Putting the Big Hurt on Twitter: Frank Thomas on the AL Cy Young Award

Photo of Evan Altman Evan AltmanNovember 13, 2014

I give a lot to the Twitter, whether it be through the incessant self-promotion of the articles I write here or the sharing of my daughter’s struggles with my oppressive reign over her 8-year-old life*. Every once in a while, I even come up with something witty enough to be shared a couple times.

But then there are those glorious moments when Twitter gives back in a big way. Such was the case on Wednesday night, when that little birdie delivered this gem:

Okay, I know what you’re thinking: it must be a slow news day if this guy is resorting to to writing about Frank Thomas’s tweets. And you’d be right. But far be it for me to allow a lack of salient topics to prevent me from sharing my thoughts with the three people who will read them.

The first thing that struck me here was was the fact that Big Hurt didn’t even have the latest Cy Young winner’s first name right; it’s Corey, not Chris, just in case you were wondering. But even worse is the fact that he he misspelled Chris Sale’s name, and sale plays for the White Sox!

As a self-described pedant and grammar fascist, Hurt’s incorrect use of “dominate” was just like nails on a digital chalkboard, a rotten cherry atop a curdled sundae. My initial assumption was that the big guy had simply consumed a few too many of his namesake barley sodas, but the real explanation was so much better…or worse.

After receiving more than a few correction notices, Thomas felt compelled to provide an excuse for his erroneous tweet:

Hey, it’s cool, I messed up because I’m tweeting while driving on the interstate. Whew, that’s so much better than just getting half-popped and sending your thoughts into the ether. Totally worth putting other people’s lives at risk in order to talk about Chrises Kluber and Sayle. But I’m sure Hurt is as dominate [sic] a driver as he was a hitter, so it’s totally kosher.

I do, however, have to commend Thomas for owning up to his mistake, sort of, the following morning:

But even in this semi-mea culpa, he managed to jack the dude’s name up again; PT Barnum would not have been happy. Thank you, Mr. Thomas, for affording me the opportunity to climb down from my angsty, brooding, existentialist-Cubs-fan horse and onto an inconsequential and superfluous steed.

*For the record, she has decided against moving to an orphanage. Whether that’s due to the restorative power of a good night’s sleep or the fact that I told her that said institution would employ a rat to gnaw the wart off of her knee I don’t know. Either way, her dream of being adopted by Jamie Foxx is now dead.

Photo of Evan Altman Evan AltmanNovember 13, 2014
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