COOPERSTOWN, New York. Baseball's Hall of Fame has a Veterans' Committee and separate admission rules for Negro League and Women's League players, but those initiatives pale beside the latest concept on the museum's drawing board; a wing dedicated to players whose record-breaking stats were fueled by steroids and other chemical enhancements.
"Mark McGwire is first in the pipeline, and Palmiero isn't far behind," said Richard "Bud" Ehrlich, the HOF official who is organizing the construction of the laboratory-like wing that will pay tribute to both steroid-stuffed players like Barry Bonds and the scientists who made them great. "We view it is a great educational tool for kids who are interested in both baseball and science."
Nicknamed "Asterisk Alley" by reporters who toured the glass and steel structure, the new exhibit space will be open to any player whose career numbers were materially enhanced by a substance that does not occur in nature, excluding hot dogs.
McGwire had 583 career home runs, and his power hitting is believed to have benefitted from his use of androstenedione, a steroid hormone. After hitting 49 home runs in 1987, his rookie year with the Oakland A's, McGwire's production declined until he bottomed out with only 22 round-trippers in 1991. Following that season he embarked on a "weight lifting" program and rebounded to 42 home runs in 1992. "Andro" produces abnormal levels of breast tissue in men, a phenomenon that weight lifters refer to as "########".
"I don't deserve an asterisk after my name," McGwire said when informed he might be relegated to the new facility as he squeezed into a size D-cup man-siere. "Maybe an ampersand or a question mark, but an asterisk? No way."
BOSTON. May 12, 2006, is a day which will live in infamy in the history of the Boston Celtics. On that rainy Friday, the team announced that it had ended its holdout and would join the rest of the NBA in the twenty-first--actually, make that the twentieth--century, and hire dancing girls to entertain fans.
Red Auerbach, who coached the team to eight straight championships between 1959 and 1966 and nine overall, was the last obstacle to the team's decision to abandon its Puritanical attitude towards bare midriffs and shaking bootys on the parquet floor. "I've always been against it," he said, "and I'm still against it."
Rich Gotham, the Celtics' Executive Vice President for Sales and Marketing, tried to smooth things over by telling reporters "We always call [Auerbach] and ask what he thinks." Just like you used to ask your parents if it was okay to get a head start on responsible drinking by having a beer when you were sixteen.
When Red broke into the NBA in 1949 as coach of the Tri-Cities Blackhawks (three cities later, the Atlanta Hawks), there were no such things as dancing girls, or EVP's of Sales and Marketing.
Red's resistance was worn down, or ignored, and so on Saturday, June 10th, tryouts will be held at the Celtics' training facility in Waltham, Mass., for roster spots with the dance troupe that the marketing gurus have creatively dubbed the "Celtics Dancers". Apparently the name "Shamrockettes" raised legal issues.
Red said he had "nothing against the concept, but there should be a little tradition involved." So here's a suggestion--let the girls dance, but make them wear a badge of shame. After all, if sex isn't forbidden or at least a little furtive, is it really any fun?
Did you honestly want to see Ward and June Cleaver in the same bed on "Leave it to Beaver"?
Boston has been known as a city where eroticism has been frowned on since the days of the Pilgrims. When Hester Prynne got knocked up by Arthur Dimmesdale in Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter", she received the first team-logo gear in American history, a patch of fabric bearing the letter "A" for "Adultery" that she had to wear on her breast.
The phrase "Banned in Boston" became widely-known as a result of efforts by the New England Watch and Ward Society to keep burlesque shows and other fleshy entertainments out of town. The designation became the literary equivalent of the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval in reverse--if your book, film, etc. wasn't racy enough to earn the ban, it probably wasn't worth buying.
So when the Celtics Dancers hit the floor for their first timeout--full or 20-second--this fall, let them each wear a letter (or maybe a number) to signify their particular preference or specialty. When your kids ask what they mean, tell them it's kinda like Sesame Street.
For years Bostonians have been telling out-of-towners that they should eat at Durgin Park, a frisbee toss from the statue of Red Auerbach in the fashionable Quincy Market area. The restaurant's slogan was "Your grandfather and perhaps your great-grandfather dined with us too!" What they don't tell you is that your male ancestors also flirted with your waitress, who is eligible for Social Security and wears support hose. It's kind of a local hoax we play.
When Hooters tried to open up a restaurant across the street from the Celtics' home court a few years ago, the mammary-themed eating chain drew protestors known historically in Boston as "bluestockings"--that is, high-minded types who butt in whenever a moral outrage is about to occur.
Where the hell were they when Rick Pitino traded Chauncey Billups?
Con Chapman is the author of "The Year of the Gerbil: How the Yankees Won (and the Red Sox Lost) the Greatest Pennant Race Ever," a history of the 1978 AL East pennant race, and "CannaCorn", a novel about minor league baseball to be published by Joshua Tree Publishing in 2009. He has written a number of plays, including "Number One Hockey Mom," "Please, Pope," and "What Mickey Belle Isle Told You," a trilogy about hockey (JAC Publishing). His articles and humor have appeared in newspapers and magazines including The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald, and The Atlantic Monthly, among others.
