BAKERS PR
NASHVILLE -- The 12th Ave. Bakers' front office, in a tersely worded press release, revealed this morning that GM Rahm Emanuel has been fired, effective immediately. Owner QCurl Sharif, visibly impaired, and a beaming head coach Snoop Dogg, enjoyed a conciliatory lunch together today at the venerable Cherry Bomb Cafe.
The Bakers (4-8) have had a miserable season, after high expectations, and Sharif had brought Emanuel in a month ago in an attempt to right a listing ship. It had been speculated in recent weeks that Snoop's job was in jeopardy as the losses continued to pile up, but apparently Sharif has had a change of heart.
"I always said I would walk through hell behind this guy," Sharif told the small crowd. "And we are walking through there right now. Snoop's boots are on fire but his head is full of ice. In fact, he's a walking Touchdown Taser."
The Bakers fell to the East Nashville Black Dogs this past week, dashing any feeble hope of a final push for the playoffs. The team is now 0-4 in the division for 2010, and Dogg's career record stands square at 20-20 following yet another narrow defeat. Still, the owner is throwing his support behind the winningest coach in Baker history. They face the division-leading and ancient rival West Nashville Beelzebubbas this weekend.
Sharif alluded to a vision he had Tuesday night after his dinner.
"My trusted aide, Bear Bear, had burned the dried husks of the fabled powpow flower at my table and I was transported to a beautiful place where men of all race and creed wrestled with one another and slathered lard onto the faces of several enormous statues standing nearby.
"I was stunned by the beauty of the setting ... a long and narrow pool flanked by a verdant green beneath a cloudless and blue sky with perhaps one hundred men in various grappling poses. Then, rising from the center of the pool, I saw the ghosts of past NFFA greats and the ghosts of ghosts — our players, owners, coaches and mascots — in a parade of the mind.
"There soon followed the fans — those who had died in revelry and wild support — led by the multi-breasted goddess Artemis who carried fallen Baker Steve McNair suckled fast against her. And I cried great heroic tears for my brothers and realized the blessing I have here in this league. And, as the lard began to drip from the statues, the faces revealed were of the original owners — even myself — and they looked down on me and a voice rose in crystal from the water and spoke 'Bacchanal.'
"And as the wind of the fabled powpow lifted me and transported me further again to a brothel, I came to know my duty. Fire Emanuel. He knows nothing of Snoop or of this terrible and wondrous place we call the NFFA."
For a moment, the crowd at the Cherry Bomb was taken aback, followed by broken applause and a growing chant of "Bacchanal ... Bacchanal..." Snoop Dogg seemed to bask in the glow of wounded Baker pride.
"Shizznit on the fuzznut," he said, taking Sharif by both hands. "We gonna break wizzle on the Beelze-skizzle."
