Saturday night I was at a Barnes and Noble looking in vain for the Baseball America Prospect Handbook (not to fear, I eventually found it at another bookstore), and one book that was in great supply was another hit from the …For Dummies series.

This one is on baseball. Who would be an expert at explaining something like baseball to somebody who is so clueless that they find the need to buy a book to learn about it?

How about Joe Morgan!?!

Nobody can explain things like Joe. He’s perfect really. For 20 years he’s been making us all dumber during Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN by repeating the same nine facts about baseball (seven of which are patently wrong) over and over and over again. Shit, he’s not just perfect, he is Baseball For Dummies!

You can buy the book at Amazon for the low-low price of $13.59 plus shipping. That’s a steal. Because apparently, the “brand new” third edition was written with the assistance of a seance.

Morgan, naturally, covers the bases–hitting, pitching, fielding, running, coaching–with plenty of whys teamed up with the requisite how-tos. For added expertise he calls on fellow pros such as Hall of Famer Bob Gibson and MVP third-baseman Ken Caminiti.

Ken Caminiti? You don’t say. They couldn’t find a third baseman who hasn’t been dead since 2004? I’ll bet his chapters are the best ones.

– Where to position the infield in bunt situations

– How to cycle on and off of Winstrol without completely dissolving your testes

– Why a goatee comes in handy in hiding your cocaine induced nosebleeds

One of the Amazon reviewers complained that Joe starts using the scorebook numbering system to refer to players’ positions early in the book but doesn’t explain it until chapter 18. Probably because Joe didn’t learn it until then.

Granted, we know Joe didn’t write any of this book. I used to write for the same Web site he did in the late ’90s and Joe never wrote a damned thing. He would phone in some talking points and have somebody else write his actual column.

I’ll venture an educated guess that Joe has never even read this book. I’m sure he read the check that they wrote him, but nothing else.

I find the example of him not explaining the scorebook numbering system particularly interesting. As we’ve seen over the years from the always awkward shots of him and Jon Miller sitting in the booth on Sunday nights grinning at the camera, Joe doesn’t keep score during games. That’s not that big of a deal. Ron Santo keeps score for no apparent reason during Cubs’ games. He’s constantly asking Pat questions about it because he misses about 14 plays a game doing something important like reading a fax from Glenda in Makoqueta or setting his hairpiece on fire.

But Joe never has any paper in front of him at all. Not a media guide, not a press packet, not even a menu from the hospitality room. It’s just him, alone with his thoughts. His painful, obvious, or completely wrong, thoughts.

A couple of years ago Joe went on a long winded diatribe about the basket that the Cubs have that hangs over the outfield and keeps drunk fans from falling out of the bleachers and onto the field.

Joe famously said that when he was playing “everybody” in baseball referred to that basket as Banks Boulevard because Hall of Famer Ernie Banks hit “so many of his homers into that basket.”

That story, as do many of Joe’s sounded plausible. But like most of those stories, this one was pure, grade A bullshit.

Ernie Banks played for the Cubs from 1953-1971. He hit 512 homers. Of those 512, Joe thinks that a lot of them landed in the basket at Wrigley Field. He’s implying that without the basket, Ernie wouldn’t have hit so many homers.

In 1970 and 1971, Ernie only played in 111 games for the Cubs. Why is that important?

Because the basket wasn’t installed at Wrigley until May 1970. Banks hit eight home runs at Wrigley Field in those two seasons, but one of them was in April of 1970 before the basket went in.

So, of Ernie Banks 512 career homers, the most that possibly could have landed in the basket was seven. Actually, we’ve all seen the replay of his 500th homer, and he hit that on May 12, 1970 and that didn’t end up in the basket, so I guess it’s six.

Six of 512 means that a little over one percent of Ernie’s homers could have possibly ended up in the basket. Now you can see why they called it Banks Boulevard. Can’t you?

What are the nine things Joe knows about baseball? I know two of them. That Joe Morgan is the greatest second baseman of all time. (Which is wrong.) And that Dave Concepcion should be in the Hall of Fame (which is so wrong it’s patently hilarious).

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Good news from Reds’ camp. The Dusty Baker suicide watch is on. He’s going to need to get a little higher if he’s going to pull it off, though.

Every major dude will tell you that Dusty has gone to new heights (hee hee) to study his 2008 Broken Red Machine.

You know who else used to coach from a tower so he could see everything?

Gerry Faust when he was at Notre Dame. Which prompted Lou Holtz to say this when he took over the Irish in 1986. “If you see me heading up the steps on that tower during practice, I’m going up there to jump off.”

Seriously, even for Dusty this is just dumb.

“Because as soon as I go to this field, I’m missing what’s happening on that field,” Baker said. “Then you run back and forth and you’re missing stuff in between. I want to see as much as I can. I can see who’s doing BP fooling around. I love my sunglasses, because I can look this way and be looking back that way.”

What? Huh? He didn’t just say he’s doing it to catch guys playing grabass during batting practice did he? I thought player’s manager Dusty was all about the grabass! Hell, with the Cubs it was non-stop grabass. They couldn’t even be troubled to pay attention to the 2004 Wild Card race because they were so grabassedy.

So, if Dusty catches somebody playing grabass will he make the whole team run laps around the field, or around David Weathers, whichever is farther?

” It depends if it pertains to a lot of people,” Baker said. “If it pertains to one or two, why punish the whole team? I’ve been there. With the Braves one day, I missed the cut-off man and they had cut-offs and relays the next day — no batting practice, no nothing.”

I don’t believe this for a second. No way does Dusty tell a story about playing for the Braves and not mention you know who…oh, wait. There’s more.

“Everybody knew it was me. They were mad, too. Hank Aaron, Rico [Carty] and [Orlando] Cepeda — they loved to hit.”

Ahh, that’s better.

Dusty’s a friggin’ goldmine. In two days he reminded us what an assclown he is. First, he refused to say that the number one prospect in all of baseball Jay Bruce had a chance to open the season in centerfield because Norris Hopper has been “really impressive.” Norris Hopper?

Then, the next day he said that on base average is overrated because all guys with good on base averages do is walk and that…wait for it…clogs up the bases.

Holy shit it’s great to not have this around the Cubs everyday.

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Not to be outdone though, Lou endorsed a contract extension for Jim Hendry.

“He’s on the last year of his contract,” Piniella said. “He’s done a heck of a job here. I’ve seen where other GMs have been extended. Why not ours?”

I’m guessing the combined 145-197 record the Cubs put up in 2005 and 2006 might have something to do with it. And maybe the fact that his drunken spending spree only resulted in 85 wins last year might mean Jimbo’s still got something to prove. Just a hunch.

But hey, you’ve got to like Lou standing up for his “boss.” One good look at Jim is a reminder he’s going to need the health insurance.