Have Yourself a Very Pennant-less Baseball Season

Just when you thought it was safe to visit the world's largest sewer located 209 miles south of Boston proudly donning a Red Sox cap, the Old Towne Team has proven once again that the phrase "laughable" is best followed by the words "Boston Red Sox".

Like a Boston University coed hastily obliterating the contents of a Krispie Kreme box with complete disregard to human decency, the Red Sox' triple serving of thickheadedness is likewise emptying the roster of the 2004 World Champions.


Sox Stooges Jed "Mo"-yer, "Larry" Lucchino, and Ben "Curly"-ington do their part to revive the glory days of the Lou Gorman era on Yawkey Way.

The latest chapter in Boston baseball's mirthful existence is their response to losing the very overrated Johnny Damon to the "official team of yesteryear", the NY Yankees. After it was announced, by Damon himself on Boston television, that the centerfielder was going to the unofficial safe haven for the "dead beat dad", Red Sox' President Larry Lucchino went out of his way to tell the media that there was no deal since the Yankees hadn't officially announced it.

Less than 30 minutes later during the same press conference, Theo Epstein wannabe and baseball incompetent co-GM Jed Hoyer later admitted that he had heard from the Yankees the night before of the free agent signing. While Red Sox Nation feels about as flat as the chest of a U.Maine hockey player's adolescent gal pal, it should be noted that this disaster has been in full flight since Halloween.


$13 million for four years will make Yankees fans cry when they realize their new center fielder's arm is so weak he needs both of them to privately satisfy himself.

The day his contract was set to expire as Red Sox General Manager, Theo Epstein chose to "give it the old quit" and instead of trading ballplayers, the lifelong Sox fan decided he'd rather make goo-goo eyes at the lead singer of a mid-level Seattle rock and roll band. Where else but in the offices at Fenway Park could a popular GM quit his job minutes before literally leaving the park in a gorilla suit on his way to a Halloween party.


Despite the dour ongoings at Fenway Park this winter, Christmas at nearby Boston University remains a festive and joyous time.

Since the post-Theo days, the Red Sox have watched everyone except the guy who cleans the human residue off the Hobey Baker trophy at the Jason Krog shrine in Durham, NH turn down an opportunity to interview for the vacated GM job. While Theo's former office remained empty, the Red Sox chose to trade their best prospect for a pitcher whose shoulder is held together with scotch tape. Days after trading their shortstop of the future in Hanley Ramirez, it only makes sense in the world of Boston baseball to trade the incumbent in Edgar Renteria who hours after the trade was referred to as "Gone-eria".

Your superiors can only surmise what will happen next. As a matter of fact, with all the new faces who will wear the red stockings this spring, one of the few Red Sox players left from 2004 is the one who wants to be here the least in Manny Ramirez. Considering the asute nature of the Boston braintrust, the chances of Manny being traded for a quality player are as likely as Pat Morita and Nipsey Russell showing up on your doorstep on Christmas Eve to sing "Here Comes Santa Claus".


It could be worse, Sox fans, you could be this guy (or even worse, a U.Mass Lowell graduate).

Your superiors at Pinhead Nation wish our fellow glitterati a few collar-up Christmas.

Collar Up.

-DW

Boise, Idaho. Just East of Nowhere.

With a vacant stare, our dim servant stood with news that would force any collar up to look for the brandy glass. After several minutes, he finally was able to speak and deliver his dour news. Boston College was being banished to Boise, Idaho to play some Canadian college named "Boise State" in a meaningless football game played on a blue football field and commentated by a lesbian ESPN announcer named Pam something.


Welcome to Idaho, wish we weren't here.

Immediately, the people you wish you were began to research "Boise, Idaho" and after several hours, realized that a "collar up" has never stepped foot in the place. Most surprising, to the best of our knowledge, Idaho is actually a real state, not just a made up locale designed to scare children into finishing their dinner like "Middle-Earth" or "Grand Forks, North Dakota".


