After over a year of working on this blog I thought I have pretty much figured out what to expect when it comes to certain subjects. Yankees-Red Sox stuff? Oh, so predictable. Steroids threads? I can chart out how the comments are going to go with those like I was Hari Seldon with a TI-84 calculator. The Phillies fan insecurity-fests are a much newer phenomenon, but I’m even starting to grok those pretty well too.
But I gotta tell ya, I’ve been rather surprised at how the comments in the Ken Griffey Jr. thread are going so far today. If you would have asked me how I thought it would have gone before I posted it, I would have figured that about 95% of the comments would be of the “he needs to hang it up and give his job to someone who cares” variety, with a smattering of “he was so good once, sad to see him go” offerings.
Imagine my surprise when I was met with a great number of comments wondering if he had a thyroid problem or some other medical condition or otherwise trying to rationalize or explain away the fact that he was snoozing during a ballgame. What happened to all of the “he’s paid top play a kids game!” comments? Where is all the outrage we typically see when A-Rod does something less than godly? Man, if A-Rod had fallen asleep in the clubhouse he’d probably need to be under police protection right now.
All of which brings us to our comment of the day. It was really the most baffling -- and hilarious -- comment I’ve seen in some time. Does it attack Griffey? No. Does it defend him? Not really. Instead, it goes after the anonymous players who told the reporter about the incident itself:
ba-----s. I work kids that age....so i know...snitches.
Look, on some level I understand that being a generally likable guy for the past 20 years has bought Junior a lot more leeway than your average ballplayer, but I figured that at some point -- and that point being simply unprepared to play the game of baseball on a given day -- likability wouldn’t matter and people would at least go through the motions of tut-tutting Griffey over this. Guess not.
And with that I’m getting out of the comment thread prediction business. Because you guys are way more unpredictable than I had given you credit for.