The Funniest Women Comedians Evar

When Joan Rivers died I wanted to write something that day but it wasn't really long enough to be a real article. I'm gonna do one now called Funniest Women Comedians Evar and I'll throw in some other women and it'll flesh out to an entire article as such.

It's going to be five entries in this here and one is an ensemble cast so this list in totallatary will involve eight human females to be exact (most of which are unfortunately deceased, R.I.P.). All five entries will be listed, then the greatest shall be declared Funniest Lady Ever.


The Finalists

The Golden Girls

I used to watch this show all the time and I don't care if anyone thinks I'm not manly for doing that because this show was fucking funny, for real. The Golden Girls is one of the greatest ensemble comedy casts in all of history as all four corners of the Human Comedy Square which made up this crew were all funny and talented in their own way.

In Ninja Turtle terms, Bea Arthur was the Leonardo character, Estelle Getty was Donatello, Betty White was Michaelangelo, and Rue McClanahan was Raphael. Well, more or less I'd say.

The Golden Girls fucking kick ass, I'm very surprised there was never a Golden Girls video game ever made because I can picture in my mind at least 36 genres of video games in which it would have transitioned into very well. Maybe not so much a Fighting Game...but a Golden Girls RPG or a Golden Girls town buidling sim with Bea Arthur as the mayor of a small town (i.e. Saint Olaf) would have been simply golden. I know you can't really picture the video games I'm thinking about because they only exist in my weird mind, but believe you me, they rock so much.

There's many tv theme songs that I can sing on the spot and 100% verbatim with no no mistakes and I don't care what anyone thinks but GGs is one of those songs, seriously, this song was so good.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWbz_mIAShM)

That song let's you know, right off the bat, that this crew is very legit and will always have each others backs even in the hardest of times. A friendship like theirs is powerful indeed and the only thing more powerful than their human friendship was their comedic prowess. The Golden Girls were big-time Legends, no doubt about it.

Rose-Anne Barr

Rose Anne is kind of kooky and riddled with plastic surgery now but back in the nineties she was the queen of prime time and with good reason...she was fucking funny. She was a big gal with a dirty mouth and she didn't give many fucks at all about what people thought about her. She said the stuff she wanted to say and did the shit she wanted to do and barely even cared. That's cool.

To highlight to what point Roseanne didn't give a fuck, here for example she's in Jack Murphy Stadium just destroying the sacred national anthem of her nation and not even given two fucks as the whole entire stadium booos the FUCK out of her....

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ls1YVhcLD2c)

She's got balls, or I guess for ladies you should say, she's got fucking ovaries, yo. She liked being herself and didn't care what nobody thought and that's really a key ingredient in being funny. I rank this anthem as one of the best renditions of our times, I really do, it's fucking original for sure.

Her sitcom was the best sitcom on TV for many years until it jumped the shark (their shark jump point was when Dan started having affairs and shit and the show just got stupid). It was a very real show and the actors were believable...the family was de-beavered of all the Leave it to Beaver-ness most TV families suffered from which made viewers relate to it better.

She's a comedy legend, 110%.

Jean Stapleton

Stapes was the wife character on All in the Family, for those who don't know, and she was a stellar actress who knew how to bring the fucking comedy.

I think the "Edith Bunker" character was born out of an exec telling Jean, "okay this character is sort of annoying, aloof, and a bit odd," and she just latched onto to those 3 traits and went into overdrive, creating one of the most annoying, aloof, and odd characters in the history of acting.

Similar to Roseanne's show, All in the Family, was not your perfect-werfect family and all the characters were pretty dimwitted and strange. The character of "Edith" was so funny that a lot of the shows tended to give the Edith character room to work as she stole the spotlight quite often. The Archie character was the headliner of the show but he took a back seat to the Edith character quite often because she could rake in her own share of the laughs from the audience.

A lot of the shows featured long-winded, pointless, monologues by Edith:

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kkue1ns4XvU)

The character Stapleton created is one of the most memorable ever in television lore. Everyone knows a friend or relative like Edith and Stapleton took that as the basis for the character and exaggerated it into something which was simply hilarious. 

She's an All-Star caliber comedienne, she was for real.

Joan Rivers

Rivers was versatile and was headlinin' on many genres from stand-up, to talk show, to trash talk show, to fashion police, etc, etc, etc. Her act was very versatile.

Similar to Roseanne, the later years of Joan Rivers was highlighted more by her insane facial reconstruction than her comedy. To estimate a ball park number, Joan Rivers must have spent at least 50 million dollars on plastic surgery...which is quite an expensive habit.

Aging is part of life, there's no reason a 70 year old woman should attempt to look like a 40 year old woman. There's nothing wrong with aging, it's not a sin to get old, it happens to everyone. It's really no big deal. To try and fight it with an asinine amount of operations is crazy...it's actually a mental disorder is what it is.

Joan Rivers talked a lot of shit, man. By the time of her death she was still embrangled in like seven different media controversies. She called some famous couple's baby ugly, she pissed off all the Muslims with something she said, she called some woman fat and that blew up into a big huge deal. She pissed off everyone, holy shit, she was a real card this one, my gosh. She didn't give no shit either, she had ovaries too, check this out when some dude gets pissed because she does a joke about how she hates kids and would only like to have a blind and deaf one because they'd be easier to manage...

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAD-ky3TYQk)

When you talk a lot of shit you have to ready to handle the fall-out/feed-back that finds it way back to you and this lady could handle it, she stood up for comedy as a whole when she told that loser to shut his fucking face up. 

Joan wins points with me too because she was down with my boys from Gwar...

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWRKlNlRsgI)

She was chill, for sure. She was one of comedy's brightest human stars for many a year. She knew how to work and she knew how handle the haterz, she was pretty hard, she was pretty hard, she's a legend for sure.

LaWanda Page

This is my lady, right here. Watching this lady work has made me laugh more than any other female human ever...she was a damned professional that's what she was. 

Similar to Stapleton, who's career overlapped with LaWanda's in the seventies, she was on a sitcom and would routinely steal the stage. Unlike Jean, LaWanda wasn't on every single episode of her sitcom, Sanford and Son, so she was never over-used and you never got tired of her. She got only enough air-time that you were always left wanting more Aunt Esther. She could steal the show too, and she was working with Redd Foxx as the headliner, who was a pretty big deal in that era. She could rob the show if she wanted to, she was fucking hilarious.

The Aunt Esther character was supposed to be a respectable chruch-going character but she had a crazy violent ugly side that was fucking funny. Here's a good example of Esther being Esther...

See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48WCvHJxses&t=15m21s

(note: that above vid is uploaded weird, it seems the uploader sped it up a bit , they are talking at a  bit faster tempo than normal, they sound like their voices are too high pitched.)

She plays that character so well, and so funny, that she headlinin' the whole scene....and it became a common thing that when Esther busted on the scene, she would steal the whole damned show.

Before she was a hit on sit coms LaWanda preformed stand-up, and holy moly was she a dirty comedienne. She put out "party records" similar to Rudy Ray Moore or Blowfly or someone like that. Take a gander at some of her prime bits:

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OHQJXy3Dzc)

She can't go 2 seconds without swearing. She's dirty as fuck.

