Arbitration

Our discussion of men’s grooming habits last week naturally led to a poll covering the topic. We asked which of our subjects had the best look. 11 of you sounded off. The results? Baffling. Mind blowing. Makes us feel like we’ve smoked crack recently. Of the 11 votes, 5 of you legitimately chose Brian Wilson’s Porn-Bush. We want the 5 of you to close your eyes and play a little imagination game with us. Are your eyes closed? Now imagine you’re alone in a quiet room with your significant other. Your significant other has tied you to a chair. You literally cannot move any part of your body. Your significant other approaches you for a sexy, smoochie. But wait…he/she has a beard the size of an afro sported by many of the actors in Jackie Brown. The beard is getting closer to you. The beard actually touches your lips before their lips can (Lisa just moaned and said, “eww, this is making me itch”). The beard grazing your face feels like a brillo pad and still, their lips haven’t touched yours yet. In fact, their lips can’t reach your lips through the beard because the beard has now taken control of everything. The beard wants to take over the world now. Wants to run for President of the United States. Wants to eat everyone’s firstborn child. Wants to bring about the apocalypse. You can’t escape. Remember, you’re tied to a chair. You’re doomed to face a lifetime of beard suffocation. This is worse than the Salem Witch Trials. You wish you were dead.

Now open your eyes. Still feel warm and fuzzy about your choice? Hmmm? We didn’t think so. The runner up with 4 votes was Justin Verlander’s Gentlemanly Scruff. In Verlander, we trust. Cole Hamels’ Compromise and CJ Wilson’s Effortless Sex each earned 1 vote. Really? The name of Wilson’s look was called “Effortless Sex.” No one bought into that? No. Why would you do something that makes sense? You a-holes bought into a porn bush with food stuck in it. No one voted for Will Rhymes’ Lack of Commitment, Brian McCann’s Proper Beard, Jayson Werth’s Sherwood Forest, or Barry Zito’s Magnum PI Stache.

Tim Lincecum and the Giants are finally closer to a contract agreement that would enable the parties to avoid a salary arbitration hearing. “Industry sources” (who are these industry sources they’re always talking about anyway? Are they fans? Stadium garbage pickers? Grounds Crew members? Concession stand employees? Front office staff? Training staff? Other players? WHO? WHO are these people?????) have confirmed that talks between the club and Lincecum have progressed quite nicely. For a 1-year contract, Lincecum requested $21.5 million and the Giants countered with $17 million. Seriously, Lincecum? $17 million for 1 year’s worth of work is a pretty sweet deal. Take it. Don’t complain. And don’t grow a porn-bush. We’re begging you.

Before we go into the rest of this week’s baseball notes, let’s talk arbitration. Admittedly, when you combine our college educations, you get a BFA in Writing, Literature, and Publishing, a Minor in History (Western Civilization), and 2 years at Nassau Community College studying Liberal Arts. Basically that’s a sh*t ton of useless knowledge and creativity (because we’re “artists”). We have zero smarts when it comes to business or anything related to the legal system. After hearing this term, “arbitration” over and over every offseason and stumbling upon it again when reading about Tim Lincecum, Serena had enough. She Googled “What the f*ck does arbitration mean?” If you knew Serena at all, you’d know that that’s legitimately what she Googled. Apparently, to make a bunch of legal jargon short and sweet, arbitration is basically when two disputing parties agree to let someone else decide the fate of the argument. For example, if we were fighting about whether to order our 10 cent wings Hot or Super Hot, we’d call in Chris, the bar back, to “arbitrate” and make the decision for us. We’d agree to do whatever Chris decided. If we’ve got this concept right (and we think we do), this means that if Tim Lincecum and the Giants have to go to a salary arbitration hearing, a person or persons would determine Lincecum’s salary and Lincecum and the Giants would have to comply with whatever the decision is. Super. Now, here’s why we should be on this arbitration panel:

• We’re awesome. We don’t ever stop being awesome.
• We own suits. Therefore, we’ll look extremely professional while arbitrating your salary or whatever it is you want us to arbitrate
• We like 10 cent wings which means we’re fiscally responsible. We’re not going to overpay athletes for simply playing a game. C’mon. Like we should pay you to play Monopoly or something. Please. You’ll get a salary that we feel is acceptable for what you contribute to the world. So, Timmy? If the Giants are offering you $17 million, you should take it because there’s no way in hell we’re giving you that much money to pitch once every 4-5 games in one season. You’ve got to be out of your goddamn mind. You’ll make the equivalent to a secretary. $35,000/year. If you make it to the World Series, we’ll give you $30 worth of Taco Bell. Anything on the Taco Bell menu that your heart desires…totaling $30. Not $31. Not $30.99. Not $30.01. $30 (including tax). We can discuss a raise after conducting a performance evaluation at your next arbitration hearing in 2013 just like every other hard working American in this country.
• Even though we hang out at a bar every Monday night, we still manage to get up for work on time. We even get dressed and comb our hair. This means that we’re responsible adults…we think. Or it might mean that we have a drinking problem. We’re going to stick with “responsible adults.” Just go with it.
• We work out so when sh*t gets out of hand during the arbitration process, we will be able to exert force and authority in order to reign it in and stay on track.
• We’re inherently lazy. Why will this benefit you? Any time spent away from eating, drinking beer, sleeping, or other bedroom-related activities is pretty much a nuisance to us. Therefore, we will not allow this drag on any longer than it has to. You’ll be in and out before you know it.

And that is why you should vote TBB for Arbitration! TBB 2012! Peace out!

Elsewhere in the league. The Oakland A’s have reportedly shown interest in Manny Ramirez. If you recall, Ramirez retired last season rather than face a heavy suspension for testing positive for steroids a second time around. A real class act. Awesome. Like that stadium needs to be made even uglier. Good job, folks. Keep up the good work out there in Oakland. At this rate, your team will never get a new stadium. At best, someone will blow up the Coliseum and never rebuild it. You’ll be homeless. Exactly how many stupid decisions does a team need to make before their decision-making rights are revoked?

Apparently, Ryan Braun was in Midtown last night. Lisa was also in Midtown last night. She could’ve banged a professional baseball player. Then we would’ve blogged about it so that you could’ve shared in the magic of their night. God, how the fates toy with our emotions. ANYWAY, Braun was in town receiving his NL MVP Award. During his acceptance speech, Braun spoke briefly of the situation regarding the positive results of his drug test. Of course, he denied ever doing steroids (But really, are you going to admit to taking steroids while accepting an award congratulating you for your performance?) and spoke a lot of crap about character and being humbled by this experience and all that mumbo jumbo. Listen, we’re not trying to take away from his eloquent speech here, but let’s face it. We don’t really care. What we care about is the fact that he was in Midtown and Lisa did not hit that sh*t when it counted. Steroids or not. Feel free to Google his acceptance speech though. It’s quite intelligent sounding, which says a lot considering that he is a professional athlete and a power hitter to boot. Power hitters are usually dumb as dirt. Just look at Alex Rodriguez. Good-looking and talented, sure. But he shouldn’t talk anymore. He should remain seen and not heard.

Cyndi Lauper is singing our song: “The phone rings in the middle of the night. It’s a major league baseball team begging us to make things right. Oh, MLB, you know we’re still #1. The TBB just want to arbitrate. Oh, the TBB just want to arbitrate.”