(and a middle-aged-fart "gold star" if you know where that musical reference comes from...)

I just don't get it.  Gerald Perry gets an eight-game suspension for sucker-punching Dave Duncan... Lloyd McClendon gets a one-game suspension for arguing with Dunc... and Dunc gets a four-game suspension for getting sucker-punched????

Okay, maybe Dunc shouldn't have said anything to Rick White (the pitcher who buzzed Luna, and a pitcher Dunc formerly coached.  But c'mon, players and coaches from opposing teams talk to each other all the time!  (Officially, they're not supposed to... it's called the "fraternization rule."  But it's been basically ignored since Kenesaw Mountain Landis was commissioner.)

The upshot of this brouhaha, imo, hurts the Cardinals far more than it hurts the Pirates.

McClendon will probably be in the clubhouse, watching the game on TV, and making his decisions known to the "interim" manager.

ANY batting coach's work is mostly done before the ballgame... watching at the batting game and making suggestions and reminders to the hitters.  With the advent of video, batters can go into the clubhouse and watch their last at-bat -- and who's to say the batting coach won't be lounging around the video room, conveniently out of sight of the umpires, to offer his years of wisdom (if any?)

But the pitching coach needs to see his staff working... to tell if they're getting out of whack mechanically, or if they're tipping pitches, or just when to trot to the mound to calm their man down (or pump him up, as the case may be.)  Tony La Russa has always claimed a large part of his success as a manager has been in trusting the pitching staff to Dave Duncan, with quotes along the line of, "I don't know pitching, and he does."  Now, the bullpen pitchers (most notably Jason Isringhausen) have sung the praises of bullpen coach Marty Mason for some time now, so maybe Marty just trots down to the dugout and away we go.  But I can't help feeling that the Cardinals got the short end of this deal (particularly with an ailing Mulder set to go tonight.)

Grumble-mumble commissioner's office... [editor's note, by The Ol Goaler]Would any suspensions been handed down at all if there hadn't been video crews there? The gates hadn't yet been openend, and the umpires werern't on the scene yet!