…”paleeze,” she says, that being the Ms. Casual Fan, “take your knowledge and shove it.”

I will, but if I take it and shove it, I will be taking Albert Pujols, Adrian Gonzalez, Miguel Cabrera, Josh Hamilton, and Joey Votto with me. You ms. Casual fan can take Ryan Howard. Oh, and while you are at it, tak Jay Buhner and Troy Glaus with you.

Major League Baseball’s “power” era has looked more like a calf in a tutu swinging a billy club at a gnat, than the rugged, gritty, off-smelling, sweaty American ball player of our beloved past. Have you ever seen Kathy Ireland pose in a tight fitting bikini with a beer belly and one slumping boob?

It has been way more disgusting than a droopy Kathy Ireland. Like gracing a spread eagle Rodney Dangerfield in a playgirl centerfold.  Can I get me some sexy baseball back?

Or do I have to assume my role as the game’s Dr. Dre, dropping rhymes on the death of the Joe-Joe-D days? Hip Hop and Baseball are two peas in a pod ripped apart in the belly of an edamame. Sushi anyone?

Not a chance. If it has been made with a pink slab of “MLB star of the last fifteen years,” then the piece righteously stinks. It has been cut from the loins of  men who consistently hit below .260, and strikeout 150 times. “Yeah, well they hit home runs.” Well America hit- some- bombs in Nagasaki; so what is your point? I can hit my head against a wall… and?

This is why nothing makes sense from the populist perspective. We the spectators, are those who choose the ones worthy enough to receive our praise.  Not Ricki Lake.

Bring back the classy LBC Snoop.

*       *       *       *       *       *       *

Last season’s year of the “no hitter,” set the bar high for baseball’s future. Players were held accountable for their extra-curricular activities and injuries took their toll. This caused reliance upon PED’s to be close to null, which is great, considering for the last twenty years any beefy troll with biceps and an average swing could be glorified for golfing forty balls out of the park. Without muscle crank being tossed around like a Nerf football in the gym locker room, survival of the fittest did what it intended to do. It weeded out the trash.

I personally was sick of this neo-golf garbage. It was baseball I wanted to see, just baseball damn it. Not a vague form it.

Which sent me into a tail spin.  I began to feel like a crack addict in need of my fix for more of a grass roots sport. So I slanted my attention toward soccer and professional tennis. I felt like I had joined a private club loving those two sports. And I’m not gonna lie, those were some of my greatest years to memory. Watching matches between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal battling it out like Roman soldiers on the clay court was nothing short of brilliance.

But it was on you. If you are a fan of this country’s historical relics, you will begin craving the game of baseball. I missed a sport that allows an average, out-of-shape man like John Kruk to accomplish something. I badly desired baseball’s organic melding of reflex speed, muscular explosion, and small motor skills, creating a one-of-a-kind masterpiece. Over its 125 year histiory, baseball has been the layered brush strokes of Picasso. Like a complex wine with flowering aromas and a lashing finish, baseball has relished in its cult-athlete — a player who would gladly draw phallic members on Thomas Kinkade’s cookie-cutter, Pollyanna bull shit.

An MLB player was never mister nice guy.

In the 1950’s, any person with the balls to heckle Ted Williams was showered by his browned, tobacco sludge. It was a way for TD to get back at his hecklers. And the man was meticulous. He studied pitchers, and swung the bat for hours everyday. A throwback professional who loved the game, practiced everything from the monotonous initial step to swing, to hip placement, and each step beyond.

The man didn’t hit .344 over a 19 year career without putting the work in. And that kind of passion created an intense fansmanship from the league. The man set in place baseball’s eternal politico, one glorifying the purist.

When  seeing monsters hitting it out thirty to forty times a year, Americans also accepted that they had to take every thing on the market to do so. Watching man-children striking out once a day, and collect hefty sums of dollars back fired. The problem with the “power era” philosophy is that it caused ticket prices to rise, and in the end, left the riled fan with the short end of the deal.

With every 450-foot bomb, the ghost of Ted Williams turned over in his glorious grave.

…thank God he did not have to shed his wrath…

*       *       *       *       *       *       *

We have been saved by a handful of non-conformists. They are what I call baseballs fab five: Albert Pujols, Joey Votto, Josh Hamilton, Miguel Cabrera, and Adrian Gonzalez. All, without question, are the most dominant players in today’s game, combining for 5 MVP awards, 5 gold glove awards, and 22 all-star games.

Their modern day recipe for creating an MLB superstar is power, defensive ability, average, and larger than life persona.

