Sometimes it’s nice to simply unleash a storm of material. Since I contribute commentary to 4 different websites, one must go somewhere and unplug. Instead of thinking where a particular story will go, a rant is required. While the work day lies ahead of us, here are some random thoughts about sports, film, TV and generally anything else that creeps in.Ladies and gentlemen, the bullet round commences!

• Don’t see the new Transformers film. Some ideas need to stay buried in a filmmaker’s head and I wish Michael Bay had decided to leave this franchise alone. Three overlong mind numbing stories that never amounted to shit was more than enough. When the first film came on FX last night, I merely smirked and switched the channel. The movie made 100 million stateside and 301 million worldwide, so expect part 5 sometime around 2016. It’s pathetic how much Bay has mishandled this franchise and twisted and churned the memorable cartoon series for more than it’s worth. Stop it. Transformers: Age of Extinction is in contention for the worst film of 2014 in my book.
• The Cardinals can’t possibly have a good record right now because that would be too relaxing for baseball fans. This is typical results for a team picked to win the pennant in spring training. The Cards were 49-32 after June in 2013 and sit at 44-39 right now. That’s not terrible, but its well deserved. This team is inconsistent and can’t hit. Right when it’s alright to play bad, the Cards will sweep the Nationals or defeat the Rockies on the road. Baseball constantly gives a fan false hope. I do expect this team to contend soon but wouldn’t be surprised at two things. I wouldn’t be shocked if they didn’t make the playoffs or if John Mozeliak made a huge blockbuster trade. In 2009, the team was lagging before the Matt Holliday trade bolstered the lineup. Expect that kind of move this summer. I can taste it.
• I will say this. I would trade Oscar Taveras(among others) for Giancarlo Stanton in a heartbeat. If the Marlins were stupid enough to do it, I would take it. Stanton is 24 years old and blasting HR’s at an electric pace. He is what we need. Oscar is an unknown quantity. Stanton is proven.
• The Blues won’t win shit until they acquire a proven goal scorer who can hit the net and sink the puck IN THE PLAYOFFS. Remember the playoffs where Alex Steen and others couldn’t hit wide open nets. This team has their goaltending set, but then decided to set 11.1 million dollars on fire when they signed Patrik Berglund. No deals yet. This team can’t stand pat this offseason. Doug Armstrong can’t keep telling himself the current roster will amount to more than a 1st or 2nd round playoff loser. Sad but true.
• The Rams finish 8-8 this season and I will be happy. More is better but all I want is improvement. If Bradford stays upright, I imagine the team will do better. Bradford was having a helluva season in 2013 before getting hurt. He has an improved offensive line, a quality young running back and older receivers. Here we go…or not.
• The Leftovers is very intriguing. 2 percent of the population goes missing suddenly and a small town is forced to recoup and figure out a way to move on. The creator of Lost grabbed this project and there is a lot of weird odd shit going in the trailer. Deers stalking humans. Babies going missing. Troubled town sheriff’s going insane. Cults rising up. People losing their minds. Lots of violence, suicide and sex. Reality, HBO style. I can dig it and will watch. Originality is present.
• Banshee on Cinemax is worth catching up on(20 episodes) because at the very least, it’s a guilty pleasure batch of entertainment. Lost dangerous sexy souls hanging out doing bad things in a small town. Cable shows and small towns always work well, right? I love this show but I guarantee you will at least like it. First two episodes are on Youtube.
• David Gray, The Black Keys and Coldplay all have new albums out and I bought The Black Keys first. There isn’t a single band making better music right now than this two man powered group from Ohio. The new album, Turn Blue, mixes in blues rock, standard rock n roll and a bit of Led Zeppelin psychedelic infusion. It takes a few listens but its money. You either like or hate Coldplay, but Gray makes new fans every day because singer/songwriters are a dying artform. Gray writes easy going tunes that can stick to your spine if you let them.
• Jason Kidd is a fucking moron and I will tell you why. He had a great roster, big city and an opportunity to do something special in Brooklyn. He was a player turned coach(faster than most and something he started last year) and he got greedy and now finds himself coaching the Milwaukee Bucks. He could be coaching in a graveyard and have more promise. He went from a great roster to a horrible one because he got mad Steve Kerr and Derek Fisher got better contracts this summer than he did. He wanted more control over the Nets and threatened to leave and the owners called his bluff. Kidd could have did something special in Brooklyn and blew it. I am not even an NBA fan and I can understand this story.
• I’ll write more about the Lebron Saga later but I will say this. I think this is a ploy to negotiate a new contract with Miami and hopefully engage the Heat owners to bring in new players. Dwayne Wade is getting too old to earn 20 million a season and is a part time player. Chris Bosh is overrated in my opinion. I can see the Heat engaging free agents to come play with Lebron because Miami was close to a third consecutive championship. In my opinion, I would love to see James be bold and go to The LA Clippers or Chicago Bulls and try to win in a large market or in Michael Jordan’s house. He could be wild and go back to Cleveland and help them rebuild around Wiggins. He could go to New York and propel the Knicks to their first title in ages. If he did that, Lebron would be a GOD and get a statue outside the Garden. My money is on him returning to Miami but I’d rather he go somewhere else. It’s boring in Miami. As a part time fan of the game, I love the drama Lebron brings. It makes it entertaining. I can’t watch the fucking games because they are boring and mind numbing but this offseason drama is good stuff.