Okay, she's filthier than anyone ever. No one has nothing on LaWanda, she's the fucking greatest. I don't think Redd Foxx, Rudy Ray Moore, or Blowfly could be dirtier than this lady, she's possibly the filthiest comic ever.

Funniest Lady Ever

Taking everything into consideration...in my opinion, LaWanda Page is the funniest woman who ever lived. Adding up her filthy stand up career with her Aunt Esther character on Sanford and Son she sums up to being a person who's created a great deal of exceptionally funny material.

All Things Considered: The Funniest Woman in History

Conclusion

If you noticed there was no one from Saturday Night Live on here, it is mainly because those women were never really that funny. I think most female comedians now a days feel that women from SNL are what they should model themselves after and they are not correct in trying to mold themselves after people they see on SNL. Basically the women on this list featured some very key features in what it takes to being a comedic individual. These old school comics are great role models for any young aspiring comic (not only females but males and trannies too). 

Try and be....

LaWanda Page: Dirty as all Heck. 

Joan Rivers: Mean and Versatile.

Jean Stapleton: Over the Top.

Roseanne: Not Givin' a Fuck.

Golden Girls: Unafraid to Age.

I think there's still some modern female comics that display these key features at times, I think that jewish one, Sarah Silverman, can be Dirty as all Heck, Mean and Versatile, while Givin' no Fucks ...hopefully when she starts hitting her 50s and 60s she won't go the route of Roseanne or Joan and hopefully choose not to get loads of surgery and thus proving she's Unafraid to Age....then all she'd be missing is the Over the Top trait. She's a fairly complete comic, I'd say.

That Amy Poehler can be Over the Top, I still remember her as Andy Richter's little sister back in the day in the Upright Citizens Brigade. I think that's the only trait she has though, she nowhere near qualifies for the other four key traits.

The most popular female comedian by far now-a-days is that Tina Fey Bakker person, yet she has none of the traits mentioned and has no real business pretending to be funny. She's like a female variation of Seth Rogan, devoid of all humor yet prancing around like they are fucking hilarious. Like a Seth, she can't stretch herself, she can't work, she can only be a Straight Man (or Straight Woman I guess). If Tina Fey and Seth Rogan made a dirty baby together that baby would be the least funniest creature ever produced. They'd probably give it a retarded name like Seth Fey-Rogan Jr and it would be famous when it got older and everyone on earth would hate that thing so much. The retarded mutant baby would star in Green Hornet 2 and be the actual encapsulation of lame.

Anywho, if you're a female comic and want to be wicked funny...stop watching SNL...and start investing time into the professional stylings of LaWanda, Joan, Jean, Roseanne, and the GGs because those ladies knew how to work, they fucking did, they were downright professionals those women....

...but then again what the fuck do I know anyway? Do whatever you want, really. My opinions don't really actually mean anything.

Hypothetical Hall of Fame Ballot

I love baseball, it's the best, it makes me very happy inside of my heart.

It's hall of fame votin' time again and if I had the opportunity to vote (which I obviously don't) then this would be my hypothetical ballot.

First off, the Steroid Era players, is a hot topic for debate (I wroted on it once too), and I think players who were caught and/or admitted to using steroids will not make the hall of fame. Maybe down the line when society is more accepting of drugs of this nature, and in the case that science is producing safer versions of steroids and human growth hormone, then a committee will probably let some of them in. Voters it seems are not voting for them in this era and I think there is a valid reason as to why they are not voting for them.

The following players are the highest profile players who were caught or admitted use: Bonds, Clemens, McGwire, Sosa, Sheffield, Palmeiro, Kevin Brown, Andy Pettitte, Mike Piazza, Jeff Bagwell, Ivan Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez, Miguel Tejada, Albert Pujols, and that no-good A-Rod.

Ok, let's get going,

This article will look at each player's case on the ballot minus those names from the above list.


Case by Case 

Craig Biggio

Biggio will make it this year 100% so there's no reason to spend too much time on him. He's basically already in. Only 14 more people have crossed the plate more times than Craig Biggio, this guy scored a heckuva lot of runs in his life.

He will be in this year, no doubt about it.


Hall of Famer? Yes.






Tim Raines

I've wrote about Raines's candidacy on four occasions:

1. http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2011/12/baseball-hall-of-fame-is-incomplete.html
2. http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2012/12/last-year-prior-to-hall-of-fame-voting.html
3. http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2013/11/rock-hall-3.html
4. http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2014/10/the-greatest-lead-off-guys-evar.html 

Rock Raines

I don't know what is holding up Tim Raines' entry into the Hall of Fame, and now that it's down to a 10 year maximum to be on the ballot (Mattingly, Trammell, and Lee Smith get a grandfather clause to stay on the ballot for 15 years but Raines for some reason didn't get that clause), he has only 3 chances left to get in instead of 8. It looks more and more like he won't get in at all which really is a shame.

I think now that the steroid era is dying down and teams are returning to a style of baseball that was less reliant on homeruns for offensive production...more people will start to realize what impact players like Raines brought to the table. His ability to get on base, get around the bases, and score runs is matched by only a few others in all of history.


Hall of Famer? Yes.


Lee Smith

I don't think the amount of innings pitched by Lee Smith is enough to warrant him really making the Hall of Fame, he only appeared in 1,289.1 innings in his entire life which is like 3 times less the amount of innings than what the average hall of fame has pitched.

That being said his era in which he pitched in was the first where the "closer" really started to be looked at as a big deal. Coaches in the eighties were starting to use a guy just for the ninth inning, so his lack of innings pitched was not necessarily because he couldn't log a lot innings but because the role he was being used in only required him to throw that many.

The thing about Lee is that he was a dominant bull-pen pitcher for about 16 years which is pretty amazing, really. He was given the task to pitch only in the ninth inning when they had a close lead (which to me is an odd role to assign a player) and he did that incredibly well. He finished with a 3.03 career ERA and 478 saves.

Even if I think the Saves stat is a very gimmicky and kind of silly stat, this man did take the job assigned to him and proceeded to excel at it for 16 years straight...so, in the end I think he is a Hall of Famer.

Hall of Famer? Yes.


Curt Schilling 
  

Awww, Curt has a booo-boooo, poor Curt.

I've had a lot of bloody injuries and I know that blood doesn't really give any indication of how bad an injury is. It's called a "flesh wound" for a reason...and that's because only the flesh is wounded. I think he's seen as a legend for having a bloody sock in a playoff game but that shit is sort of exaggerated to an extent where it's just annoying to hear about him.

He was sort of linked with roids....many on the '93 Phillies did them (like Dykstra) yet Curt is not mentioned by anyone as having done them. He has an odd investigation for steroids in Boston yet this occurred after his career was over in 2008 where maybe he was thinking of coming back, I don't know. Either way, officially, his name is not linked to steroid use.

He's got decent numbers, it's a shame Randy Johnson and Pedro have shown up on the ballot because it makes his numbers look like trash compared to them. The big stat for him is his 3000+ strikeouts and honestly anyone who struck out that many people in his life is probably a Hall of Famer.

Curt Schilling played in some big markets and still never won a Cy Young award though. He's a tough call, I think he will eventually get in due to his Ks though.

