It was a year ago tomorrow that L.A. Times’ columnist T.J. Simers filed what was one of the worst, low-rent columns I’ve seen in a while. Ripping Marcus Thames for being exactly what he is: a platoon/bench outfielder who is not an All-Star.
It wasn’t some meta thing. He wasn’t making a larger point. He simply confronted Thames in the clubhouse and asked him where he got off not being Ryan Braun. Oh, and when Thames refused to take his bait and snap back at him, Simers ripped him for “being unable to talk about his shortcomings.” It was quite impressive, I tell you.
Well, apparently this is an annual thing for Simers, as today he has another installment of his “I show up, rip everyone in sight in the laziest way possible, put people on the spot with my hostile questions and offer no baseball insight whatsoever” column.
He’d like to tell you that the Dodgers are terrible. He provides no context for this. No discussion of where the Dodgers stand on the success cycle, what their actual strengths and weaknesses are or anything like that. He just says they suck and that Tommy Lasorda could do better. Oh, I take it back, he did offer one bit of “analysis": Jamey Carroll was the team’s MVP in 2010, so why isn’t he back?
He then goes on to rip his own L.A. Times colleagues -- by name -- for, you know, reporting on the Dodgers. Because that’s not worth anyone’s time, see, so aren’t they a bunch of idiots. I’ll agree with the broader point: the Times is wasting their time and money on one of their writers. But here’s a hint: It’s not Dylan Hernandez, Kevin Baxter or Bill Shaikin.
Anyway, just one to bookmark the next time someone goes after the bloggers for wasting any access given them, needlessly ripping people, having no understanding of the game and lowering the level of the discourse.