Briefly, I have to say I'm a little down. First, my man Steve McNair retired from the Baltimore Ravens. It was only fitting that he moved away from the Tennessee Titans shortly after I moved from Nashville. We were boys. Every Sunday in the fall from 1999 to whenever it was I left the Music City. Hm. He had heart. One season, he had back surgery and still came back to lead his team. BACK Surgery! And you know that amazing Super Bowl chuck and grab that Eli Manning and David Tyree made? Well, Steve McNair did that against the Rams years earlier, but Kevin Dyson was a yard short of the goal line. Anyway.
Then the backbreaker: Ryan Klesko. He's retired. For the longest, he was my favorite active player (my favorite all-time being Phillies great Mike Schmidt) but now, I don't know what to call him. When the Braves foolishly traded him to the Padres, I became a Padres fan. Seriously. I still am thanks to Jake Peavy. Anyway... I almost stopped watching the Braves. They'd traded Klesko and Bret Boone for Quilvio Veras (who?EXACTLY!) and Wally Joyner (who should've been retired at the time). Because of Klesko, I saw the fatal flaw in Bobby Cox: he's stupid. Everytime a left-hander came to pitch, Klesko came out. Your 30-homer guy came out. How easy was it for opposing managers to dismantle our line-up knowing all they had to do is pitch a southpaw? Bah. Well... No one had picked Ryano up so far, and rather than remain a free agent, he packed his bags and decided to mosey into the woods sans bat. He's probably somewhere hunting right now. I can almost hear him making those wild animal calls.
R.I.P. (retire in peace) Klesko, we hardly knew you.
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