1. Power: Pujols is the best of the five. For most of his ten-year career in St. Louis, Pujols has hit balls out with a larger than life authority, lacking a star hitting in front or behind him. He has averaged 41 home runs per year, and has never hit less than 32. If we were to judge players by their first ten years in the league, Pujols is arguably the greatest hitter to ever play this game.

Gonzalez is another worth mentioning out the “fab five,” because of his lack of support in San Diego. In his first five full seasons the slugger has said goodbye to 32 so-called offerings a year. If you take into consideration that no other Padre over the last five years has hit more than 21 homeruns, you will begin to understand what makes Gonzalez so great. HE DOES IT ON HIS OWN. He is the consummate slugger, causing pitchers to shake in their cleats.

Other totals by elite long-ball threats from last season include: Cabrera with 38, Hamilton with 32 in just 133 games, and Votto with 37 while Brandon Phillips was the only other actual threat in the Reds lineup.

2) Defensive Ability: All five are stalwarts defensively, but Pujols and Gonzalez set the bar. Gonzalez, a back to back gold glove award winner from 2008 to 2009, was not only sought out by the Red Sox this off-season because of his left-handed power, but because of his ability to fill a much-needed defensive hole for the Sox with his glove at first base. In 2010, Gonzalez was 2nd in the NL in putouts, and 3rd in assists.

Pujols is also a two time gold glove winner with the Cardinals. In 2010, the star led the league in assist and put-outs at first base. For much of Pujols’ career, his defensive abilities have been overlooked because of his offensive dominance.

3) Batting Average: All five are fantastic. Last season, the worst of the five was Gonzalez, who hit an unashamed .298 while driving in 101 runs. Pujols did as Pujols does; give pitchers headaches. Over his ten-year career,  Pujols has hit .331, never striking out more than 92 times. Last season Cabrera quietly hit .328 with his partner in crime, Magglio Ordonez only a mere shadow of himself. This set him apart in the American League, finishing 2nd in MVP voting. Cabrera for his career has hit .313 and driven in an average of 120 runs in his seven year career. Hamilton won his 1st MVP award in the American League last season hitting .359 with 100 runs driven in, in again, a shortened season due to injury. Votto’s season was perhaps most impressive considering he had no help in the Reds lineup. The reigning NL MVP hit .324 and drove in 113 runs.

4) Larger than Life persona: It is impossible to give this area some form of quantitative analysis. What I can tell you, however, is that Pujols is the greatest player of his generation. He is the leagues biggest face on and off the field. He has the power to sway MLB opinion and the perspective on the sport by the fans. Whether it is true or not, Pujols has been glorified as a “clean” superstar, who has done it all through hard work and true dedication to his craft. His throwback image is used quite often by the league promoting its “drug free,” policy.

Josh Hamilton’s dominance is down right scary. In 133 games, Hamilton hit .359 last season with 32 home runs and 100 runs batted in. I believe Hamilton is the new face of the American League, as a guy who not only dominates with his bat, but has proven his worth and sustainability by kicking his drug habit.  He has essentially become a hero to many beyond the straight-edge.

Joey Votto is the sure favorite to win his 2nd NL MVP award this season. If the Reds make the playoffs with pretty much the same team as last season, and Votto has a season like last season, he will continue to build a legacy as a guy who accomplishes things as the face of an organization. You cannot get any larger than that.

Adrian Gonzalez is set to have the most dominate season of his career. Lefty’s fair better in Fenway hitting away from the green monster. Gonzalez is the central piece in a stacked lineup with Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia, Carl Crawford, Jacoby Ellsbury, and David Ortiz. He will get more pitches to hit and could jack more than forty this season.

Many will disagree, but Miguel Cabrera embodies this larger than life persona as well. A star has the ability to shine without the fans’ approval of them. And Cabrera shines. His DUI has been the biggest story of this off-season, acting as a driving point for the media circus. Cabrera has ignored it, kicked his habit again, and is focused for another dominate year. With Ordonez back in the lineup and looking to again prove himself after an off-year, Cabrera  should have the best season of his famed career, and win the AL MVP award.

*       *       *       *       *       *       *

For those of you who abandoned the MLB after the 1994 strike, I urge you to come back. I understand your complaints. For too long the league had been glorifying overrated PED-hungry athletes. But the five described above are giving purists like me some hope. No, the league will never return to those beautiful days when a fan felt like “one” with is favorite star – but we can evolve and re-direct the trajectory of this historical game.

I have hope for the first time in years. Hope in the diamond’s version of the “fab-five.”

