Johan Santana’s Towel Inanimately Exasperated by All the Pouting

As Mike Axisa pointed out yesterday, Johan Santana is not very happy with his situation right now. He’s coming back from injury, he wants to throw, and in fact is throwing in the bullpen against the wishes of Mets management, who haven’t allowed him to pitch in a Grapefruit League game yet.

But the real scoop is being, ah, scooped by the NotGraphs Investigative Reporting Investigation Team, and that scoop is about Johan Santana’s Gatorade Towel, which the star pitcher recently jammed into a fence link and forgot about while he crossed his arms in selfishness.

Johan Santana’s Towel looks on as Johan Santana pouts.

“The Towel” — as the towel has come to be known — has belonged to Santana for about an hour or so now, ever since it was handed to Santana this morning by Mets batboy, Bobar Handsomely. The Investigative Reporting Investigation Team has discovered that Santana never used The Towel to wipe his brow or any other part of his body, because, well, he hasn’t broken a sweat.

“Pouting isn’t exactly exercise,” The Towel said sarcastically, unable — due to the fact that it’s an inanimate object — to turn up its nonexistent nose in disapproval. “He’ll probably need me to dry his dumb eyes later though, but good luck finding me then. I’ll be long gone.” The Towel proceeded to make several grunting noises, as if trying to free itself from the chain-link fence, to no avail.

“Look, every day I’m just one in hundreds of cheap-ass towels that get handed out to wipe away sweat and other gunk from these guys’ very animate bodies. I mean, I know that’s my job, and at least I was chosen for Major League Spring Training. That’s pretty cool. But going through the washer and dryer every day, that’s painful. Being folded is painful; being jammed into a fucking chain-link fence is very painful — it’s not a great job, but as far as the lives of sports towels go, mine could be a lot worse.”

A spring breeze jostled the fence a bit, imbuing The Towel a look of great ennui.

“But you know what the worst thing is? Not being used. Being forgotten and cast aside before you even get to do your job. And then having to watch someone pout about his life? Pfffft.

“At least I wasn’t picked to be the towel that Terry Collins uses to powder his genitals. Yeah, things could always be worse. Tell that to Jonan for me, will you, dear Investigative Reporting Investigation Team? If you see him?”