The Morning Offering - Feb. 23, 2005

Written by TiVo on February 23, 2005

Yo, son. I feel like the Bengals.

That’s right people, I’m sitting on the No. 1 pick in the ultra-competitive Rotogods rotisserie baseball draft. Of course, I had to lick ass last season to get here, and Christ, my team sucked.

So for this honor, what do I get? Albert Pujols? Nah. Pay-Rod? Nope. Not even Vlad “Damn he should be on the Nationals right now” Guerrero.

When you’re in a keeper league, all those “who you should take with the No. 1 pick” articles won’t help you. And neither will this article, but at least I’ll feel better about not having any of those stud wood-wielders.

The Rotogods’ league allows for four keepers, so the top pick in the draft is like the first pick of the fifth round. But of course, the imbalance of teams at the end of last season, due to owners like me getting their asses handed to them by people who knew what they were doing, leaves quite a few players available who should have been kept.

And so, like the Bengals, I scan the pool knowing that I get whichever guy I want, but figuring I’ll probably blow the pick. But with the 12-team snake draft, I wait 23 picks before it comes back to me, so I can’t drop the ball at No. 1.

After briefly considering Kerry Wood and Tim Hudson, I settled on taking Ichiro, even though I already kept four hitters. None of the available pitchers seemed much better than the guys who would be available when picks No. 24 and 25 came to me. Plus, if Ichiro gets anything like 700 at-bats and hits even close to .372 again, that would have twice the impact on my team batting average as Barry Bonds and his .362 in 363 at-bats. I kept Bonds, who walked 232 times in 2004.

As enticing as the thought of nearly wrapping up a category on draft day might be, I came to my senses. Nowhere else in the non-keeper pool could I find a guy not coming off an injury who may strike out 200-plus. Couple that with the prospect of another 20-win season pitching behind Roger Clemens in Houston, and Roy Oswalt doesn’t seem so bad. Definitely the ace of my staff to start.

Still, I worked so hard at sucking last season. Not getting some 50-home run, .350-batting masher is a bit of a letdown.

Piss-poor picking
One of the luxuries of being TiVo is that you can call up old shit quickly. I’ve saved the past few drafts from our main league, and went back to study the early rounds to see if I could pick up any trends.

Instead, I found some egregious selections.

Two years ago, after Eric Gagne was the first off the board -- remember, this is like round 5 of a regular draft -- Jeff Kent, Mike Piazza and Larry Walker followed. Then it comes to me at fifth overall, and with Carlos Beltran and Bobby Abreu on the board, I nutted and took Troy Glaus. I guess my rationale was I needed power, and at least I didn’t draft Glaus last season, when he played just 58 games. But still, Doc Fury and Beagle must have been licking their chops after I picked, because they snapped Abreu and Beltran up with the quickness.

The rest of that round doesn’t look so great either: Jeff Bagwell, Bernie Williams, Shawn Green, Chipper Jones and Roberto Alomar.

No one missed as badly in 2002, except for maybe Father Time grabbing Phil Nevin directly ahead of Manny Ramirez and Carlos Delgado. Last season, first-rounders Barry Zito, Mark Mulder and Richie Sexson all disappointed, but they weren’t bad picks.

I made some decent picks the year I took Glaus first (Shannon Stewart in the 9th, Mariano Rivera in the 10th and Vernon Wells in the 12th), but you’re way behind the 8-ball if you blow the first-rounder.

Worm, the resident “starting pitching is overrated” guru, didn’t take a pitcher until the 13th round that season, when he snagged Johan Santana. He drafted Rick Reed and Denny Stark also, but he was a year early on Santana and 17th-round pick Oliver Perez.

‘I always get my manicure on Saturdays!’
Hands-down, the worst part of the roto season is trying to find a draft date. As soon as you find a time that’s good for 11 of you, the 12th guy has to go get his back waxed or can’t miss his Granny’s birthday party. Never fails.

We’re in the midst of that crisis now, and our fearless leader Xach is trying to rally the troops toward an online draft via mockdraft.com.

We’ll let you know if that’s a viable option if you‘re in a similar situation, or if you’re better off telling the dude who can never draft on Sunday, Monday or when it rains to just bite the bullet and set his draft card.

Droppin’ a Blog
So my boy started up a hip-hop blog recently (allthangsfunky.blogspot.com), and the shit’s dope.

While searching yesterday for a link to an old Tuff Crew jam, I found loads of other hip-hop blogs. I know the phenomenom is not new to a lot of you, but there’s more good reading out there than you could ever kill an 8-hour shift with (after you leave Rotogods.com, of course).

Some of the ones I peeped with the craziest names, if nothing else: We eat so many shrimp, Cocaine blunts & hip-hop tapes, hollertronix, Naked Cartwheels and for the rappin' roto fan, Chauncey Billups.

Shit, even D-Nice has his own blog, where today’s story is about how Big Daddy Kane read him the lyrics to Ain’t No Halfsteppin’ on the subway before he recorded it or some shit.

There’s a list to get you started at hiphop-blogs.com.

Feeding frenzy
Is there anything funnier than going out with the fellas, getting a cool and fine-ass waitress, and then watching everyone compete for her attention? Suddenly the jokes have a little more zing and the stories have funnier endings. And then, while laughing with your crew, she slips in a story about how her “fiancee” does this or that, and you realize everyone was wasting their time with the “I‘m so cool" song and dance.

That’s one of the few times it’s actually cool to be married, so you can pretend you “didn’t want that bitch’s attention no damn way.”

All-blah games
I didn’t watch a single RPM of the Daytona 500 this weekend, but that’s to be expected. But I also didn’t check out the hoopin’ homeboys at the NBA All-Star Game. Come to think of it, I ignored the Pro Bowl and the MLB All-Star Game this year, and hockey spared itself the indignity of getting ignored by me and the 295 million U.S. residents who aren’t Canadians living in exile.

Is it just me and my weird life schedule, or are these fabrications no fun anymore? You can’t even get up for the dunk contest like you did back in the day, because it’s all been done before. If it didn’t jump the shark at Brent Barry, and if Vince Carter saved it in 2000, Fred Jones definitely did the trick. As of this writing, I have no idea who won nor any interest in finding out. And yes, I work in the sports section of an actual newspaper.

The sendoff
Well, my little roto-critics said I needed more practice, and should think about writing shorter and punchier.

Uh, my bad fellas. Still long-winded, still TiVo.

Until next time.

Berate, belittle or big-up TiVo at Tivo@rotogods.com. Or find him lurking the message boards 24-7.

-- Written by TiVo on February 23, 2005