s Back Door Curveball, You Know the One He Got Terrence Long With: The Back Door Hooker

Thanks Papelbon. Look at what you’ve made Jose do.

2. A curious piece of news emerged yesterday as Curt Euro expressed interest in playing in Tampa next year if the Red Sox do not resign him.

At first, Jose found this perplexing. Curt is an ultracompetitive guy, he loves to win, so why would he consider going to the worst franchise in Major League Baseball. Sure they have some young talent, but that’s been the case for years and they’ve never been anything other than awful. And yes, Joe Maddon seems like a good manager, but it’s not like Curt would ever go to a team for the manager, right Tito?

Jose kept rolling it over and over in his head. Why? Why? So he can play in a dome? So he can be on a 90 game loser? And then it hit Jose like a Pedro fastball to that little b*tch Jorge Posada. It was a lesson from his frequent trips to “the continent” as the aristocrats call it. Euros love Florida. Inexplicably, Euros absolutely adore the place. All over Europe, travel agencies promote places like Fort Myers and St. Petersburg as exotic destinations for Euros looking for a taste of the new world. So Jose figures Curt is no different, the lure of sun, sand and seniors is simply too much for him, or any other Euro, to resist.

3. Jonathan Papelbon last night became the first pitcher in Red Sox history ever to have two 30 save seasons with the team. Moreover, he became the first professional athlete of any kind in Boston to have two 30 save seasons since Andy Moog. (Note: Jose doesn’t watch much hockey and more, but the Bruins have probably had a goalie or two somewhere in there who isn’t that horrible. Or maybe not. At least Jose is sure that Blaine Lacher never had consecutive 30 save seasons.)

While the accomplishment sounds underwhelming when one first hears it, it is shocking that Papelbon is the first to do it given some of the names who have closed for the Red Sox, such as Jeff Reardon, Lee Smith, Tom Gordon and Dick Radatz. This is of course, in sharp contrast to Red Sox who have had two 30 blown save seasons, which Jose figures must include Heathcliff Sloccumb, Jeff Russell, Ken Ryan, or maybe it just felt like they blew 30 a year.

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

Antibiotic Resistant Baseball

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

1. DJ Dru is not a problem.

He’s not. Sure he’s batting .262 with 6 HR and 45 RBI on August 21, but he is not a problem.

No, he is THE problem.

Everything going wrong with the Red Sox is DJ Dru’s fault. The lack of scoring? Dru’s fault. Mediocre right field defense? Dru. Papi’s torn meniscus? Dru’s fault. Somehow. Rococo Crisp getting hit by a moose? Dru was probably in the costume. It’s all his fault.

Imagine the Red Sox right fielder, for a moment, as an antibiotic. Dru was signed to his prodigious contract because the old right fielder, Mosey Nixon, was basically amoxicillin. Sure he was terrific back in the day, a nice moderate spectrum right fielder, who did a lot of things, but not everything, well, but he had become completely useless due to overuse and adaptation by his adversaries. So what did the Red Sox do? In the words of Hubert Lewis, they wanted a new drug. So with old, inexpensive Amoxicillin Nixon rendered all but useless, they chose to throw a lot of money at the expensive new broad spectrum antibiotic, the ciprofloxacin that is DJ Dru. He was supposed to be far more effective, good at everything, and damn it all if he was so expensive that insurance wouldn’t cover him.

So we swallowed hard and took our cipro exactly is directed. We only used it at designated times; we were so careful. And then… it didn’t work. Despite all of the expense and the side effects, the so-called five tool antibiotic didn’t get the job done. DJ Dru didn’t hit for power or average, he didn’t steal bases and he didn’t do particularly good work with the glove. Jose supposes his throwing arm has been fine. So where does that leave us? That leaves us with cipro effectively treating our most minor problem a metaphorical urinary tract infection but leaving our pneumonia, syphilis, septicemias, legionellosis and atypical lycobacterioses, all robust and expansive. In other words, it leaves us completely f*cked.

