There are any number of people within sports who heap shame upon their families every time they leave the house. This season, however, baseball more or less found itself in the clear: no high-profile steroid busts, no Clemens re-un-reverse-retirements, no players smacking around their wives in full view of 50 Red Sox fans.

Ah, but there's still despair and intellectual/moral/emotional rot for those who dare to track it down. The race for sixth place starts behind these five entities.

The Seattle Mariners
You can almost—almost—forgive the Yankees this year's failure; they can blame a chunk of it on injuries and the rest on A-Rod. But the Mariners opened the season with a $118 million payroll, including $22.5 million in commitments to the since-released Richie Sexson and Jose Vidro. Along the way, they axed their manager and GM, and finished 61–101 (.377). Seattle boasts tasty seafood and gentile citizens who, charmingly, stop when the street signal starts blinking, but the city has become the Baltimore of professional sports.

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When you or I need a hug, we simply go down to the corner and offer to pay a stranger for his/her kindness. But baseball players, bound by a code of duty and hairy-shouldered manliness, have to stymie their affectionate impulses. We propose remedying this situation with a league-mandated hug-off, commencing with the following lonely hearts.

Milton Bradley, Texas Rangers
We focus so much on the rage that has set Bradley upon umpire, teammate and Sunday driver alike, not to mention his insistence upon “introducing himself” to unflattering broadcasters. What we don’t focus on: the scared boy inside the sociopath, one whose good deeds and on-field accomplishments have been acknowledged with little more than widespread adulation, huge mounds of cash, and free home-theater systems.
Type of hug: Quick shoulder-to-shoulder bump, with a battalion of snipers and security personnel monitoring the proceedings nearby.

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According to our mole embedded deep within the Brewers clubhouse, dugout fisticuffs between Milwaukee's Prince Fielder and Manny Parra began when the 275-pound Fielder said, “Manny, old chap, I have only the deepest admiration for your contributions to the team, but I do wish you’d throw a strike occasionally.” Parra, a lithe 6’3” 200- pounder, responded, “You look like a meatloaf with arms. Go snack on some kelp, you vegan churl.” After dabbing a stray tear and huddling with Brewers utilityman/emotional lynchpin Bill Hall, Fielder pounced on Parra.

And thus we were treated to a full day of “they're losing it!” headlines… just as we’ll be treated to similar reports when these five intrasquad tensions bubble over into slappy semi-violence.

Jason Varitek and Sean Casey, Boston Red Sox
Varitek is the heart-of-the-franchise guy who was born wearing eye black. Casey is the smiley, beefy dude whose genial disposition has earned him the nickname “the Mayor.” Sooner or later, Varitek will snap during one of Casey’s fraternizations with the enemy at first base—say, when he attempts to get New York–based enemy operatives to participate in his “Doughnuts for Darfur” charity bake-a-thon. Terse conversations will ensue.

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Maybe it’s the summer heat, or maybe they figure that we’re all too revved up about fantasy football to concern ourselves with baseball silliness. But man, this was the dumbest week for baseball dummies in some dumb time. Here are your most flagrant offenders.

Melky Cabrera, New York Yankees
There's plenty to dislike about Yankees fans: the sense of entitlement, the pink replica caps and jerseys, the stubborn refusal to admit that A-Rod is 32 times the player Derek Jeter is, etc. But one of the truly great Yankee Stadium traditions is the first-inning “roll call": fans in Section 39 chant each starter’s name, followed by a quick wave from said starter. On Tuesday night, Melky Cabrera took this tradition a bit too seriously, responding to the fans during a play and promptly kicking the ball for an error. IDJIT.

Jim Bowden, Washington Nationals
As the July 31 trade deadline approached, it seemed there would be a mere three or four legit relievers on the market: Colorado’s Brian Fuentes (zesty!), Pittsburgh’s Damaso Marte (mysterious!), Atlanta’s Will Ohman (oh-some!), and Washington’s Jon Rauch (tall!). Bowden, who controlled the destiny of the latter, didn’t see it this way. He struck way early, sending Rauch, his top-20-reliever bona fides, and his cheapie-pants contract to Arizona for minor-leaguer Emilio Bonifacio, who ain’t especially young (23) or proficient at any one thing (he’s fast, yet has been thrown out on eight of his 25 steal attempts... in triple-friggin’-A). Why can’t we lure guys like Bowden into our big-money rotisserie leagues? Every cellar needs a dweller. MORON.

