Angry Ward Wednesday: Good Riddance, 2012!

Angry Ward • December 26, 2012 • 19 Comments

NEW YORK, NY - There are no holidays at MTM. No vacations. No sick days. Not even on Christmas. I texted Short Matt early Christmas morning explaining that I was under the weather (not the Irish flu, but the genuine article) and asked whether he would get someone to jump in and post in my place or simply run a “Worst of Angry Ward” column from the archives. This humble request was met with more whining than a stadium filled with spoiled brats who didn’t get what they wanted Christmas morning. So much for the spirit of giving. So, now that I’ve shaved, showered, and powered down a Ramen Noodle Soup, I’ll give it my best shot.

As we wind down 2012, I gotta say I am happy to see it go. I know we all say things on New Year’s Eve like: “Let’s hope 2013 is bettter,” but this time we should really mean it. Friends and loved ones have suffered through natural disasters such as Hurricane Sandy and unspeakable horrors like what happened in Newtown, CT. Personally, yet another friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer. As we all sat around a restaurant table on Christmas Eve, I counted that four in our group were either cancer survivors or actively battling it. All of these things certainly give you some perspective. Before I drag everyone down even further, here are some sports-related things I’d like to see change for the better in 2013.

New York Mets. Forget it, the Mets are gonna stink in 2013. Bank on it. Next.

Minnesota Vikings. If the Vikings can somehow manage to beat Green Bay in Minnesota this Sunday they will open 2013 as an NFC playoff team, which is pretty good coming off a year in which they won three games. However, and JG Clancy can vouch for this, as a Viking fan I am conditioned to expect some sort of excruciating ending. Still, hoping Minny kicks 2012 in the teeth and gets in.

Seattle Mariners. The M’s pursued but did not land Josh Hamilton. While it would have been nice to finally have someone who can hit the longball in the Pacific Northwest, I’m glad they didn’t offer anything along the lines of the monster deal the Angels gave him. Instead, the M’s signed Raul Ibanez and Jason Bay (The Old Man and the CT-Scan) to one year deals, which is pretty hilarious. Better, they traded 29-year-old former Met pitcher (remember the J.J. Putz deal?) to the Angels for 29-year-old slugger Kendrys Morales. Cautiously optimistic. The AL West is a beast.

New York Giants. They are not making the playoffs and don’t deserve to. They get a pass because of all the recent success, but it really looks like this entire team has been playing injured all season long. They’ll bounce back in 2013 but not gonna be easy facing RG III every year for the foreseeable future.

New York Jets. I would personally like to ask the Jets not to change a thing in 2013. They provided so much humor this year when it was needed most. Mark Sanchez running up his O-lineman’s ass… Rex Ryan and Co. keeping the wraps on all the Tim Tebow packages they were working on only to reveal that they had none… Woody Johnson… Mike Tanenbaum. Gold, Jerry. Pure gold.

[Sick & Tired] Angry Ward

OK, I’m done. Message to Management, I am TAKING OFF next Wednesday. Please make a note of it.

Country Cam James tomorrow… Or is it Lori Levine?

Filed in: Angry Ward
Tagged with: Angry Ward • Giants • Jets • Meet The Matts • MeetTheMatts • NBA • New York Mets • New York Yankees • NFL • NHL

About the Author (Author Profile)

Wednesday: Angry Ward, who has admirers at the NY Times, is the quintessential angry sports fan but one exception... he's flat-out funny. And the angrier he gets, the more amusing his work becomes. Psychiatrists say, "Angry Ward's 'anger' is a direct result of "Bronx/Mets syndrome: growing up in the Bronx as a Mets fan." As if that weren't enough, his Minnesota North Stars abandoned him for Dallas, forcing him to embrace The Wild the way conservatives embrace Mitt Romney. While the Vikings tease him incessantly with flirtations of success, the Golden State Warriors, "Don't have a enough short, white angry guys but I don't dislike them... that much." A-Dubya is MTM's longest-tenured indentured servant, its Larry David and quite simply, The Franchise.

http://twitter.com/JunoirBlaber Junoir Blaber

All I got to say to that Vikings cover girl is All Day!! Oh and Happy Boxing Day everyone.
Johnny Rox

Hey Wardy, sorry you’re not feeling well! As a Parent, the “Holiday Season” is a bit taxing to say the least!

I took the kids to Macy’s Herald Square to see Santa. I’d rather get anally raped by EVERY inmate in Rikers Island, TWICE, before doing THAT again!!! Christmas Eve I drank the better part of a bottle of Cognac. Christmas came early, after that! Today I’m STILL paying the price!
Free tip of the day: Cold Stone Creamery has a deal with the Soup Nazi. Not sure if its every CSC location or not, but the Soup is Niiiiiiice!!!

As for 2013:

- The Mets are not gonna be great! They’re in a building Year, and have been for 28 years now!
- The Yankees will Win the World Series (just to help Mets fans hate them even more!)
- The Nets will be the Nets! Enough said
- The Knicks will Rock the Garden (like the Rangers would’ve, DON’T GET ME STARTED!!!)
- The Giants I can’t explain! Injuries are a pathetic excuse! It’s Football for Christ Sake’s!!!
- The Jets, GREAT News! Ya can’t possibly have a worse Year than this year! Trade Sanchez for Fireman Ed for all I care! On second thought, trade em both for a box of hand warmers! (Or a partial box, if ya can’t find someone dumb enough to part with an ENTIRE box for those two losers!!!)

Happy Jew Near!

