Curt reponds to "Sock-Gate" in a way only he can

"You see, Terry, here's what happened. I was eavesdropping on a conversation in the clubhouse that night..."

In a scathing assault on both Gary Thorne and the media in general (of which he himself is now a part of), Curt Schilling ripped into the faulty Orioles play-by-play man for being a liar who "misreported what he overheard...then misinterpreted what he misreported", and vilified the rest of the press for running wild with the story.

On his blog 38Pitches.com today, the media-hog (something Curt will readily admit to) righthander ripped Thorne a new one; his post regarding the issue is rather lengthy, so here are a few of the best verbal beatdowns Curt laid on the bespectacled broadcaster:

• "So Gary Thorne says that Doug (Mirabelli) told him the blood was fake. Which even when he’s called out he can’t admit he lied. Doug never told Gary Thorne anything. Gary Thorne overheard something and then misreported what he overheard. Not only did he misreport it, he misinterpreted what he misreported."


• "...even after they spoke Gary Thorne still covered his ass by lying about the conversation and twisting it in a way that absolved him from blame."

But Curt, who is obviously both incensed and amazed that this 2-year-old story is still garnering attention, was just as straightforward when detailing his feelings about the media's involvement in the escalation of this incident (notice how he still manages to skewer Thorne also):

• "Watching Woody Paige or the plastered made up face of Jay Marriotti spew absolutely nothing of merit on sports, day after day, makes it easy to understand how Gary Thorne could say something as stupid, ignorant, and uninformed as he did the other night."


• "My only real problem is not that Gary Thorne said something stupid and ignorant, which he did, but that without a word being uttered by anyone in our clubhouse this somehow became a major news story."


• "The media hacked and spewed their way to a day or two of stories that had zero basis in truth. A story fabricated by the media, for the media."

Great rips on "Woodrow" Paige and Mariotti! Look, it's time to put this thing to rest. Curt states that his blog finally "serves one of the purposes I’d hoped it would if the need arose", which was to be able to fight back against his detractors or anyone he sees as challenging the facts of any story.

Mission accomplished.

Sure Curt proceeded to jump on his moral high horse, claiming the media should have been focusing on the double-amputee Iraq war vet who threw out the first pitch Wednesday night before his start, and that many writers still hold a grudge for him crediting his faith with as the reason he was able to do what he did that memorable October, but that's neither here nor there.

The the fact of the matter is that anyone with a sane mind knows that the sock is as real as Schill' s pain, passion and perseverance was in delivering the title to Boston after 86 years of frustration, heartache and misery.

Which would exclude Stankee fans.

Let's play some friggin' ball already!

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Do I have to change the name of my blog now?

Orioles announcer Gary Thorne claims Curt's bloody sock is a painted fake

You had to be a big shot, didn't ya, you had to open up your mouth?

First let me say that although I did watch the telecast of last night's game between the Sox and Orioles, broadcast on Extra Innings via Baltimore's Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, I was at my son's Little league game when it started, so I caught most of it on the DVR so I could skip the slow parts.

Apparently during a break in the action in the 5th inning, sometime ESPN analyst and current MASN (what the hell is that, NESN's ugly stepsister?) broadcaster Gary Thorne made a controversial comment regarding the authenticity of the sacred bloody sock. You now, the one to the upper right that is so important to Red Sox Nation that I decided to name this blog after it.

Yes, that sock, the one that Curt Schilling wore in Game 6 of the 2004 ALCS when, on a surgically-repaired ankle, he willed his team to an emotional victory over the hated Stankees. It currently resided in the Baseball hall of Fame and is rumored to be worth a cool million.

For some reason Thorne decided to let everyone listening to the game in on a little secret that he claims Doug Mirabelli told him about the holy piece of hoisery: it's a fake.

That's right, Thorne said that 'Belli confessed to him that the sock was a, well, a shill, a prop to elicit sympathy for Schilling's plight and to make his pitching seem that much more heroic.

The blood, according to Thorne through Mirabelli, is actually paint.

Needless to say this little tidbit Mr. Thorne just decided to throw out there during a meaningless early season game that no one outside of Maryland and RSN was watching caused quite a stir as everyone got word of it this morning. Mike & Mike were all over it first thing this morning, and the story just mushroomed from there.

Next came the flat-out denials from 'Belli and everyone associated with the Sox, and a bewildered Thorne sticking to his claim that the sock is a sham. Everyone involved, from team president Larry Luccino, who "would not dignify [Thorne's] insinuations with extensive comment", to team doctor Bill Morgan ( "sutures will pull with movement, and we completely expected a certain amount of blood to ooze from the wound.") to the man himself, who wrote on his blog last month "needless to say it was blood, my blood, and it was coming from the sutures in my ankle" vehemently claims that the blood is real.

So either Gary Thorne is a lying weasel, a simple idiot for misinterpreting Mirabelli's locker room comments, or let the cat out of the bag on one of the biggest World Series stories in recent history.

Way to go, Gary.

Why don't you stick to hockey.

**UPDATE: This story has been taking over the airwaves since the talking heads hour began at 5:00 on ESPN. On Around the Horn boozin' Bob Ryan claimed that while "I'm not a Red Sox fan, the sock is indeed authentic because when he saw it at the HOF, the red of the blood had begun to decompose and is now turning brown. Thanks Bob.

On SportsCenter Thorne began backpedaling quicker than Lance Armstrong on the Champs-Elysees, explaining that he must have misunderstood 'Belli when, months after the World Series, he responded to a Thorne question about the sock by saying "we got a lot of publicity out of that." Thorne interpreted that to mean that the blood was fake, but where did the part about 'Belli saying it was paint come from?

I got some advice for Mr. Thorne. Check out the photo of Curt's ankle, post-surgery, on the Boston Dirt Dogs site via Deadspin, and tell me if you think the blood was fake. As Bill Morgan said so elegantly, "socks are like sponges, and even a small amount of blood can soak a sock."

Anyway, this looks like a dead issue now. Sanity has prevailed, and Thorne can go back to being an obscure, underwhelming sports announcer.

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