• Reasons to be excited about the new Expendables film. It stars Rambo, The Terminator, Riggs from Lethal Weapon, The Transporter, Blade, Indiana Jones and has the badass UFC fighter Ronda Rousey in it. That’s enough for me. That and the fact that these films go down like a bag of skittles.
• I don’t drink a lot of beer these days but when I do, I like to wash down some barbecue with a pale ale or finely made lager with some hop. My choice at the moment is O’Fallon Zeke’s Ale. Strong, bitter, sweet finish and mighty hops at the end.
• Iced coffee only gets better when the weather gets warmer, so when it’s 97 degrees out today I will seek out a monstrous cup of Iced Coffee. I drink it black and there is nothing stronger than iced coffee. It’s brewed twice over for double the strength. That’s the way you wake up. Hot coffee…..nah. Iced coffee will give you a jolt and bump your mood up a bit as well.
• I happened to turn on HBO boxing right as Terrence Crawford and Yurekis Gamboa were waging war on each other Saturday night. If you have HBO, watch this fight this week. It has to be a fight of the year candidate. Each fighter was undefeated and while Crawford won by technical knockout in front of his home crowd, Gamboa showed a bit of Arturo Gatti flair and nearly got the best of Crawford. It was thrilling. Two guys staying in the middle of the rings, throwing sledgehammer shots at each other and NOT holding on every chance they got. That’s classic boxing. Two guys laying everything out in the ring. That’s true war. My hat is off to these two for a great fight.
• Man, True Blood has truly become comical satire these days and is only worth watching for the nudity. Sad fall from grace for a show that I always thought was overrated.
• My wife and I cut back on cable this past month and you learn to appreciate the random TV channels when you don’t have premium cable. Instead of watching Dark Knight Rises or Game of Thrones ten times in a week, I am watching the Travel Channel, Food Network and go to sleep every night to the sweet repetitive sounds of the wonderful MLB Network. I miss shows like Californication, Thrones, Banshee, but have improved my intellect in other areas in the mean time. If I ever need to make a good meal, reconfigure a house plan or care to see three guys break down a baseball game over and over again while wearing ridiculous suits, I am good.  But damn it I miss cable.
• Watching a Melissa McCarthy movie tonight. I am not a fan of hers but hopefully she flips me tonight because I don’t have time to waste on bad films.
• If you need a DVD to watch, please go rent Lone Survivor. It’s awesome, brutal and a true story worth knowing. Kudos Peter Berg.
• A weird thing happened yesterday. Scratch that. A bizarre ordeal. Entering contests via twitter can be tricky. You don’t know who you are dealing with. Let me first state that in the words of Sammy Sosa, “Twitter has been berry good to me”. I have requested and received interviews from movie stars, TV stars, and broadcasters. I have joined 4 sites via my connections on Twitter. I have gone on the radio a few times. It’s grand. However, every social media platform has its loop holes and Monday I entered a contest to win a Lionel Messi jersey. I am not a soccer fan but a couple of my friends are so I entered by retweeting a post. Later Monday afternoon, I was announced as the winner. 30 minutes later, the account holder then tweeted, “Hey Buffa is the winner, but you must retweet his photo 20 times or else he gets nothing”. The picture he used was my profile pic BLOWN way up. I don’t need to see my face that close. I tasted spam and bullshit right away. After going back and forth with the account(@247SportsNow) he or she tweeted that I wasn’t the winner because I didn’t follow the rules. It didn’t end there. He then started posting pictures from my account, making wild accusations and even involving my wife. Please go to that account and check it out. They are still there. It got bizarre and wild. I didn’t really get mad but sat here kind of in awe of what I created. Here’s the amazing part. My friends on twitter rallied behind me. I didn’t need them to but they did. Several of my friends there, people from all over the country and world, rallied and blocked/reported this account for spam. A couple people started tweeting Team Buffa and saying I was the leader of the underground. Gracious stuff. That’s the lesson in life. When you get attacked in any way, you find out who your friends truly are. People came out and said how nice, good and cool I am. I don’t take that shit for granted. I appreciate it. Anyway, check out that account. It’s entertaining.
