Last night Chip Caray stopped by the Sports Central studio to hang out with Dave Kaplan and Tom Waddle. Not only did WGN promise to screen out any caller who would dare to criticize the monobrow dumbass, but they let him ramble on for nearly an hour. I was going to just turn him off and ignore him until he said something that I’m still trying to figure out.

He was talking about how baseball needs to somehow increase its appeal to kids. He said, “Right now we’re losing kids to soccer, basketball and handball.”

Handball.

Handball?

Are there all kinds of kids’ organized handball leagues all over America that I’m not aware of? Is ESPN2 going to cover the Little League of Handball World Series this fall? And by handball does he mean that stupid version of racquetball that you play without a racquet or does he mean the goofy Olympic version that’s like indoor soccer with hands?

I was hoping that at the very least Chip would tell us that his imaginary twin boys were avid handball enthusiasts? But Kap and Waddle were so dumbfounded by the handball answer that they quickly changed the subject.

Chip had a couple of other doozies though. The first hour of the show was dominated by Steve Stone’s regular Monday night visit (on the phone, even he’d had enough Chip). Steve for about the 1,000,012th time in the last two years advocated a Major League Baseball team going back to the four-man pitching rotation. Steve says that if you start it in the minor leagues you can get your pitchers used to doing it. It makes sense, given that most teams fifth starter is a joke and the typical winning percentage for a fifth starter (ask the White Sox) is less than .250.

Chip was asked about it and he said that it would work but it would shorten the careers of the pitchers because they’ll get hurt.

Huh?

OK, first of all, if, as Chip believes, the pitchers would get hurt then it wouldn’t work. Secondly…there is no secondly, Chip is a moran.

Kaplan went off on how Bruce Froemming is an embarrassment to baseball because he’s a lousy ump and at at least 100 pounds overweight he’s literally obese. Chip responded by trying to not respond, and when pressed he refused to call Froemming by name, instead referring to him twice as “that particular umpire.” Chip was in his typical kissass apologist mode anyway, talking about how hard it is to be an umpire now that there are TV cameras to document every play. That’s right, they have to actually get it right. Wow there’s a tough standard to uphold.

I’m just wondering if Chip’s refusal to say “that particular umpire’s” name had anything to do with Fox’s new show, “The Best Bruce Froemming Sports Show, Period”?

Kaplan went off on Sammy and gave his ususal the Cubs will never win anything until he’s gone rant. Kap has never hid his disdain for Sosa, even though it’s rooted in the fact that he had a man crush on Mark Grace and since Grace hated Sammy, so did Kaplan. Kaplan could have picked up other parts of the Grace persona, like smoking Winstons by the carton and banging any skank in a halter top, but instead he went with the Sosa hatred and the inability to stop talking. Hey, life’s all about choices.

Kerry Wood’s five game suspension was upheld yesterday and Chip said that it’s ridiculous. Of course, why he thinks it’s ridiculous…is ridiculous. Personally, I don’t think Wood should have been suspended at all. For what he did, running up to an ump and yelling at him, you get a fine and go on your merry way. Chip thinks that you should suspend a starting pitcher for “a start” not for five days.

How the hell do you do that? Like a manager couldn’t say, “Wood is starting on Wednesday” and then baseball says he’s suspended and so he starts on Thursday? Brilliant, Chip. You’ve got your finger all over that button, don’t you? Nitwit.

Here I thought I was going to enjoy a nice, peaceful, Chip-free night and instead I ended up learning that Chip Caray’s “Lloyd Dobler sport of the future” is handball.

Speaking of handball, it’s time for a Karry Ling Olympic Moment.

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Hello again, everybody, your old friend Karry Ling here at the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. Yesterday, Pepe and I took in some of the badminton action over at the…uh…badminton arena.

While there I stopped to chat with NBC Badminton expert, Bill Clement.

Karry: Bill Clement, what does a five-time NHL All-Star know about badminton?
Bill Clement: Why is this yak licking my arm?
Karry: I think he likes you.
Bill: Can he like me from a distance?
Karry: No.
Bill: I’ve uh…got to go.

Anyway, from his bio on nbcolympics.com it says that Clement was a two time Quebec champion in badminton during his high school days in the 60s. Even in the 60s, I think badminton champion was code for “queer as a three dollar bill.”

Regardless, I spent some time at the badminton arena watching…the guys play badminton. It’s incredibly boring. You can say what you want about how fast the shuttlecock moves, Inga Hammond claims she’s seen a shuttlecock go 200 MPH, and I told her that it’d feel better if she slowed down. She slapped me. But no matter how fast the “birdie” is moving, there’s no way to play badminton and not look like Richard Simmons at a bake sale.

I don’t even know what that means.

Clement is not only a badminton expert, but he’s also the NBC analyst for table tennis (ping pong for those of you in the Parcells-ian anti-Asian League) and modern pentathlon. For those of you who don’t know what modern penthlon is, it comes from the Greek word penta which means five. It also involves a horse. As far as I can tell the five stages of the pentahlon are
1) riding your horse around an obstacle course
2) shooting the horse four times.

That doesn’t seem right, but I guess it has to be. I was going to ask Clement about it, but Pepe kept licking his arm and suddenly Clement remembered that his room in the Olympic village was on fire. I hope he was able to put it out.

For tomorrow’s report, Pepe and I are hoping to meet those cute little Russian synchronized divers. So we’ll either be in custody, or we’ll have that report.

Until next time, reporting from Athens…Karry Ling.

Jim Hendry didn’t seem any too pleased that Kerry Wood’s suspension stood.

Dave van Dyck says that the Cubs might not like it, but they have to root for the Dodgers. Why would they care if the Dodgers win? Hell, they seemed pretty happy to help LA out this weekend. I can’t imagine there’s a big anti-Dodgers sentiment on the club. Well, except for Grudzielanek.

Seabiscuit’s Jockey has realized that the Cubs’ fans like Nomar. Very perceptive, little man.

Mike Goolsby’s glad to be back. I’d be glad if he actually tackled somebody.

Rex Tucker’s hurt again. What a shock.

Groucho’s worried about Larry Brown.

Mariotti puts down the doughnut for another column on Michael Phelps.

Toni Ginetti trots out the most overrated stat in baseball. A team’s record in one-run games. All one-run games are not created equally. If you are up 7-1 in the ninth and your bullpen implodes and you win 7-6 that’s good? If you’re down 6-0 and you rally for five runs, that’s bad? Here’s the important stat. You take the total number of games you play…hang with me here and you compare the number of them you win, to the number you lose. The good teams, they win the most.

The Wizard of Roz says that fans and the media made Sammy what he is. We made him the most prolific home run hitter in Cubs history?

Who is Chuck Klosterman and really, why should anybody care?

Then again, it’s not like Simmons spent thousands of words trying to get us to buy Madden 2005 even though it’s the same steaming pile that Madden 2004 was and is basically just the fourth version of Madden 2002. Nah.

Does Dick Vitale really think he’s the first guy to dream up sending the NBA Champs to the Olympics?

John Donovan on what’s left of the pennant races.

Hey Houston fans, get ready for lots of needless bunting! And I don’t mean the stuff you hang up on Opening Day.

Deion says Ray Lewis might just talk him into coming back. Yeah, that a big-assed check.

Honestly, shouldn’t Ray have a bigger helmet? That thing can’t be comfortable.

Diane Lane married Josh Brolin in secret. Probably so Shannen Doherty couldn’t charge in and beat her (or him, for that matter) up.

America’s finest news source with the story of new woman Sally Erhardt!