Who? Yea I know, I know. For most of the sports world a name like McNamara means nothing. That is unless you are talking about the Central Coast realty agency. But for March Madness Maniacs like myself, the name McNamara takes  on a life of its own.

This is the best time of year. A time when college athletes from all over the country battle it out for supremacy. Conference tournaments do one of two things. If you come from a mid-major conference (Big West, Missouri Valley, etc.) winning your conference tournament is your only shot at recieving a birth come March. If you are from a power conference (ACC, Big East, Big 12) this is a time to settle the nay-sayers and establish yourself as a legitimate seed come playoff time.

The one-and-done atmosphere is like electricity to the veins of its viewers. March Madness Maniacs live for the David vs. Goliath matchups–1 vs. 16, 2 vs. 15, 3 vs. 14–because within the human heart we all root for the underdog. All of us at one time or another have felt completely overmatched whether it be in our business, collegiate academics, married life, health concerns, and the list goes on. And when we overcome incredible odds, the certainty of miracles grows stronger, more steadfast, more golden.

This common strand that interlinks our societal consciousness is lost when players go professional. Money becomes the central driving point, and before you know it, the competitor is lost to a swirling world of popularity. No longer can we revel in the that moment in time–that one moment in March–when the man we watched on TV was a strungout kid proving his greatness on the largest stage.

Which is why memories haunt college basketball fans. We only get the innocence of our loved competition for two to four years. Watching kids graduate, go pro, or overseas is less a culmination of success, and more a feeling of uncertainty for a game split down the seams between its two largest entities: collegiate and pro.

I am not surprised that our fastfood sports junkies have so quickly forgotten greatness wrapped in its stocky, awkward, out-of-nowhere form. A package wrapped with an outlying vanilla colored goatee, instead of a pretty form of wrapping paper that screams “ME!”

“Draft ME! Look at ME!”

His name is Gerry McNamara. One of the greatest players to ever adorn a Syracuse Orange jersey. A guy who played with the likes of current pros Carmelo Anthony and Hakeem Warrick.  The 6’2, 185 pound pride of Scranton, Pennsylvania, gloried in a four year run at Syracuse, leaving Orange fans and March Madness Maniacs with some of their greatest memories in tournament history.  Who as a freshman co-led with Carmelo Anthony, the Orange to their first basketball title in 2003. Had he been endowed with four more inches of height, he would still be tearing through defenses like a cavalier slicing and dicing foes to the bone.

Here is a nice clip of McNamara to ‘Melo. Pure beauty.

The true Mighty Mouse drove the lane with a poised abandon that made his knock-off, Damon Stoudamire, look like a cheap version bought at Wal Mart.  His ability to hit the step back three meant a defender had to body up at all times. If his defender did, G-Mac would stagger his off shoulder, drop a Tim Hardaway crossover then finish with a tear drop in the key.

2005-2006, McNamara’s senior year, left fans with his image inked in their minds forever. For much of the season McNamara was ridiculed with “too slow” and “undersized,” by pro scouts. The pinnacle of this type of media hit hard when Sports Illustrated published a featured story on McNamara being the most “overrated” player in the country. G-Mac bore the brunt of his teams off kilt 19-12 regular season record. Facing the Big East Tournament, the Orange needed to roll through its entirety to have any hope of earning McNamara and the Orange their fourth birth in March.

What he ended up doing was pure greatness. Fueled by the Sports Illustrated reports, and hobbled by a deep leg bruise, McNamara’s Orange upset Cincinnati in the first round of the tournament 74-73, in which he hit a one handed three point shot at the buzzer. The following day, he hit a fading three-point shot to tie number one ranked U Conn and send the game to overtime. There McNamara scored five more of his team high seventeen points to close out the country’s number one team.  In the conference semi-finals, McNamara hit five three-pointers in the second half against Georgetown to win their third game in three days.  Things culminated when G-Mac and the Orange upset Pitt in the Big East title game, 65-61. The Orange was the first team in Big East history to win four games in a row in the tournament. McNamara as you would expect, was Conference Tourney MVP.

His play was so superior to his foes, that the great and quiet natured Jim Boeheim went on a tirade like this:

McNamara adorned this t-shirt in mockery for a media more in love with big money athleticism than with the heart of a competitor…

G-Mac finished his Syracuse career starting every game (135). His 2,009 career points ranks him fourth all-time in Orange history, 4,781 minutes first, 258 steals second, 648 assist third, and 400 three-pointers first. He also owns the record for the most three-point field goals in Big East Tournament history (183).

So where in the world is Gerry McNamara?

