I really wanted to start by just tearing through Rick Morrissey’s column today, but I’m going to get the Survivor recap out of the way, first.

And, oh by the way, don’t forget that on Sunday we’ll be GameCasting the Bears and Packers starting just before noon Central Standard Time. With the exchange rate that’s 12:17 for you Canadians.

Previously on Survivor: Pearl Islands — Johnny Fair Play pretended his grandmother was dead to win a reward challenge. He then managed to squeeze a little more guilt out of the other castaways and use that ploy to save his pal Burton who seemed a goner at that night’s Tribal Council. Instead, Tijuana was sent packing.

Sandra’s mad at the world and is yelling…again. Why is she on this island still? How have they been able to put up with that for 30 days? I’ve only had to put up with it for eight episodes and I want to bludgeon myself to death with the TiVo remote every time she opens that yapper of hers.

Johnny Fair Play reminds the CBS camera that he’s an evil genius who is using an allegedly dead grandmother to manipulate the simpeltons in the tribe.

The reward challenge is for the best reward the show has ever given. Yes, even better than one of those weird looking Pontiac Azteks. The winners will be flown to a resort where they will get to spend the night in a hotel suite. Suh-weet.

The challenge itself is a long water obstacle course. The castaways are divided into groups of three by a random coin draw. Sandra, who never closes her mouth, and therefore has difficulty swimming has to swim the most on her team. This dooms her, Burton and Christa.

Darrah leads off for her team which also includes Lillian (swimming in her underwear–oh, God, make it stop!) and Johnny Fair Play.

Darrah can actually swim and so her team wins easily, as Burton stands at the end of the course cursing his fate to be constantly waiting on Sandra to swallow the entire ocean.

For Burton, the torture isn’t limited to not winning the challenge, but now he has to spend an entire day and night alone with Sandra and Christa. If I were him I’d send Christa out looking for some wild marijuana plants. I’m sure she could find them.

At the resort, we see Johnny FP, Lillian and Darrah looking in a huge mirror in the bathroom. Johnny thinks he looks good, Lillian realizes what a disgusting wretch she is and Darrah wonders where he boobs went.

Don’t we all.

They shower (seperately) and then head to the spa. Lillian was amazed that “the massage lady put cucumbers on my eyes!” I’ve got news for you Lillian, you’re so ugly the massage lady put cucumbers on her eyes, too.

After their facials and massages, they order dinner. Johnny FP proves what a pompous dumbass he is and orders for the ladies. He orders chicken breasts for Darrah who shoves them in her blouse.

Which reminds me. The most horrifying underwater scenes during the reward challenge belonged to those of Lillian swimming in her huge white underwear. But both Darrah and Christa have lost so much weight that their buffs (which they both use as tube tops) came down during their swimming and CBS had to blur out their nipples. Giggle, giggle.

Johnny insults Lillian with something I didn’t hear, but I’m sure she overreacted to. So she goes to bed early. Leaving Johnny to make the moves on Darrah.

Or something.

Back at the beach, Burton is talking to Christa about whether or not she’d vote off Darrah or Sandra next. Christa says if she “had to” she’d launch Sandra, but she thinks Darrah’s more likely to win immunity challenges because “she was a cheerleader.”

I am without speech on how ridiculous that last sentence was.

Two, four, six, eight, who do we appreciate? Jeff! Anal! Probst!

Lillian is mad that Johnny FP because he bragged about how great their night at the resort was. I think it’s because Lil is afraid they’ll think Johnny had his way with both women.

However, as annoying Sandra says of John, “He’s pretty much a girl.”

At the immunity challenge the trick is to use an old fashioned musket and shoot flares at targets. The first one to hit all three of their targets wins immunity. Darrah shows that all cheerleaders can shoot and wins immunity.

At Tribal Council Anal makes a big deal about whether any of them can trust anybody anymore. They all say that it’s part of the game and that they can’t trust anybody.

Then he asks them one by one if they can trust the people in their alliance and they all say yes. Because, they have to.

hee hee.

Christa gets the boot.

Next on Survivor: Sandra’s annoying! Lil has a real swimsuit! Darrah’s boobs are still missing. Johnny FP is still swearing on his grandmother’s grave.

—

OK, now on to Rick Morrissey. In today’s missive he wants the Cubs…no, he insists the Cubs sign Javy Lopez.

Javy?

No. No. A thousand times no.

Isn’t it curious that in his contract walk year, Javy (who is 33) posted career highs in batting average (.328), homers (43) and RBI (109). That is a great year for any player, especially a catcher.

But in 2002, Javy had his worst year. He hit .233 with 11 homers and 53 RBI. That’s worse than Damian Miller.

You just don’t spend the kind of money Javy wants on a catcher in his mid-30s. You just don’t. Especially not one with a history of knee problems and a mysterious career year at 32. Unless he’s on the Bentio Santiago nutrition supplement program (which probably just got shut down), he’s more likely to pull a Todd Hundley on whatever team signs him next.

Rick starts off with this assertion about the LaTroy Hawkins signing.

“Let’s clear up something first. The Cubs need Hawkins as a setup man. Too many times last season the bullpen went up in a mushroom cloud before Joe Borowski had a chance to get in the game. Hawkins has contract incentives that will give him as much as $4 million more if he finishes a certain number of games. There will be pressure on manager Dusty Baker to give Borowski’s job to Hawkins. Don’t, Dusty.

Yes, Borowski is a high-wire act, and it’s not easy negotiating that wire while wearing spikes. He is not what you would call a confidence-instiller in the ninth inning. He’s more of a sigh of relief when it’s over. But he has been successful. I believe the rhyme says you don’t mess with success.”

