Beer Fuels Tom Gorzelanny

I don't know how many readers out there are religious and frankly, it doesn't matter all that much to me. But let's look at a time-line of this spring for Tom Gorzelanny (who is a pitcher for the Pirates, if you were uncertain). On February 21st, Lent began. At this point in the year, Catholics started giving things up for the next 40 or so days. It's okay, I'm Catholic so I can poke fun. Anyways, at that point Tom Gorzelanny decided it was probably a good idea not to drink beer over the next 40 days. This seemed like a good idea, but the Pirates top minor league pitcher in 2006 has been getting shelled. Ace reporter Paul Meyer has the story:

"I'm Catholic and it's Lent," [Gorzelanny] said. "You're supposed to give up something. I gave up drinking beer and soda for Lent. I thought I'd try it and see how it would make me feel body-wise, and I feel great. I feel energized all the time."

Anything else?

"I've lost 15 pounds," he said. "I realized that beer gets you fat."

There's this, too. Giving up runs will get one's earned run average fat.

Gorzelanny's spring ERA is an obese 10.45.

Now terrible journalism and tasteless jokes aside, David Wells would be apalled if he found out that someone else in baseball was giving beer up for something as trivial as religion. And let's just say that Gorzelanny's lack in performance this spring is more than suspcious. He and Moises Alou need to have a talk. And maybe next year he should give up something less performance enhancing for Lent.

This post brought to you by six beers. I know it says 10 AM, but you'll just have to trust me that it was written at 2 this morning.