After three years of bouncing between NBA training camps and professional ball in Greece, McNamara now leads shooting clinics near Syracuse University at Onandaga Community College. He has become a primetime guest on a popular radio station, and as of 2009, has been an assistant coach for Boheim and Syracuse. Despite never making the pros, McNamara left fans with memories of why college basketball’s March Madness is superior to the NBA’s take-a-night-off-and-nap seven game series.

Thinking of McNamara brought up a few more past greats…

Leading his team to back-to-back title games (winning one),  former Arkansas Razorback guard Scotty Thurman took a set of bad advice and declared early for the 1995 NBA draft, where he went undrafted. Thurman was a do-it-all guard with a wide wingspan. His ability to hit the deep shot was on full display when he drilled a three-point shot in the final minutes of a title win over Grant Hill’s Duke Blue Devils 76-72. Thurman played overseas for a few years, but never stepped foot in the NBA. He is now a real estate agent in Little Rock, Arkansas.

How about the 5’10, 202 pound tank, Khalid El-Amin? El-Amin was the driving force with Rip Hamilton to U Conn’s title in 1999. Rip went on to a nice NBA career, but El-Amin left after his junior year citing financial troubles. Playing just fifty games in the pros, El-Amin has had quite a nice career overseas. He was a back-to-back all-star in Turkey from 2004-2005, averaging 20.5 points per game, and in 2007, El-Amin won the Ukranian league MVP award and led his team to the Ukranian title.

Most of you remember Brevin Knight, the former great who played point guard for the Stanford Cardinal teams in the late nineties. But what about Brevin’s brother Brandin Knight of Pittsburgh? Knight was a standout point guard for the Panthers who helped establish their recent string of success. He was co-Big East player of the year in 2002, and is currently first all-time in assist for the Panthers, and first in steals. Knight played two years in the NBDL before blowing out his knee, and is currently an assistant coach for the Panthers.

Another past name is Joseph Forte, former standout guard for North Carolina. In his sophomore season he averaged 21 points per game and shot 38 percent from the three-point range. Still considered one of the great guards to ever roll through North Carolina, Forte left early for the NBA draft. Drafted by the Celtics late in the first round, Forte never got the PT and currently plays overseas.

Power forward John Wallace of Syracuse left Orange fans with great memories. A bruiser in the paint, Wallace led the Orange to the 1996 championship game, where they lost to a deep Kentucky team filled with Tony Delk, Walter McCarty, Jeff Shepherd, Ron Mercer, Derek Anderson, and Antoine Walker. Wallace is one of fifty-six players to finish his collegiate career with 2,000 career points and 1,000 rebounds. Drafted 18th overall in the 1996 draft to the Knicks, Wallace bounced around the league for eight years before retiring in 2005.

Before Buckeyes like Greg Oden, Evan Turner, and Jared Sulinger,  Scoonie Penn was the god of Ohio basketball from’98-’00. Born with a forty-inch vertical, the alt-athlete–a blend of both finesse, strength, and speed–led the Buckeyes with current pro Mike Redd to the 1999 final four. An inch under six feet, was the only knock on Scoonie’s Chauncey Billups like game. Because of that Penn was drafted 57th overall to the Hawks in 2000, and never played a minute in the NBA. Penn currently plays ball in Italy.

Checkout this video of Scoonie’s greatness and how about the young Ronald Artest?

The “fab five” for the Michigan Wolverines went to back to back final fours in 1992 and 1993. With Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, and Juwan Howard, it was easy to dissapear. But the “other two,” Ray Jackson and Jimmy King were no slouches. Both were high school all-Americans and top one hundred recruits. King had the ability to drive to the hoop, acting as a safe zone offensively when Rose or Webber was in foul trouble. Ray Jackson was a defensive stopper and a captain, a guy who acted as the glue in tense situations. Once the other three left for the pros, both King and Jackson combined for 30.5 points per game their senior season. King was drafted 35th overall to the Raptors in 1995, and played a total of sixty-four games in his pro career. Retiring in 1997, King now works for Meryl Lynch in New York City.  Jackson was the only one of the five who went undrafted in the NBA, though he played three years in the CBA, winning the Rookie of the Year in 1996. He now runs a non-profit in Austin, Texas assisting underpriveledged kids.

As the gift of March Madness enfolds in the coming weeks with game winners and upsets, players will establish themselves in the ranks of tournament greats. These players will leave us with their legacies in the backdrops of our minds, haunting us with the need to replay their moments over and over. Which is the very reason, why college basketball’s march madness is the greatest playoff atmosphere in the world.