Hall of Famer? Yes.


Edgar Martinez

I come from the view that pitching and defense are paramount to winning ball games, I really do. I know offensive numbers are what makes most fans excited, but one of the reasons I think Schilling (and Mussina too) are Hall of Famers is because pitching and defense is what wins games.

Edgar Martinez was a career DH, meaning he didn't field a position and in the years early on when he did play third base he was atrocious. He finished with a .933 OPS which is amazing but how much of a penalty should he get for never playing defense? I don't know, it's just my opinion that Edgar is not a Hall of Famer.

In the final assessment of things, 1261 RBIs is not enough to warrant his entry...if he never played defense and had like 2000 RBIs then fine but his numbers aren't anything really amazing anyways to begin with.

Hall of Famer? No.


Alan Trammell

I wrote about Trammell not long ago (in an article about him, Mike Marshall, and Dick Allen).

Here: http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2014/01/the-greatest-of-people-who-are-not.html

I came to the conclusion that if Ozzie Smith (a contemporary and comparable short stop to Alan) is in the Hall then 100% so should Alan. It's literally just an IF and THEN case scenario with this case.

There's no way he's not a Hall of Famer, really.


Hall of Famer? Yes.


Mike Mussina

K, now there's a manly injury

I remember when he was hit in the face with a line drive and everyone thought his career was done but he made it back and still pitched very well after that scare. His stats are hard to compare to other pitchers from other eras because he pitched through the steroid era so his ERA was definitely higher due to that. If he pitched in the seventies I think Mike would have had a sub-3 ERA, I think that would be a good estimate.

Like Schilling he never got a Cy Young but I still think he will make it with like 75% near the end of his candidacy....I think it'll be a close call but I think he'll make it. Again, I do value pitchers quite highly so maybe it's just me, I don't know.

Unlike Schilling though, his blood image is actually fucking hardcore as fuck, it's not a foot boo-boo it's a broken eye for crying out loud.

Hall of Famer? Yes.


Jeff Kent

Too coiffed lookin'

He played with Bonds on that Giants team where Bonds went nuts, but Kent has stayed out of the steroids scandal's long-casting net of stigma.

Jeff was a great player, who looked like an 80s guy with that mustache too. He was never known as a superstar and due to playing in the steroid era his .855 OPS looks pretty average. If he was a stellar defensive player than he'd be a shoe-in but I don't think anyone saw Kent as a great or even good second baseman.

I have a feeling he'll sneak in because he played in some big market cities but he's borderline at best. If he hit like that in the seventies or eighties then yeah but just because he looks like he played in that era doesn't mean he did. He played in the steroid era where one of his own teammates hit 70 fucking homeruns in one year...his numbers really pale in comparison to his era.

Hall of Famer? No.


Crime Dog

He's a big homer big RBI guy, usually these dudes always make it in with little trouble. I wonder why he doesn't get a lot of votes. The voters are weird with their milestone numbers I find, like say a hypothetical player gets 2,991 hits with a .956 OPS then he's somehow worse than a guy who got 3,000 hits with an .880 OPS. They mainly care about the milestone numbers, they don't care about sample size or anything else.

In the case with the Crime Dog, he got 493 homers in his life....but that's 7 less than 500, if you didn't notice, and 500 homers is one of those milestone numbers that gets you in. Are they really gonna keep Crime out due to 7 measly homers? Gimme a break. If Jim Rice made it than so does he. Rice only had 382 homers...he didn't even make it to 400 let alone 500.

I think Crime should go in.

Hall of Famer? Yes.


Larry Walker

I wrote a long one about him the other day,

Here: http://writtting-d.blogspot.ca/2014/12/on-park-factors-and-hinderance-to-larry.html

I don't know with Larry, I think my brain is saying No but my heart is saying Yeah, He's a Hall of Famah.

I 100% do not think he will ever get in but I for me personally I will put him down as a Yes.


Hall of Famer? Yes.


Don Mattingly

Playing in a big market I think the 4 or 5 great seasons he had somehow got exaggerated into him being of legendary status. He was showered with golden gloves and this and that...good for him. Cut yer side burns for crying out loud you dirty hippie!

He was a great hitter for 3 or 4 seasons but that don't make a hall of fame career.

Hall of Famer? Nope.


Pedro, Unit, n' Smoltz

Pedro Vs. Gerbil (RIP Don Zimmer)

Pedro was the greatest pitcher I ever saw, he was incredible...if he doesn't get 100% of the vote then whoever doesn't vote for him shouldn't be dis-barred but they should be fucking executed for fuck's sake. He's god damned fucking PEDRO for crying out loud he's like the best pitcher ever. He had a sub-2 ERA in the darned steroid era on two occasions (once in the NL and then in the AL), that's actually ludicrous when you think about it. Pedro is literally amazing, the fact that there's probably millions of people named Pedro on earth but he can still be identified solely from his first name is incredible in itself, when someone is talkin' 'bout Pedro you know exactly who they are talkin' 'bout.

Randy too, that guy started as a weird lanky dufus but ended up being a real pitcher's pitcher. He's not as good as Pedro but he's one of those guys who could get 100% of the votes in his first year. He even hit a bird mid-air one time and caused said bird to literally EXPLODE.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwpRHrAh3pk)

Holy Fuck.

Smoltz? He's going in too, no doubt about it. Oh man I hated Maddux/Smoltz/Glavine so much, they were great though. They got all the calls these guys, man. Sometimes it felt like they paid the umps these three guys. At least that Steve Avery character petered out, there used to be four or them in that clan...4 of their stupid faces to look at.


Conclusion

So the Yes variables and the No variables were:

YES: Pedro, Unit, Smoltz, Biggio, Rock, Lee Smith, Schilling, Trammell, Mussina, Crime-Dog, Walker.

(Schilling, Mussina, Walker, and Lee Smith I think are quite borderline but are Yesses).

NO: Steroiders, Edgar Martinez, Jeff Kent, and Mattingly.

Great Moments in Literature 3: The Development of Ma Junior / Demon Jr. / Piccolo

I like writing these, they're funner, no one gets offended with these ones either, they are fun for the whole family and everything.

Previous articles in the Great Moments in Literature Series:

1. Bob Backlund

2. Stan Gable


Today we shall not be looking at literature from fake wrestling or even from movies but shall be looking at a great character from Japanese Cartoons.

Now before we get going I want the record to show that for the most part...I am not a huge fan of Japanese Cartoons. It has a very cookie cutter format to it with thousands of people over in Japan writin' comix and making animations and it has reached a level of conveyor-belt-a-tude that almost is sweat-shop-esque in nature. I think the thing with these cartoons are "how fast and how many of these can we make?" and quantity always outweighs quality. Sometimes they do put budget into them and make feature length high-quality ones (like Akira, etc.) but for the most part the genre lacks originality.

That being said there's two Japanese Cartoons over the years which I think are fucking cool as all hell and they are One Piece and Dragon Ball (Z). Why out of the 2.7 million different Japanese cartoons are these the only two that I think are fucking cool as hell? Because they pump me up like fucking crazy, that's why. When I'm feeling unpumped there's nary a time either One Piece or Dragon Ball Z can't re-pump me up and get me all crazy and shit.