DJ Dru, like cipro was brought in to address a whole host of nasty problems, yet he has solved almost none of them. We get no power from our right fielder, we get no five hitter, we get no big hits, we get ho hum defense. And when a team, when a body, is giving so much and getting so painfully little, things can deteriorate quickly.

So what do we do? Do we try another cycle of cipro and hope to God it works or do we cut our losses and shell out a ton of money for vancomycin the antibiotic of last resort, which will cost a ton, and will probably work, but still might not? (Note: Not that Jose knows who that would be. Andruw Jones?)

Medicine, they say, is as much an art as a science, and so too, it appears, is player evaluation. All of those statistics, all of those numbers said Dru would flourish in Boston, despite what former fans and managers had said about him. But in the grinding art of player procurement, that small chance of morbidity is still infused with painful statistical significance.

2. As long as we’re talking about bacterial infections, Jose would like to commend SoSHer pedros hairstylist for coining the term Gagnerrhea, a wonderful way of describing painful and embarrassing condition that has been Eric Gagne’s Red Sox career thus far. Jose plans on appropriating this outright and is preparing a whole routine of STD related nicknames. So far he’s got Claymydia Buchholz (note: because when he’s going it feels like he’s on fire), Joba(cterial vaginosis) Chamberlain (note: absolutely filthy) and of course Nongonoccal Urethritis Clemens.

3. Not only have the good people of Red Sox Nation lost all the glory that was Wily Mo, they have lost access to his myspace page as well. The Nationals slugger set his myspace page to private after sources including Jose and later the harpies at the Herald’s Inside Track posted the address.

Of course, Jose wasn’t the first to post it. No blogger Dan Lamothe of Redsoxmonster found it a good few weeks before Jose and the Track and then wrote a smarmy little letter to the harpies accosting them for failing to cite him.

It is exactly these kind of petty, self-promotional nonsense that Jose… applauds and commends. Time and time again Jose has gotten what the PR pros call “earned media” by sending snippy little letters to people who have in even the vaguest and most unrelated way used an idea that sort of resembles his. Remember Jose getting in Eric (K)neel’s ESPN column by complaining like Paul O’Neil after a call third strike down the heart of the plate about the use of the term “Balki Arroyo.” You see, in the internet, as in baseball, petulance pays.

Ergo, in order to simplify further complaints, Jose is going to offer a few phrases that he considers proprietary even though he has no trademark whatsoever, makes no money from this blog and doesn’t really care.

• It’s time for Jose Melendez’s KEYS TO THE GAME.
• I’m Jose Melendez, and those are my KEYS TO THE GAME.
• Curt Euro.
• Rococo Crisp
• J.D. Drew is the worst free agent acquisition since Matt Young. No check that, he’s the worst free agent acquisition ever. He has no power, he doesn’t hit for average, his defense is worse than advertised and he eats like a pig. He probably smells bad too.

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

Multitasking

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

1. Believe it or not, there is a problem with baseball.

It’s kind of boring.

It is. Let’s stop fooling ourselves and admit it.

Jose loves baseball as much as anyone— no more than anyone, but the critics are right, the game is boring. Jose has always known this, and sometimes he has even admitted it. Indeed, from time to time, Jose has been known to argue that baseball is the greatest of sports precisely because it is boring. In football or basketball if you are distracted for a moment or two you can lose the entire flow of the game. Also, they angry up the blood. In soccer, looking away for a moment at any time can result in missing the sum total of the day’s scoring. But baseball, with its leisurely pace and long season lends itself to a lacksidasical approach to watching in all but the most important of games, and Jose is nothing if not lacksidasical.

The historical notion is that this relaxed tempo has made baseball the most old-fashioned of sports, a leisurely pastoral game designed for the slow pace of the late 19th century. Jose could not disagree more. While baseball may have been born in a more plodding age, it is the absolute best game for the information age. You know why? Multitasking.