Idaho ranks 49th out of 50 US States with an average IQ of 87 ahead of only Mississippi. An IQ of 87 is considered "below average" and is consistent with careers such as "Gardeners", "Miners", "Farmhands", and something called a "sorter".

After learning as much as we could about "Idaho", your superiors quickly learned that Idaho wasn't as bad as previously thought. According to 2004 US Census numbers, 21% of the state's population has earned a college degree while a whopping 84% used their blood, sweat, and tears to earn that prestigious high school diploma. Most impressive is that of the 1.3 million residents of "The Gem State", only 200,000 of them have physical disabilities.


Although claiming tolerance towards other religions, Idahoans who don't pray to a potato resembling former Idaho resident Harmon Killebrew are subject to scorn.

Nonethless, on December 28th, the official college football team of Pinhead Nation will embark on a three-day journey to Boise (the word "Boise" is the Sioux indian word for "worthless") for the MPC Computers Bowl vs. Boise State University. Boston College was sent to Boise as part of a bizarre Atlantic Coast Conference hazing ritual for its new members. Boise State won the honor to participate after Gene Bleymaier, Boise State University Director of Athletics, was awarded the bowl game after holding the lucky ticket following a NCAA 50/50 raffle event.


The Boise State Broncos, here shown on defense, appear to be overmatched vs. their ACC opponent despite winning 31 straight home games and owning several Pop Warner championships.

Although most of the maroon and gold clad cognoscenti that dot our Blackberries are quite upset about this game, your superiors simply look at this contest as a Peace Corps mission disguised as a football game. Considering the average per capita income of Idaho is just over $37,000 per year, the opportunity for residents to sell keychains and french fries to their regal visitors from the Northeast is a Godsend.

Collar Up.

-DW

Night of the Living Detritus

Since last Saturday night, the phone at Stately Pinhead Manor has been ringing off the hook. If the people you wish you were paid our Northeastern grad servant by the number of phone calls he answered, he probably could have taken his family off welfare.

By Monday, the number of disgruntled classmates from America's Best College who had called to voice their vexation was amaranthine. First, they were mildly agitated by the fact that America's Team, in a moment of charity, folded up the tents and gave Kenmore Community College a gift win on the ice on Saturday night. Second, they were ireful by the fact that the football squad was disgraced by being sent to Boise, Idaho for their annual bowl game.

Our weekend started innocently enough as your superiors jumped into our limousine and headed for a place rarely visited by high society, the cognoscenti, or even by those who bathe on a regular basis.

Several times during the winter when our social calendars have, quite frankly, nothing better planned, Pinhead Nation has been known to travel to other universities and watch America's Team play. Normally, we are treated to yet another BC hockey victory and, more important, we are reminded of our social and intellectual transcendence by simply witnessing the cultus qualities of the local coterie.


The excitement of game day has made it difficult for employed Boston University graduates to focus on their jobs.

As always, a visit by Pinhead Nation to the ugly end of Commonwealth Ave is an exercise in lunacy and an opportunity for the elite to mix with the raffish. The highlight, of course, is witnessing the scarlet and white-clad muck populating an arena named for a man who lacked the athleticism to play 1A football and settled for Boston U. BU's mega-Mongoloidian students, armed with a hatred only the combo of a "Rubbing Alcoholic-induced" buzz and a BC rejection letter can create, add to a sociological carnival that would make Jane Goodall proud.


Local street people who populate the Boston University campus give the Terriers a unique home ice advantage over their opponents.

Attendance at a game at Agganis Arena, or Egg-Anus Arena, is a celebration of academic incompetency. Realizing their inferiority to an elite group of visiting fans sitting in their own arena, BU fans chant "BC Sucks (for rejecting me)" while secretly wishing they were sitting in BC's section donning a gold t-shirt and owning an IQ above freezing. Some BU students, so hideously ugly that when they were born the hospital delivery room doctor slapped their mothers, hide their disfigured faces with paint.


