A quick aside from the previous debate discussion, which I'll pick up soon, when I have a tad more time ...

While the Texas Rangers have never been perennially great, they have probably never been as bad as they are this season. At 21-38, they're on pace for more than 100 losses, and I suspect they could be even worse.

It's not like they don't have the position players. Mark Teixeira, Michael Young, Ian Kinsler and Hank Blalock, I think, comprise the most promising infield in baseball. However, Texas is woefully inconsistent offensively, and pitching is and has traditionally been a weakness. That is an understatement.

It's leadership. Tom Hicks is a dreadful owner, having tried to merge his baseball and hockey businesses into one front-office. Firing Doug Melvin. Hiring that kid to be GM. Killing Johnny Oates. Where does it end?

I jest, but truth is my ballclub needs some creative destruction. I stand by my proposal: Trade every position player for pitching. Trade Teixeira. Young. Blalock. Kinsler. Cruz. Laird. Trade them all for young pitching, and then promote the Oklahoma Redhawks position players.

That should be your team for 2007. That is the foundation upon which winning can be done. A drastic move to communicate to the organization, to the public, to everyone that pitching is not just paramount -- it's everything -- has to be done. Oh, I'll be a fan no matter what, but life is too short to be listening to or watching incompetent teams for the sake of loyalty.

So, as of tonight, I'm spending the rest of my 2007 baseball season with the World Champs. The St. Louis Cardinals. I need to see how a real club does things, a club with mega-history. It's a team I've traditionally loathed as much as the New York Yankees.

However, in Oklahoma, the Cardinals are basically the local boys, even moreso than the nearby Rangers or the Royals. Norman's KREF plays the Cardinals every night with Mike Shannon and John Rooney at the mic. The former is not just a Cardinals icon as a player, he's one of the best voices in the sport.

The fans are knowledgable. The city is wonderful. I am drinking the Kool-Aid merely because I want a team to follow this year. Listening to your team night after night getting drummed isn't a test of loyalty, it's a test of sanity.