A Midsummer Night's Bream

"I have never used steroids, human growth hormone, or any other type of illegal performance-enhancing drugs" —Roger Clemens, in a congressional hearing, 2008.

Except maybe for the 20 times your trainer claims he injected you with the junk? Or was he was the one doing the "using" or otherwise "employing," it, or in this case, "deploying" it into your fat ass, because you just weren't a big enough arrogant bully without it.

Sorry. That wasn't necessarily a classy comment by a classy writer. I do let my emotions take hold from time to time, hopefully in service of the irreverance I pathetically attempt strive to achieve for my scanty yet plucky readership.

Want a class act? Me, too, and for the Fenway fortunate, one is available for close observation every time Tim Wakefield picks up a baseball, or otherwise walks into a place.

Wakefield, one of the last remaining sporting heroes. Wakefield, who was nominated 8 times for the Roberto Clemente good-guy award and won through his consistent, quiet action, unlike Jerkweed Supreme Roger Clemens, who had the audacity to call himself "the gooddest guy around," when he's not pitching. No, that would be the Other Guy, actually—a soon-to-be 45-year-old who still bakes a richly seasoned humble pie, and slings irregular slices of it at men who were swinging nothing more fearsome than Sippy Cups during Wake's Rookie Year.

 

He's on the mound again, tonight, in pursuit of Win # 198, versus some guys from Toronto. The progeny and I will tune in, witness the carnival cannonshot that is a knuckleball, and the ironic surprise of a sub-80 mph "heater." I'll also attempt to throw a weak-ass dinner pitch past my suspicious kid: some whole, deep-sea bounty that was swimming off the coast of Massachusetts recently, courtesy of my landlord. Haven't yet had the ichthyic pleasure of meeting this particular species before. Pretty sure a bunch of garlic and olive oil will be involved, so everyone hope for the best.

That's not a bad approach to life. Don't hand power over to the bullies, throw knuckleballs of great humility well into one's 40's, and periodically try a new fish.

Thanks for reading, and please remember: Even if you say Porgy and I say Sparidae, we should not, in fact, call the whole thing off.