No, the Cubs don’t NEED Hawkins to be a set up man. What they need is for LaTroy, Regular Joe, The Farns and Mike Remlinger to combine to get the last nine outs of most games. It does not matter who gets which outs, as long as somebody gets them. That’s the beauty of adding LaTroy to this mix. Any of those four guys could pitch the seventh, the eighth, or the ninth. As Cubs fans, do we care which one gets the save?

Only if we have them on our rotisserie team, I suppose.

Rick says this about Derrek Lee. “Lee will hit home runs at Wrigley Field and play the best first base since Mark Grace left. Hee Seop Choi will become a star with the Marlins. Good all the way around.”

I think I know that Morrissey means “play the best first base since Mark Grace” as in defensively. Because, Lee will be the best Cubs first baseman since…uh…Frank Chance? I suppose the real answer is Dave Kingman, but I don’t want to give that answer. So it’s probably Ernie Banks. Yes, Lee will be the best defensive first baseman since Grace, but he’s oh, so much more than that.

However, I will not argue one bit about how Rick ends the column.

Their playoff success sneaked up on us. It was a stunning, pleasant development. When they blew that eighth-inning lead with their best pitcher, Mark Prior, on the mound in Game 6 of the NL Championship Series, it knocked the wind out of a windy city.

But we’ll be waiting for the Cubs this time, with expectations that are realistic. World Series expectations, right here in December.

—

Before we get to the links, I need to comment on last night’s Bulls-Sixers game. First, it was nice to see the Bulls on national TV again (even if it was cable), and though they lost to the Sixers, I just continue to like what I see from this team. It’s amazing how different they look on both offense and defense. That said, they should have won last night. They blew an 11 point lead in the third quarter. They had SEVEN :24 clock violations. But I’m starting (very slowly) to become a Kirk Hinrich fan and Jamal Crawford should hug Scott Skiles every time he sees him. Though, that would be embarassing.

You know what sucks now? Put a healthy Jay Williams on this team right now…and it’s that much better.

Oh well.

—

Rosey is just clueless today. I’m not even going over the whole “trading for Derrek Lee didn’t cost the Cubs a shot at Luis Castillo or Pudge Rodriguez thing” again.

This just in: Allen Iverson is good. But also this just in: Eddy Curry catches the lob better than any big man I’ve ever seen. Ever.

KC Johnson acts like we never knew Doug Collins was almost an assistant coach on this team, this sumer.

Isn’t it nice how yesterday the Sun Times talked about how Eddie Robinson has learned to play with pain, and then he misses last night’s game with a respiratory infection?

Kordell says he’s ready this time. That’s…nice?

Here’s my prediction. Roberto Alomar will end up signing with either St. Louis or the Cubs for less than what the Sox are offering him right now. Clip and save.

Ed Sherman said the movie Ron Santo’s son made about him is “gripping.” The last gripping movie I saw was that Adam Sandler thing where he wasn’t trying to be funny. I had to grip the seat just to keep from ditching my date and running to the parking lot. Hey, she didn’t live that far from the theater, she could have walked home.

John Jackson likes the new Cubs-Sox-Bulls-Hawks channel. Whatever.

Mariotti puts down the doughnut to make himself the center of this column about Tim Floyd. Just shut up, Jay.

Mike Kiley thinks that Jim Hendry is going after Jason Kendall. The only catch is that Hendry will want the Pirates to pay half of Kendall’s salary. Here’s the deal. The Cubs and Sox learned this last season. If you trade for a player another team is trying to dump you do it one of two ways.

The Sox way: You make the other team pick up all or most of the player’s salary and in return you give them good prospects.

The Cubs way: You pay the freight and send them crappy prospects.

I like the Cubs way better.

The Wizard of Roz says that Leslie Frazier might be the Bears next coach. Leslie? Didn’t her brother used to play for the Bears?

Bruce Miles thinks Gruddy might be back.

A number of papers are reporting today that the Rangers have decided that if the Red Sox will pick up all of Alex Rodriguez’s salary and most of Manny Ramirez’s, that they’ll do the trade. This is ludicrous of course. It may happen, but it’s still ludicrous. How about if the Cubs swoop in and take Nomar off the Red Sox hands?

Can you imagine the cool arguments Nomar could have with Mark Prior in the Cubs dugout?
Nomar: “Your wife is kind of homely.”
Franchise: “At least she’s not a lesbian soccer player.”

The Mariners are gettin’ Miggy with it. Yeah, that was bad.

The Mets think they’re going to get Little Matt Suhey.

John Franco, who is always annoying, is right about this. Moving Jose Reyes to second for some orange haired, mulletted jagoff like Little Matt Suhey is just dumb.

Baltimore thinks it can sign two of these three: Vlad Guerrero, Miggy Tejada and Javy. In a related story, the Brewers think they can sign two of these three: Keith Osik, Keith Ginter and Keith Moreland.

The Braves want another Jones.

Odalis Perez is Spanish for Shawn Estes, and the White Sox are after him, pronto.

Sports Guy with a long one on the Red Sox and his NFL picks. Oh, and he picked the Bears to cover, so we’re screwed.

Another of my former girlfriends is married. Bridget Fonda married a gay man, Danny Elfman.

This lady should go to jail, she should know McDonald’s doesn’t put mayo on their burgers.

Ben Aflac! says that he sucks in bed. That’s what Matt Damon said about him.

The world’s greatest newspaper says idiots are going to unionize. You know who their leader is, right?