PONDERABLES
How does Angel Hernandez, not only the worst umpire in Major League Baseball, but probably the worst umpire in the history of the game, keep his job?
How many different statistics are compiled by Major League Baseball?
THINGS I FIRMLY BELIEVE
Umpire Phil Cuzzi is not far behind Angel Hernandez when it comes to incompetence.
The Blue Jays’ logo is the best in Major League Baseball.
Although most baseball fans and pundits expected great offence from Vladimir Guerrero Jr. this season, not many expected him to be a Gold Glove candidate at first base.
The Blue Jays could have four Silver Slugger winners this season: Guerrero, Semien, Hernandez (who won last year) and Bichette.
Toronto is not a hockey town, it’s a Maple Leafs town.
The vast majority of protestors these days are a lot louder than intelligent.
President Biden looks good only in comparison to Donald Trump.
When politicians say they’re “focused” on something, you can bet they’re evading a question.
SOME MORE LIGHTHEARTED COUNTRY SONG TITLES
She Loved The Cheating Out Of Me.
I’m Mad At Myself For Getting Mad At You
I Bought The Shoes That Just Walked Out On Me
You Left Me With My Arms Full Of Empty.
THE LEADERS “DEBATE”
”Debacle” would be a more apt description of this frustrating fiasco, and even more frustrating is the organizers’ stubbornness in refusing to institute five changes that would turn the event into a real (and entertaining) debate.
1) Include only leaders whose parties have candidates running in at least 275 ridings (a little over 80%). This would have eliminated Bloc Québécois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet and Green Party leader Annamie Paul. The Bloc has no candidates outside Quebec. Paul didn’t even win her own seat, and unless mail-in ballots and recounts change results her party won only two. All their presence accomplished was reducing the time available to Trudeau, O’Toole and Singh.
2) Let the leaders choose the topics.
3) Don’t have journalists or members of the public involved. The involvement of CTV’s Evan Solomon, Global’s Mercedes Stephenson, and Aboriginal Peoples Television Network’s Melissa Ridgen diminished rather than enhanced the telecast. And the “public questioners” segment was farcical.
4) Select a seasoned moderator whose role is limited to introducing the topics and monitoring the leaders’ time allotments.
5) Mute the leaders’ microphones except during their specifically allotted times.
THE ELECTION ITSELF
It’s easy to sum up the 2021 federal election: a Liberal cabinet shuffle that cost taxpayers $610 million.
THE CONSERVATIVE PARTY OF CANADA
This election proved again that the Conservative Party of Canada doesn’t have any idea how to run an election campaign.
The only reason Erin O’Toole may survive as the party’s leader is that unless Rona Ambrose has a monumental change of heart there’s no obvious successo.
A DREADFUL BROADCAST TEAM
Why Sportsnet allows Buck Martinez and Pat Tabler on the air together is a ponderable truly worthy of its own heading. Martinez is fine as a colour commentator, but a total bust doing play-by-play. He often misidentifies players (even Blue Jays), too often misses player substitutions, wastes a lot of time uselessly predicting what pitches are coming (and is wrong more often than right), and doesn’t recap scoring often enough. He also seems to forget that we’re watching the game on TV; for example, when he opines a pitch “just caught the corner” when it clearly missed the plate by six inches.
Tabler is a babbler who rarely adds anything worthwhile. He spends far too much time talking like he’s addressing a bunch of 12-year-olds at a little league clinic, constantly beginning sentences with “That’s how you …..” He also thinks he’s a mindreader, evidenced by his seemingly endless pronouncements about what pitches batters are “looking for.” Tabler’s overuse of the phrase “a little bit” is particularly annoying. (I once counted 87 times during a game, and a friend told me that he once counted five in a single sentence). His “colour” is laced with harebrained inanities. In this respect, I thought he had hit an all-time low a while back when after Bo Bichette drove in a run, Tabler commented “That’s how you lead the league in RBIs, you drive in runs.” But then a little later, when pitcher Steven Matz got hit on the foot by a grounder back to the mound, Tabler declared that Matz had been hit “in the body area.”
As mentioned, Martinez is okay as a colour commentator, especially with the great Dan Shulman doing play-by-play, but watching Martinez and Tabler together should count as time in purgatory.