Local Columnist Explains Baseball To 'Female Persons' Who Know 'Nothing' About Baseball

The Albany Herald is a newspaper in Albany, Georgia with a distribution of nearly 22,000. The Herald's editor is Carlton Fletcher, which is the only explanation as to how Carlton Fletcher's column, "Answers to ladies' questions about baseball" was published in the year 2019. It has everything and nothing. Dated references, false premises, a straw woman.

The actual content of this article is bad. Even if this is an attempt at satire, it is funny only in its unintentional hilarity. The author's headshot even looks like something that would accompany something much more well-written on ClickHole. Every paragraph contains something that will make you cringe. It's a hodgepodge of old store-brand Tim Allen bits written through the lens of a knockoff of Dave Barry. This column may as well have come to us pre-installed on an AOL free trial CD:

"Some people, though, are always looking for ways to add a little flavor to their baseball viewing. For those folks, here’s a suggestion: Watch it with a female person who either doesn’t particularly care about the game or, better yet, watch it with a female person who not only doesn’t particularly care about the game but also knows nothing about it."

I am legitimately curious about what inspired this article. Is his son dating a girl who grew up in Canada? Did he see a woman actively not caring about the Braves clinching the NL East? Did he sustain a concussion in the Herald's slow pitch softball league and forget what year it was?

"QUESTION: Why do players pat each other on the butt all the time? Is there some kind of homo-erotic element of the game that we don’t know about? ANSWER: As Sir Mix-a-Lot so aptly told us back in the day, guys like butts. (Sir Mix, big ones, but that’s his thing.) Since it is not, though, a good idea to express that sentiment or, worse yet, act on it in the everyday workplace, especially if your co-worker happens to be a female, guys just settle for a lesser thrill and do this with other guys on the ball field. For some reason, women don’t appreciate a good butt-pat and “good job” when they close an account or complete a delicate operation successfully. So guys just pat each others’ butts and move on."

Each portion of this column is like that. From butts to translators to chew... This has to be poorly done satire. Either way, the Albany Herald needs to hire someone to edit the editors.