Phillies: Here They Come To Save The Day

It's been a long, tough winter. Budget crises at every level of government, not to mention in millions of households. The absurd path to something resembling health-care reform. The Pope and his church continuing to minimize the importance of doing something about the child molesters in their ranks. The earthquake in Haiti. The horror that is this season's American Idol. A slut named Tiger Woods. "From Paris With Love."

And in more "important" areas locally, a pro football team that ended the 2009 season in heinous fashion and looks to spend 2010 falling fast into mediocrity, a pro basketball team that fell fast from mediocrity into incompetence (but no one cares anyway) and a pro hockey team that was touted as a championship contender, only to fall into a desperate fight to barely make the playoffs so they can be first-round cannon fodder. Speaking of stuff falling, let's not forget Snowpocaplypse, Snowmageddon and Snowverkill.

Enough bad news. Winter, like Donovan McNabb, is gone. Spring has sprung. You can tell because the Phanatic (as you can tell by the photo above, taken on Wednesday) has gone red for a week. The Phillies are back! The 2010 season starts Monday at 1 pm in Washington, with Roy Halladay making his Phils debut. Halladay! Celebrate! Now we've got Roy Halladay...and it's time to celebrate...okay, no more channeling my inner Madonna.

So There Was Some Tiger Woods Thing Today...

One of the benefits of not being employed is that, on days when one stays in bed listening to sports-talk radio until noon and then gets up to shower, dress and greet the afternoon, one manages to avoid certain unpleasantries. Those unpleasantries are known as Andy Reid Monday-after-the-game press conferences. Now, one doesn't avoid said press conferences entirely, but only hears the audio. (And by now you should have figured that when I use the term "one" I am referring to myself.)

I find it helps to not actually see them because when I hear Reid not answering questions or otherwise being disdainful of the media, I'm less angry when I only hear his remarks than when I see him making them.

The reason I bring up the Eagles' head coach is because today Tiger Woods decided to go public today in an even more controlled environment than the typical Reid briefing. Only certain members of the press were allowed to attend. He took no questions. He was joined in the room by his mother, some business associates, the PGA tour commissioner, and selected others -- although, to my surprise, his wife Elin was not present.

Since today was one of those radio-in-bed days I didn't actually see Tiger make the statement, but I heard it all. And what struck me from listening but not seeing it was that the entire time he read his statement, he sounded like he was reading it. The only time he sounded like he had any feelings was when he attacked the media -- explicitly, for following his family around; and implicitly, in his denial of reports that Elin attacked him on that Thanksgiving night when he crashed his SUV and then decided not to explain in full to the police what happened, starting the chain of events that led to his sluttiness and sordid infidelity becoming public knowledge.

And other than to be seen in public, I'm not sure of the point of this. If all he wanted to do was give a statement, he could have just posted it to his website, as he has twice before. He didn't say anything really new. He didn't announce his return to golf, as one might have thought (and the PGA desperately needs). Why go to the trouble of gathering the group of supporters around him, not to mention interrupting "The Price Is Right" and "The View"?

Granted, I wouldn't have expected a detailed account of every time he cheated on his wife. But the fact that he saved his emotions for the media speaks volumes. Instead of "I'm sorry" it came off more like "I'm sorry I got caught." Perhaps he's sincere in his apologies, or he's at least working towards that sincerity in his therapy, which is ongoing. But if he truly wants to get on with his life, and get the media off his back a little, he'll need to say a little more than he did today, and not just in a speech.

On Tiger...and a TMZ guy (Bonus: they're shirtless)

I see and hear comments that people are tired of hearing about Tiger Woods and his big scandal. I'm not tired of it at all, surprisingly. I'm fascinated by it. I don't care so much about why he cheated on his wife because that's sadly commonplace, especially with men -- and especially with rich and famous and handsome men -- but why did he cheat with so many cocktail waitresses and wannabe "reality" TV skanks and "hostesses" and, if what's been reported is true, at least one porn actress? He's Tiger Woods. Can't he afford to find a higher quality of woman?

On the TMZ show the other day one of the TMZ people accidentally came up with a great word to describe the women Tiger's cheated on his wife with: "affairesses." That sounds so much better than "mistresses." They're having so much fun with Tiger on that show it's almost criminal. (Speaking of TMZ...the guy sitting on the car is Max, the guy who came up with "affairesses," if I recall correctly. He is a total surfer/valley boy type, which can be annoying normally, but he says such off-the-wall things sometimes that I kind of have a minor crush on him.)

Back to Tiger Woods. Now that the cat is out of the bag that he's a slut, I wonder if he's going to try and stay married or live openly as a man-whore? Either way his wife is going to get seriously paid -- whether it's in alimony or in "forgive me" gifts, following the strategy Kobe Bryant used on his wife after that little "incident" in Colorado.

And one other obvious point: this is more proof that the institution of marriage is in such pathetic shape that allowing same-sex couples to marry can only make it better, not worse. The ultra-right scum and ultra-religious freaks will never agree publicly, but deep down in their twisted hearts I think they know it's true.