Open Mic: Crazy Uncle Bud Does It Once Again

The other day, I was clicking though the dials and landed on the classic western movie, The Magnificent Seven. I had just tuned in when Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen were trying to talk Charles Bronson into joining them.

Their pitch was how a little Mexican village needed six gunfighters to save them from a band of outlaws. Bronson's character asked to the opposition and was told 30 guns. His reply, "I admire your notion of fair odds, mister."

I just wish I could give the same admiration to baseball's commissioner. When Hurricane Ike made playing ball in Houston impossible, he decided to move the series scheduled  there against the Cubs. His choice for Houston to host from: Milwaukee, WI!

Traveling from Wrigley Field, Chicago (that's the visiting team by the way) it is a 90-mile jaunt up the I-94 through two states, estimated at about an hour and 45 minutes.

Traveling from Minute Maid Park, Houston (yeah, we're talking the home team now) it's a quick 1,274 miles through eight states, estimated at roughly 19 hours 39 minutes nonstop.

These numbers are courtesy Google Maps; your mileage may vary.

By what machination of the mental processes allowed Crazy Uncle Bud to figure Milwaukee would be a good place for Houston to host Chicago I will never know. I'm quite confident it is better for my mental health if I try to never find out, since it may trigger internal hemorrhaging.

Logic would think he would first look to the Astros' AAA franchise. That would be in Round Rock, TX. No good since, at 169 miles to the east, Round Rock would still be in the path of Ike.

The next largest AAA city that would afford the Astros a reasonable chance of hosting the series would be Las Vegas, NV. While it is slightly farther at 1,478 miles from Houston, given the diverse makeup of Las Vegas, it is also reasonable to assume the crowds would not be so slanted in Chicago's favor. 

Who doesn't like a trip to Vegas for a couple of days? Got to beat the hell out of Milwaukee, as a location for a couple days of displacement. Ike wouldn't be poking his nose out that far, travel from Houston has to be easier than going up to Milwaukee, and there are plenty of hotels and potential customers already in the city.

But our loving commissioner clicks on to his default (home) city. When the Cleveland Indians had to move some games against the Angels in the start of 2007 due to weather, they played in Milwaukee. When the Commissioner was an owner, it was in Milwaukee. Anybody seeing a pattern here?

Some have said the Astros' owner, Drayton McLane, dragged his feet over moving the games, hoping to keep the games and the money in Houston. MLB had no choice but to step in because of his delay in making a decision.

This excuse is weak bathwater. It does not justify giving the Cubs, in effect, two more home games this season. The Astros were so displeased with the decision where the games were moved, they refused to wear their home uniforms.

The Cubs won both games against the Astros in Milwaukee and have opened up their lead against, of all teams, the Milwaukee Brewers. The Astros and St. Louis Cardinals are a few games behind the Brew Crew in the chase against the Cubbies, with a little more than two weeks to play.

If the NL Central does come down to a two-game final margin, you best believe there will be more than a couple people giving ol' Bud the fisheye. Good thing he is used to it from so many bad decisions so many times before.