J…
- AngryWard
  
  J Rox, you’re right about braving the hordes of tourists days before Christmas. It’s like Survivor New York. I think running around coupled with too much holiday cheer had my body wanting to take a bit of a holiday break itself. Too bad Matt had other ideas.
buffalobilly84

There is no way that girls from Minnesota. But at least reading this and looking at her I don’t feel as miserable being at work today. This should be in off-day.
- AngryWard
  
  That girl kinda looks like Jaime Edmonson, that former Dolphins cheerleader who was on the Amazing Race. In fact, just checked, it is her and she was also a Playboy Playmate.
http://twitter.com/CheesyBruin Cheesy Bruin

Feel better, Homie! Thought I’d never see the gay porn adorning today’s post! Good riddance indeed.
Sam’s-A-Fan

Ward, sorry you’re not feeling well and that Scrooge McCarthy made you work anyway!

Since it’s a glacially slow day at work I just spent a few minutes catching up on the last few days’ columns and was happy to see the usual stellar contributions from MtM’s staff (I can’t even call you folks wage slaves since the aforementioned Bah Humbugger doesn’t give you anything other than the promise of liquor that comes about as frequently as Kohoutek’s Comet). I particularly liked the pictures of Cookie and Lori Levine, of course, but was also quite taken with Cam James’ rendition of Twas the Night Before Christmas. If Ward is truly off next Wednesday, as he has threatened, I would suggest that MtM simply run a pictorial series of the best of Cookie and Lori’s photos, if they don’t do that or if they go with a guest writer of a stature less than my old MtM favorite B Cox, I probably won’t tune in.

Finally, I spent some time yesterday morning watching Comcast’s (I was down in Alexandria, VA at the bro-in-laws) on demand version of the Holiday Yule Log, and I have to say that it could not have been more derivative of the WPIX classic if it had tried. It also was put together with the most hackneyed editing (long shot; dissolve to medium shot; dissolve to close up; repeat ad nauseum) imaginable and the most obvious musical score I’ve ever heard. I was all set to blame McCarthy for this too, when my sister-in-law pointed out to me that I was watching the actual fireplace and that perhaps I’d had too much eggnog the night before?

Happy Hangover to everyone!
- Time Warp Tony
  
  Kohoutek’s Comet isn’t all that. I’ve seen it thrice.
- AngryWard
  
  I like the pictorial idea, Sam. I would like to add that 2012 will not go quietly. Taking from us Jack Klugman and Charles Durning in a 24-hour period. Brutal.
vinny from brooklyn

i don’t get why jets won’t just play tebow. and the mets should sell every player making over 8 mil. that pic made me laugh tho. hgh matts!
http://meetthematts.com/ Meet The Matts

First off, Happy Day After Christmas… or, as mentioned, Happy Boxing Day… And thank you to A-Dubya for battling through his untimely illness and delivering on the grand scale… Now, let’s get down to the topic(s) at hand; namely that Short Matt is some sort of Scrooge… The events unfolded as such:

1) 9:58 AM Short Matt exits Holy Cross Church on 42nd Street, “all massed-up.” He turns on his phone and sees the following text from Angry Ward, which was sent at 9:14 AM:
“I’ll be sick for Christmas. Can you please get someone to cover or run a “Worst of Angry Ward”?”
2) Short Matt has to pick up his elderly mother and get her to the family gathering in Montclair, NJ. by 1pm…

First of all, “I’ll be sick for Christmas…” coming from a man that is always angry at you means what exactly??? Does it mean that he’s actually sick or that he is anticipating calling in sick? Secondly, who in blazes is available to pinch hit on Christmas Day without any heads up??? Thirdly, Putting together “A Worst of Angry Ward” column would take WEEKS to put together. Where does one start, what does one include??? This is not something to simply throw together as your 81-year-old co-pilot is grabbing the dashboard and playing with the air-brakes while you’re scrambling to come up with someone to fill-in, knowing you can’t!!!

As for the frequency of MTM drink-ups, we’re just now recovering from the cost of Replacement Matt and Sams-A-Fan ordering top-shelf everythings at the first Bourbon Street gathering. Seems the beer and drink special that Short Matt was adhering to wasn’t good enough!!!

Finally, Short Matt had planned on staying in NJ with his elderly mother – with no Internet access, thus making it impossible for him to stay there as planned, if indeed he needed to write a column that was potentially being vacated 13 hours before its publish time! On Christmas!

Scrooge be damned, Short Matt should be exonerated!
- Sam’s-A-Fan
  
  Well I can’t remember what I may have ordered that night, so I’ll just have to assume that Short Matt is speaking the truth and therefore righteous in his indignation.
  
  So in the spirit of the season, please accept my apology and thank your elderly mother for me for blessing us all with her offspring!
- AngryWard
  
  Please post your exact replies as well. (Sorry I was not taken seriously.) Ask Cheesy Bruin and the Public Prof how I was Christmas Eve.
WestCoastCraig

why do I get the feeling I’m writing both the Tuesday and Wednesday posts next week…
- Grote2Dmax
  
  It’ll be fun.
http://ThePublicProfessor.com The Public Professor

What flavor Ramen? I like crab.
- AngryWard
  
  Chicken. Well, um, Chickeny crab, I suppose.
Cookie

Cam James’ ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’ was solid gold.

Hope everyone had a good holiday.

Am I up to write Friday? My brain is toast…so if I am, another case for a pictorial. Lori…come on over and we’ll have a pillow fight, will take pics and FINALLy make some dough off this site.
Grote2Dmax

Here’s to a better 2013 all around.