In almost all cases, if I am referring to someone as a Barf Man, the term is not meant to be taken literally. To me there is almost nothing worse than barfing, and there is certainly no substance worse than barf. A Barf Man, therefore, would be a guy who sucks real bad. It's really that simple.
Adrian Houser, pitcher for the Chicago White Sox, presents a special case. I have no opinions about his character. Maybe he's a sweet and likable fellow, charitable and broadminded, rescues dogs, a ringing tenor! To be honest, I am perfectly satisfied with the information I already possess about this person: He is a pitcher, he pitches for the Chicago White Sox, he used to pitch for the Milwaukee Brewers. He wears a beard, he throws right-handed, and he vomits. Houser is the vomiting guy. Once you become the vomiting guy, unfortunately, you're a thesaurus away from being referred to as Barf Man. It's not personal!
Houser took the mound Wednesday for the White Sox, for the final game of a three-game series against the Toronto Blue Jays. This is a tough matchup, as the Blue Jays are presently on one, having strung together 10 straight wins and four straight series victories, including a four-game sweep of the New York Yankees. It's been a hell of a turnaround. The Blue Jays were 25–27 back on May 25, fourth in the AL East, ahead of only the lost Baltimore Orioles. They were not feeling good at all that day: They'd been swept by the Tampa Bay Rays in the miserable heat of George M. Steinbrenner Field, the final loss coming by the score of 13–0; in that series Toronto scored just two total runs. "We're better than that," insisted Blue Jays manager John Schneider. "The highs and lows, we have to figure that out. We have to be better at being more consistent."
I like Schneider's deal, as a manager; he can come lead my shit-ass baseball team any old time. He has a calming way about him, at least in postgame settings. That day, Schneider expressed a general belief in his team, and chalked up their lousy three-day performance at least in part to the hateful late-May conditions of a minor-league park in Florida. "It’s tough. It’s really hot," explained Schneider, who said that they were stuffing extra jerseys into freezers to help their guys stay cool. "The environment is just different. I don’t want to say that we’re spoiled, but everyone has earned the right to play in the big leagues at a big league ballpark, so I think that creeps in a bit today." I have the benefit of hindsight, yes, but Ugh let's just get out of here and back to civilization, we'll be fine seems like exactly the appropriate message for such a fiasco; it's the message level-headed parents send to each other with their eyes as their exhausted toddler throws a tantrum at baggage claim.
The Blue Jays did not succumb to discouragement. What threatened then to spiral into another crummy summer spent slinking around the back of the wild-card pack has since become something else entirely. Look at them now! From the morning of May 26, they have posted a record of 29–12, and today they sit in first place in their division, 2.5 games up on the sagging Yankees. Suddenly they are kicking turbo ass, and can do some buying at the trade deadline, and may even hold onto Bo Bichette. Bichette is having a nice bounce-back season, old man George Springer has had a resurgence, and a youth named Addison Barger is socking the ball all over the place. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hasn't yet begun to truly rake, although once again reports of his underperformance are greatly exaggerated: Vladdy is fifth in the American League in on-base percentage, and is second on the Blue Jays in OPS+, per Baseball Reference. If his second half is even anywhere in the same universe as his second half of last season, buddy, we are in for a show.
All of which is to say, you might barf too if you were on the mound on a sweltering Wednesday afternoon, facing the hottest team in the American League, hoping to salvage some dignity for your own Barf Team. And you're not even the Barf Man. Houser, as I mentioned, is a special case: There exists a YouTube video with the title "Every Throw Up Of Adrian Houser's Career," and that video was made three entire years ago. Jomboy did a breakdown of a notable Houser barf way the hell back in 2019. Houser is so untroubled by the presence of barf surging up his gullet that in one of his more notable barfs, against the Philadelphia Phillies, Houser barfed into his mouth while on the pitching mound and then—and I am truly sorry to bring this to your attention—appeared to attempt to swallow it back down, so that he could continue pitching. The man is an experienced barfer, an advanced barfer. "Puke and rally," Houser explained Wednesday. "Once I get it out, it's all good. Ready to rock and roll."
And rock and roll he did, pitching seven innings of one-run ball, working around seven hits, a couple of walks, and a barf, the latter of which took place in the dugout. The sequence was wonderful: Houser pitched a scoreless first inning and was headed off the field when an umpire moved on an intercept path, to complete a gunk check. Houser began gesturing warningly, and the umpire dove out of the way, hands up, at the last moment. The little bit of delay prevented Houser from getting down into the tunnel, and so right there in the middle of the dugout he spewed all over the place. Look out!
Houser then marched back to the mound for the second inning, and resumed stifling the Blue Jays. Toronto managed its only run against Houser on a perfectly executed safety squeeze, and our hero pitched around some delightful defensive blunders, as when the White Sox let a popup fall on the infield grass and then sailed consecutive routine throws, all in the same scoreless half-inning.
Houser picked a good day for a great performance, with his own Barf Team primed for deadline fire-selling, and the Blue Jays perched atop a tough division and desperate for relevance. Toronto has the sixth-worst rotation ERA in baseball, just ahead of the shit-ass Washington Nationals. It's not their only soft spot—they stink at baserunning, too, and they could use some more slugging—but this version of Adrian Houser would sure look great barfing in a Blue Jays uniform. He's pitched to a 1.56 earned run average in nine starts this season, working a 5–2 record for the team with the second-worst win percentage in all of baseball. The man has earned a chance to do his barfing on greener grass.