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Baltimore’s Brian Roberts is one of the few MLBers who holds the twin distinctions of being both a pretty darn great player and a decent, thoughtful guy. Fresh off an All-Star snub—he doesn’t think it’s a snub, but we have no clue how a second baseman boasting an .864 OPS and a solid glove doesn’t belong on the team—he called to talk charity (his Brian’s Bracelet program, which provides more comfortable stays for patients at the University of Maryland Hospital for Children) and about his way-friskier-than-expected Orioles.

How did the Brian’s Bracelet program start?
I’ve been working with the hospital for five or six years now. GameWear came up with the idea of a bracelet with Orioles colors and a baseball on it, with me and two kids kind of cartooned on it. They’re $10 each and all proceeds go to the hospital. GameWear doesn’t make a cent off this.

You seem to be taking this stuff pretty personally.
When I was five years old, I had open heart surgery. So I spent time in a hospital as a kid and I know what it does to both the child and the family. We're trying to make the experience there as good as it can possibly be—not only with visits and having personal relationships with the kids and their families, but also financially as well.

I was very fortunate. My dad was the college baseball coach at the time for the University of North Carolina. I can remember his players coming to visit me and lots of other people reaching out. But unfortunately, not all kids have that, so we try to make visits and take over t-shirts, toys, books, video games, things like that. We’ve got the bracelets and my function in September (Brian's Baseball Bash).

OK, what about this season?
It’s been fun for us. Going into spring training, there were not a whole lot of expectations outside of our organization or even inside our organization. With the big trades we made this winter—trading away Miguel Tejada and Erik Bedard—people thought we’d fall off the face of the earth for a little while. But we’ve played really good baseball and it’s been fun to be a part of it. I’ve heard more support from fans this year than I have in a long time, about how much fun our team is to watch.

Uh huh. And what about your All-Star snub?
The All-Star Game is always interesting. You never know how it’s going to shake out player-wise. There are lots of second basemen having great years: Dustin Pedroia, Ian Kinsler. It was one of those numbers games, I guess.

You don't sound like you've been snubbed. Surprised by your Os so far this year? 
You’re talking about major-league players here. It’s not like we’re going to roll over and die, and it’s not like we’re not capable of going out and playing against anybody else. On a daily basis, you go out there and believe you have a chance to win. How that turns out over 162 games? We may not be in the position to fight against New York or Boston in a 162-game season, but we’re certainly capable of going out there and giving ourselves a chance on a day-to-day basis. 

How 'bout them Tampa Rays?
We’ve been saying for two or three years they were ready to play this way. We just felt they needed another arm or two in the starting rotation; they never really had that front-to-back depth. Offensively they’ve always driven you crazy. Now they’re starting to pitch. We knew when they put the two together they’d be dangerous. I’m not sure if any of us expected it to happen this quick or that they’d be this good. 

You've been the subject of numerous trade rumors, mostly involving the Cubs. Let's talk about feelings.
You say that you don’t worry about it and it doesn’t bother you, but throughout the winter and spring training, I thought about it. Every day it was part of my life. People were asking and calling. At one point this winter, I got a text message saying a deal was done.

You put it out of your mind. Once the season starts, you just go out there and play the game. You know you’re going to be playing baseball one way or another, whether it’s in Baltimore or Chicago or some other city. You're still going to be playing the same game and position.

Which players did you most admire growing up?
Cal Ripken is one of the guys I certainly admire, for who he is as person and what he did for the game, the way he went about his business. I was fortunate to play with him in his last year. The consecutive game streak, for most of us who play every day, is unfathomable [Laughs].

I loved watching Ozzie Smith play when I was growing up. He was a smaller, switch-hitting shortstop, which is what I was at the time. Walt Weiss, who played for my dad, was one of my heroes. B.J. Surhoff as well.

What are we going to get out of the Orioles in the season's second half?
We need to continue to build for the future. At the end of July, you never know what’s going to happen and what’s going to unfold with teams and trades. We have some pieces people may want. You try to keep your focus on the game and not worry about the trades. We may not win the pennant, but we do want to continue to get better.

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