Some Things Never Change

Here are a couple of tidbits that were in the news this morning. I was glad that I was sitting down when I heard both:

1. Carlos Gomez does something stupid. Before we begin, I would like to say that I always kind of liked Carlos Gomez when he was with the Twins. He seems to be a nice guy, tries hard, has a good sense of humor. The ongoing problem with Gomez, however, and the issue that got him traded from the Twins is that he is utterly clueless. While his effort was never questioned, he had issues with base running, throwing to the correct base, hitting the cutoff man, etc. It was the "little league stuff" that got Gomez in trouble with the Twins coaching staff and he was traded to Milwaukee for J.J. Hardy.

Now, last night, Carlos Gomez happened to hit a three run home run against pitcher Nick Blackburn and the Twins. When this occurred, Gomez flipped the bat high in the air (and the bat happened to hit catcher Joe Mauer) and he admired the blast from the confines of the batters box before leaving on his home run trot. The problem with this, however, is that the score of the contest at the time was Twins - 15, Brewers - zero. The Gomez blast brought the Brewers within a touchdown, a field goal and a safety. Not really the time to be showing a team up.

The Twins were a little pissed off about this after the game, but I think that they realized this was simply "Gomez being Gomez." There are concerns that the Twins might retaliate against Carlos today by beaning him. I doubt this will happen, however. Why bother? After all, if you bean Gomez, he might accidentally run to third base instead of first. It would just be an embarrassment for everybody involved.

As I have stated, St. Paul Pioneer Press columnist Tom Powers had the best description of Carlos Gomez that I have ever read. While praising his overall effort, Powers said that Gomez has "the same knowledge of the game of baseball as an Icelandic gradeschooler."

2. ESPN reports that Brett Favre has ankle surgery. WHAT!? Favre in the news??! It's not even football season! The reason that this is relevant is that (I think) it may be an indication that Favre intends to return to the Minnesota Vikings this fall. I know that the world is on pins and needles waiting for Favre to emerge from his palatial Mississippi estate with the final word on whether or not he intends to play. This, however, could be the most meaningful evidence to date that he really plans to play again in 2010.

But wait. There is one problem. The aforementioned surgery might cause Favre to miss the first few weeks of training camp. Check this out from today's Startribune report:

Sources told ESPN that Favre will need four to six weeks of rehabilitation before he starts a running program that would put him on schedule to report to training camp "either at the beginning of camp or shortly thereafter."

Genius. Pure genius. Who says Favre is not intelligent.

Some things never change.

Jeff