When hazing works well, the new members of a group feel like they have a new connection with the elder members. So if you go on a road trip and make a fool out of yourself, suddenly you have a common experience to draw on. Best of all, it’s usually funny.

But we’ve all read the horror stories of Fraternity and Sorority hazing: freshman hospitalized from drinking too much soy sauce or anything else you witnessed in “Animal House”. The problem is, this hazing doesn’t bring people together, it just tortures them.

Every year when the new baseball rookies are hazed with a ridiculous costume on a team flight, it’s a good time for all. The problem is, it turns out that you can’t dress up a $103M pitcher in drag. So what do you do? You don’t give him any run support. (It’s about as brilliant as making the freshman chug their beers every time you blink.)

In the past three starts Dice-K has received 4, 0 and 1 runs of support (and still managed to go 1-2). Giving Dice-K the Timmy treatment isn’t going to make him a better pitcher, it’s probably just going to make him pissed off. And I have a feeling we don’t want Dice-K mad.

Two people you do want mad are Coco Crisp and Wily Mo Pena, however. I insult both of them the other day for not being able to hit. Last night they were both in the lineup, and went a combined 4-7, with 1 HR, 1 2B, 1BB. I’ll keep this in mind for the next time they start to suck.