Special guest appearance!!

There was an orgastic (word lifted directly from F. Scott Fitzgerald in The Great Gatsby!) feast televised live for sports fans across America (or Amercia if you work for Mitt Romney's campaign) last night. Beginning around 7 PM and continuing until almost midnight, a sports fan could belly up to a buffet of baseball, soccer, hockey or basketball rarely seen on a Wednesday night. I had a little baseball, soccer and basketball on my visual plate, but passed on the hockey. All three of my selections gave me indigestion though as I swallowed down losses to the teams I hoped to win. Since I'm a glutton for both food and punishment, I will not be deterred by my horrible gastric experience and will cheerfully await the next opportunity to ingest a similar sports buffet.

Most of my stomach pain was centered on Dusty Custer's omission of Joey Vottomatic from the Reds lineup last evening. While it is true Vottomatic had played in 176 consecutive games, Lou Gehrig played in 2130 and Cal Ripken, Jr. played in 2632 consecutive games respectively. Viewed through that perspective, Vottomatic was still trying to get potty trained!! His Dustiness said he could see Vottomatic wearing down the past couple weeks and needed to get him a break. Despite Dusty the Befuddler declaring our automatic hitting machine being held together by nothing more than chicken wire and duct tape, Vottomatic, he was hitting .361 over his last 24 games and is on pace to set the MLB single-season record for doubles. Too bad all the Reds swingers aren't wearing down like Joey!! Those of you who perused the blog yesterday might remember two facts that I, Kernac the Magnificent, predicted would happen in last nights game. 1: I reverse jinxed the Reds by saying the Pirates were worse than the Chico Bail Bonds Bad News Bears. Jay Bruce particularly felt the Kernac jinx in the first inning when he should have driven in two runs ...... but instead his rocket to the right field corner was three inches short of clearing Matt Hague's mitt and nothing more than a hard out. 2: Without Vottomatic in the lineup I predicted the Reds would put on an offensive show worthy of the ages. And man was it offensive!!! Two hits off A.J. Burnett??? Believable in 2002, not in 2012!!! George Costanzo crawled out from under his desk long enough to start at first base and lower his average to .067 before being replaced by Miggy Cairo. Top four swingers in the Redlegs batting order were 1-12, and that one came in the top of the first. Johnny Cueto allowed one ball to be hit hard all night and it beat him. Luckily our redskin friends (the Atlanta Braves) beat our redbird enemies (St.L Cardinals) and kept us a game and a half up in the division. Consistently inconsistent ... I've said that before too!!

For another day's discussion: Walt Jock's BSDM-inspired bench handcuffing of Dusty Custer. The Reds have no bench and all the prospects who could help were traded. That's on Walt Jock not Daft Dusty.

Conspiracies are popping up in the sports world daily it seems. Yesterday we found Mitt Romney and Fidel Castro attempting to jam the Cuban Missile from his frequent launches. Today we find David Stern rigging the NBA draft lottery (I refuse to capitalize draft and lottery ... it's a part of the sport not an event!) in favor of the NBA-owned New Orleans Hornets at the expense of the Jumpman owned Charlotte Bobcats. The prize?? Anthony Davis and his potentially franchise altering Unibrow talent. Call me Oliver Stone if you want, but as the lottery was unfolding David Stern was definitely on the grassy knoll!! The NBA needs the value of the Hornets to be as high as possible to insure Tom Benson (owner of the N.O. Saints) pays top dollar for the club. So the one franchise owned by the league wins a lottery conducted by the league and soon Tom Benson will pay some bounty money to Stern for taking out the Bobcats (Before you dismiss such a side deal between Benson and Stern you might want to read up on the N.O. Saints bounty program and who knew what .... uh huh!!). And if you think last night popped Stern's draft rigging cherry was Stern's first time manipulating the lottery, google "1985 nba draft lottery" and see what results you get!!! While you're at it, google "michael jordan gambling suspension". You still think David Stern is above such a conspiracy??? I didn't think so.

Sincerely,

Oliver Stone

P.S. I don't think I need to lengthen our conspiracy list by adding the blatant no call from last night's Heat-GeriatricsCeltics game when, with the score tied at 105 in overtime, D-Wade was allowed to punch Rajon Rondo in the face on a lay-up attempt without being whistled for a foul. The Heat went on to win 115-111 and somewhere Tim Donaghy was nodding furiously!!!

Thanks Oliver ... now back to our regularly scheduled programming ....

On the soccer pitch, the U.S. took on Brazil last night in Landover, Maryland. Well ... took on may not be the correct word ... looked on while being blitzed may be a better description. Brazil toyed with the U.S. for gargantuan portions of the match and cruised to a 4-1 victory. Neymar (all Brazilians have one name ... even the crappy ones. Neymar is NOT a crappy one!) reduced the American defense to Border Patrol status as he created chance after chance for the Selecao (I can't figure out how to get all those crazy Portuguese punctuation marks under the c and over the a!!). He wasn't the only immigrant getting into the American box and causing trouble, as Thiago Silva, Marcelo and Pato also scored. The U.S. bundled one goal in right before half, but didn't threaten again until late in the match when both teams were substituting freely. World Cup qualifying starts in a little over a week for the Red, White and Blue and thankfully there are no Brazilians in our group, only Mexicans.

That's all I got for today. Tomorrow is the last day of school for me so be ready for some summer tips!!