The Quarties: The Sporting Edition
- June 29, 2012
- by Quarters
- in Qvoices
- 0 Comments
In which our dear leaders pontificate on the issues of the day…
J. Rashad Brown: Say, Melinda … I find myself in a bit of a quandary and was wondering if you could help me out with it.
Michael H. Samuels: Oh boy, here we go. Deep breaths, deep breaths, count to three … 1 … 2 … 3 … OK, hit me with your best shot.
JRB: See, that’s just not right. Anyway, I was coming to you because we’re getting into the dog days of summer here and I can already feel the boredom coming on. Football season seems years away, basketball season just ended and, well, I just don’t care about baseball. That’s where you come in. I know you love baseball. I need your help.
Belly Shift: 2.0
Teach me, Mikey … teach me to like a sport where people who look like Prince Fielder can make millions of dollars and keep a straight face when they say they’re “athletes.” Because, if I don’t figure out a way to make baseball interesting to me, I’m going to have to completely devote the part of my brain that enjoys watching highly competitive, completely fascinating, but ultimately pointless contests between manchildren bred from birth to win at all costs to politics the next few months (Hi-yo!).
It promises to be delightful doesn’t it? More on that later…
MHS: Well, it seems like you’re already pre-conditioned to despise baseball, so I’m not sure how much I can change that right here and now. However, just like football and just like basketball, the personalities make the game. Sure, there’s sabremetrics and OPS WAR Zone ratings and the like that will make your head spin, but then there’s also the Big Papi’s of the league, the A.J. Burnett’s, the Jose Reyes’ of the league. First thing I suggest you do is schlep all the way down to Little Havana and take in a Miami Marlins game.
Two reasons: 1. The ballpark is amazing. If you don’t have a good time there, that’s your own damn fault (The Clevelander in left field has dancers dancing all game long, my friend. All game). 2. The game live is something to behold. Just like you enjoy the intricacies and strategies in the Association, baseball has many, many more. Hope that helps a bit. If it doesn’t, go to the batting cages and see how well you do. Then you’ll understand why Prince Fielder is considered an athlete.
JRB: Yeah, I’ve got to get down there. I’ll admit, I’ve always enjoyed going to Marlins games, I’ll probably like it even more now. So, figure out how to calculate BABIB, learn what the hell BABIB is and start doing research for your GOP VP pool before reading this week’s edition of…
The Quarties
Let’s just jump right in, shall we? Leading off, I’ve got to give a you’ve-got-to-love-when-young-players-exceed-expectations QUARTIE to SCOTUS Chief Justice John Roberts. Roberts was the deciding vote in the 5-4 ruling upholding President Barack Obama’s signature piece of legislation – the Affordable Care Act.
Justice Roberts gets this Quartie for two reasons.
You can’t see it… but, he’s doing double finger guns in this picture.
Fist of all, some scholars have said that Roberts made his decision based on the perception that the highest court in the land has become a place for presidents to plant eternal, partisan land mines. Because of that, he decided to go against the political leanings for which most believe he was appointed and voted in favor of the law in an attempt to elevate the court’s standing in the public. If that’s the case, he did the famous “SCOTUS Political Affiliation Double Cross” move made famous by Anthony Kennedy … awesome.
Secondly, there’s something to be said about the possibility that Roberts actually takes his job seriously, looked at the law, debated whether it was constitutional, determined that it was and rendered his decision based on that. It’s possible that he just decided to sidestep all the political bullshit and, because he has a lifetime appointment, decided to do the right thing.
Some reports say it might be a little of both. Regardless, I’m happy that the right thing actually happened. My cynicism meter, on a scale of 1-10 has gone down from 487,987,984 to 487,987,983 … Progress!
By the way, did you see CNN and FOXNews get that story wrong because their reporters and anchors couldn’t bother to read past the first page of the decision? Fantastic. When I was watching it, I could hear the Benny Hill song playing in the back of my head. It was hilarious. This is a great time for Aaron Sorkin’s new cable news show “The Newsroom” to debut, wouldn’t you say, Mackenzie?
MHS: Yes, I finally did watch “The Newsroom,” and while I enjoyed it more than my wife did, “Too preachy,” was her initial review… followed by, “At least West Wing’s pilot opened with Sam and the prostitute.” I don’t know how I feel about being Mackenzie. No doubt you have the Will thing going on there. Affable, yet a volcano ready to spill at any minute. And, you do take vertigo medicine, don’t you? Let’s not answer that. Anyway, I’m not totally sold, but I’ll certainly watch episode 2.
Moving on, I’d like to give a hearty congratulations QUARTIE to journey-woman Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton for setting the globe-trotting record among U.S. secretaries of state. By touching down in Riga, Latvia, this week, Clinton landed in her 100th country since she took the post. No other Secretary of State visited more than 96 countries while in office. Worth noting.
Does this guy look like the next VPOTUS to you?
JRB: Indeed. I’d like to give WillJeff a dose of Sodium Pentothal and find out how he feels about Hilly doing all she can to not be at home. Anyway, sticking to my new favorite sport — politics — I’d like to give a good-upside-but-a-bit-of-a-tweener QUARTIE to Teapublican darling Marco Rubio. You know … for a guy not interested in running for vice president, he sure has been all over the place lately, hasn’t he?
I’m on record in this space and others for calling Rubio a fraud, lightweight and Teapubican puppet, so I’m not going to get too much into that here. About Rubio, I’ll slightly tweak what I’ve said about Newt Gingrich… you can’t be an asshole in public for years and try to win a popularity contest.
MHS: How come all politics always has to come back to the state of Florida, huh? Haven’t you all down there suffered enough? At least it’ll keep you busy for the summer.
I’m going to switch to business and give Research in Motion a time-to-hang-up-the-cleats QUARTIE after announcing this week it lost $518 million in the most-recent quarter and delayed the release of its newest smartphone, putting the company further behind Apple and Google in that lucrative market. If you know me, you know I’ve been pulling for the BlackBerry maker for a long time. I have a BlackBerry and an iTouch and I find the BlackBerry much easier to type on. Still, it pales in comparison to the iPhone. It might be time to sell before the company goes the way of Nokia. Motorola found a buyer in Google. Who wants BlackBerry?
JRB: Ugh… I have a BlackBerry too. Like Brer Rabbit said, time to be movin’ along. I have a Berry and an iTouch as well. I’m pretty ready to put those two functions into one device.
And, finally, I think I speak for Mikey when I send a quick get-well-soon QUARTIE to America’s Team: Your Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade. After playing through a knee injury in the playoffs — an injury that caused him to get said knee drained during the playoffs — Wade will have surgery and will miss this year’s Olympics in London.
I’ m totally cool with it. Gold medals are nice, but NBA Championships are cooler. Get well soon, D-Dub. Stay off the knee. We have a dynasty to start.
OK, That’s our time. For Mikey, I’m JB. GOODNIGHT EVERYBODY!
J. Rashad Brown can be reached at chocolatethunder@quartersmagazine.com. Michael H. Samuels can be reached at hebrewlightning@quartersmagazine.com. Yes, really. Please email us.