There are some things that I see, hear or sometimes just notice in general that can 'irk me', really 'p*ss me off', even 'amuse me', and then there are those things that I just sit back and say to myself 'What's up with that?'

This week I saw this article about the movie 'Couples Retreat', the movie itself looks as though it maybe fairly humorous, (although the critics rated it below par), but that wasn't what the article was about. It seems in someone's infinite wisdom they removed two of the characters from the poster promoting the movie in the U.K. (United Kingdom).

The two actors removed were Faizon Love and Kali Hawk, both happen to be black actors. - In response to outrage over the move, a Universal spokesman said the altered poster aimed "to simplify the poster to actors who are most [recognizable] in international markets." -

If you continue to read the article they quote a NY Times article from 2007, like a child caught with their hand in the cookie jar, they attempt to pass the blame for this onto the international viewing audiences, and since this was about the poster for the U.K. (United Kingdom) I can only assume that for the most part it is directed at the viewing public in the U.K. (United Kingdom). The New York Times article that is quoted references a James Ulmer statement "The international marketplace is still fairly racist."

It seems they came to this conclusion because certain movies with black actors didn't generate enough revenue from the international market, however having read the article, the movies that are actually used as examples that didn't meet expectations, some of them I hadn't heard of and others just simply sucked in my opinion. But the NY Times article is not what this is about, it's about Universal's need to pass the buck for there misgivings.

The article in question is nothing more than a media outlet to pass blame from Universal and attach a racist label on the international viewing audience, in this case the U.K. (United Kingdom). I'm guessing the arrogance of another large American organization, Universal, would not even consider the fact that some of their movies just suck and aren't appealing to the majority of international viewers, regardless of the color of the actors skin.

Should we not classify the American public as racists towards the British, since the infinite wisdom of TV and Film producers in America are constantly remaking British sitcoms etc. with American actors, since they feel the British dialogue is not fully understood in America or should we just sit back and classify the TV and Film industry as total idiots that have no idea about the viewing public anywhere in the world. They would rather blame the viewers for the mistakes they make instead of accepting responsibility for their own actions.

Baseball's - 'What's up with that'

Well done baseball's ingenious methodology in giving out awards, lets reward a dope smoker with a Cy Young, obviously Cardinals fans are going to be really p*ssed off, and you can't blame them. Next you'll be giving the MVP award to Manny Ramirez.

images are courtesy of Universal (I think)

There are a number of ways to become famous in sports, you can even become an international sport star given the right circumstances.

For example you could be an over egotistical jerk like TO, you could just be the very best at what you do like Tiger Woods, there is even the chance that you can have a great career that may or may not be destroyed by the alleged use of enhancements like Barry Bonds, you could also have a famous wife and play in a number of different countries yet still be one the very best in your home country like David Beckham.

It has been some time since I saw this type of behavior  that made a person famous in multiple countries over night, or at least a couple of days.

What the hell was she thinking... not a lot apparently...

I guess we can think ourselves lucky baseball isn't a contact sport, unless you get hit by a wayward baseball.... or a player charging the mound, or the now famous glass of beer...

This week, as normal I received my regular volume of Junk Mail, ordinarily it ends up in the trash can along with the chain letter style emails family and friends seem to enthusiastically send out, I can only assume in fear that the punch line of said emails will come true. For me however more bad luck can only transform itself into good luck, plus the knowledge that emails do not have any power over the universe and the fact that if emails could render anybody rich and shameless just by forwarding it to 10 people then we would receive them under the same pretence as we do the  'Make Millions from Google' emails.

There seems to be a new resurgence of emails relating to money that you don't even have to do anything to obtain this wealth, you just have to be you. I refer to the 'inheritance', 'email lottery' or the 'you've been selected' type emails. Sometimes boredom gets in the way of common sense and the lack of baseball induced excitement invariably increases the boredom I decided to look at some of these emails.

'Inheritance'

It seems that I, along with all the other 'undisclosed recipients' have an Aunt or some other relative, who believes I am the sole heir to her fortunes. It doesn't matter that I have older siblings, I am still the sole survivor of her millions, and all I have to do is send my information to the attorney listed to have the 340 million US dollars transferred to my bank account.

So there you have it, I am now rich and shameless and can purchase box seats behind home plate for every game at home and away that the Phillies will play in the 2010 season.

'email lottery'

It also seems that this week my email address along with all those 'undisclosed recipients' have won the 'email lottery' in Australia and Europe. I won 2 email lotteries that I didn't enter, how cool is that, and all I have to do is respond with my personal and banking information to collect the millions of dollars in foreign currency, which after a quick conversion would give me another 680 million US dollars

What more could I ask for, I am more than just 'rich and shameless' I am now a billionaire and all I have done is open 3 emails.