During a promotion during BU hockey games, a lucky BU student is asked to raise his BC rejection letter and invite all those who also received one to leave Agganis Arena for free drinks at nearby T's Pub, thus emptying the arena.

The Egg-Anus Arena is one that has taken a considerable home ice advantage away from the home team. As recently as last year, BU's Walter Brown Arena, affectionately known as "The Urinal" for its permanent smell of kashi-laden urine, provided a formidable feeling of intimidation equalled only by the endless "call of the bottle" felt by the current Terrier hockey coach. Despite having toilets that are made with the ability to flush and actual sinks in the bathrooms, closer inspection of "Egg-Anus" reveals one epic flaw. While coach Parker has included several weight and meeting rooms designed to make his players better, he tragically erred when he allowed BU's existing fan base to pollute his multi-million dollar edifice.


Deep within the bowels of Agganis Arena are classrooms designed to help BU hockey players with their course work. Each year, BU Hockey's "Magna Cum Bourquey" Award is given to the Terrier icer who achieves the lowest team grade point average.

As the game vs. America's Team wore on, it became clear that they had caught BC on a bad night and were heading towards a victory over their hated rival. In a homage to former UNH netminder Michael Ayers and overall Wildcat NCAA futility, the Eagles collapsed by allowing 4 goals in the last eight minutes to fall 6-2 to BU. When the final buzzer sounded, the party in Kenmore Square was just beginning.


Following BU's 6-2 win over America's Team, Boston University students celebrated and danced the night away on Landsdowne Street.

While being carted back to the estate, we happened to throw on the TV to catch the second half of the ACC football title game. Sadly, the rewarding feeling of charity we felt after watching BC gift Kenmore State a much needed victory was quickly dashed by the ongoings in Jacksonville. Despite being a 14 point favorite, the bucolic mossbacks of Virginia Tech found a way to lose to Florida State, thus affecting the ultimate bowl destination of the gridders from Chestnut Hill.

Shortly after our arrival at the manse, there was a pounding on the door. When the door was opened, there stood one of our drones with a look of mortal shock on his face. He had bad news about BC's bowl destination and it was clear that our night had just begun...

(To be continued)


Even sorority girls at BU weren't shy about telling everyone who was "number one" after their team defeated BC.

Collar Up.

- DW

Something Old and Something B(l)U(e)

Joe Paterno gives BU fans hope.

You've heard the comparisons before. Jack Parker is a classless, drunk version of JoePa. They've both lost it. They both should have retired long ago. The game has passed them by.

But this year these statements have proven to be false. Well... half false.

It's been an amazing season for Penn State football. They are a last-second Michigan touchdown away from being undefeated and in the national title mix. The old ball coach has risen from the ashes to return the old ball club to past glory. This return to glory at Penn State is real. And even though our Eurotrash friends down at the disgusting part of Comm Ave don't have a football team of their own to root for (American football anyhow), they've been watching college football and Penn State and see a reason for optimism in their once proud hockey program.

But that's where it all ends. Quickly reality slaps them in the face like a pimp slapping his hooker on the sidewalk in front of Warren Towers. And then it sinks in for the fans that couldn't get into Boston College. BU sits at 4-5-1 overall through a fairly easy schedule (RPI, Lowell x 2, UMass Amherst), with the reaper coming.

This weekend, they will stare face to face with the team they wish they were. And aside from selling out his players in the papers to cover up his pathetic recruiting and player development, there's nothing "Jack and Choke" can do to keep the downward spiral from happening. Like a portion of feculent waste that swirls the bowl before finally disappearing into oblivion, BU's hockey demise has exhibited a slower death than a moribund alzheimer's patient who overdoses on Viagra in hopes it will rekindle "the good ole' days".


Each game, Coach Parker's positive attitude and gregarious personality has his Terriers pumped and ready to return BU to its days of glory.

Like a lunatic standing in a traffic rotary yelling at cars, Parker will kick and scream while his team fails. It will be the ref's fault. It will be the puck's fault. It will be the fans' fault for only filling up half of their new 6,000 seat arena. It'll be the band's fault. But you can be sure in his own mind, it isn't HIS fault. Nope. Never. He'll berate officials. He'll bench players. But it's all just a circus sideshow to distract the few English speaking people that are watching from the main attraction from the student section. Truth be told, over the last decade, Kenmore Community College has gone from a perennial power and the best program in the east, to a has-been and the fourth best team in Hockey East.

So we raise our flumes to you, Penn State. We pop our collars to your football season and for giving BU fans a glimmer of hope during a hopeless situation. If you can actually get your arms around one of them, give a BU fan a hug today as they certainly need it.

As outlined above, it still SUX2BU. The worst BU fans of all are the "QueerEyefortheBUguys" who sit in the front of the BU student section and jump up and down and hug their male friends when BU scores a goal. After witnessing this phenomenon, it's clear that poor BU forward Brad Zancanaro won't the only one who will "get a high stick in the crease" on game night.


Due to fear of STD's among the student population, Boston University made it mandatory for BU fans to "wear protection" before jumping and hugging eachother after the rare BU goal.

The jumping and hugging by the male BU students has become a tradition at BU. Just like the fat, slightly-retarded, hairy ape named "Sasquatch" that takes his shirt off to get BU fans' minds off the fact that they hold a degree that we use as coasters at our yacht club. If you've been watching lately, you'd know that the Sasquatch tradition is on its way out. Quite frankly, we're worried that another pathetic BU tradition is in danger of becoming extinct as well (don't fret, BU students, fifth-year sophomore Khalid Karwari's "Kashi and Keg Cavalcade" in Shelton Hall is still alive and strong), we're talking about hockey recruiting.


"The Kashi and Keg Cavalcade" at BU allows students to blow off steam and "drop some trou" after enduring another failed hockey campaign.

It's December and another BU recruiting class is well on its way on the road to underachievement. Although loaded with young offensive firepower, once again, Jacko has somehow managed to turn a talented group into a class that couldn't score in a monkey whorehouse with a bag full of bananas. With almost 10 straight underachieving and overrated recruiting classes coming into Baghdad University, the Derrieres find themselves in fine company in the scoring department once again. BU's 2.62 goals per game average is 7th in Hockey East. The only ones who score less than BU are Northeastern, Merrimack, and that Pakistani kid with psoriasis who sits in the back of BU's "English for Hindus" class while stashing skin flakes in his turban.

It seems that BU students haven't been getting hugs as a result of the low scoring offense and their inability to convince any girls under 300 lbs to go out with them. So, we at Pinhead Nation implore you all to have a heart. Give a BU student fan a hug today. They badly need it. DISCLAIMER: Pinhead Nation is not responsible for the contraction of any STDs or head lice from hugging BU fans.


Dateless and without the burden of wearing deodorant, the BU hockey fan is living proof of what can happen to a high school student if he doesn't take his S.A.T.s seriously.

While we're on BU recruiting classes, it reminds the people you wish you were how extraordinary the freshman class is over at America's Team. BC's dynamic duo of Brock Bradford and Nathan Gerbe have combined for 8 goals already this year, 3 of those being game-winners. BU's Terrible Trio (realize we're giving BU an extra player while comparing 2 vs. 3 players here) of Brandon Yip, Chris "Crosby" Higgins, and Jason "Drury who?" Lawrence have combined for 5 goals. And only 1 of those 5 goals were game-winning goals. The stud of the class, Lawrence has a whopping 1 goal to his name so far. Welcome to the Terrier hockey, Jason! Another great recruiting class for BU. Remember, you can't spell B-U-S-T without "B-U."

Look on the bright side BU fans, the 2nd Monday in February is almost here, so the season is almost over!

Collar Up.

- Mav