As the end of the 2010 Major League Baseball regular season edges a little closer every day, playoff races from around the league are gradually taking form.  The final months of the season have the potential to produce any number of dramatic, memorable outcomes, especially with some divisional races being three teams deep.  Although the teams with the greatest divisional leads- Texas Rangers and San Diego Padres- seem to be on the verge of pulling away, their respective magic numbers are still 42 and 46.

Oddly, those are not the magic numbers that I care about at this time.  The only number that matters to me is 45, because that is how many days must slowly pass before the Season 2 premiere of HBO’s Eastbound & Down on September 26^th, which just so happens to be my birthday, as well as a mere 24 hours after Dee’s birthday on the 25^th.

Whether you are an actual fan of baseball or not, the show is sheer genius and absolutely hilarious.  Out of all the conversations that I have had with others about the show, I can honestly say that I have never had someone openly assert their distaste. In fact, I have never even experienced an individual who seems to be on-the-fence, or “ehh” about it.

We are a society that loves, “The Man With The Golden Dick.”

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Apparently Yadier Molina didn’t appreciate Brandon Phillip’s comments from Monday, and he wasted no time displaying his discontent with the Reds’ second baseman.  Like any respectable baseball player would do, Molina confronted Phillips after he tried acting all “buddy-buddy” with him as he stepped up to the plate, in his first at-bat on Tuesday.  All hell broke loose, the benches cleared, and Jason LaRue is in some pain today.

The bigger story here is that Chris Carpenter finally got to throw down.  For those who have watched him pitch this season, Carp has been at the center of several confrontations and skirmishes, but nothing that had materialized into a bench clearing brawl.  Thus, it comes as no surprise that he was one of key players in Tuesday’s brawl- he’s been itching for this for the past 4 months.  Here’s some videos from the Reds/Cardinals fight from Tuesday:

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After watching Alex Rodriguez roll on the ground for what seemed like an eternity, I would have expected him to have had a broken leg, or at least a fractured hoof.  However, A-Rod was able to postpone a trip to the glue factory for one more day, and was in the starting lineup on Sunday.  Yesterday, ProRumors published the story that Joe Buck might have been the reason that A-Rod took the line drive to shin- apparently their exchange of greetings distracted A-Rod just before being struck with the batted ball.  While he has denied that he was distracted by Buck, I don’t think that alone should exonerate him.  Personally, I think we need to examine a different angle in this story- Joe Buck’s undeniably ginormous head obstructed A-Rod’s view of the ball.

If you could use one word to describe Adam LaRoche, what would it be?  For those that have had him on their fantasy team, I’m sure that you chose the correct answer, “streaky.”  For the record, I would have also accepted “hack-taker,” as well as “pain-in-the-ass,” and of course, “brother.”  To those fantasy owners who are unfamiliar with the LaRoche, he can be summed up like this: when he’s hot, he’s hot, and when he’s not, he’s…absolutely brutal.  Year after year, LaRoche’s M.O. remains the same: a slow starter who has a mediocre first half, followed by a blistering July and August, and ultimately finishes with respectable statistics.  Similarly, year after year, those familiar with the Diamondbacks’ first baseman are left asking, what if?  What if LaRoche finally rakes for an entire season?  What if he finally cuts down on the strikeouts?  As somebody who has extensively watched him play this season, I have realized that there will always be recognizable potential in a player who gets his hacks in.  That is why there always seems to be a surprising amount of fantasy owners, who target LaRoche as an ideal, late-round sleeper.  This year, I was one of them.

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Even though none of these videos are actually commercials, they are just as entertaining thanks to the hilarious antics and personality of San Francisco Giants’ closer, Brian Wilson.  If you know nothing about the flame-throwing right-hander, there is a lot to take in.  Wilson dresses like a rock star, acts like a rock star, is continually sarcastic, is a self-proclaimed genius, has the best mohawk in baseball, and is rarely serious.  Just like when he takes the mound, Wilson wants to be the center of attention at all times: he is incredibly entertaining with his electric fastball, devastating slider and post game celebration.  Additionally, it’s quite possible that he was put on this planet for the sake of providing the most comical sound bites.

On Wednesday, Major League Baseball fined Wilson $1,000 for wearing the loud, orange cleats that he first displayed in the All-Star Game.  They stated that his cleats could only be 50% orange, as opposed to the 100% that he was currently sporting.  How did he respond?  Wilson simply used a sharpie to fill in some of the areas of his spikes to make them more presentable.  Even though some of these videos are rather lengthy(some checking in at around 10 minutes), they are worth every second.  Here is a combination of his self-shot videos on YouTube that have been dubbed “Life of Brian”, and his interviews with Chris Rose on The Cheap Seats:

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