ESPNough!

For me, nothing is more relaxing than a baseball game. In person at either Shea Stadium or Chavez Ravine, I can totally decompress by sitting with my scorebook and watching the day's story unravel before my eyes. Because, indeed, every Major League Baseball game is essentially a short story. Within the space of two to three hours, a plot will unfold. Characters will intertwine. And there will be some conclusion to a very interesting storyline that is perhaps much different than the game/short story from the day before. A baseball game is supposed to be free flowing and easy. No more than the stimulus of a cool breeze on a summer's day.

Except, of course, if you're watching said game on ESPN.

I've written previously about their Sunday night baseball broadcast crew, Jon Miller and Joe Morgan, who are the audio equivalent of a tooth extraction. They take on the mantra from ESPN that their network virtually invented whatever sports they are telecasting on that given day. If ever my teams are featured as the Sunday night game, my mute button is pressed and I might even use the local radio play-by-play as a substitute. Miller and Morgan are just that bad.

But, when I am on the road in NY, I often find myself needing ESPN's weekday baseball coverage in order to keep up with the Dodgers. Such was the case the other night when I felt the urge to watch the Blue Crew list through another non-hitting barrage versus the Chicago Cubs. My hosts for the evening were Chris Berman and former pitcher Rick Sutcliffe. Admittedly, Berman is the worst sport announcer ever to come out of a mother's womb and is better suited to managing a Pizza Hut. Sutcliffe's best days were on the mound and not behind a microphone, where he displays all the excitement of a funeral director taking some widow through a sales brochure of caskets. These two chuckleheads spent the middle three innings of the game essentially talking up Sutcliffe's singing of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the seventh inning stretch. Barbra Streisand's last concert tour didn't get this much build-up. But, I wanted to watch the game, so how bad would it be to endure them?

Freakin' bad. The dribble emanating from Messrs Berman and Sutcliffe was worse than I could have expected. When Dodger reliever Takashi Saito had his problems in the ninth inning, Sutcliffe kept telling us that he hadn't gotten a save in a week, as if his mediocrity was being caused by non-use. Wrong. If Sutcliffe had looked at some game notes, he would have seen that Saito worked two innings on Sunday, striking out five in the process, for a win in extra innings. Of course, Berman was too busy thinking of his next unclever thing to say. Naturally, he became infatuated with all the obvious gags that can be deduced from Dodger infielder Chin-Lung Hu. Hu is at short now. Hu is hitting. N'yuk, n'yuk. n'yuk. In comparison, I like to think about Dodger sportscaster Vin Scully during Hu's major league debut last Fall. Scully simply said "Hu is now playing second base and we won't say that ever again." And he never did. But, Berman naturally overplayed it so much it was probably like the day he found out how to lift up comic strips with Silly Putty.

But, the really annoying thing about ESPN's baseball coverage these days is the constant onslaught of information. A scrawl at the bottom of the screen. Constant and ever-updating stats at the top of the screen. By the end of the night, I was exhausted and had a headache that would probably rival Teddy Kennedy's. All of it rendered me senseless.

Over and over, I read about Pedro Martinez' rehab appearance in Class A ball. Somebody on the Braves went on the disabled list. Scores were updated from out-of-town on a pitch-by-pitch basis. I was expected to read that the Yankees' Alex Rodriguez had sex with his wife Tuesday night and "it was terrific."

At the top of the screen, the brain drain continued. You saw what the batter's average was with a 0-1 count. Then a 0-2 count. Then a 1-2 count. Then a 2-2 count. On and on and on and on and on. If arsenic had been handy, I would have emptied the bottle.

ESPN takes a very simple and relaxing sport and turns it into another version of the Iraq War. In the process, I can't believe that there are very many folks in the audience who give a shit what how many homeruns Manny Ramirez has hit while wearing blue boxer shorts.

Just give me the basics. Better yet, just give me nothing and I will construct my own fun.

But, I guess that would be too easy for our already overloaded society.

Dinner last night: Snacks at a wine tasting event in Fort Tryon Park.