By Jeff Moss
August 28, 2011
DetroitSportsRag@gmail.com
As you probably already know, last week ESPN: The Magazine idiotically decided to publish a column entitled, “What if Michael Vick were White?”
In the second dumbest move of ESPN’s week (mistakenly inviting Tommy Craggs of Deadspin.com to their State of the Mothership Address was slightly more idiotic), “The Magazine” hired some dude named Touré to pen this ridiculous “what-if” piece.
(And seriously, what kind of WRITER goes by one name? Touré? Unless you are a Brazilian soccer player or a midget musician from Minneapolis or a whore singer from Rochester Hills who dabbles in Kabbalah, YA PEOPLE NEED TO HAVE TWO FREAKING NAMES!!!)
The purpose of this column isn’t really to critique One-Named-Insufferable-Douche Bag’s column, but I have to make one point. I am pretty sure if Vick was born Caucasian, he probably wouldn’t have been able to run a 4.3-forty. So, they pretty much lost me with the headline, the asinine imagery of Vick looking pasty and my inability to suspend disbelief.
Although I am really looking forward to Newsweek’s upcoming thoughtful cover entitled, “What if Hitler Kept Kosher?” and MacWorld’s fantastic piece in this week’s issue, “What if Pancreases Couldn’t Get Cancer?”
Anyway, I normally don’t take requests like I’m the piano player at Ocean Prime on a Saturday night, but I received several Tweets requesting that I satirize the ESPN article with my own column entitled, “What if Brandon Inge were Black?”
It was such a great idea that I would like to take credit for it myself, but I cannot. (Actually, considering the potential this column has to inflame, I might want to give FULL credit to @backdoorslider.)
So I have done my best to not completely fuck up this brilliant premise with 15 “What if Brandon Inge were Black” possibilities.
And remember when you are reading this article, I am a bleeding heart liberal who believes in affirmative action, I voted for Barack Obama and will do so again and I fully believe in reparations for the ancestors of slaves.
And with that caveat, I hope you enjoy.
1) When he lost his job at third base to Miguel Cabrera he wouldn’t have had his wife Shani whine to WDIV’s Bernie Smilovitz about the toll it had taken on him. Instead, Soul Inge would have requested that Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson come to Detroit to picket Dave Dombrowski’s office.
2) Instead of being beloved by 5’1, 275-pound chicks from Southgate and River Rouge he would have been idolized by the Detroit Tigers African-American fans. All 14 of them.
3) African-American Inge would probably have atrocious looking tattoos of his children’s names plastered on his forearms. Oh … wait.
4) Instead of bitching to the media that opponents are pitching to him like he is Ted Williams and Babe Ruth he would have blamed his struggles on pitchers treating him like Buck O’Neill and Josh Gibson.
5) Instead of [ALLEGEDLY] cheating on his wife with waitresses at the Fountain Walk Hooters in Novi his extra-marital affairs would probably have taken place at the Black Orchid.
6) Actually, he would never have been married to Shani in the first place. More likely one of the lesser known Kardashian sisters. (Although Shani does appear to have the rump the “Brothers” seem to like.)
7) Jim Leyland never would have thought he had any grit or moxie.
8) He wouldn’t have moved his family permanently to Saline, Michigan. Unless he was a big fan of burning crosses on his front lawn.
9) His Lambo would be blue.
10) His entrance music to the batter’s box would NOT have been split between Korn’s “Coming Undone” and “Ridin” by Chamillionaire. It would have been ALL Chamillionaire ALL of the time.
11) Mike Ilitch wouldn’t have sent a PERSONAL message to Inge when he was Designated for Assignment begging him to tough it out in Toledo and stay with the organization. Instead, they would have DFA’d him and then hired character assassin Lynn Henning to write multiple columns in the Detroit News suggesting that Black Inge was spending too much of his free time assisting children with cancer and that was the REAL reason he was hitting .175.
12) If at all possible, Fox Sports Detroit color announcer Rod Allen would have liked him even more. They probably would have even chased skirts on road trips together.
13) In 1998, Inge landed on the Disabled List when his then three-year old son decided to spend the night in bed with Brandon and Shani. When attempting to provide the little one with a pillow, Inge claimed he pulled his oblique muscle. Black Inge’s CRAZY and non-believable DL story would have been the time he walked into Club Envy wearing sweatpants while carrying a loaded Glock and accidentally shot himself in the leg.
14) WFAN’s Mike Francesa never would have “liked” him. Repeatedly.
15) Because the Tigers only seem to be desirous of surrounding their Latino players with a token white positional player and not an African-American, he would have been let go in 2003 coming off a .203 batting average.