My New Favorite Game Show: Baggage

During Junior Year of College I went on a huge game show binge. The Game Show Network was my new best friend. I'm not sure how or why - I guess I was getting tired of the MTV/VH1 nonsense and I also had 3 days off a week AKA too much free time. It got to a point where me and my roommate were trying SO HARD to see someone on Millionaire win the Million. Of course it happened on a Friday when we were out, that was one of the more disappointing moments of the school year. I'm serious.

Anyway, I've lost touch with GSN until The Soup informed me of this new game show they have - Baggage. Hosted by Jerry Springer, it's like a cross between Deal or No Deal - clearly a favorite since it's one of my favorite sayings - and Exposed. Here's a link to the entire first episode. If you don't have an extra 20 minutes (come on, it's summer, if you took the time to read this you can watch that,) just skip to the last 3 minutes and try not to laugh to hard. Please.

Let me quickly explain the concept:

1 contestant goes through 3 people's of their "baggage" - 3 rounds, with each one being more "baggy" than the next. In the second round, the "baggage" is revealed not by person, and the contestant must choose which "baggage" is "too much to carry" and must leave the show, leaving two contestants.

--- That's part of what I love --- the cheesy one liners that come as a part of the show. When someone is kicked off, they must "pack up your bags and head on out of here." It's like those corny episodes of Next on MTV. It makes me laugh every time. And when they defend their baggage, there's usually some convoluted idiotic Room Raiders type-of-thinking where it's like: Well, I don't know if we can date, because you have 100 purses, and I just don't know if I can afford you! (In Room Raiders, it would be: "You have a lot of purses, that must mean you like to spend money, and I don't know if I can support that." I love this stuff.)

Anyways, at the end, after the contestant has picked the baggage that he or she can "carry" - the tables are turned, and then he/she must reveal their biggest baggage and the "winner" has to determine if he/she can handle the baggage.

What's underlying from the show is that this show is SO TRUE. People are judging based off only knowing a few things about you - and only the "bad" things, things you wouldn't tell someone right away.

When getting into a relationship (even a normal friendship) you don't reveal your life history. It comes with time - because you're scared of what the other person will think. You're scared they might not want to be friends. That's why people struggle with "coming out" - the criticism and fear that their friends might not accept them for being different than they were perceived originally.

Specifically in more serious "romantic" relationships, there's just things you don't tell your significant other's right off the bat. You don't say "I've been arrested" or whatever your dirty mind can come up with, I'm trying to stay somewhat PG. The show proves how judgmental and low our society is. People don't give you a chance when they hear something about your past right away, even if it happened so long ago. People grow and people change - the person that did that so long ago isn't the same person now, and maybe that's because of the event that caused the baggage. Our society say it doesn't matter. Awful. Everyone deserves a second chance.

Except for cheaters. You cheat, you should have a red X on your forehead for a year. I'm kind of not kidding. That's not cool. After a year of a red X on your head maybe you'll get a clue. Okay, so that's really dumb, but I actually hate cheaters. As much as I love Tiger, he lost a lot of credibility in my book. I still want him to win, but I hope he never finds love. I really do. He had it and threw it away. Too bad he's so rich it won't matter. People who cheat really piss me off. Too bad it seems like everyone does. Brutal.

Okay I strayed from my point, just had to get that out.....

Anyways, you should watch Baggage! 6:30PM GSN!

Oh and one of my favorite lines (and this is how I'll close) at the end, Jerry Springer says "Well we didn't find a match today, but we had a lot of fun!"

So one of my goodbyes to college is: Well I didn't find a match in four years, but I had a lot of fun!

Mark McGwire took Steroids. Shocker of the Decade.

I meant to post about this yesterday, but I was traveling. It's still timely however.


On Monday, Mark McGwire admitted to taking steroids. During most of his career. Most notably, that 1998 season that captured everyone's hearts and minds and made baseball relevant again. And it turns out to be not necessarily legitimate. Was any of baseball legitimate in the 90s?

I've always said that I think that steroids were unfortunately 'part of the game' in the 90s. There's alot of people to blame. Players, Managers, Owners, Fans, Bud Selig, but blame won't get anything done. It happened. Who knew who took what. I'm sure there's plenty of big-leaguers who took steroids and we have no idea. This is the bed that we all created. And we have to accept it.

Fans wanted something they could follow (like the breaking of a historic Home Run Record) and embrace the sport again. Players wanted to be signed to bigger contracts. Owners wanted to bring in more money. Bud Selig wanted higher TV contracts. They all got what they want, and now they act in shock and disgust for what happened. As if they didn't know that this day would one day come.

