Never Trust a Guy Named Doug

There's been a bit of a storm around Curt Schilling recently, sort of like back in the 1980s. Anyway, this most recent dustup has centered around a hockey announcer who also does Orioles play-by-play, a dude by the name of Gary Thorne.

Just a side note: Joe Dirt tried to add an "e" to the end of his name to make it sound French. I have since been turned off to trailing "e"s.

Anyway, Thorne (on the air, no less) was talking about Curt Schilling's bloody sock from the 2004 ALCS Game 6, when Schilling had his ankle tendons sutured to his skin to be able to pitch. The Red Sox, partly behind Schilling's performance, beat the Yankees in that game to set up Game 7, which they won to advance to the World Series. Schilling also pitched in Game 2 of the World Series, with a bloody sock, and which the Red Sox also won en route to a four-game sweep of the Cardinals.

This announcer, Thorne, suggested that the blood was fake. Doug Mirabelli, a Boston Red Sox catcher at the time, told him so (or so he claimed). Schilling has reacted angrily, as he used to before he found Jesus.

Side note: finding Jesus does not mean you have to stop being an asshole. I really do miss old, violent Curt Schilling.

Back to the story: Schilling has announced a $1-million prize to a charity of Thorne's choice if he can prove that the sock was not bloodied so much as painted or otherwise doctored. The Game 6 sock itself is in the baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, so if anyone really cared, they could just do a quick touch up with luminol to see if it glows under black light - if it does, it's blood (or semen, which is admittedly less likely).

Bets, or even the facts, aside, the real key is this: Curt Schilling won Game Six of the 2004 ALCS with an ankle that had been surgically reinforced, though not repaired, just a few days before. And he and the Red Sox won that game because Schilling and his sock had gotten inside the heads of New York Yankees players.

If Schilling's blood was real, he got inside the Yankees' heads with his toughness.

If Schilling's blood was fake, he got inside the Yankees' heads because he's smarter than they are.

Either way, he was inside their heads and the Red Sox won. And that's the bottom line.