Oh man, the first time I saw Chiaotzu jump on to Nappa's back and blow himself up to try and save earth yet ultimately only managed to self-sacrifice himself vain, I felt like to cry, but then Tien Shin Han totally steps up and even though he has one arm cut off and blood is shooting everywhere...he fucking totally flips out and starts doing one-armed Kikihoos all over the damned place and just fucking going ballistic and goin' nuts.

My emotions get confused when watching this show sometimes...I don't know whether to cry, to get super-pumped...or both! It's like this show invokes an emotion in my brain n' body that I've never even felt before...bein' sad and pumped at the same exact time. It's like being Sumped or maybe Pumpad.

There are very little if any other entertainment media that can invoke the Pumpad emotion (which was just recently named only 10 seconds ago) in this boiling and festering soul of mine....so for that Dragon Ball is pretty cool in my books.

The character who's devo-lopment we shall be lookin' into shall be the character known as Ma Junior / Demon Jr. or as most Westernites know him...Piccolo.

(Note: Everyone's seen this fucking show, no? There's no need for a spoiler warnin' really).


Piccolo's Dad

Before you can learn about Piccolo you first have to hear a bit about his crazy old dad.

Good (Right), Evil (Left)

Piccolo's dad was a weird green alien man from outer space who got bored on his dumb planet (which we learned later was mostly green oceans, ugly green people, and dumb looking domes) and blasted off into outer-space lookin' for adventure! Eventually Piccolo's Dad would wind up on earth where he'd notice was a planet filled with weak and boring people.

He soon figured these jabronies needed a cool alien to guide them so he became God (seriously), but he felt that in order to be a super-benevolent God he'd first have to rid himself of evil. So using a technique common on his planet he split himself into two...one Good Side and one Evil Side.

The Good side of Piccolo's dad became God and watched over the earth while the Evil side went nuts and killed a bunch of fucking people. Luckily, a local martial arts man named Master Muta Ito managed to seal the Evil side of Piccolo's dad into an electric rice steamer where he remained for like a hundred years.

Many years later, unfortunately, a blue midget, a ninja-dog, and a hot russian-looking woman eventually happen upon the rice steamer and let Evil Piccolo's Dad out and shit gets messed up quick. Evil Piccolo's Dad (EPD) gets all the dragon ballz, wishes his youth back, and then declares May 9th as Piccolo Day. All the earthians have to celebrate that day marking it forever and ever as the day their new King arrived.

Ya, Piccolo's dad was fucking evil, a serious bad guy. He starts spitting out all these mutant "sons" that look like pterodactyls and all kinds of crazy things, which is pretty cool, but Tien and Goku beat up all the mutant "sons" in their attempt to stop his evil deeds.

Eventually, after Tien fails to re-trap Piccolo's dad in a rice steamer...Goku (when he's still a little kid) beats the living fuck out of Piccolo's dad....

....but.....

...Before Piccolo's dad dies he spits out an egg but this one isn't a stupid egg that hatches pterodactyls and stupid things like that...inside this egg is a perfect clone of Evil Piccolo's Dad...a perfect baby EPD which has all his DNA and even some of his memories and stuff.


Piccolo, First Incarnation: REAL EVIL

Piccolo, when he hatches from that slimy egg looks cute...but he's not...he's actually really really evil. He's as evil as his Evil Dad but he's just in a cute cute baby form at first.

He ages quickly because he's not human and soon enough he's a big boy and ready to compete in the 23rd Annual World Martial Arts Tournament. All the big names will be there like Yamcha, Chiaotzu, Tien Shin Han, Krillin, and the one who killed his dad...Goku.

Piccolo is more than just his dad's son, he is literally like a clone of his dad with not only his facial features and physiognomy...but also is a prisoner to his father's evil hopes and dastardly dreams.

He knows he has to kill Goku and get his revenge. He will stop at nothing to kill Goku, even if it means destroying the entire arena, or even the planet if that's what it takes.

His uncle Good Piccolo shows up and steals some dude's body in order to fight his nephew and seal him in a rice steamer but he fails and Piccolo gets his uncle sealed away instead...oh no!

Goku and Piccolo meet in the finals, as everyone expected and they do indeed destroy the entire arena during the battle...yet once again Goku comes out on top and defeats Evil King Piccolo's son.

Yet, in an act of kindness befitting of Goku, he gives Piccolo a Senzu Bean which heals his deep wounds and saves his life. Piccolo is remiss at this action yet undeterred as he vows to re-match Goku and kill him some time in the near future.


Dangerous Liaisons

Both Piccolo and Goku train in order to be in top shape for their re-match when the title is back on the line...the stakes shall be once again high as Piccolo vowed death unto Goku's head....yet misfortune erupts around our would-be pugilists as different aliens from a more different planet (the one Goku's actually from) come to earth to kill everybody.

Oh shit. The new alien kidnaps Goku's son and all kinds of panic ensues...oh my goodness.

Piccolo is distraught at this turn of events under the reasoning that if this dumb alien kills all the earthians and Goku then how the hell is he supposed to kill all the earthians and Goku!? After much deliberation, Piccolo decides that his only option is to propose a brief alliance with Goku to rid this alien menace under the understanding that it would be mutually beneficial for both parties...to which Goku accepts....

AND THE WORLD'S MOST STRONGEDEST TEEEEEEAM IS BORNED! DA-DA-NA-NA-NA-DA-Na-na-na-DA-DA-NA-NA-NA-NAAA!

Piccolo's deranged and evil mind seems to be easing slightly as he shows extreme signs of rational thinking with these actions. One might even begin to wonder if the heart of this evil being is beginning to crack slightly...possibly the Senzu Bean Goku gave him long ago as an act of kindness chipped away at his heart? Only time will tell.

Goku and Piccolo gang up on the stupid alien and try to kick the shit out of him but simply can't because they suck so bad....but then something really fucked happens...Goku's kid who's only like 4 years old and who's been kidnapped by the alien this whole entire time flips out hard when he sees his dad getting his ass kicked and goes ABSOLUTELY FUCKING BUCK WILD CRAZY AND FLIPS THE FUCK OUT. He nails the alien guy and the alien, Goku, and Piccolo are all like....

"Whoa, what the hell?"

Goku and Piccolo get their shit back together and get pumped after seeing Goku's son go nuts and they get more confidence to beat the alien. Goku gets the alien in a fricken Full Nelson and implores Piccolo to shoot his crazy-cool Demon Spiral Death Ray, that he loads from his mind into his index and middle fingertips, right through both the alien and himself.

Wow! COOOOOOL!

Piccolo is all for the idea of killing the alien and Goku with one super-wicked-cool-as-smoke damned Makankosappo Demon Lazor Cannon Ray for it would be like killing two birds with one stone (as they say).

He blasts them both and gets his wish of killing the alien and Goku....yet he can't relax yet.

