Shawn Chacon did what a lot of fans in Philly never got the chance to do. Grab Ed Wade by the throat, throw him to the ground and jump on him. The Houston Astros are doomed. The Ed Wade story proves in America you can grow up to be anything you want except maybe GM of a baseball team.

"So at that point I lost my cool and I grabbed him by the neck and threw him to the ground. I jumped on top of him…Words were exchanged."

Shawn made a mistake here plain and simple. Everybody knows its choke all the way and then drop the lifeless body in a septic tank or well. For that he should be suspended. You either do it right or don't do it at all at this level of professional sports.

In Philly Ed Wade was the genius that traded All Star Curt Schilling for Omar Daal and Travis Lee, All Star Scott Rolen for Turk Wendell, Bud Smith and future All Star Placido Polanco. Only Placido never became an All Star in Philly because Ed Wade, you guessed it, traded him for machete wielding, arsonist, murderer and sometime head case reliever Ugueth Urbina. He traded future All Star Johnny Estrada for Kevin Millwood who proceeded to stink up 1 out of 2 seasons.

"Spoljaric, could you use that in a sentence please?"

He signed Andy Ashby who distinguished himself giving Phillies fans the finger and followed three straight seasons of 14 wins in San Diego with 4 wins in Philly. Wade is baseball's equivalent of Motel Hell when it comes to pitching, his Philly roster of acquisitions reads like a who isn't of pitching; Paul Spoljaric, Bruce Chen, Chad Ogea, Robert Person, and Vicente Padilla. Gutless, heartless and soft were used so often in the sports section of the Daily News, Dairy Queen advertised its ice cream was tougher.

Because of Wade, 3rd sackist David Bell played 4 seasons past his expiration date hitting an anemic .243 while hopeless Phillies fans jumped off the 700 level in despair.

Why Houston hired him remains an utter mystery. Personally I wouldn't pencil him in any baseball job higher than peanut vendor because even though he might have to make change for a five dollar bill he doesn't have to open the shells.

When 3rd Place is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow

During Ed Wade's 8-season death grip on 3rd-5th place in the NL East, the Astros made the playoffs a total of 6 out of 8 seasons. Last season without Wade the Phillies won the division.

Now Wade gets to Houston. He trades a shutdown closer, Brad Lidge (1-0, 18 saves, 0.87 era), for a banjo-hitting outfielder. Plus he's already doing to Houston's pitching staff what he perfected in Philly. We call it Eddie's patented panic move, when things go bad, blame a pitcher, a couple of bad starts and you're yo-yo'd into oblivion.

"He is suspended pending final resolution of whatever move we end up making with him…"

Which is where Shawn Chacon comes in or more accurately goes out. Wade pulled one of his legendary temper tantrums and finally met a brick wall most adult people do when they throw hissy fits with guys bigger than them. Houston loses a so-so pitcher by making Chacon walk the plank, but if they don't get rid of Wade they're going to get baseball's bubonic plague.

No Question About It


Fowl Line Bonus Feature

My good friend and Phillies fan, Don Z. Block is the poet laureate of the Brooklyn Dodgers, his take on Ed Wade's demise as the Phillies GM is rightfully one of the greatest pieces of baseball satire ever scribbled...here it is in its entirety.

I was there with Eddie when the bombs began to fall. We could hear the enemy outside using flamethrowers, and the air was filled with screams. Throughout the battle, little Eddie never stopped smiling. When it became clear that they would be breaking through the bunker door in a matter of minutes, Eddie called for his pet puffin, Charlie, patted it on top of its rather large gray head, and gave it a big, wet farewell kiss. By now we were all crying. Then Eddie slipped the bird some aspirin, and seconds later the creature exploded rather messily.

Eddie then asked us all to line up in a row so that he could shake our hands. When he came to me, I was so overcome that I could not look at him, but Eddie said, "Be brave, Paul. You were my finest acquisition. I will never forget how nobly you filled in for Randy. I want you to do me one last favor!" And he whispered in my ear what he wanted. I couldn't believe it.

Seconds later, I was toeing a mock piece of rubber in the bunker with the door behind me. At a mock plate stood Endy Chavez, a hitter with a reputation for always making contact. In my left hand, by the scruff of his neck, I held little Eddie Wade. I wound up and threw Eddie toward Endy. Endy took a mighty swing and finally made tremendous contact. Little Eddie went zooming towards the door on a straight line, and he lasered through it with a loud boom and a bright light--and then he disappeared.

