As a baseball announcer, Gary Thorne is a great hockey announcer.  I think he may have taken one too many pucks to the melon when he said, on the air Wednesday night that Kurt Schilling's famous bloody sock from the 2004 playoffs was a fake.  Not only that, but he named the name of the player who told him. 
Thorne now claims he misunderstood something catcher Doug Mirabelli told him about it.  That's always a convenient excuse when you put your foot in your mouth up to your knee.

What Gary Thorne did goes beyond the bounds of being a play by play announcer.  It besmirches the reputation of a highly decorated player and taints a magical moment in baseball history.  Does Thorne think players will be eager to confide things in him, knowing full well that those items may be used against them or reported erroneously? 

Whether the blood was blood or paint really isn't the issue more than it is someone betraying a confidence.  Players are tough to get to know and very distrustful of anybody who doesn't wear a jock.  Gary Thorne just made every announcers job harder.

Lightning Round:

• Thursday night's game between the Chicago White Sox and the Detroit Tigers has been postponed due to rain in Chicago.  And, injuries to Jim Thome, Jermaine Dye and Rob Machowiak.  And, the embarrassment of being pantsed for eight innings Wednesday night by Chad Durbin.  And, to keep Brian Anderson from going 0 for 4 again.  Nobody knows white flags like your Chicago White Sox.
• The Twins Torri Hunter was taken to a Minneapolis hospital after being hit in the mouth by Royals pitcher Zach Grinke.  As Hunter was being led away by team trainers, Grinke stood on the mound screaming at Hunter saying "If we can't drink champaign, you can't drink champaign!"
  
• Here's a blog by someone who believes that sometimes it's okay to abandon your team if they are losers.  I couldn't disagree more.  Loyalty in sports is everything, I think.  Backing your team, thinking this could be the year, that's why were fans.  And since free agency began and players move around every year, the name on the front of the uniform is really all we have left to root for.  I waited for the White Sox 2005 championship  for over forty years.  My Dad waited 81 years to see his beloved Red Sox win a title, If everybody just dumped their team when times got tough, who would be left to root for the Cubs?
• In the chase for Lord Stanley's cup, where have you gone Marty Brodeur.  Four first period goals put Ottawa ahead to stay as the Sens downed the Devils 5-4.  Meanwhile, in a fairly defensive and dull game, San Jose drew first blood against Detroit 2-0.  Detroit had more turnovers than a French bakery. On Friday night, it's the resumption of Buffalo-Rangers and Vancouver-Anaheim.
• Good news.  Dick Vitale has eight more years of kissing Bob Knight's fanny.
• St. Louis will announce Friday that they have hired Rick Majerus as their new head basketball coach.  No over/under has been established yet as to when he might change his mind.
• Larry Brown must have pictures of every NBA owner fornicating with a sheep.  That's the only reason I can think of as to why people feel compelled to hire him.  Anyone recall the Knicks era?
  
• Pittsburgh has been named the most livable city in America again.  Not bad for a town that has the NFL, NHL and minor league baseball.
• Actor Hugh Grant has been arrested for allegedly assaulting a paparazzi with a pot of beans.  Somebody has to do something about these idiot photographers that don't give people a moment's worth of peace.  Even Hugh Grant is entitled to privacy (except when he is being serviced in a car on a public street.)
• The country of India may actually arrest alleged actor Richard Gere for making out with Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty in public.  What Gere didn't realize is they have strict obscenity laws over in India.  No doubt if sentenced to prison time, many prisoners will be looking forward to the prospect of "getting it in Gere."
• He was working in the lab late one night when his eyes did spy an eerie fright; for the grim reaper for his slab reared his ugly head and soon, very soon Bobby Pickett was dead.
• Motion Picture President and former aide to LBJ Jack Valenti reaches THE END at 85.  Rated DOA.
  
• The story here really is irrelevant, it was the headline that caught my attention: "Ole Miss Women's coach to retire."  I got the visual of an never married elderly matron with a lot of cats not a basketball coach.
  
• With so many couples working, time pressures and family pressures have become such that according to a British survey, many couples have only ten minutes a day to talk.  What's even more interesting is 40% of women put off discussing their relationships with their husbands until the two are alone in the car.  What the experts don't tell you is that this results in 70% of marital related homicides.  If the husband is in the car with the wife, then he is either a) being dragged against his will to a big box, supermarket or worse, an indoor shopping complex b) on his way to a restaurant he doesn't want to eat at but is going because it makes her happy or c) on the way to the in-laws.  So now, you have an already unhappy, fairly agitated male trapped in a moving, inescapable metal vehicle with a woman about to pull the Oprah card and want to talk about relationships.  All this while he is negotiating heavy traffic dodging soccer moms at an indoor shopping complex on a Saturday afternoon when he should be planted in front of his TV with a remote, a cold beverage and the games of his choice.  So, his options are: a) pretend to listen by nodding the head up and down and praying that she doesn't ask anything that requires an answer more than uh-huh or b) fling her whiny and ungrateful butt from the vehicle.  Ladies, please remember that if we are in the car with you it is because you made us go with you somewhere we most likely didn't want to go in the first place and then you compound our agony by wanting to talk about relationships?  Can't you just look out the window?  That's why men tend to take their dog somewhere before they take their wife: The dog is better behaved.
  
• If you are a testosterone driven male, this clip will absolutely scare the crap out of you.