They're disgusted because it blew out of control. They really didn't know what they were getting themselves into. McGwire AND Sammy Sosa broke Roger Maris' 61 more than once. Barry Bonds was just a few years away from breaking that record, and then becoming the All-Time Home Run Leader. Is there ANY doubt that he took steroids?

As a fan I find it extremely frustrating how MLB has handled this. There's no accountability for the enablers (the clubhouse guys, owners, GMs, Jose Canseco, etc) outside of Victor Conte. Instead all blame goes to the players. While they are the ones who accepted the steroid injection, they had help in acquiring the drugs. It turned into a witch hunt, and a comical one at that. Congressional hearings. The Mitchell Report. Sosa forgot English. Rafael Palmeiro flat out lied. Curt Schilling ran his trap about how clean the game needed to be. The list can go on and on.

I just think it happened. It's hopefully over. There's still no HGH test. Steroids are clearly still in baseball if superstars like Manny Ramirez can get suspended. You can't asterisk the records, because it was on somewhat of a level playing field. Whether that particular pitcher was juicing vs that particular batter is unknown. Sports requires a competitive edge; doing 'whatever' it takes to get an advantage. How can anyone blame players for trying to get an edge? Sports has become so big and there's so much money at stake that it would seem stupid not to take steroids.

The thing that I think everyone doesn't really know (outside of users) is how effective steroids REALLY are. They do not enhances anyone's hand-eye coordination. Maybe it makes for a faster swing. Does it may the difference from a ball landing on the warning track versus out of the park? We only really look at home-runs, but how else can it help a hitter? Pitching, I would believe it can help recover after a 7+ inning game. There needs to be studies to test the differences these drugs can have on an athlete.

If anything, the only issue now is how MLB claims to be clean. But with every story of Alex Rodriguez, (previously determined to be the "clean" player who will take over the home run record that Bonds claimed.) that comes out causes doubts in the minds of every fan. I personally love Ryan Howard, but I just can't be sure. We know about Josh Hamilton overcoming drug addiction, but what about steroids? He's massive. Even players who aren't huge home run hitters. Bronson Aroyyo admitted to taking performance enhancers. David Ortiz. Jason Giambi. Andy Pettite. Miguel Tejada. Frank Thomas. The list goes on. Who knows who else was on the 2003 report. And Roger Clemens is just as much of a slam dunk as Bonds.

There's no answers, there's no solution. The entire baseball community just must accept the mistakes that have happened that lead to this point and understand that baseball isn't as 'clean' as it used to be. These players shouldn't be kept out of the Hall of Fame. It shouldn't be on their plaque that they were on steroids. They played the game in a different time frame and did great things. Mark McGwire saved baseball. He should be honored for that. It's still a beautiful game, and I hope that it can actually maintain it's legitimacy for years to come.

Tiger Woods is Just as Human as You

So it's been a month since everything went downhill for Tiger. It's been a roller-coaster ride. I figured I would chime in now that we think we know everything.

Tiger might be my favorite athlete ever. Iverson was a strong option, Brian Dawkins did it too. I really liked Nomar Garciaparra, but he fell off so quick. Tiger's always been winning, and his sport allows him to keep winning for a long time. For over 12 years, he's been the most consistent, polished, winning athlete. He was always so poised, he almost seemed immortal. He never tried to be the country's favorite, he just wants to win. America loves Tiger, but we don't know much about him except for his golf career, which included his father's death.

Superstar athletes and celebrities assume all types of privileges, one of them including women. It's hard to find one who DOESN'T live life like a "rock star." I'm sitting here and can't think of one that I haven't heard rumors about cheating on their wife or getting divorced. A-Rod. Jordan. Varitek. Kobe. Duke Lacrosse (although innocent). They've all taken advantage of their positions, and for the first three, it ruined their marriages (although Kobe recovered.)

I don't want to say that everyone cheats on their significant other. It feels that way. You don't hear about the couples that stay together, because that's too boring. Most of my friends have at some point cheated on their girlfriend/boyfriend, many times without admitting to it to them. Maybe that's just us in our youth. I know several older married couples where they've caught their significant other cheating on them, and they stick together "for the kids." Divorce is brutal, but so is a marriage with no real substance. There's no right solution, other than don't cheat and make sure you're making the right choice when you commit to someone. It sounds easier sitting here than it actually is.

Tiger's case was 6 years in the making. How many other celebrities have girls on the side that we don't know about? If Tiger can fall, anyone can.

But the thing is, people don't really care. Sure, they care about scandal and gossip. But in the end, do people really view Tiger any differently? Nike called this a "minor blip" in their relationship. Only one of his sponsors dropped him. His golf game should be fine (2010 was set up for him to have a HUGE year). I think the reason why people don't care is because cheating has become so common, its almost like its no big deal. The bigger deal was that Tiger Woods wasn't who we thought he was - he was actually just like everyone else.