We never saw him again. That night, the sky was filled with shooting stars--lots of them. And one of them, I am certain, was the Little Eddie.

Oh great another Astro's closer, hope this one works out better than WagHole! If you're a blithering optimist the Phillies trading for Brad Lidge makes perfect sense. If you're a lifelong Phillies fan your digging a fallout shelter in the backyard.

Let's look at the "glass is half full" theory. Trading Bourn, Geary, and Costanzo for Lidge means the Phillies get to move Brett Myers back into the rotation. A win-win trade. Fair enough. I'll raise you Freddy Garcia for Gonzalez and Floyd. See what I mean? That trade netted one win and eleven starts before bursting into flames like a Tibetan Monk at a Rage Against the Machine concert.

Let's look at the "glass is half empty" theory. Geary and Bourn, equal value for a head case reliever with a propensity for melting down in the playoffs. Is that the sweet smell of a three-run Albert Pujols Sputnik from Game 5 of the 2005 NL championship series wafting off Lidge? We should also point out Lidge's 2007 DL -worthy pulled left-side oblique muscle and post-season surgery to repair torn cartilage in his right knee. But forget all that.

What about Mike Costanza the Phillies minor league system's 1st legitimate power swatting 3rd sacker since, um, hold-on, enjoy the moment, Mike Schmidt??? The guy swats .270 with 27 boxes of waffles and 86 RBI's!!! Needless to say they're justifying it by saying he commits too many errors and strikeouts (same thing they said about Ryan Howard) but apparently not enough for Ed Wade to swipe him from the doddering Pat Gillick. Congrats Pat you've managed to completely denude the farm system in just 2 years. You're strip coal mining and rain forest slash 'n burn all rolled into one.

To wrap it up, the deal stinks. Myers should have been a starter with Hamels no matter what. Switching him to closer was desperation because Manuel can't win a stinking game before July. Now with this deal the Phillies will sit on their hands and act like Hamels, Myers, Moyer, Kendrick and Eaton will get you to the World Series.

This kind of off-season do-nothing stupidity is the hallmark of the Giles regime. Real starters even mediocre ones, still better than the back 3/5th's of the Phillies rotation will be deemed too pricey and next season we'll fall short by a game or need a team to implode like the Mets to even smell the playoffs. As for Costanzo, we've seen this happen before, only then we got Ivan DeJesus and the Cubs got Ryne Sandberg...

It's all about the headline here at the Fox blogateria you can pretty much bet Bonds plus Duke is pure gold for shooting up the popular blog list.  Is it a shameless grab at the gold ring?  You bet.  I can also pump up my comments by stating Ruth sucked and Aaron wasn't so hot either like what did he really hit 720, 730 HR's?  Who cares?  See that really pokes the ol' hornet nest, don't it?  I could inject race at some point like good barbecue sauce or a dry rub it really makes the ribs pop.  Ruth would've hit way more HR's if he wasn't white or Bonds would suck if he were white, no way he would've hit more than mid-500 HR's. See? Nothing to it. 

The camps are equally divided on one side the steroid loving, Pro-Bonds, you must be racist to not appreciate his chemical prowess, nothing past 1980 happened cause me and ESPN didn't see it set and the baseball purists scratching their heads at the collective insanity.

Or

Barry's just being Barry and you sentimental white bread racists can't see past your rose #### glasses dimmed by the past to recognize greatness right in front of your noses and a bunch of  fuddy-duddy, HOF loving, out of touch with reality, grumpy senior citizens waxing nostalgic over a dead ball era.

See how easy that is?  Just throw in a few Duke lacrosse players who did rape that girl or absolutely, positively didn't do a damn thing and you have yourself a post to remember.  I think something must've happened at the frat house that night because you have preppies, booze and a minority stripper.  I watch that movie every week on cable though Jason and Freddy usually kill more people.

As for Bonds he wasn't indicted but he was beaned by Russ Springer and you know what that's OK, because if you're going to play baseball for twenty-plus seasons you're bound to  face a really crummy pitcher like Springer who has no better idea of where his pitch is going than you do.  Top of the Mo-Pop here I come...