Starved for baseball, I settled in for a night of graphic design work and chat, some baked ziti dinner, and the Yankees-White Sox game. 

It’s been awhile since I willingly watched the Yankees on television, not because of the team so much as because I feel the broadcast partnership of Michael Kay and Ken Singleton should be banned by the Geneva Convention as a matter of course. 

But I heard Al Leiter’s voice, learned that Philip Humber (former Met and Johan Santana trade fodder) would be going for the White Sox, and found the Met Classic airing to be their turn against the Cubs in Japan in 2000, which I’ve seen any number of times.  And, likesay, I’d be spending my time with a home-cooked meal and Photoshop/Illustrator.  So I left it on.

What followed were seven spectacular innings from Philip Humber. 2 walks, a hit batsman (Russell Martin), and, occurring in the 7th, a lone hit.  The big talking point for Kay—I hope fed by his production team, who might also seem to think that the Mets played their first games in 1961 (a gaffe uttered by Kay in the 1st)—was Humber’s time with the Mets.  Never mind that Humber threw all of 5 games and NINE innings total for the Mets in 2006 and 2007 combined.  Humber was the former Met, traded for Johan Santana, pitching a gem.  And how many Mets have thrown no-hitters after leaving the Mets?  And Al, which is the sixth guy we missed?

Humber lost the no-hitter, and they figured out that Doc Gooden, in fact, was the Met they were missing.  Al, you threw yours BEFORE joining the Mets, so you don’t count.  Of course.

Since my eyes were trained on my screen, I had the misfortune—wholly self-inflicted, I grant—of listening without having the visual to distract.  I could’ve imagined Gary Cohen and Ron Darling dissecting the pitching strategy and the Yankees’ approach at the plate, fruitless as it was, if I could just look up and mute Kay’s insipid musings.  But I couldn’t look up.

The problem here, if I can be more than simply mordant, is that Michael Kay’s been a sports reporter for nearly THIRTY YEARS.  And he’s covered the Yankees since 1987.  He’s worked in newspapers, on the radio, on television for basketball and baseball.  He hosts that Centerstage program, whatever that’s supposed to be.  Can’t he think on his feet?  Can’t he provide some level of commentary more scintillating, more incisive, more clever than musing about the Mets because a guy who had a couple cups of coffee with them is on the mound totally dissecting an AL powerhouse?

No.  The answer is no, he can’t.  If ever he could, he’s been wholly incapable in the small number of games against varied opponents I’ve sampled in the past six years.

And I know I could’ve changed the channel and I know I could’ve shut the TV (projector, actually) off and I know I could’ve gone into my office and put on some music.  But I’m baseball-starved lately, trip to Citi Field on Thursday notwithstanding, and this is the best I could do without going to the freneticism of MLB Tonight Live, which I imagine is what Hell is like for meth burn-outs.

So Humber lost the no-hitter on a hit up the middle by Alex Rodriguez, Kay kept talking, and I kept being a masochist.  At some point though, I uttered to no one the phrase, “Michael Kay makes me want to jump out a window.”

So, being a child of the internets, I ran a Google Images search:

Which produced the following first-page result:

Allow me to draw your attention to the images that drew my attention:

I don’t have much to wrap up with.  But let it be known that searching Google Images for “Michael Kay makes me want to jump out a window” produces, among other results:

  • a screengrab from an episode of The Simpsons in which Bart is described by Prinicipal Skinner as a vortex of distraction;
  • Enterprise helm officer Hikaru Sulu;
  • a nun hitting a bong like Jesus’s life depended on it;
  • some dude with a bunch of cats;
  • two bionic humanoids gazing out onto what I can only presume is a dystopia of epic proportions.

Delving into any of these would’ve been more fulfilling than listening to Michael Kay. 

But then, I wouldn’t have discovered this cornucopia of What? without listening to Michael Kay. So let that bake your noodle.  As I mentioned at the beginning, my noodles were baked well before this whole business began.