From the Top Step

It was just a matter of time before Curt Schilling responded to all the chit-chat and bloggy-blog fodder about whether his socks were, indeed, bloody during the Red Sox run to the World Series in 2004. On a bad day Schilling never needs an invitation to talk, so it's not surprising that Top-Step Schill offered his retort to the notion that his socks were less than authentic.

In doing so, Top-Step came out swinging in his blog, called, creatively, 38pitches.com. Get it? He's a pitcher and he wears No. 38 so he called it 38pitches instead of something else less pithy. Anyway, Step offered $1 million to anyone who could prove that he wasn't bleeding like a stuck pig (I know… we used that term before) and his famous socks didn't get stained with the blood during the 2004 playoffs.

During the same blog post, Schilling also found an opportunity to criticize media types, which is fair. Just as it's fair to wonder why Schilling is said to have switched from red colored socks in all of his starts in '04 to white hosiery specifically for those two playoff games. Hey, I'm not sayin' anything – I'm just sayin'…

Be that as it may, just the idea of Curt Schilling with a blog is like giving a pyromaniac a Bic lighter.

Regardless, Schilling is correct about one thing in his 38pitches.com post and that's way too much attention was spent on stains on one man's socks. That's why it would be a good idea to unleash some of the sporting press on the White House or Congressional beats. After watching Bill Moyers special on PBS last night, it seems like it would be a good idea.

Did anyone happen to catch that documentary about the Washington press and their "collusion" with the government? It was incredibly riveting.

But something like that would never, ever happen with the sporting press. For one thing, no one would ever be able to get together on a consensus point. And for another, simply, athletes don't have talking points, spinmeisters, pundits or PR people telling what to say, who to say it to and how to say it. The reason why is because they would never, ever be able to get away with it. If a pitcher gives up a home run to cost his team a game, he stands there and answers every question no matter how painful. Basically, he has to live his failure in the game on television in front of millions and then go into the sanctity of his clubhouse and relive it for the the scribes. That doesn't happen in Washington, which is odd because the idea that a relief pitcher is more accountable to the public than a politician is a little troubling.

Of course we don't vote on the players or the managers either, so maybe it's a push.

Anyway, watch the Bill Moyers special here. It's very interesting.

To really get to the bottom of the Schilling Sock thing, go to The Zo Zone! You want to really know what it was on the sock? It was ketchup (not catsup).