Field of Deets

How is it possible that the White Sox have not yet tried to resign Paul Konerko? The guy is 29, in his prime, and coming off back-to-back 40 homer, 100 RBI seasons. He's a premiere slugger. Those guys aren't exactly a dime a dozen. And apparently he can hit in the clutch, see the Grand Slam he hit last night.

Has anyone else noticed how Joe Buck over-pronounces the first D in Scott Podsednik's last name?

Has anyone else noticed how much greater Jack Buck was than Joe Buck is?

Viscaino made Phil Garner look like a genius and then the unthinkable happened. Brad Lidge gave up a huge homer to Albert Pujols in the NLCS. But that's Pujols, probably the best hitter in the game this season. But giving up a walk off shot to Scott "I hit ZERO fucking home runs in the regular season" Podsednik is unforgivable.

Commentators have been heralding this guy as maybe the best closer in baseball. The best closer in baseball doesn't give up walk-off homers to Scotty Pod, who by the way has a weak ass throwing arm, not that that matters when you're hitting home runs in the 9th inning of a WS game.

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The Vikings are a very, very bad football team. But somehow they won after that incredible first half performance. But, I can just see them inexplicably building momentum now after a much improved second half performance, especially from Culpepper and that ridiculous 56 yard kick from the goofiest looking damn little man in the NFL, Paul Edinger. Forget Bernie Kosar's side arm chucking or anything Favre does, that wind up of his is the strangest technique in the history of the game.

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Sunday would have been my mom's 45th birthday. I always miss writing that card. So Happy Birthday to one of the most amazing women ever to walk around on this planet. There has to be a reason for my magnificent brilliance, right?

And I don't write that she was so amazing like the media writes about fallen celeberaties. When a famous person dies, the media glorifies their life and their personality with a plethora of exaggerations and makes them out to be the greatest hero/heroine who ever lived. If you put out an album or a movie within the year before your death and its at all viable, you're almost guaranteed at least a grammy/emmy/oscar nomination.

People try to remember greater people than they knew. They forget about flaws, but flaws are what make people individuals, they are what make people interesting. You can't love a person if you can't see their flaws. If you can't see their flaws then it's just idolatry. Listen to Robin Williams's speech about his late wife in Good Will Hunting.

I don't use the word amazing either. A few reasons: first, I think it is far overused. Listen to how many things people describe as amazing. They need to save words like that for when they are truly deserving. Second, I just don't like the way it sounds - something about when people prolong the sound of the second A and then the combination of the Z and ING sounds. There aren't many words, let alone good words, that end in "zing."

Zing. Reminds me of Adam West punching out a villian.

And I also don't write that my mom was amazing from the perspective of a biased son, I mean, of course I do, but she wasn't a person who only her family felt was amazing but to everyone else was just some regular, anonymous women, or worse, some bitch.

There are people who I am sure felt she was a bitch, because, she like me, could be sharp-witted with people and, also like me, was on the stubborn side of things and wasn't afraid to speak her mind.

But she was a woman widely loved. When she died my friends didn't say "Deets's mom died." They said, "Mrs. Deets" died. She was a friend to my friends as much as I was a friend to them. I've never known anyone to be able to find the good inside even the most fucked up kid like she could. She befriended kids with whom I wasn't even friends. She made an effort to make sure people knew that someone was interested in them, and it was effortless for her to do so. Her ability to feel empathy for people and to understand how they were feeling to me is still something I can't imagine being able to do. And then her instinctive ability to know just what to say to someone to brighten their day was uncanny. She could say one simple, well-timed, well-delivered, perfectly worded sentence to someone and pull them off the mat in an instant.

She wasn't always the nice, warm woman all the time. She a fierce competitive nature that had no antidote. She spent her only semester in college on the volleyball team at Moorhead in Fargo, ND. She was a 5' 11" middle hitter. Up until I was on the varsity football team, she would pace the sidelines at my games, following the ball. Her knowledge of all sports was unlike almost every other mother's. She didn't have to ask "Why are they doing that now?" all the time. She knew what the hell was going on. And she also knew the role parents should play in youth sports. She and my pops always said/say that parents are the worst part about youth sports. Parents coaching teams is a bad idea, except in rare circumstances, and then you have idiot parents who yell at kids, theirs or not, they try to live vicariously through their kids and live out their own unfulfilled dreams. Mostly they are a disaster.

When I was a sophomore on the JV basketball team I was just starting to play on the perimeter. I had always been a center up until then. It was on the first games of the year, against Merrill, and I was on the left wing and I received a pass, set my feet, began to shoot when I heard my mother's voice screaming, "NO!" from the stands. She was unforgiving yet supportive to her son, when it came to sports. I hit the three point shot, looked up at her, shook my head and hit a couple more that game. She just laughed. She had a great laugh.

So yeah, too bad for most of you, you didn't get to meet one of the top 5 greatest humans ever to live.

I pity you.

Until The Next.