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Dan Shaughnessy Sucks – Bob Ryan has done his Spring Training Valentine’s love letters & now it’s Shaughnessy’s turn. From Mike
Lowell two days ago to Rocco Baldelli today. Let’s
get to the slurpin’! (Shaughnessy’s
sticky doucheiness in bold, my zing-zing-zingers
in plain.) Hey, I great idea for the title!
“Rocco’s Modern Life!” Get it?! Baldelli’s Energy Crisis Or that.. FORT MYERS, Fla. - He's
dressing in Manny's locker, Like literally inside it? he's got Nomar's
number, Blaspheme! and he's enshrined in the
Rhode Island Italian-American Hall of Fame, Ha, hilarious joke Dan. Wait, seriously?
Motto Bene! right there alongside Ernie DeGregorio. Oh, and his name is Rocco. Yeah, ‘cause “Shaughnessy’s” a normal name.. How can he be anything but a
fan favorite at It’s unpossible! Rocco Baldelli
is scheduled to make his Red Sox debut against big
league competition today when the club takes its show up Route 75 to
play the American League champion Rays in Port
Charlotte. I’m not sure a February Spring
Training game is considered “big league competition.” More like Evan Longoria
and a bunch of Nice symmetry there. Rocco
played the first five years of his career with the Rays and he homered in his last game with Tampa, the final game of
the 2008 World Series. He signed with the Red
Sox in January, and the Sox plan to use him as a fourth
outfielder - no small job on any team that employs J.D. Drew. JD? You just got Shaughnessy’d. Most Sox fans need no
introduction to Rocco. ‘Cause an Italian stands out
like a sore greasy thumb in He was All-State in baseball,
basketball, and volleyball Ha, girl.. at Bishop Hendricken High in But—but he’s Italian! But there was a ton of
potential. Italian potential. Baldelli played 156 games in his rookie season. His injuries
started a year later and he played 136 games. In 2005, he did not play at all
because of a torn ACL in his left knee and a
torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow. He’s tearin’
shit I ain’t even heard of. Fuck’s an “elbow”? He came back for 92 games in
2006, then disappeared again. Magic! He played 35 games in 2007.
Then 28 games last season. And then he died. What's wrong with Rocco? His life isn’t modern enough. He's not sure himself. Um, maybe it’s all the fuckin’ injuries? Doesn’t take an Italian rocket
scientist to figure that shit out. It's tough for a young
athlete to explain chronic low energy. And erectile fatigue. But it’s
nothing to be ashamed of.. Baldelli is only 27 years old. He's 6 feet 4 inches, weighs 200
pounds, and looks healthy enough for an 80-hour week on the loading dock. Loading & unloading crates
of linguini, fettucini & pasta fagioli. But he's got something that
won't allow him to play baseball full time anymore. Yeah, a broken everything. And the Rays let him go
because they couldn't live with the uncertainty and didn't want to match
money incentives offered by the Red Sox. Pussies.. "The way things played
out, I think this was the best situation for me," Baldelli
said yesterday after taking extra batting practice. Easy on the extra batting
practice, guy. You’re fragile. According to Baldelli's bio in the Red Sox press guide, Because that’s the only way an
award-winning nationally-syndicated sportswriter like myself
gets any information. That and Wikipedia.. he suffers from "a mitochondrial disorder, a
condition that slows muscle recovery and causes fatigue." He also has a
flesh-eating bacteria in his eyes. Good luck, Sox! Tests conducted in Yeah, but those were "I don't want to get
into medical stuff," he said. Dude, what else could you
possibly have to talk about? You’re the boy in the plastic bubble. It’s
Moops. "It's difficult to
explain. I'm not really a doctor and it's not like it's a one-word answer. It’s five words. It's tough for me to give a
brief answer when I'm talking about this stuff, so usually I stay away from
it. But I did go to Just wrongdiagnosed. At the time, with the
information they had, I think it was the best they could do. “I’m sorry, Mr. Baldelli. But the best we can do at this point, with the
information we have, is be wrong.” "Right now I feel many
times better than I did last year. I feel three times better. Last year I was still pushing
myself because I wasn't fully aware what I was dealing with and I wasn't
comfortable feeling the way that I was. So I was halfway trying to push
myself to do more and more, and instead of getting better, I was going the
other way." Not better. So how do we put this in
layman's terms? Have Tom Lehman explain it to
us? "It's tough," Baldelli said. "I don't know if there is a layman's
way to describe it. It's almost impossible. My muscles get tired, but I
prefer not to even say things like that because I don't want that to be the
headline of the story. “My Muscles Get Tired” – by Dan Shaughnessy. Got a ring to it.. That's why I don't really get
into it much. It's tough for me to explain to other people exactly what's
going on." Does Baldelli
have any emotions about playing against the Rays today? No. I am a robot. Beep-boop-beep. Error. "It will be nice to see
everyone," he said. "I have a lot of friends over there, and it was
a really good time." Baldelli is polite, almost shy when dealing with the media. Dan loves when they play
hard-to-get. He'll deliver words and fill
the sound bite for the Shaughnessy: “Rocco, how do you think you played tonight?” Baldelli: “Buh.” Shaughnessy: “Do you like your team’s chances against Baldelli: “Sneh.” This makes him a perfect fit
for the 2009 Sox. Theo and his guys have assembled a group that is the polar
opposite of the 2004 Idiots. No more wild and crazy quotes. No more Jesus
hairdos or Jack Daniel's shots. In other words: Borrrrrrrrring! Rocco won't admit to rooting
hard for the Red Sox or even the Man, he is a robot. Baldelli played left field and batted three times (two
strikeouts) against The autographs said, “Disregard
the ticking sound.” He said he felt good after
the game. He did not play against the Pirates yesterday. He is now considered missing. "I do pretty much
everything except for some conditioning stuff, I just shampoo and go. but I'm taking part in all of the baseball
activities," he said. Especially the steroids. Lots
of steroids. "My individual goal is
to be able to do what Tito [Francona] asks me to
do." Tito: Ask him to hit lots of
homeruns and not die. Dan
Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at dshaughnessy@globe.com.
~~~ Well, there you have it. Another
player, down & slurped. A month from now, the entire team and most of |