(yo, don't worry death isn't legit in this show, people can just get wished back to life with the darned Dragon Ballz...like Krillin's been killed at least 5 times in this show and he's still there)

He cannot relax and feel victory because his loose lips are gunna sink a bunch of ships. As the alien lay dying, Piccolo added insult to the alien's injury by telling the stupid alien that Goku's friends were just gonna wish him back with the darned Dragon Ballz anyway, so the alien is the only bozo that's gunna die. The alien gets the last of the laughs though...because he had a fucking tape recorder broadcasting that conversation to outer space where his alien friends are and now they are gonna come to earth to get those darned Dragon Ballz and fuck everything to shit and kill everybody! Oh my goooodness.

As Piccolo feels stupid that he said that and realizes this fight is only beginning, he recalls Goku's son's flip-out from earlier and tells the 4 year old he's gonna train him to harness that power so he can help him fight the aliens when they get to earth. The kid doesn't want to but Piccolo tells him he'll break his fucking neck if he doesn't do the intense Jungle Survival Training he has planned for him!

Has the evil Piccolo become less evil or is he just allying himself with Goku and now his son to save his own evil green skin? Only time will tell.


Benevolent Uncle Piccolo

Piccolo throws Goku's son into the jungle and tells him if he doesn't die in the next like 6 months then he'll train him to be wicked strong. He does this to toughen the kid up, but it turns out not to be as harsh as you'd think as Piccolo is always giving the kid apples and helpin' him out in the jungle from afar so the kid doesn't die. Piccolo's watchful eye doesn't look evil when he does this...his watchful eye looks kinda uncle-like.

Take THAT ya big moon!

With Piccolo's help Goku's son (Gohan) progresses his survival training nicely, except trouble brews out as Gohan (due to being a monkey alien) turns into a gigantic gorilla at night time cuz of the moon and tries to murder Piccolo. Being a pretty smart guy, Piccolo realizes this is a total werewolf-esque situation being caused by the dumb moon....so he fucking Makankosappo Demon Lazor Cannons the god damned moon! Cool.

Blowing up the moon is just plain cool. It just is. Master Roshi blowed it up once too, I think, but I don't remember how or why the moon came back...I'm guessing someone wished it back with those darned Dragon Ballz, I dunno.

After that Gohan isn't a big gorilla for a while and they develop a sort of friendship between them. Piccolo keeps telling himself he is training him to stop the aliens so he can conquer the world himself when the alien threat has passed...yet the viewer knows better and can plainly see his evil heart cracking before their very eyes.

When the other two aliens (the friends of the first alien) finally show their retarded faces on earth to kill everyone and rob the Dragon Ballz...Gohan participates with the other earthian heroes to repel them, yet with Goku still out on the disabled list (60-Day DL; Out indefinitely due to Death), Gohan and the others cannot defeat the monkey aliens and their painful deaths are imminent...

...and not only imminent but those deaths are for REAL this time cuz if the monkey aliens kill the guy who makes the Dragon Ballz (which turns out to be fucking Piccolo...cuz if Piccolo dies then the Good Piccolo dies too and Good Piccolo is God, remember?)...then they can't wish nobody back with said Dragon Ballz, which sucks cuz then when yer dead yer dead for good.

All that taken into consideration, i.e. Piccolo KNOWS that if he dies then no one can wish anyone back to life, what happens next is pretty large, man....

...................

When one of the monkey aliens tries to kill Gohan, Piccolo jumps in front of the child and takes the energy blast meant for him....and dies. It's so damned sad, my goodness...because this time it's real...like there's no more Dragon Ballz if Piccolo dies....and now Piccolo's straight up dead.

Before he dies, he tells Gohan something that will break your damned heart even if it's coming from a green man from a very silly cartoon show from Japan, he says...

"Gohan, you're the only real friend I've ever had. I want to thank you..."


You saw this evil creature's heart cracking the whole entire time, from when he started training Gohan 'til this very moment, you knew he was slowly becoming a good guy. Now in the heat of life-or-death battle, he sacrificed himself for his sworn enemy's son...but why? Because that boy was "the only real friend he ever had." 

Those were his last words. That's so deep, word.

Yo.


I'm Home! I'm ALIVE! I FEEEL GREEAT! I FEEL INCREDIBLE! YES! YES! I CAN WIN! WOW! MY GOSH!

Well, even though apparently he was dead for good...he really wasn't. Turned out there was more of those magic Dragon Ballz on the planet Piccolo originally came from so they all shoot up to space to find them and resurrect all the earthians that died from the alien attack (including Piccolo).

Unfortunately, A crazy planet-broker who buys and sells planets and their resources to the highest bidder gets pissed that our heroes are messing around on a planet that he wants to gut and sell so he gives them a hard time. This guy is tough too.

Our intrepid space-venturing heroes eventually wish Piccolo back and he feels stronger from training on that King Kai planet but is unconfident that he can beat this new enemy....but as luck would have it he finds a really powerful countryman who is near death and fuses with him (remember how God did that at the start? Yeah you can un-fuse yourself but you can also fuse yourself too, obviously).

This guy he vulcan mind-melds with is like a totally cool guy too and when their bodies merge Piccolo turns into even more of a better guy and even more of the evil washes away, in fact a huge wave of Positive Thinking hits our favorite green guy, check it out...

YES! YES! YES! WOW!

Holy moly, I've never seen Piccolo this positive before, he's like a new man after he fused with that dying guy. Wow. Talk about character development...how 'bout merging souls with another person and becoming a more better person? How's that for character development!? Whoa.

Piccolo kicks some ass, then Goku comes and turns blonde and beats some more ass....they win, but the important thing is that Piccolo is even more less-evil now.

Becoming God's Uncle

After they make everyone alive again and come back to earth from Piccolo's planet...they have to fight a bunch of robots who came from the future to murder them, why the fuck not?

These robots? Holy shit they are strong...like waaay more stronger than the last guys they fought in outer space. Piccolo comes to the conclusion that he is but merely half a man and could never beat a bunch of robots from the future in his present state.

Remember how his dad and his uncle were once One? Well, Piccolo thinks it's time to become One again and goes to see his Uncle God on that tower where God, a cat, a fat guy, and a guy with a turban live. Piccolo is basically all like....

Piccolo: "Uncle God, I'm not all that evil anymore so let's fuse and become One like you and my dad used to be before, ok God?"

God: Ya, okay, fine.

So, Piccolo and God fuse together and become One...thus completing the long and somewhat strange transformation of Piccolo from a bad guy into a good guy. This new good-guy Piccolo and his friends beat those damned robots and everything's chill again.

After all's said and done...Piccolo (now God) looks back and remembers all the bad shit he did to people and realizes he's still a bit too evil to be friggin' God of Earth so he vacates the position and recommends a kid they brought home with them from space be God now... and Piccolo will be like God's Uncle and watch over God and teach God right from wrong.

Character Development Assessment

Okay, so...basically, Piccolo went from being:

1. An Alien

and then became,

2. Two Aliens

and then became, 

3. An Egg

and then became,

4. A cute baby Alien 

and then became,

5.  A Bad Guy

and then became,

6. A Rational Bad Guy who Worked with Good Guys when it was Necessary

and then became,

 7. A Bad Guy who Understood what Real Friendship Was

and then became,

8. Almost a Good Guy after Fusing/Merging Himself with a Pretty Decent Guy

and then became,

9. A Good Guy after Fusing/Merging with his uncle who happened to be God 

and then became,

10. God's Benevolent Uncle

Okay, wow....now that's some character development, man. My goodness. They won't teach you that in those script writing classes those hollywood jaboronies take. Fuck.

