John Smallwood is a miserable, fun-hating buzzkill who, at this point, is bordering on committing a crime when he collects his tenure-assured paycheck. And last night, when he was for some reason a panelist on Philly Sports Talk on the night of Chase Utley’s return, his miserable ass was put in its rightful place by Jim Salisbury – and to a lesser degree, Michael Barkann*, who is somewhat close to Utley having MC-ed his charity events – who explained that Utley is not the guy Smallwood made him out to be.

*I love Barkann’s dig at Jayson Werth, who is universally hated among reporters.

First, Smallwood:

Smallwood: “I think it’ll be great. I think they’ll give him a really good ovation – as well he deserves.  It’s just me personally I’m not all that warm and fuzzy about Chase Utley. I mean he’s a great player.”

Barkann: “Interesting point, beacause?”

Smallwood: “Because he wasn’t a very nice person.”

Barkann: “What do you mean? I mean Jayson Werth I’ll grant you, but Chase Utley?”

Smallwood: “I actually liked Jayson Werth.”

Barkann: “See? I don’t think you know.”

Smallwood: “Well, you’re right. Maybe I don’t know.”

https://twitter.com/JimDavi62289061/status/765659790290804736

“What did they play for Placido Polanco when he came back?”

https://twitter.com/JimDavi62289061/status/765669766015004672

Smallwood Claiming Jimmy Rollins (or Pat Burrell) was the most important player in the 2008 World Series: “I’ll never forget the video of [Rollins] telling Pat Burrell who are you, I don’t know this Pat Burrell, this guy who can’t get a hit. That was in the World Series, and then Pat went out there and hit a home run.”

Pat Burrell didn’t hit a home run. He doubled.

There is no doubt that Chase Utley is a prickly guy who’s rubbed many people the wrong way over the years. He’s terse, hardly full of sunshine, and often quite rude. But Smallwood obviously has a personal vendetta against the guy who probably more than once ignored his asinine questions in the clubhouse. So, rather than even attempt to understand the viewpoint of his audience – which adores Chase – Smallwood would rather play the jackass card because he doesn’t like Utley.

Thankfully, Jim Salisbury, who covered Utley on an almost daily basis for over a decade, was there to put Smallwood in his place:

“With Chase Utley, people say, you know he wasn’t a nice person. I can personally attest he’s not only a nice person, but he’s a good person. He’s not Mr. Bubbly, he’s not good time Charlie, he’s not gonna fill up your notebook, and I think sometimes that maybe got some reporters’ noses out of joint. But you know what? If you said “I need ya at 8:15 tomorrow morning,” he’d be there at 8:14 and you better be prepared with some questions because he ain’t gonna suffer fools. But I thoroughly enjoyed covering him and I can tell you he treated the small people, the behind the scenes people, really well. I suggest maybe some night you have Scott Sheridan on, the head athletic trainer over here – and you know Chase had those bad knees – he had to show up at 12:30 every day just to begin he pre-game workouts. And Sheridan would have him on that table, bending him around like a pretzel and stretching him and deep massaging, trying to get those knees to work. And every time, they did that for years, and every time Chase Utley got off that table he looked Scott Sheridan in the eyes and said “Thank you.” So he was very appreciative of what the people behind the scenes did for him as well.”

I think sometimes that maybe got some reporters’ noses out of joint is a direct blow to the face of Smallwood, and I enjoyed it very much.