Monday, February 23, 2009

Injuries...

So I’m surfing around the sporting landscape and I decided to check in on my favorite futbol team, Newcastle United. I’m not sure why I chose Newcastle as my favorite squad. Maybe it’s the beer…




Or maybe it’s the Foot Locker/prison stripe kits…



Either way, I adopted the Mags (short for the Magpies & don’t ask me why they are called that) as my club. Anyway, Michael Owen is the team’s richest and highest profile player. Of course since this is the Mags, he’s frequently hurt (Don’t ask. Let’s just say the Mags, much like the Orioles, are known for poor management, free agent busts, and bad luck).

With that setup, I must say I cringed when I learned that Owen had to have a “groin operation.” I love this quote:

"He has had a minor - very minor - groin repair which came in line with the period of time he is out with his ankle," added Hughton.

To quote Dennis Miller, if someone is sticking a sharp object near your genitalia, I’d say its major.

Nonetheless, it got me thinking about conversations me and fellow blogger, Easton High School/Towson University alum and comrade Greg “Snake” Maki used to have about sports injuries. We’d sort of cover the gamut. Like which video game had the most painful sounding injury (I always went with shattered heel from NHL ‘04, he would go with broken elbow from Madden ‘05. No coincidence we were single at the time) And how some guys’ names have become euphemisms for gruesome sports injuries.

Joe Theismann

Napoleon McCallum

Jason Kendall

Mike Cameron


We also used to discuss the pro football injury report and which was the goofiest sounding listing. I would always go with the time Joey Harrington (a very shitty quarterback for the Detroit Lions) had a heart condition and had to miss a game, so he was listed as “QB Joey Harrington (heart). Snake was always partial to the time Joey Porter got shot in the ass outside a nightclub in Colorado and was listed as “LB Joey Porter (gunshot wound).” Just to clarify again, we’re not mental or anything, relax.

Anyway, the point of that long-winded introduction was to set up that fact that this got me thinking about some examples of goofy sports injuries and how they would appear in an injury report. Some of these are real, some not. But they’re all fodder for my vivid and occasionally morbid imagination.

OF Glenallen Hill (nightmares)- A real one apparently. Hill had such an extreme case of arachnophobia (no, not the shitty Jeff Daniels movie) that during a nightmare about being covered with spiders, Hill fell out of bed, got hurt and had to spend time on the disabled list.




OF-DH Marty Cordova (tanning bed accident) - Whenever anybody brings up the subject of bad Orioles free agent signings, the first name that usually pops up is Albert Belle. Rightfully so, but for my money, the worst free agent signing the O’s ever had was Cordova. He won Rookie of the Year with Minnesota in ‘93, sucked for 5 years and then had a surprising 20-homer season in Cleveland. So of course, the Orioles ignored the five years prior to his 20 home run year and gave him a three-year contract. He was just as crappy as advertised but the highlight of his tenure was when he burned himself in a tanning bed and had to miss a couple games because he was advised by doctors not to go into the sunlight. And you wonder why the Orioles have been in the American League basement the last 12 years.

QB Kyle Boller (shattered pride) - Let’s just say Boller, a nice enough guy, caused plenty of this during his time in Baltmo…




Which led to this…

…hmm, maybe this injury wasn’t so bad after all?

OF Sammy Sosa (violent sneeze) - Maybe this is an unknown side effect of steroids. That you sneeze so violently, you give yourself back spasms. You could ask Sammy but his English may not be so good…



RB Eddie George (broken spirit) - Too many collisions with the 2000 Ravens defense will do that too you.


WR Hines Ward (strained pussy) - Not a real injury. I just hate Hines Ward.





(TBD) LB Ray Lewis (tarnished legacy) - Only if this happens.



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