Normally, character development goes like a 1-2-3 progression of bad guy - to normal guy - to good guy... but with Piccolo, the vehicle getting him from point A to point B on his character development map took some scenic detours, that's for sure.

If you're gonna write a book, or a fake wrestling, or a Japanese Cartoon, or a movie...always remember when you're branching out your character devo-lopment maps to throw in some wild-ass 180s and 360s and some U-turns to keep everyone interested...you might as well make your characters eggs and God Uncles too.

Dang, Piccolo is cool.

Piccolo (left) with his nephew God (right)

An Open Letter Acting as an Official Nomination for the Following Party to be Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize Trophy

The following letter is an open style letter (meaning anyone can read it), it is submitted to the internet for all to see but is specifically directed at the attention of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee who accepts and reviews nominations for said prize.

The criterion for a human being to be allowed to nominate someone for review by the Nobel Committee is to meet one of the following requirements:


A) Bein' a "member of national assembly and/or government of state"
B) Bein' a "member of international court"
C) Bein' a "University rector; professor of social sciences, history, philosophy, law and theology; director of peace research institute and/or foreign policy institute"
D) Bein' a "Person who has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize"
E) Bein' a "Board member of an organization that has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize"
F) Bein' "Active and former members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee; (proposals by members of the Committee to be submitted no later than at the first meeting of the Committee after February 1)"
G) Bein' a "Former adviser to the Norwegian Nobel Committee

I meet the following requirement: B


In the month of July of 2012, I served on jury duty in the case of Fields, S. vs. Amsterdam, M., thereby (be it bit but a brief moment) acting as a member of an "international court" and thus giving me access to nominate humans to be reviewed by the Nobel Committee in regards to said party being awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.

Okie Dokie?

Before penning my open letter to the Nobel Piece Prize Committee, we shall look at just what the heck the peace prize committee is and we shall also look at the man I wish to nominate. So this is gonna be a pretty clunky article smashed into three parts.

Nobel Peace Prize

A brief tl;dr summation of the history of the Nobel Peace Prize is as follows:

This guy invented dynamite and got very rich, but he hated money so much that he never spent any and as he lay on his death bed he proclaimed to the people watching him die,

"My fortune is yours for the taking, but you'll have to find it first.
I left everything I own in Nobel Piece." -Nobel, A.(Dec.10/1886)

Millions of able bodied men and women searched Scandinavia for the fabled Nobel Piece. Naysayers thought they were just dreamers and n'er do well adventurers who were searching for something which didn't even exist....but it did. So, yeah. Yet, inside Alfred Nobel's buried treasure was simply a letter which stated,

"I, the undersigned, Alfred Bernhard Nobel, do hereby, after mature deliberation, declare the following to be my last Will and Testament with respect to such property as may be left by me at the time of my death:

...

[my] estate shall be dealt with in the following way: the capital, invested in safe securities by my executors, shall constitute a fund, the interest on which shall be annually distributed in the form of prizes to those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind." -Nobel, A (source)

That's the jist of it.

Everyone knows about it but is it even that important? I mean Albert fuckin' Gore has one of these fuckin' Scandinavian trinkets so how important can it fucking be? Fuckin' Mikhail Gorbachev has one of these chachkies...what's up with that? One year the recipient was "The European Union" not even a human at all. How on earth could Albert Gore have been deserving of an award commemorating the "greatest benefit to mankind" during the 2007 season?

Look, to me it sounds like a stupid little thing but people around the earth take this thingy super cereal. So, as the power invested in me as a member of an "international court" during that one time I jury membered on Fields S. vs. Amsterdam, M. I hereby nominate to be the recipient of the Nobel Prize for Peace...

...The Iron Sheik.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LhqN7SFNEE)

Yeah!

Iron Sheik

A man who's name precedes him and needs no introduction of any kind. Everyone knows the Sheik, he's a living Legend, a living Champion, a living The Real. Like a Michael Jordan, or like a Muhammad Ali, he's a man who's kind is born only every five hundred years.

The Sheik's selfless acts of altruism make him the most deserving human being ever to awarded one of these Nobel Peace Prizes. Why? Firstly, some historically significant set-up is in order...

Back in the olden times, wrestling wasn't a monopoly, instead it operated in scattered factions who claimed "territories" under their respective promotional banners. There was Memphis Wrestling featuring Jerry Lawler and Andy Kaufman for example amongst many many other regions.

Eventually one regional promotion would grow so powerful that they monopolized wrestling promotion and that company was the WWF (now the WWE). How did they get so powerfully popular? So popular that they were able to unify the country under one single wrestling promotion? "Hulkamania" happened...

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xHz0Ozq5EQ)

Hulk Hogan become such a phenomenon that other regional promotions couldn't compete with this ratings grabbing behemoth of a hollywood babyface superstar. Hulkamania conquered wrestling promotion for the WWE and discounting a brief challenge by Ted Turner in the 90s...it has remained that way since.

As everyone knows for every hero there must be a villain and Hulk Hogan's explosion into Hulkamania was heavily due to the Iron Sheik. The Sheik represented the evil foreigner who defeated the 60/70s America-Boy babyface Bob Backlund and was the most hated man in America while holding the title...and it was the hollywood blonde 80s baby-face Hulk Hogan who who took the belt back from the great Sheik which launched Hogan like offa spring board into Super Stardom.

Remember this is before the monopolization of wrestling promotion and other regions were jealous of this brazen Hulk Hogan who they viewed as a body builder who didn't know a thing about fake wrestling. Many don't know that the Iron Sheik had an offer on the table from Verne Gagne in Minnesota to literally break Hulk Hogans legs as the ultimate insult to this hollywood blonde body-building jabroni. In fact, Gagne offered the Sheik hundreds of thousands of real dollars to break his jabroni-ass legs.

Nobel Peace Prize? None more deserving than he.

What would you do in that situation? I bet many of you good boys and girls are thinking, "Oh, surely the angel known as me would not have broken Hulk Hogan's legs for I am a good person" but if you're thinking that's what you'd do if faced with a similar situation then you people are full of shit. The Iron Sheik is a shooter, man. He is a man who could break your back with one of his little pinky fingers. He could have "accidentally" snapped Hogan's legs like a twig, ruined Hogan's career, went back to Minnesota to collect hundreds of thousands of dollars...and in that moment...destroy Hulkamania forever and ever.

Under those circumstances, breaking Hulk Hogan's hollywood blonde jabroni legs was obviously the most beneficial choice for him. In the present we can look to the past and see that he did not chose to do what 99.9999% of us would have done in his shoes...no, no...he chose to spare Hulk Hogan's legs and lose the fake wrestling match like he was paid to do. Why? Because he's a man of his word, he would never double cross anyone...he has a heart of the purest of gold.

With the act of choosing not to smash Hulk Hogan's leg bones into millions and millions of pieces, the Iron Sheik displayed a level of humanitarian kindness and goodwill that I believe blows all other acts of humanitarian kindness out of the water. If you could condense kindness into some sort of sap-like substance (you know like maple sap in maple trees) I bet the Iron Sheik's heart would be figuratively oozing with Kindness Sap. It's unreal how he put others before himself in that situation, and for that I believe there has never been a human more deserving of a Swedish award that commemorates goodwill.


