I will no longer listen to that podcast this year without Pascarelli. His sarcasm was the only reason why I went there in the first place.

I used to listen to Baseball Today a few years ago, and ended up stopping a few weeks after Pascarelli took over, because he was SO FUCKING BORING. He would just spend most of the show recapping what happened in games without actually really saying anything interesting.

Maybe he improved.

I agree, I didn’t like Pascarelli much but ESPN and Selig are horrible for trying to fix some loose mortar with a wrecking ball.

Pascarelli always seemed to have a good (accurate) Giants insight, however.

And this wasn’t his first apology. I remember him apologizing once for doing an interview with a mouthful of sunflower seeds. It was clearly audible that he had something in his mouth during the interview.

I can’t remember the occasion, but on one of the podcasts this winter he said something that struck me as so blatantly racist that I honestly thought “he’ll have to be back on tomorrow to apologize for that one.” Figures it would be a shot at Bud that did the trick instead.

That said, IMO it’s a benefit to any program to be without Pascarelli’s services. He brings absolutely nothing to the table other than inside access to a small group of executives and managers who he has old friendships with. Most of his “analysis” is composed of praising his few drinking buddies (Sabean clearly being one of the more prominent, just before the winter meetings this year he noted that his favorite winter meeting memory was sitting in a bar with Sabean in Las Vegas for 8 hours straight betting on everything that came up on the board), and absolutely excoriating the intelligence and character of anybody who fell outside that circle. And of course, anybody who dared use statistical metrics for judging players performance was sure to get a dose of old school whup ass from Pete.

He was a tired act and I’m glad he’s gone, though I can’t imagine ESPN bringing anybody much better on board to replace him.

I read this as:

Peter Pascarelli, silently rubbed one out…

and thought, “Not a screamer.”

When the Hopper got the ant pinned down on the ground, but the bird came up behind him and ate him up.

A small jerk got slapped by a bigger jerk today. It’s all part of the circle of life.

eh, it thought it was Len.

Trotsky, Yogi, and some self-important blather.

Not only did they erase him from the show, ESPN even scrubbed the offending comments from the original podcast. There’s this weird edit late in the recording, and when I was listening to it originally, I thought it seemed odd. The next episode was one of the most excruciating apologies I’ve ever heard, basically one long, “I am so sorry…so very, very, very, very sorry…i’m so stupid and that was bad…so sorry”. I’m pretty sure a series of tweets by Bill Simmons ripping on Selig’s statue were a protest over what went down. I knew he was toast when no new podcast appeared the following week. Karabell’s doing the show solo for now; wonder if anyone will ever comment on it.

Speaking of Selig….he stood next to me at Maryvale during Spring Training, and I was shocked that in person he’s the spitting image of Springfield nuclear power plant owner Montgomery J. Burns. I can see the discussion in his lair now:

Selig Burns: Smithers, who is that disrespectful employee?

Smithers: That’s Peter Pascarelli, sir.

Selig Burns: Pascarelli, eh? Bring that lap dog to me…when i get through with him, he’ll be begging for a job as the pigeon on my statue!

I agree with almost everything you say here, I loved Pascarelli. The one exception I’d make is that this is a pretty clear case of capitalism.

always a good idea, sexist comments or no.