With Cubs leadoff men struggling to reach base even 20% of the time, GM Jim Hendry took a rather unconventional approach in finding an acceptable table setter by purchasing an Acme rocket-leadoff man. Hendry expects the rocket to be in the lineup in time for Saturday’s game against the White Sox.
“There wasn’t anyone available on waivers and I had no assets to make a trade,” lamented Hendry. “So I did what Wile E. Coyote or any other GM would have done: I went to Acme and bought us a fine rocket-leadoff hitter.”
The Acme rocket-leadoff man, model #156009, is built mainly from old Star Wars Stormtrooper costumes and faulty NASA rocket parts. It’s been on the market since 1990 and has had mixed results at the Major League level. In 2006, the Detroit Tigers won the pennant using one, but the 2008 San Diego Padres lost five players when theirs exploded on a team charter. Acme guarantees a .400 on-base percentage and 55 stolen bases for this particular product.
“Performance-enhancing drugs are clearly a violation of the rules and spirit of the game,” said Hendry. “But there’s nothing written anywhere in the rules that prohibits high-performance rocket fuel.”
With Kosuke Fukudome in his annual post-April decline, Darwin Barney on the DL and Starlin Castro simply too productive to bat first, Hendry went online and got himself a leadoff hitter for three easy payments of $129.95 (plus shipping).
By Patrick Olson. Image by Kurt Evans
