Sawx Nation Update--Schilling Strikes Back

Curt Schilling's taking the blogging seriously, and is answering reader questions.

If Schilling keeps this up, he might be really on to something here---a chance for our more articulate and witty professional athletes at least to be able to bypass the sports media, Kornhoser & Wilbon and that horrid Frank Deford, and the talk radio screamers, and communicate straight with the fans in a non-canned manner.

For example:

Q-What do I think of the hypocrisy of writers who blast Manny for not talking to the media and call me a loud mouth for talking too much?

A-It’s humorous really. I saw it in Arizona as well. Matt Williams was labled the same way. Matt wanted to show, play, and go home. Guys wrote horrible stuff because he didn’t talk to them. Those same guys would come to my locker, ask me questions, sit there and nod approvingly, ya, uh huh, I see, then write about me talking to much. It’s there, you deal with it. You learn that a lot of them do what they do to hear themselves talk. They are as interested in being the story as they are in writing it. The problem is that fans actually believe some of these guys are ‘experts’?

Here’s one. I am in the training room today and there was some ESPN sports talk show on, Jay Marriotti is waxing poetic about his NFL expertise. He says “The Patriots spent almost 120 million on these contracts, given that the Colts haven’t done anything I think the Patriots have to be considered a favorite in the AFC next year”. Holy crap! You actually get paid for that Zen like wisdom? A guy who gets the meat of his stories from sitting on the couch at home, watching TV, like 2 billion other sports fans is an ‘expert’ on sports? Please. Once you realize guys like him exist it becomes easy to laugh at the stuff they do. Woody Paige is another one, the next time Woody Paige says something insightful and smart about sports will be the first.

Q-Shaugnessy and Conlin think you are self serving, how does that make you feel?

A-Dan Shaugnessey once wrote a colum about Roger Clemens. In that column Dan writes about how Roger pitched a game, left the ballpark after he came out, before the game was over, and what a gamer that made him. He wanted to win so bad he couldn’t stand to be around ‘losers’. That same guy writes a column in 2004 about Pedro Martinez, who pitched a game, left the ballpark after he came out, before the game was over, and what a jerk he is, what a bad guy.

Bill Conlin wrote a LENGTHY article in which he made his argument for NOT voting for Nolan Ryan for the Hall of Fame. Bill stated that he didn’t vote for Nolan because Don Sutton didn’t get in on the first ballot, so Nolan shouldn’t. Soon after that, in Tampa Bay, I called him out in the clubhouse on it, how he should be embarrassed by the fact that he used the hall of fame voting ballot as a personal soap box. At the end of the argument, and there are witnesses, he admitted it wasn’t the right thing to do. Not to mention that in a few appearances after that in which Bill and I were on the same show, he asked that I not bring that up.

Those two columns right there are as self serving as you can get, so no, I don’t get worked up when self serving people call me self serving. I talk to the media because part of what I do, win or lose, is stand at my locker and answer questions about the game. I was taught that was part of the job when you are in the big leagues. I can’t stand around and answer questions after I pitch well, and not stand around when I don’t. In between starts I will talk to reporters that are doing stories they want to ask me questions about if I have time, but I turn down more than I say yes to, believe it or not. The one and only time I plead guilty to taking the initiative is sports talk radio and I can’t say exactly why that is. I just hate when ‘experts’ say things that are stupid and fans buy into it. The Butch Stearns Pedro thing was a perfect example. Someone I had never met, didn’t even know, was on the air ‘explaining’ what he knew about our relationship, and could not have been more wrong. When all was said and done and Pedro aired out his issues with the media and the team it had to do with them, and not me. Pedro and I got along fine and no one rooted harder for him to deal everytime out than I did.

Q-Why associate with the Republican Party? Blah blah blah.

A-The question that could open Pandora’s box. Bottom line is I don’t associate myself with either party. I don’t vote on party lines and never will. I vote for the candidate I feel is the best person for the job. Was President Bush flawless? Nope. Has anyone ever been? Nope. Having said that I won’t add to the crap that’s out there, and disparage the ultimate sacrifice made by thousands of men and woman over the last 4 years, too many other second guessers doing that already. The amazing thing to me is the fact that only about 50-60% of this country that can vote, does. It seems we have been locked into voting for the candidate we least dislike in local elections rather than the person that we know is going to do a great job.

Q-Favorite all time pitcher?

A-Roger Clemens. I think, given the era he pitched in, he’s going to go down as the best ever.

What's great about this is that Dan Shaugnessey has got to be the greatest maroon in the entire Boston metropolitan area (this includes the entire Kennedy clan, except for Patrick, I guess). The fact that a Sox star--and particularly one who is both unassailable as the wearer of The Bloody Sock itself, and is obviously sharp and a good writer--can now take on Shaugnessey in his own medium is going to be utterly priceless to watch unfold this season. Don't think the Boston sportswriting community isn't looking forward to watching either.