Asshole Of The Week: Joe Mauer

Welcome to Asshole Of The Week, where every Friday your trusty Foul Balls editor picks out the one person from the previous seven days who makes him think, "Man, what an asshole." It could be anybody from an athlete, an owner, someone in the media, or just anybody who happens to catch my ire.

This week's winner of the Asshole Of The Week wasn't as easy for me to figure out as it has been in the first three week's of its conception. There wasn't that one person who really stood out to me this week.

For a while I thought about giving it to PETA for their reactions to Eight Belles dying at last week's Kentucky Derby. The only problem with that was then I'd have to pretend I really cared about horse racing, and I don't.

I also thought about giving it to Carol Slezak, but really, Panger is far more qualified to handle that situation than I am.

There was even some thought as to giving it to both Jay Mariotti and Rick Telander for their columns about Cedric Benson, and how the team should just cut him now immediately, even though the entire story hadn't surfaced yet. Just because he's not that good at football doesn't mean we should deny him a chance to prove his innocence first.

I decided against it though because I've given the Sun-Times enough grief this week, and really, giving Jay Mariotti an AOTW would be redundant. He's already the Asshole Of Every Day.

So, after much deliberating, in the end I had to go ahead and give it to Twins catcher Joe Mauer. After all, it was Mauer who broke up Gavin Floyd's second no-hit bid of the season with a one-out double in the 9th inning. Of course, there's a problem with giving Mauer the AOTW as well.

By all accounts, Joe Mauer is a nice guy and I've never read or heard a story saying otherwise. Plus, you can't really blame him for hitting that double. It is his job after all, and I don't think there are many players in baseball who want to be on a team that gets no-hit.

Still, it ruined my night. And I deserved that night too.

I've spent the last few years being tortured by sports teams in Chicago. As has been chronicled here at Foul Balls during the time, ever since the Bears lost Super Bowl XLI things have gone to shit around here. The Bears suck, the Bulls suck, the Sox sucked last season, and even though the Blackhawks improved, they still didn't make the playoffs. The only team that's had any success is the Cubs, and for obvious reasons, that doesn't exactly thrill me. Though even if it did, they still got swept right out of the playoffs.

When it hasn't been the teams themselves sucking, it's been off the field crap. Tank Johnson, Lance Briggs' car ride and contract situation, Brian Urlacher's family life and now his contract situation.

Ben Wallace's bad attitude, and Chris Duhon's partying.

Ozzie's mouth (actually, that's entertaining, but hearing the moaning about it gets annoying).

Sam Zell.

Even Benny the Bull is getting in on the act, if not spearheading it, with his reign of terror upon Chicagoland.

Everything in this city has just had a negative undertone when it comes to sports. So when I have an opportunity to take joy in something like a no-hitter, I don't take it for granted. It's the type of moment that helps a fan get through trying times like these, much like Mark Buehrle's no-hitter last season, or a Devin Hester touchdown return.

You took that moment away from me on Tuesday night, Mauer, and I don't appreciate it. And what did you accomplish by doing so? You still lost the game, but I lost happiness. You were going to lose anyway, why did you feel the need to rob that from me and other White Sox fans?

You're a sick and evil man, Joe Mauer, and you should be ashamed of yourself, but you aren't. No, when I look into your eyes, I don't see remorse. I see nothing. A cold, dark heart that has no feelings for anything but singles the other way and neatly trimmed sideburns.

Look into the eyes of a soulless man

And that, Joe Mauer, is why you're the Asshole Of The Week.

Rick Telander Doesn't Trust Anybody

I didn't see Rick Telander's column in the Chicago Sun-Times yesterday until I was already at work, but if I had read it before I left in the morning, I don't think I'd have had any trouble finding something to write about yesterday.

Telander's column was focused on one thing: his Hall of Fame ballot. The ballot he left blank and refused to turn in this year.

I didn't mail my ballot. The stamp is still good.

The Steroid Era has taken the wind out of my sail.