'you've been selected'

How much more money could I make this week, it seems quite a bit actually because my email address is very popular. I received from 4 different people telling that I personally, along with all the other 'undisclosed recipients' were people of good nature and would be able to benefit from the 137 million US dollars stuck in an account in Nigeria, and that the person controlling that account needs my help and I can get to keep 10% of the funds, if I just give them my personal information and banking details.

I figured 10% of 137 million US dollars, is peanuts compared to the billion or so I already had, but greed being the ultimate evil I wanted everything, so I added the 4 lots of 14 million US dollars to my total income this week.

Of course on top of all this money I could have also made millions from Google.

What amazes me about the stupidity of the people that send these emails is they believe that people are stupid enough to respond to them.

1 - The email addresses they send them from in no way reflect the content of the email as most come from the new spam email service supplied by 'gmail'. I know a lot of normal people use 'gmail' accounts, but eventually 'gmail' will get the same bad name as 'msn', 'hotmail', 'yahoo' and 'aol'. Although all but 'aol' has managed a recovery from there email servers being branded as spam accounts by many.

2- The IP addresses of the mail servers which send these emails is not even close to the location they claim to be sending them from and most times is being used as a mirror server.

3- The return email address can never be found as it is cancelled moments after the mass email is sent out.

4 - If you are going to personalize an email and hope someone takes the bait, DON'T send it to 'undisclosed recipients'

To all those people that have being irresponsible and fallen for one of these types of emails, you really shouldn't be allowed to have an email address, and to all those people that find it a requirement to harass us with these spam emails, do me a favor and TAKE MY EMAIL ADDRESS OFF YOUR F*CKING LIST

Back to baseball - It seems Brad Lidge wants us to feel sorry for him because he may have an injury which he didn't disclose, he felt it was better to blow a save in the World Series than go on the DL. Well Brad, now you have to put up 2008 type numbers in 2010 for any normal person to take you seriously again....

Finally bye bye Brett Myers....

If you stuck around long enough to read this babbling piece of crap then your as bored as me without baseball....

GO EAGLES....for now

That feeling of anticipation as each game progresses as you get closer to the final out of each game, becomes a drug, an addiction, when the game is finally over, if your team wins there's that state of euphoria, but it isn't long before you just want the next game to start again, you want that feeling of anticipation, you long for your team to be back out there battling it out for the ultimate prize in Major League Baseball.

I was not expecting to have to wait till the 7th day before I saw the Phillies back out on the field again, both the ALCS and the NLCS had the makings of being 7 game series.

The ALCS between the Angels and the Yankees could be just that, with the Angels winning last night in an exciting 9 innings it has now driven the series back to New York with the Yankees holding on to a 3 games to 2 lead.

The Phillies managed to seal the deal in 5 games, taking a 4-1 series win over the Dodgers in true Philadelphia style, in the 3rd game to be played at CBP before heading back to LA the Phillies clinched the NL crown.

So now we have to sit back and wait to see who we will face in the 2009 World Series scheduled to start this coming Wednesday. For the Philadelphia Phillies I am not sure if they have a preference, since home field advantage is with the winners of the ALCS.

The pro's and con's of facing each team are obviously long, when you consider each teams line-up and each teams starting rotation, but they're the obvious points to reference when looking into reasoning, but when evaluating the pro's and con's, in simple terms it would be better if the Phillies played the Yankees in the World Series, for 3 reasonable reasons, color, distance and the memories.

COLOR

If everyone in the stands is wearing red and waving rally towels, it would confuse the players, they wouldn't know if it were the pitcher or batter that was being cheered. So we need a team that wears the color blue to play against.

DISTANCE

This really is a no-brainer, having to contend with west coast times during the World Series would make me very tired each morning. Keeping an east coast timetable and giving the players a short little trip to New York where the Phillies have already played this year would make so much more sense.

MEMORIES

It was fun watching the Phillies at the new Yankee Stadium back in May, I remember the first game, first pitch, Jimmy Rollins went deep off of AJ, next batter Utley, AJ threw the ball right at him and hit him square on the shoulder. The 3 game set went in favor of the Phillies 2-1, but that was way back in May and both teams are a lot different now. Although with AJ and CC in the Yankees rotation they both bring back memories when facing the Phillies.

Back to the 'Waiting Game' although irritating and annoying for Phillies fans, it is considerably short at 7 days (now down to 4 days) compared to other NL team fans who are having to wait and see if there team will have a shot next year.