The Official Letter

The following is a transcript of the notarized letter sent to the Nobel Peace Prize Committee by yours truly,

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee
Henrik Ibsens gate 51
0255 Oslo, NORWAY

Dear Noble Peace Prize Committee, 
Attn: Peace Division

I hereby, under the authority of acting on the jury of the legendary case of Fields, S. vs. Amsterdam, M., and thereby a member of an "international court" (i.e. a court in a nation somewhere on earth at any given time), nominate one Khosrow Vaziri AKA "The Iron Sheik" to be this or next year's Noble Peace Prize recipient.

I nominate him under the merits of that time back in 1984 that, under the guidance of his heart made of gold-like sap, he refrained from breaking one Terry Gene Bollea AKA "Hulk Hogan's" fucking legs at the Madison Square Garden in front of like a hundred thousand people.

This act of humanitarian courage should heretofore be recognized by your organization, the King of Sweden and/or the King of Norway and/or the King of Finland, and/or the Bernadotte dynast-kings of yesteryear (retro-active). If you leave this man's merits unrecognized you risk a great deal of international shame to your organization as many will question if you know what the heck you guys are doing over there.

Truthfully Yours, 
Deric W. Brazill (md) 

I threw an "md" on that shit at the end to make it look like I got some smarts, you know? I'm not really one of those.

Anyway, hopefully the Sheik gets a Nobel prize this year or next because he's obviously super-deserving of one of those things.



(End Note: This letta is OFFICIAL meaning if they fail to respond to an OFFICIAL letter then they are proclaiming to the world that they a bunch of friggin' jabronies those Scandinavians.)

Canadian Election Human Value Rankings!!!

Hey world, did you know Canada is having an election in 2015? Yeah, they are, exciting eh? We get to vote for our "prime minister" whatever the fuck that is.

This topic was one of the first articles I ever did for last election back like four non-score years ago, you can read that one if you want, but my writing style and comedic tact was a little worse for wear back in the day (I think I only got good at this bloggin shit sometime around 2012-ish):

Previous Canada Election Article: Here

I like that I worked in Fergie Jenkins at the end there in that one, that was pretty cool. He's a hall of fame pitcher, that guy.

Anyways, let's explain how this election system works first before we get into the human value rankings.

Canadian Elections

It's not a popular vote poll, it's based on "seats" in "parliament". A seat is just a regional area, there's 310 or so seats that they fight over and the party with the most seats wins! Yay.

There are not two but five parties who get "seats" in our elections. The current polls (with the amount of seatz being set to a round number like 100) are as follows:

Liberals (Left-Center Field): 41 Seatz
Conservatives (Right Center Field): 32 Seatz
Democratic Party (Left Center Field): 17 Seatz
Green Party (Left Field): 5 Seatz
French Separatists (?????????): 5 Seatz

Even though I don't really care for putting political views on a line, I have denoted the leftness or rightness of the party because they do advertise themselves to the public along this silly line. You'll be quick to note that unlike the USA who has two parties (the left-center field party and the right-center field party)...Canada has a whopping 3 left leaning parties and 1 right leaning party.

If it was like the states and it was 1 left-center party versus 1 right center party...the results would be:

Theoretical Left Center Merged Party: 63 Seatz
Right Center Party: 32 Seatz
French Separatists: 5 Seatz

It would be a blowout win, but that's not what's gonna happen as the Left Center parties are split into three factions who argue over votes with each other and thus the Liberals and Conservatives are neck-and-neck in the polls.


Human Rankings

Ew.

1. Stevie Harper

Evangelical Christian who hates science and is suspected of being mentally handicapped so you're supposed to give him leeway and be nice to him. It's annoying. He's been in power for almost 9 years now and if he wins again he's gonna get double digits.

I firmly respect the USA and their laws on term limits, which Banana-Republic Canada simply does not have, we've actually had prime ministers in power for over 20 years back in day.

To me, no one should be in power of a country for over 10 years, so I don't believe anyone should vote for this person again for that reason alone. Ten years is the "dictator" barrier that once you cross that line you can longer be referred to as an "elected official" yet must be denoted as a "dictator." It's true, I don't make the rules, that's just the way it is.

Overall Ranking: -100 / 10


2. Trudeau Jr.

Put yer fuckin' shirt on, Bieber.

Some little punk who's never worked a real job in his life who was hired to be the Face of the Liberal Party....an unbelievably boring dork. Like the Bush family, he feels since his daddy was Prime Minister then he should be too.

He's killing the women vote though, holy fuck, women want to suck this kid's balls right off, they love him so much. He is literally the Justin Bieber of politics, the Liberal party should of just signed Bieber if they wanted to monopolize the lady vote any further.

His parents are famous international jet-setters who had threesomes with celebs all the world so the name "Trudeau" is quite famous. Here's masterful interviewer Bill Boggs interviewing his Mom about her friendship with Fidel Castro and how important she feels she is:

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klVDOrJ0u_0)

Bill Boggs

His family is like a big deal in Canada, they are certified celebrities and this and that...so he's a good face for the Liberal Party, no doubt.

Obviously, as a 30 year old male human, I don't fall into the Bieber demographic and thus will not be voting for him.

Overall Ranking: -80/10


3. Beard Man

A bearded man.

I don't know what the point of Beard Man is, this guy's only job is to split the vote of the left center party so the Harper team wins again, for all I know Beard Man and Harper are in fucking cahoots. If they split the vote well enough the Harper Team will win again...so to me I seriously have to question if Beard Man is a real candidate or just a plant for the Harper team.

I don't really know anything about him other than that he has a beard....so nothing good and nothing bad...which for politics isn't such a bad thing. He's just a bearded man...no more and no less. Very bland shtick, wow.

Overall Ranking: -80/10


4. Green Party

Hasn't got off the ground yet, mainly acting to further split the left-center party.

Overall Ranking: -80/10


5. French Separatists

Who knows, who cares.

Overall Ranking: -80/10


Assessment

Liberals/Green/Demo/Separatists: -80
Conservatives: -100

The conservatives are the worst party by a full 20 points and it is in my opinion that NO ONE should vote for them in the next election.

I know this is a very basic look at Canada's Leck Shuns but it's the only things you need to know about it...it's not entertaining like other countries' elections where you can write interesting shit about it. It's two old white men and one somewhat young-ish white man fooling around up here...it's immensely boring.

Get some fucking chix in there, or some black guys, maybe a native, maybe an asian. Mix it up, fuck, gimme a break...this shit is soooooo lame. It always has to be boring-as-fuck white dudes who run, never anyone cool.

The only thing that can save another boring-ass Leck Shun is if that fat ol' crack smoking Rob Ford gets off his lazy ass and makes a run for the Prime Ministership.

"Prime Minister Rob Ford", has a good ring to it. Come on Rob, you know you wanna be Prime Minister, bro...get off your ass, stop smokin' crack and throw your hat in the race, man.

Come on...RUN!