I am weary of the constant insult brought on by doping and stupidity and head-in-the-sand-ism and Bonds-ish arrogance and Clemens-ian tape-recording and duplicity of all manner and the way this has chipped away at the edifice of the wondrous American sport of baseball.

Now I understand where Telander is coming from here. His point is that he just doesn't know whom to trust anymore in the world of baseball. But I still think his not sending in his ballot is absolutely ridiculous.

Especially when he goes on in the column to say things like this.

I read the biographies of the 25 candidates in detail, studying numbers as intensely as an accountant.

Rich Gossage -- nine All-Star teams, 310 saves, 2.36 World Series ERA. I'm delighted Goose was voted in Tuesday.

He deserved it.

I voted for him in 2007.

So he deserved your vote last year, when you already knew about Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, and everybody else, but now that Roger Clemens and David Segui's names have come out, you can't vote?

What the hell sense does that make? If you have children, let's say three of them, and you find a bag of weed in your youngest kids' bedroom, do you punish your oldest kid as well because he might have gotten high once in his life as well?

No. You punish the one you busted.

Of course, there's a difference between your kid getting busted with pot, and a baseball player doing steroids 25 years ago. That difference is your kid actually did something illegal, where as baseball players did nothing against the rules.

I won't even get started on the absurdity of what Telander said here.

I saw Tommy John throw some mediocre games. But I saw him come back from radical elbow surgery that one day would be named after him.

Tommy John -- 288 wins -- was a pioneer. He should be in the Hall.

What if Tommy John made his comeback from that tendon grafting because of HGH?

Ok, Rick. Did anyone even know what the hell HGH was back when Tommy John played? Honestly, I don't know.

Maybe things are just different for me because my entire baseball-loving life has existed during the steroid era. I don't know any other game, and guess what, I love the game just as much as fans did before me.

I don't know. All I know is that if I was ever honored with having a ballot for the Hall of Fame, I'd actually use the damn thing.

And not just for a column.

Foul Balls

So Maybe The Falcons Aren't Wasting Their Time (Okay, They Are) - Yesterday I said there was no way in hell that USC coach Pete Carroll would ever leave sunny southern California to take over in Atlanta as coach of the Falcons.

Apparently I was wrong.

Carroll is interested in the job, and he's talking to the Falcons about it.

Southern California coach Pete Carroll is interested in the Falcons' head coach opening and spoke with Atlanta owner Arthur Blank via phone Wednesday, sources at the American Football Coaches Convention in Anaheim told ESPN's Joe Schad.

Blank, who has also been searching for a general mangager, was expected to offer full control of personnel decisions to Carroll, and the sources said that is what intrigues Carroll most. The coach is currently on vacation in Hawaii.

Okay, Pete. Let's think about this for a second. Let's say I had a choice between Jessica Alba and Britney Spears. I could take whichever one of the two I chose, and have complete control over both of them. What they do, and when they do it with whomever I tell them to do it with.

Who would I pick? Let's break down our options.

In the case Alba, you have an established star who's still rising, and oh yeah, she's hotter than hell. With Spears, you have a situation that used to look nice and had a lot of promise, but all we've seen from her the last year is not pretty. Things are falling apart, and fast.

Don't pick Britney Spears, Pete.

The Bears Can Take Derek Anderson's Name Off Their Wish List - So most of the talk about who the Bears were going to go after to play quarterback next season included Donovan McNabb and Derek Anderson.

Word out of Philadelphia is that the Eagles aren't interested in trading McNabb, but that could be nothing more of a way to make sure that if they do trade him, they want anybody who is interested to know that he won't come cheap.

As for Derek Anderson, well, the Bears won't be signing the restricted free agent because he's not going to be a restricted free agent.

The Browns plan to sign quarterback Derek Anderson to a multiyear deal soon, keep him off the restricted free-agent market and let him start at least one more season, Browns General Manager Phil Savage said Wednesday.

In his end of the season news conference, Savage said the Browns have been talking to Anderson's agents and that negotiations could heat up by the end of this week.

