Computer cooks writer’s rotisserie team

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Idle thoughts from a mind gone haywire.

Let me see if I’ve got this straight. The University of Maine hockey team, which has been ranked No. 1 in the nation from time to time this year, has to go on the road and play a lower-seeded team – Michigan – on Michigan’s home ice.

And not only that, they have to play Michigan’s football team.

Hail to the victors.

– . –

The baseball season has not even started yet, and my rotisserie team is already in the dumper. I let the computer make my picks for me. My general manager, Mr. Hewlett Packard, decided that I like closers. So I have 12. That’s about as many closers as the Red Sox have first basemen.

They range from Eric Gagne to Julio Jorge – or is that Jorge Julio?

It is so bad, the other owners were laughing about it. They were writing messages during the draft making fun of me.

One conversation went like this:

Knucklehead owner: “Nice pick, Don. I was going to take him.”

Me: “Thanks. But the brilliant move was made by my GM, Mr. Hewlett Packard.”

Knucklehead owner: “Not you. The Don in Virginia.”

Me: “Oh.”

– . –

Of course, now they’re lining up to put the wood to me. They know I have closers and nothing else, and that I will be forced into making trades.

This merry band of cutthroats will be offering me ridiculously one-sided deals.

I will have been offered, among others, Billy Hatcher, Jeff Frye, Joe Sambito and Wes Chamberlain before it’s all over.

And when I object and reject the deal, I will be told, “Geez, I don’t think I can do any better than that.”

Of course, he will be laughing so hard, he’ll have trouble getting the words out.

– . –

Maybe I should give up rotisserie baseball and join an arena football fantasy league.

– . –

The Perryman Award for the best line used by a sports announcer during a game goes to Brad Dougherty of ESPN.

During a recent basketball game, Dougherty described a ridiculously good dunk by a player as follows:

“I don’t know who they sent to the store for the peanut butter, but I know who brought the jam.”

– . –

The McDonald’s Senior All-Star Games were played last Saturday at Husson College in Bangor.

The games are a showcase for some of the best players in the state. They are also played in almost a pick-up game, laid back style. There are coaches for each team, but the coaches actually have little effect on the games.

It is a player’s game. As was evident when, in the fourth quarter of one of the girls games, a player dribbled across midcourt and paused near her bench.

One of her coaches told her to take it easy and kill some time off the clock.

The player immediately bolted on the dribble to the basket and attempted a difficult layup.

The coach looked around and laughed.

“They don’t listen to me during the regular season, either,” he said.

– . –

I think the NASCAR season should consist of one long race at Bristol. They could call it the Goodwrench, Northeast Tennessee Dodge Dealers, Bass Pro Shops, MBNA, Pepsi, Tropicana, Sylvania, UAW-GM, Pop Secret, EA SPORTS, Checker Auto Parts, Blimpy’s, Gatorade, Food City 1,000,000.

It would be perfect because I’m told that most people watch auto racing for the wrecks (or maybe that’s just me) and there would be plenty of them at Bristol. The other side of wreck theory is that drivers aren’t generally injured in wrecks at Bristol.

Also, when a car is involved in a wreck early in the race and has to go “behind the wall” and falls 22 laps behind, the team will still have plenty of time to make up those laps.

Don Perryman can be reached at 990-8045, 1-800-310-8600 or dperryman@bangordailynews.net.