Even though I enjoy Red Sox games, I don’t consider myself to be a rabid baseball fan. Mostly because I watch games in the manner in which the man who originally dubbed baseball “The Great American Pasttime” intended: as an excuse to get liquored up and whip D-cell batteries at Derek Jeter. And if those batteries accidentally ricochet off the back of the head of the nine-year-old sitting in front of me with the giant foam finger who keeps whining for Fenway Franks and complaining about my Marlboro, what can I say? Nobody expects me to be able to throw. There’s a reason I’m shitfaced and throwing badly from the stands, instead of the field. That reason is that my name isn’t David Wells.
Because of this, I’m finding it hard to crank up too much outrage over Barry Bonds being ready to break Babe Ruth’s home run record, even though Barry’s supposedly done it by pumping himself full of more horse testosterone than the girl in the animal porno MPEG I play to get people the hell away from my desk.
It’s hard for me to condemn someone for using a drug that enhances performance in their chosen profession, because I am, by trade, a comedian. And comedy is rampant with a performance-enhancing drug that scientists classify as alcohol. Barry might not have known what was in his shots of the “Clear,” but comedians know: it’s orange juice. Because it’s hard enough to do comedy after seven shots of Everclear without the pesky dry heaves.
You can hang on to your naive beliefs that comedians are compelled to go on stage because they love enteraining or because they believe in the healing power of laughter, but every comedian I’ve ever met who’s worth a damn does it because you’re allowed to drink at work. Let’s be honest: stand-up comedy without alcohol is nothing but public speaking. Imagine if your job involved driving for two hours to give a sales presentation to a bunch of strangers every night, and see how long you go before you start pronouncing “great 401K plan” as “bourbon”.
And yet while everyone’s up in arms that Barry Bonds is, most likely, juiced, nobody cares that comedians rely on drugs to make them better, because they realize that the entertainment’s all that matters. Let’s face facts: without booze and drugs, a Sam Kinison show would’ve ended with a pass of the hat and a laying on of hands, and that way lies scabies. And never forget: Richard Pryor on performance enhancers? That Nigger’s Crazy. Richard Pryor clean and sober? Superman III.
And not to put myself anywhere in the league of those guys, but is it weren’t for the comedy-enhancing qualities of booze, you would be reading a 404 Page Not Found error message right now.
Baseball is the same as any other form of entertainment, except there’s a nightly score to keep track of instead of a weekly gross. If Barry’s habits piss you off, return your tickets. Stop watching the games on TV. Hell, return one ticket, and use your single to fling batteries at him; with that giant mutant body he’s been sporting for the past few years, you won’t be able to miss him, even if you’re fucked up. Just don’t be surprised if he leaps into the air, pounces on you, and vomits a semenish-looking corrosive digestive fluid onto your leg, while Bud Selig mutters about dusting off and nuking the park from orbit because it’s the only way to be sure.
Actually, I’d pay extra to see that.
[tags]Barry Bonds, Babe Ruth, steroids, home runs record, BALCO, San Francisco Giants, dark humor[/tags]
Oh, American Jerk! How I miss you!