Thursday, February 14, 2008

The Replacement


By John McMullen
The Phanatic Magazine
You may have yawned when the Phillies signed Kris Benson to a minor-league deal Wednesday.

It's a low-risk move with some upside but its not exactly like the Fightins trumped the Mets acquisition of Johan Santana. Benson, 33, missed all of last season after right rotator cuff surgery in March of last year.

In 2006, he went 11-12 with a 4.82 earned run average in 30 starts. So, the ceiling for Benson, if healthy, is an adequate third or fourth starter and a big upgrade over Adam Eaton.

But, that's not what you should be excited about.

By signing Benson, the City had finally replaced Carmella Decesare and Heather Mitts. You see, when the Eagles foolishly parted ways with Jeff Garcia, they also sent Carmella to Central Florida.

Meanwhile, when the world's dumbest backup quarterback kicked Heather to the curb, we were left with no high-profile significant-others among our athletes.

The Phils finally came to the rescue yesterday. Anna Benson is not quite as hot as Carmella and she will never be confused with Heather in the class department but she sure is fun.

In November of 2004, Benson posed for FHM and was named baseball's hottest wife.

In July of 2005, she played at the 2005 World Series of Poker in Vegas under the nickname "Gold Digger".

In December of 2005, Anna turned heads when she went to the Mets Christmas party wearing a rather low-cut, Santa-style dress.

But, the best Anna moment of all was her appearance on the Howard Stern radio show when she told Howard she would have sex with all members of the Mets organization, including the grounds crew, if Kris ever cheated on her.

That accomplished a couple of things -- it got Kris a lot of free drinks from teammates over the years.

And, it also secured Anna a warm welcome to the Philly from The Phanatic Magazine.

Finally, we have replaced Carmella and Heather.

No comments: