wait what the f**k is going on

Writing about Alex Karras in today’s Sports On TV: Archer’s 15 Greatest Sports Moments sent me down a YouTube rabbit hole, and I cannot believe what I found.

If you’re like me, you know George Plimpton best from Ken Burns’ Baseball and from that one episode of ‘The Simpsons’ where he tries to talk Lisa into throwing a spelling bee for a college scholarship and a hot plate (“it’s perfect for soup!”). In the 1950s and 60s, Plimpton was a prolific sportswriter and author whose schtick was signing up to participate in pro sports without any training or know-how, then writing about his experience. He boxed with Sugar Ray Robinson, stood in net for the Boston Bruins, pitched in a post-season exhibition game at Yankee Stadium under coach Mickey Mantle and attended preseason training as a backup quarterback for the Detroit Lions. These moments were shared in beautifully-written books or in the pages of Sports Illustrated.

Also one time he learned pro wrestling against the dad from ‘Webster’ dressed like a caveman lion. That was … uh, not written about beautifully.

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With the Major League Baseball winter meetings under way in Dallas, this surprisingly stagnant free agency period is hopefully about to get a lot more entertaining. When the Miami Marlins are providing the only real excitement by signing Jose Reyes and overpaying Heath Bell, we’ve got a problem. Hell, I was at least hoping that 4 or 5 teams would be running smear campaigns against each other for the sake of signing Prince Fielder. But nope, bunch of jerks running these teams.

Thankfully, we have journalists like Jon Heyman, of Sports Illustrated and Scott Boras’ supple teat fame, who strapped a car battery to the testicles of this week’s meetings with a Tweet that would make Donald Trump proud.

If albert pujols wants to beat $200M 9-yr cardinals offer, he should produce birth certificate. skepticism abounds over 31 claim

Ah yes, the age thing again. You see, Albert Pujols is from the Dominican Republic, so he is most certainly lying about his age. It’s just like how all Iranians are terrorists, Greek men have sex with sheep and the Irish are all drunks. OK, maybe that last one is a bad example. But Heyman’s accusation – which echoes that of Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria – is pretty ballsy.

Let’s pretend for a minute that Pujols isn’t 31-years old. Let’s also go ahead and assume that he’s completely loaded up on steroids and HGH like some ignorant baseball fans like to believe to make themselves feel better about their teams sucking. Wouldn’t someone out there, some young, hungry bloodhound journalist, be trying desperately to reveal the truth? You know, instead of Tweeting it like a keyboard hard ass?

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Not to bring you down further on this somber 9/11 anniversary, but SPORTSbyBROOKS (that's ALLCAPSnoSPACES) is reporting that famed FSU Cowgirl and Internet phenomenon turned pin-up model turned SI.com columnist Jenn Sterger has been fired from the "two-letter."

I've never quite understood why the backlash against Sterger was so pronounced.  Everyone was all, "She just got the job because she's hot" and "She's not even that hot."  And — this is gonna be hard for you to believe — but I've even read diatribes against her breast implants.  As if they were bad.  What a bunch of homos.  Like it's some kind of surprise that attractive people get jobs.  It's no secret that's how I got this gig.  With Leather just wouldn't be a credible source of judgment if I weren't so attractive.

Anyway, good luck, Jenn.  Enjoy your new gig at NFL Gridiron Gab, and I hope to see you in a reality show soon.  And remember, if it doesn't work out… two words: Sex. Tape.

I'm sure we've all enjoyed this NFL offseason, what with Der Komissar Roger Goodell handing out draconian suspensions to players before the court system can even find them innocent or guilty.  But ol' Rog is laying the smackdown on the media, too: the websites for local TV stations are now pretty much screwed for video content.

The NFL has issued a new set of rules that severely restricts media sites usage of video shot from NFL press conferences, interviews or practices. The rules stipulate a maximum of 45 seconds of video per day, no use of live footage, a 24-hour window for all content and that content must contain links back to NFL.com and official team sites. Additionally, the video footage cannot be sponsored, and no more than 45 seconds per day of team practice footage.

The Houston Chronicle's John McClain (sadly not John McClane), who relies heavily on video for his blog content, isn't exactly thrilled with the new rules, and his most recent video displays just how little 45 seconds of screen time gives a reporter.

Roger Goodell: pissing off the players, pissing off the media, and putting NFL games in other countries.  Is he the NFL's worst commissioner ever, or…?  Huh.  I was gonna write another option, but nothing else made sense.

Unbeknownst to me, the Boston media squares off against the New York media in twice-annual "friendly" baseball games in order to… I don't know.  Mirror the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry?  Try to make themselves feel important?  And yesterday, according to Peter Abraham's LoHud Yankees Blog, things turned uglier than the players on the field (note: that's Abraham's picture on the right).

Bob Klapisch accidentally hit Boston Spanish radio broadcaster Uri Berenguer in the helmet with a pitch… and tempers flared on both sides. Boston manager Carl Beane [pictured, left], the Fenway Park PA announcer, had to be held back from attacking a few of our guys…

Good thing those New York guys weren't holding cocktail weenies, because then there would have been no chance of restraining Beane. 

I will say this about the New York media, we don’t back down when the benches clear… I wish I were kidding, but I’m not. We were a few seconds away from a full-out scrap.

Yeah, the only thing that prevented a "full-out scrap" was the two dozen aortas clogged with butter and preservatives.  They would have fought but everyone was wheezing by the time they got to the top of the dugout stairs.  Which is probably for the best — I know I wouldn't want to fight Peter Abraham.  It looks like his head is encased in a protective layer of jellied bacon.

Also see: Barstool Sports, A Pudge Is A Sandwich 

Mike Penner, who has been a sports reporter for the LA Times for 23 years, has something he wants to tell you.  I don't want to ruin the surprise, but the column is called "Old Mike, New Christine."

Today I leave for a few weeks' vacation, and when I return, I will come back in yet another incarnation. 

As Christine.

Yes, Penner is transgendered, and he's off for some surgery and hormone therapy that will make his body fall in step with the way his brain operates.  Needless to say, in the male-dominated world of sports journalism, this makes him a total freak pioneer.  Honestly, though, I have to give him (her?) credit for the bravery of the piece, and I don't envy the task of being the chick reporter who used to be a dude.  Like, chick reporters have it hard enough in sports already.  

So, Mike, good luck.  I hope the Adventures of New Christine are better than that shitty show with Julia Louis-Dreyfus.  And remember to keep detailed journals over the next couple of years, because all the persecution you face will be totally worth it when you cash in on a tell-all memoir.