On the banks of the Pearl River
in Jackson Mississippi the crowd came to see their local
hero, Mississippi GM Gary Wattson, lead the EL All-stars
to victory. He had everything going for him: a sellout crowd
in his home field; tons of confidence coming from a very
recent 24-game winning streak; and a secret weapon of having
park president, Emmit Till, hand out for free to the WL
team jambalaya and gallons of moonshine. The latter of the
three was sure to finally bring a victory to the EL team,
who had lost 5 straight. But that's where it all went wrong.
Emmit Till never made it to the WL locker room prior to
the game to hand out the free Mississippi delicatessens.
Instead, thinking that such favorite local treats would
inspire greatness in all who devour it, he went to the EL
locker room an hour prior to the game where players feasted
on jambalaya and moonshine up until the time they had to
take the field (it's been rumored that Pedro Martinez was
on his third bottle of 1 gallon moonshine before he stumbled
to the mound).
So unaware of what had happened, cocksure Gary Wattson
sent his men to do battle on the field (later Gary would
say "I thought the rancid, stinging smell coming from
my players was some God awful new hipster cologne that the
youngsters were wearing. Hey! Wada' I know, I'm from New
York!").
And right from the start the shalacking was on. Ichiro
Suzuki of Medicine Hat hit a routine grounder to Cleveland
SS Jose Hernandez who scooped it up and threw it to...third!
Cleveland third basemen Albert Pujols then smiled and took
a few steps towards the stands and gently tossed the ball
underhand to a freckled face boy wearing a straw hat in
the crowd. "Hey, my favorite picture book growing up
was Tom Sawyer, I thought it was Tom," Pujols would
go on to say after the game. Suzuki was awarded second on
the play. Being the fierce competitor that he is, manager
Gary Wattson flung up from the bench and ran directly out
to Jose Hernandez to see what's going on, where Hernandez
told Wattson that he didn't want to throw the ball to first
base because Jason Giambi plays for Virginia, and he only
wants to play catch with players from his team, Cleveland.
Wattson then chuckled and thought this was just some inter-league
rivalry fun and said "ok, no more funny stuff, let's
get serious and win this thing." In the meantime, as
Wattson was meeting with Hernandez, the rest of the players
on the field huddled together and danced in circles as they
sung Volare. Wattson then came over and broke them up and
told them to play some ball.
But it would only get worst for Wattson. After a single
and two doubles, Oakland's Vladimir Guererro hit a 3-run
homer to give the WL a 6-0 lead, and not one out was yet
recorded. After a Miguel Tejada (OAK) single, the first
out came when instead of the usual catcher-pitcher conference
at the mound, starting pitcher Pedro Martinez (ANG) and
catcher Jorge Posada (CLE) met at home plate. While at home
plate Pedro blew a toxic kiss towards batter Eric Chavez
(SDI). When Pedro resumed the mound he had Eric Chavez swinging
at three one-hop pitches to the plate for the strikeout.
But the glory didn't last long as Medicine Hat's Alfonso
Soriano blasted a 2-run homer to give the WL an 8-0 lead.
Pedro then resumed his toxic-blowing kiss strategy and was
able to strikeout Suzuki & Paul Lo Duca (NEB) to finally
end the inning.
Pedro would finally be removed after surrendering 9 runs
on 8 hits, giving up two homers in 2 innings pitched. While
exiting the game he crossed paths with his replacement,
Mississippi favorite Barry Zito, and told him to "Give
'em helllll Zzzito!" Zito, being relatively sober,
was sprayed in the face by Pedro's stinging spit when Pedro
gave him those words of encouragement, temporarily blinding
Zito as he took the mound. Zito got lucky that the first
batter was Eric Chavez, who was still blind himself from
the first inning toxic air kiss from Pedro. Zito threw three
wild pitches and Chavez swung at all three of them for the
stirkeout. But once again Alfonso Soriano feasted on debilitated
EL pitching and hit a 2-run homer, giving the WL an 11-4
lead.
Finally Gary Wattson discovered what happened to his team
when in the top of the 7th ining his players on the bench
started to celebrate as if they had won the game by pouring
a 10-gallon spiked jug of gatorade on him. In some post
game comments Wattson said, " I see Mike Piazza (SDI)
single to give the WL a 16-4 lead, and the next thing I
know I get a jug of liquid poured on me...and I instanly
can't see crap and this stuff goes down my throat and I'm
spitting out fireballs! And it hits me that my team is totally
sauced! So after I calm down a bit I say what the hell,
get me a bottle of that stuff, and while your at it tell
Emmit to hand out free jambalaya and moonshine to eveyone
left in attendence."
So in the end everyone ends up happy: WL manager Mick Mikkelson
(FWO) got his first taste of online play with a 16-4 blowout;
the WL wins its 6th straight all-star game; Alfonso Soriano
is the MVP with an incredible performance; and a Mississippi
GM from New York sings an off-key drunken Dixie with 30,
000 sauced Mississippi rebels into the early morning hours
of sunrise.
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