• Melissa McCarthy doesn’t do it for me and I will tell you why. Loads of movie fans love her physical fat girl brand of humor but I don’t. It’s old. It’s repetitive. It’s used in generic scripts. McCarthy got her start on a popular show called Gilmore Girls. She was the tough friend of Lauren Graham’s lead character. She played dramatic moments and mixed them with humorous ones. I watched this show with my wife. It wasn’t awesome but it was addicting. McCarthy’s career skyrocketed when she had a part in the hit Bridesmaids. She was repulsive, frat style humor oriented and people ate it up like chocolate ice cream. She has since starred in other crap playing the same kind of character. It’s not funny. It’s off putting. A once talented actress has ate the Hollywood bait and turned into this Chris Farley styled comedy actress. Her latest, Tammy, out tomorrow, is another example. She plays a lovable loser who goes on a road trip with her grandma(played by the sharp Susan Sarandon) and the usual tired old cliched humor ensues. It’s just a terrible film. Nothing redeeming about it outside of a great Kathy Bates cameo. McCarthy will continue to do this, in the same vein that Nicolas Cage will keep doing weird odd direct to DVD action films. If you dig her humor, good for you. I think it’s terrible and I love to laugh. Take a chance McCarthy.
• Updated from earlier(I started writing this Monday night and posting tonight), Oscar Taveras has been called up to the Cardinals in SF. This is good. At the very least, Taveras will give the lineup something new. It wasn’t until Michael Wacha came up for the second time that he stuck here. Taveras only hit .189 but if you watched closely, one could see the kid wasn’t being overmatched. This is where anti-sabermetric peeps will skip this paragraph. That’s cool. I used to think the same way and involving sabes has only helped my sports writing. It proves points that sometimes words just can not do. Taveras had a very good line drive rate during his first stint and simply had bad luck. Baseball takes some luck for hits to drop and Taveras was putting good swings on the ball and the hits weren’t dropping. His Batted Ball in Play percentage was high. Pitchers only got Taveras to swing and miss 2% of the time. They couldn’t get the ball past him. They sure can get it past Allen Craig, Peter Bourjos and fellow rookie Randal Grichuk. Oscar only had 40 at bats. Very small sample size for someone to go, “he wasn’t ready, forget it”. The only problem with Oscar is he needs to play. He needs to be in there. At least 5 times a week. With Craig struggling, the time has come. Unleash the kid. Let’s see how far he can take the team. Let him run until the trading deadline. Give him a solid month. Then, Mo will know what he needs to do in a trade.
• Floyd Mayweather Jr. will take on Marcos Maidana in a rematch this September. It will be the first rematch Floyd has granted since he rose to the top of the boxing world. I think it’s a mistake. Maidana gave Floyd a run for his money by bullying him and tying him on the ropes and hitting him with a few solid shots. However, I don’t think Maidana’s boxing IQ is strong enough to beat Floyd and I therefore declare this rematch to be useless. I predict Floyd will easily defeat Maidana this time. He’s too seasoned, fast, smart and can adapt to almost any opponent.
• The Blues lost out on Jason Spezza but they did land someone else…

Quick Finish

• There’s nothing worse than having a bullseye on your back at work when you are busting your ass. That’s all.
• I really want to quit smoking cigars but they put me at ease in a way coffee can not.
• Speaking of coffee, I need some. I need to try this place Sump Coffee or Park Avenue. Sometime soon.
• Nothing beats a glass of chilled Jack Daniels.
• The Rams won’t suck in 2014. Book it.
• Jeff Fisher wins the award for best mustache in St. Louis for a coach. Matheny has the best hair. Hitchcock is…well…nah.
• The Mini Abe commercials(tour spots for Chicago) are hilarious. Youtube it.
• Reality TV is so bad but that’s all I have so I watch.
• I need to read more books. Seriously. Reading books makes you a better writer.
• Men, take care of your women. Don’t forget about your wife or girlfriend.
• Ladies, stop worrying about the way you look. We are all sweating.
• Listen to Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. I have listened to their stuff for a solid 18 months and it still hasn’t gotten old. Good old fashioned bluesy rock n’ roll.

That’s all. Until further notice, thanks for staying. This epic 2,800 word rant is over.