Baseball fandom was made for multitaskers. Because baseball, unlike other sports, does not require one’s undivided attention, it is the perfect sport for the era of blackberries, connectivity and all of that other techno-Al Gore- mumbo jumbo. Who can do one thing at a time anymore? Who dares to drive a car without listening to the radio and/or shooting out the window? Who would imagine washing dishes without talking on the phone? Who would ever walk to work without trading on the Hang Seng wirelessesly? Suckers and back numbers, that’s who. And baseball is perfect for this on-the-go lifestyle.

It used to be that Jose would read a magazine or the paper while watching the game. But those days are long gone. Jose has now taken to watching DVD’s on his laptop while watching the game with the sound off (note: this has the added benefit of ensuring that he does not hear the gyroball song ever again.) As a result, Jose is able to entertain himself twice as efficiently. Hell, you could blow through an entire season of Weeds in the time it takes to watch one Red Sox-Yankees game. (Note: Though of course, Yankees games are one of those categories that require undivided attention.) Sometimes, Jose will even go for the trifecta and watch a DVD with the game on while reading a magazine.

Jose’s only regret is that computer-based video systems did not exist in the early 1990s. He’s pretty sure he could have watched entire episodes of Lost in between Jeff Gray pitches.

2. There is enough bad news in sports today, what with dog killing quarterbacks, crooked refs, juicing sluggers and pro wrestling deaths by the fistful. Jose would like to focus on the positive. He really would. But just when you think you’ve found a great story, something uplifting to focus on, that pedestal crumbles to dust.

Jose was going to use this space to write about Brandon Webb’s remarkable pursuit of Orel Herschiser’s consecutive scoreless innings record. Webb has pitched 42 straight without yielding a run, stilly two complete games short of Herschiser’s number. But then he checked his email last night. Scandal city.

Waiting in Jose’s Inbox was an email from none other than Brandon N. Webb advertising Jose incredible low, low prices on prescription drugs. The drugs available included the typical assortment of male prescriptions in addition to Ambien and Xanax. The best part was that one gets four free Viagra with every order!

If Webb is running an internet pharmacy, that is not only a gross violation of U.S. law, but circumstantial evidence that he might be involved with some of the more pernicious substances floating through the Major League ranks.

Now you’re probably asking yourself “Why would a Major Leaguer making big money risk it all by running a pharmacy business on the side?” Well, first it’s not unprecedented. MLS star Joe-Max Moore ran an internet pharmacy with his father. Second, it is not as though Webb did not take precautious to disguise his identity. In the email, Webb cleverly changed his middle initial from “T” to “N,” which would through most professional journalists off track, but not someone with Jose’s keen investigative senses.

So there you go. Brandon Webb, you are a crook and possibly a cheat. Jose is onto you and he will rarely, if ever buy prescription drugs from you. If Jose absolutely must get his prescriptions from a major leaguer, he will get them from Jason Giambi like everyone else.

3. While the Doug Mirabelli injury on Friday was disappointing, it did give a chance for upstart Kevin “Kid” Kash to make his Red Sox debut. According to wikipedia and a few other sources, Kash learned to catch the knuckleball under the tutelage of former tag team champion and Rock ‘n’ Roll Express legend Ricky Morton.

So what does Kid Kash bring to this team? Well, aside from having the 4th worst OPS plus among hitters with 300+ plate appearances since 1967 (note: thanks to SoSher CaptainLaddie for that stat), he offers decent skills at throwing out runners and a whole slew of humorous Kash-themed wrestling maneuvers such as the Money Roll, Bankruptcy , K.O.D. – Kash On Delivery, the Money Drop and the Bank Roll.

Keeping with the carefully crafted Kash persona, Jose suggests that every time he throws out a runner we refer to it as “foreclosing on a subprime mortgage,” every time he gets a hit, which will be rarely, we can call it “paying dividends,” and each strikeout will be known as selling short.

Also, when he uses the men’s room, we’ll call it liquidating his assets.

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

Classic KEYS

Below is a classic KEY 1 from 2004. It is among the most beloved KEYS ever written and seems appropriate for a day when the Sox are wearing the Red unis.

Now included, for the first time ever, is the picture that didn't go with it back in 2004 because Jose was too stupid to use pictures.