Miscellaneous Thoughts

Some random thoughts while I watch the Red Sox / Royals game...

I wonder if Angel Berroa's new contract and the $11 million that goes with it will help clear up those migranes that have been keeping him out of the Royals line-up... Carlos Zambrano threw a 2-hit shut-out today for the Cubs against the Rockies. I found it interesting that the only two hitters from the Rockies to score hits were their two rookies - Aaron Miles and Matt Holliday... I was surprised to learn that George Brett is not the Royals all-time leader in batting average. Brett finished with a .305 average for his career - which is just a tad behind current Royal 1st baseman Mike Sweeney and Dan Shaughnessy favorite Jose Offerman - both of whom have .306 marks... George Brett does hold the Royals team marks in HR, runs, RBI and hits. If Brett had those numbers for the Red Sox - he would have been 5th in HR, 3rd in runs, 3rd in RBI and 2nd in hits. Brett's .305 average would only be good enough for 12th place on the Sox all-time list... Have you heard the phrase "the buck stops here"? The phrase actually doesn't mean "I take responsibility for what happened because I'm the boss." The "buck" is actually a poker term. It is the puck/token that is passed from the player who just dealt to the next player to deal to keep track of whose deal it is. The saying really took root because of Harry S. Truman (who was an avid poker player). When Harry said, "the buck stops here" - he meant that he would take action (i.e. deal) and not leave it for someone else to act (i.e "pass the buck" or in other words "pass the deal"). People today seem to think the phrase means taking the blame. We used to be a nation that fixed the problem - not the blame... The next logical step in the Spiderman II logo on the bases scam is for MLB to auction off a bunch of bases that they had made up for the promotion on eBay with the proceeds going to charity. The movie gets more free publicity - I'm just waiting for this to happen...