I would predict a Rob Ford election would maximize voter turnout, increase world wide press, and I believe the end results would be the following:


Ford Nay-Shun United Co-A-Lishin' of Crack-Heads: 50 Seatz
Theoretical Left Center Merged Party: 32 Seatz
Right Center Party: 13 Seatz
French Separatists: 5 Seatz

A landslide win for Rob Ford.

On Park Factors and the Hinderance to Larry Walker's Hall of Fame Bid

Hall of Fame votin' season is getting into full swing, I did my annual Timmy "Rock" Raines for Hall of Fame article early this here,

Read that one: Here

Today we'll be looking at a player with a career .965 OPS (on base + slugging), which is unusually high, yet who's hall of fame bid is not garnering much support. This man is Larry Walker who was born in Maple Ridge British Colombia.

The reason for him not garnering a ground-swell of support hinges on the fact that he racked up insane numbers in a hitter's park...in fact the park which greatest favored hitters over pitchers of any park ever.

Park Factors

Park factors is a fairly new way of looking and interpreting baseball statistics. It is quite simple, it boils down to, some stadiums favor hitters and other stadiums favor pitchers. Many factors are at play some examples are the following:

1. How close are the outfield walls? If the corner of the outfields are 350 feet instead of 355 feet...it might sound like no big deal but that five feet means many a ball that would be home runs in the 350 park will be outs in the 355 park.

2. How big is the foul area? Some parks have huge in-play foul territories and some parks have very small foul territories. If a guy pops up to the third base side and it sails into the crowd...it becomes a souvenir for a fan rather than in the third baseman's glove and the third out of the inning. Large foul territories favor pitchers.

3. Is the infield grass or turf? A grass infield will slow the ball down and a sharp hit grounder will die out and be fielded by the infielder...while in a carpet park with turf many of these hard hit balls hit the hard ground surface, don't slow down, and wind up past the infielder and into the outfield for a hit.

Walker, in a rare right-handed at-bat

Those are examples of how a park could favor hitters or pitchers. In the case of Larry Walker a very new park factor came into play with the expansion Colorado team in 1993. It took a while to figure out why everyone on that team was hitting close to .400 and hitting 40 homers a year...but it was physicists who figured out as to why the hitters were getting such an undocumented boost and pitchers' ERAs were getting into the fives and sixes.

Scientists pointed out that the altitude of the stadium, which is a full mile above sea level, or around 1600 meters above sea level was making the air in the stadium less dense. Mountain climbers might be familiar with the gasping for air as they get higher and higher up a mountain, and this is the same case here. The air is simply not as thick when you're that high above sea-level.

Now, pitchers throw balls usually between 85-100 miles per hour and hitters nail these pitches with bat speeds coming through their centers of gravity at about 100 miles an hour...meaning when these two forces collide the ball off the bat will go quite far quite fast. If the air is thinner, the resistance of the air molecules that the traveling ball is meeting isn't posing much of a resistance at all. Not only that, but many breaking pitches need to push off dense air molecules to complete their breaks and if the air is too thin then, for example a curve-ball, will not break/move/drop on the hitter because it has nothing to break against.

Colorado has tried to curb the exaggerated effects of the boost to hitters over the years and the effects are not as exaggerated as they used to be (but it still is a VERY hitter friendly park). They now store the baseballs used in the games in a big humidor to make the balls more moisture-logged so they don't rip through the air as easily. Unfortunately, the era of 1993 to 2002 in Colorado and hitters hitting there have the stigma of "Mile-High Effect" on their stats, and Walker was a Colorado Rockie from 1995 to 2004, therefore, getting a good eight full season of the Mile-High boost.

Hall of Fame voters now don't know what the hell to do, no one knows what his numbers would have been without the boost and it seems for the most part they are all just not voting for him at all. It's unfortunate because chances are without the boost he may very well would have had a hall of fame career regardless.

Another Player who Benefited from Park Effects

Teams used to design their damned parks after their star players. If a big left handed hitter was their star player than possibly one year the right field wall would have "accidentally" been brought closer by about 20 feet. I read in Bill Veeck's book that, well he claims that, he installed an electric fence which went in closer while his team batted, and then at the push of a button, went out really far when the opposing team batted. There is no evidence of this ever happening and is accepted by historians as being a flat-out lie told by Veeck as more of a parlor jest than anything else.

Aided by Park Effects?

I don't want to cut into legends, everyone loves Babe Ruth, and his name has grown to be bigger than life itself...yet in defense of Larry Walker, I think we'll have to cut into the Babe a bit and detail just how easy it was for him to hit homers.

There's parks now and over the years where it is 345 to the corner outfields, some stand at 340...and then there's some where it is literally just above 300 feet. It is the older ball parks where this is the case, most people have seen the green monster in Boston which looks like a little league park it is so close to the hitter but at least they raised the wall to tower up and keep line drives from becoming homers. Yankee Stadium in Ruth's era had a right field wall which was 314 feet away and wasn't an over-exaggerated tower of a wall like in Boston....just a regular wall 314 feet away. That's it.

Ruth was a pull hitter who pulled the ball to right field, and at 314 feet away, guess what? Fat Boy logged a lot of fucking homeruns. Is it just me or does logging 714 homers while your home park custom built you a wall 314 feet away seem kind of cheap? No offense, I know the Babe is a legend, but F that cheap tailor made field for him, man. Revive this guy with some voodoo, put Babe Ruth in SafeCo Field down in Seattle as his home park, and watch this "legend" hit .275 with 22 homers next year.

That kid Kyle Seager who hit 16 homers at SafeCo last year should be pretty proud of himself. That's not an easy park to drop bombs in.

A lot of the old legends got the benefit of playing around in home parks where they were literally little league dimension fields. Home or away, they got to fool around in tiny little parks.

Conclusion

Did Larry Walker get his stats monstrously inflated from Coors Field? Yes, yes he did.

Those are his stats from the 1998 season for example, hitting .418 with 17 homers at home but only .302 with 6 homers on the road. That is highly irregular and not normal. To get a good idea what his stats would have been sans-Coors, someone should look at his career Away OPS, and see if it is still good. If his career Away OPS is still over 900 then I think he should be a shoe in Hall of Famer.

According to the data his career OPS on the road is .865...which is still very very good and possibly good enough for the Hall of Fame.

The thing is, the Hall of Fame is filled with players who's park effects weren't analyzed even a little bit. Should Walker get sort of a "grandfather clause" bypass because Coors Field was basically the field which made park factors such a well-studied phenomena? If Babe and all these other guys got their park factors thrown out the window then maybe Walker should too. He has the negative stigma of playing in the park which literally lead to such an interest in park factors...which is a huge stumbling block to his candidacy.

It's hard for anyone to imagine what his numbers would have been if they weren't altitude inflated...I'm not sure that is a license for all BBWAA writers to just toss his case out the window though. All in all, the design flaw of Coors field may keep him out of the hall of fame.

For what it is worth, I 100% fully believe, that if you took the 1920s Babe Ruth, you somehow cloned him or revived him with some hypothetical elixir, and stuck him a Mariners uniform (or a Padres uniform where it's 402 to right-center) for the 2015 season...1920s Babe Ruth would struggle to even hit .280 and not even make it to 30 homers in a full season. I truly believe that.