So Brady Quinn will be sitting for at least one more year in Cleveland, who now has a situation that's very similar to the one the Chargers faced a few years ago with Drew Brees and Philip Rivers. The Browns may keep both quarterbacks for one more year, but there's no way in hell they keep both in 2009. That's just too much money locked up into your quarterback position, so I expect the "Get Brady Quinn!!" screams to start around the second preseason game next season.

Tyler Hansbrough Fears No Giant - UNC-Asheville has a 7'9 7'7" (Ed. Note: Thanks to Jenks for pointing that out) center named Kenny George on their team. No joke, the kid is 7'7. The UNC Tar Heels have Tyler Hansbrough, who's nearly a full foot shorter than George at 6'9.

That didn't stop Tyler from dunking on the big man on Wednesday night though.

An Inconvenient Column

Normally, when I open my copy of the Chicago Sun-Times and I see that Mariotti has the day off, I rejoice. It's like a gift from the Gods that I don't have to look at that picture.

Instead, yesterday there was a column from Rick Telander.

And what was Telander's column about?

Global warming.

What. The. Hell?

I'm sorry, I thought I was in the sports section, and I get this:

Hey, Chicagoans, how would you like to live in the Miami of the Midwest? All you gotta do is stay put! Climate-wise, in 50 years, maybe less, Chicago could be what Miami is now -- minus the proximity to Havana, of course, and minus the fact a good part of South Florida might be under water.

Forget January snowball fights in Grant Park.

How about spring-break water skiing on Lake Michigan?

How about Christmas margaritas outdoors?

By now, you've heard of global warming.

I'm guessing the only people who don't think the condition is real and largely man-created are right-wing loon Ann Coulter -- whose little black dress will give way to a little black bikini with temperature increase -- and flat-earth societies.

Boy, you're right, Mr. Telander. I sure have heard of this global warming! Sounds terrific, I could use a break from these harsh Chicago winters. You know what else I've heard of, though?

Sports.

You know, that topic you're supposed to be writing about. So get to it.

Sports Illustrated, not exactly a scientific journal, just used a doctored photo on its cover of Florida Marlins pitcher Dontrelle Willis standing on the pitcher's mound at Dolphin Stadium in Miami, thigh-deep in water.

''SPORTS AND GLOBAL WARMING,'' the headline reads. ''As the Planet Changes, So Do the Games We Play -- Time to Pay Attention.''

Ya think?

Ice caps that have been around for millennia are melting swiftly.

The ocean is expected to rise anywhere from a minimum of 4 inches to 3 feet by 2100. If that doesn't sound like much, consider that 4 inches would imperil many of our Eastern beach areas, and 3 feet would, according to the April cover story in The Atlantic, threaten the survival of countries from Bangladesh to the Netherlands, ''while submerging pretty much all of the world's trendy beach destinations to boot.''

SI lists 13 ballparks and arenas -- from San Francisco to Jacksonville, Fla., from Oracle Arena in Oakland, Calif., to Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla. -- that will be under water with a 1-meter sea-level rise.

In its quaint, sports-focused way, SI neglects to mention that the host cities will be swamped, too.

Umm, okay.

So, Sports Illustrated wrote about global warming, and now we all have to?

You know what else SI did? They gave Beyonce Hepatitis A. Are you going to give me hepatitis tomorrow, Rick?

Listen, global warming is a hot topic (glorious puns) and I know the scariest part of what it could cause is the fact that Dolphin Stadium might be submerged in 100 years. Seriously, I wet the bed at night just thinking about it.

That said, I really want you to listen to what I'm going to say next.

You are a sports writer, Rick. Sports.

S-P-O-R-T-S.

So let Al Gore stick to talking about global warming. Did you know there's a pretty big basketball tournament going on as I write this? Maybe you should write something about that? The White Sox and Cubs are holding their spring training. Maybe there's a tale of interest there?

I do not want to open my sports section and be hit in the face with somebody's political agenda. That's what the rest of the paper is for. Just do your damn job. Thanks.