Fear Delmon

Reading the essential AOL MLB Fanhouse, I came across this little tidbit on the Rays and their lack of hype.

So where's the respect [for the Rays]? Where are the "Fear Delmon" T-shirts and Carl Crawford Nike ads?

Why, indeed? The very least Delmon Young can get is a t-shirt. If anything symbolizes the “Booyah” generation, it’s athletes with freakish athletic talent coupled with penchants for criminality, destruction, and a flagrant disregard for authority. If Michael Vick is given million dollar contracts for dog fighting, and Sebastian Telfair is given shoe contracts for gunplay, then Delmon Young is absolutely a role model for the new generation of criminal athlete.

Delmon signed out of a California high school for six million dollars, immediately making him the highest paid Devil Ray since Jose Canseco. At age 18 he started out in single-A ball, where he racked up minor league all-star selections and player of the year awards. After a banner year in 2005 for both on and off the field activities, Delmon finally made it to the show for good at the end of 2006. Although he’s put up respectable numbers in the majors, his projections are far more impressive for the destruction outside the realm of traditional baseball.

Delmon has made it a practice to physically assault umpires, which according to notables such as William Ligue Jr., is every fan’s dream come true. In the minor leagues in 2005, Young gave an umpire a chest bump that Lou Pinella would be inspired by, earning him a paltry suspension of three games. A year later, Young would become the standard bearer for nihilistic rebellion when he intentionally hurled a bat at an umpire for handing out one of the worst third strike calls ever seen in AA baseball.

C'mon, that pitch was outside
A 50 game suspension resulted, but it did not slow Delmon’s progress in “Booyah”. When asked by a reporter how he felt about being held back in the minors, Delmon said that the organization was “cheap,” and that “when it comes to free agency, [there’s] no use trying to stay around there for the long haul.” Rational observers might think that because of the bat incident and attitude, the Rays felt Delmon lacked the emotional maturity that’s required for the major leagues. Madness! A similarly talented Ken Griffey Jr. was in the majors at that age, but he did have to suffer through occasional spankings by his father in front of Jim Lefebvre and Harold Reynolds.

And speaking of family pedigree, according to police forces in the district, Delmon is also a known accomplice (or sibling) of Washington D.C. arch criminal and drug lord Dmirti Young, whose sole presence has single handedly caused crime statistics to skyrocket, with long term residents wishing for the halcyon days of the crack epidemic and Marion Barry. Experts now say Southeast DC is a war zone markedly worse than Detroit on Devil’s Night, or a post-liberation Fallujah. If Dmitri is Avon Barksdale, then Delmon is Stringer Bell.



Tampa Bay is no place for Delmon Young. Rumor has it Tropicana Field was created to house homeless people in case of a Katrina-like disaster, with the intention of performing sociological experiments when the residents eventually dissolved into cannibalism and madness. This vibe is palpable throughout the arena, and does not make for a pleasurable viewing or playing experience. Young will not stay. In that well placed tirade against the team mentioned previously, he said that his goal was to “Get your six years and leave.” Can you imagine the publicity he'll get when he's a Yankee? By that time Joe Torre will be dead, replaced by an animatronic robot who cares little for things like "character" and "hustle."

Is there any player in sports who we should fear more than Delmon Young? Of course not. Marcus Vick and his twin gats doesn’t have the army that Delmon has behind him in southeast. After getting fired by the Celtics, Bassy won’t have the money. Until LeBron James starts doing drive-bys out of the Hummer that his momma bought him, Delmon will be the athlete that symbolizes the "Booyah" generation. And that, my friends, is outstanding.