As for the World Series match-up

- it will be, who it will be -

NLCS GAME 1  - Phillies 8 vs. Dodgers 6

This game started off as a good pitching match-up, by the end of the 4th inning both pitchers seemed to be in their groove, the Dodgers had the advantage of a 1 run lead and nothing looked as if it would change anytime soon. The top of the 5th inning something did change, not sure what, but it did, the Phillies got to Kershaw and exploded with 5 runs, I am sure at this point many of the Phillies fans were ecstatic with Hamels pitching with the poise of 2008, how could the Dodgers come back. Well we found out in the bottom of the 5th, where the Dodgers got to Hamels with 3 runs making it a 1 run game.

Both starting pitchers, Kershaw and Hamels became the...

....VICTIMS OF GAME 1, their chances of greatness in this game were killed off by each teams offence.

The 6th inning and both teams were into their respective bullpens, I am sure this delighted many Dodger fans, since the Phillies bullpen has been below standard for most of the season. The Dodgers bullpen pitched 4 1/3 innings using 5 different pitchers. The Phillies bullpen pitched 3 2/3 innings using 6 different pitchers. For the most part both bullpens had solid performances. The Dodgers bullpen gave up 3 runs and the Phillies bullpen gave up 2 runs, miraculously these all came in the 8th inning.

The 8th inning not only gave us the deciding runs, the only runs that both bullpens gave up, but it also gave us...

...BELOW PAR PLAYERS, for Sherrill, it was his inability to find the strike zone, and when he did it was front and center for a long ball, and for Utley it was a throw to first to complete a double play that just sailed off into the dugout, I do not believe the hesitation from Rollins was at fault, Utley should have held the ball if that was the case.

It was definitely a nail-biter for both fans and in my eyes lived up to all expectations of excitement. It was one of those games where either team could have won it and for game 1 the Phillies were the lucky ones.

PLAYERS OF THE GAME...

Carlos Ruiz and Russell Martin, both catchers played outstanding baseball at the plate and behind the plate, they each handled a number and variety of pitchers, played good defense and showed us offense too.

HIGHLIGHT PLAYERS...

Loney and Ibanez are my highlight players, Loney because it seemed like he was always on base, he went 3 for 4 with a walk, an RBI and 2 runs scored. Ibanez because he went 2 for 4 3 RBI's and 2 runs scored which included the 8th inning, 3 run bomb. 

NLCS GAME 2 - Phillies 1 vs. Dodgers 2

This game was a pure pitchers duel both starters went pitch for pitch with each other, it seemed like they both had something to prove, both guys facing clubs that had given them a rough deal when parting ways. Martinez went 7 innings giving up just 2 hits, while Padilla went 7 1/3 innings giving up 4 hits, a walk and a run. It was definitely another nail-biter for both sets of fans. The Phillies bullpen managed to give away the winning run to the Dodgers in the 8th inning by walking Ethier with 2 outs and the bases loaded after Utley threw away the tying run earlier in the inning.

Because of the way the starting pitchers performed for me they were the...

PLAYERS OF THE GAME...

and the VICTIMS OF THE GAME, because neither pitcher got the win, yet the performances they both produced were definitely winning performances.

This game, like game 1 was a game for the taking by either team, but once again there were in my eyes players that didn't perform and because of that made it harder for their respective teams to win...

...BELOW PAR PLAYERS, Ramirez because he went 0 for 4 with a strikeout, but mostly because he had the opportunity to put the game well out of the Phillies reach, but chose to first pitch swing for a pop up. Utley because he didn't learn from the game 1 mistake and made the same identical throwing error, that should have been a double play and the tying run would have possibly held at 3rd and may have allowed the Phillies to go on for the win.

HIGHLIGHT PLAYERS...

 ...Howard for seizing his opportunity in the 4th inning, by hitting a long ball off Padilla, and Pierre for his excellent base running to bring the tying run home.

So now it's off to Philadelphia and Citizens Bank Park for the next 3 games of this series. If the first 2 games are anything to go by then it is going to make a lot of fans on both sides more nervous than ever. For baseball fans in general it should produce some more of the most exciting baseball we've seen all year long.

The Yankees and the Angels played the first game of the ALCS series Friday, which saw CC Sabathia pitch 8 tremendous innings, throwing 113 pitches with 7 strikeouts, allowing just 1 run on 4 hits. Matsui came through as a DH should, going 2 for 3 with a walk and 2 RBI's. The Angels appeared to have a lack-luster performance due to the dominance of Sabathia. The Yankees won the game 4-1 taking a series lead. Game 2 is Saturday (tonight) evening at Yankee Stadium where the Yankees will be looking to go 2-0 up in the series and the Angels hoping they can take a tie back to Anaheim.

- it will be, what it will be -