“Jordana does not date baseball players. She f—s them.” – Anna
I know that body image is a sensitive subject for women, but I would be remiss if I neglected to broach the topic when talking about VH1’s new reality show, Baseball Wives. During last night’s premiere I had an exceedingly difficult time focusing on the action or the dialog; I couldn’t stop staring at the women’s bodies.
Let me be clear about this. There is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING sexual about my fascination with the shape of these ladies. My interest is strictly clinical. I want to know how these women came to look the way they do. More importantly, I want to know what they see when they look at themselves in the mirror.
Baseball Wives, which follows a group of women in Scottsdale, Arizona with varying degrees of romantic attachment to professional baseball players, features two distinct “types” of bodies. The first type (represented by Chantel, Erika, and Brooke) is by far the more disturbing of the two. Chantel, Erika, and Brooke look like they stumbled out of Dachau and into a plastic surgeon’s waiting room. These chicks are beyond skinny. The question isn’t if these women have an eating disorder, it’s how many eating disorders do they have. There is a zero percent chance any of the three weigh more than 100 pounds. If I was a betting man, I’d take the under of 80 pounds. Their emaciated frames are augmented with extremely large fake breasts. The fact that they are even able to stand up straight, much less walk, defies all of the laws of physics and nutrition.
The second type of woman on Baseball Wives is much less horrifying from a health standpoint, but equally fascinating psychologically. Represented by Jordana and Tanya (and to a lesser degree Anna), these chicks are working with a few extra pounds around the midsection, yet behave like they’re the sexiest women in the Phoenix metro area. In their minds, I think they honestly believe they look like Megan Fox. In reality, Snooki is probably a more apt comparison.
Jordana and Brooke’s trip to a nightclub mid-way through the premiere is portrait of contrasting ickiness. Jordana discovers an empty swimming pool in the middle of the club, and decides it’s her job to set an example for the more reserved party girls. Without a shred of self-consciousness she strips down to her bra and panties, jumps into the shallow end, and proceeds to shake what her mamma gave her. Unfortunately for us viewers, her mamma gave her a spare tire around her belly and thighs like Jonathon Ogden. Brooke follows suit. Out of her cocktail dress, Brooke resembles Ichabod Crane in a two-piece. It’s truly ghastly, and yet I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen.
Baseball Wives is compelling TV because these ladies’ personalities are as a terrifying/fascinating as their bodies. They’re awful human beings in every way imaginable, which makes them perfect reality stars. Most of the episode consists of contrived dinner parties and brunches designed to bring out the cattiness in the cast members.
Anna Benson is the ring-leader of this hellish circus. In 2004, Anna appeared in a photo spread for FHM. The magazine awarded her the title “baseball’s hottest wife.” Apparently a lot has changed in the seven years since that piece in FHM. I wouldn’t consider Anna the “hottest” anything at this point. She’s a least a couple dozen pounds overweight and her face is a contorted mask of Botox and silicon. Fans of Howard Stern might recall an incident a few years ago in which she threatened to sleep with the entire Mets clubhouse if husband Kris Benson ever cheated on her. She’s completely off her rocker and as starved for attention as Chantel is for nourishment.
The other Baseball Wives are much less notorious than Anna. In some instances the ball players these girls are married to aren’t even particularly well known. Rob Villone and Matt Williams aren’t exactly household names. But in baseball, with its guaranteed contracts and lack of a salary cap, even no-name journeymen can be millionaires many times over.
My suggestion to Chantel, Erika, and Brooke: take some of hubby’s hard earned cash and buy yourselves a hamburger before you waste away. Jordana and Tanya: you guys invest in a personal trainer. You can afford it. Anna, please take some of that cash my Orioles wasted on your husband and get some therapy, lots and lots of therapy.
Lingering thoughts on “Episode One”:
- “I wanna taste your gum.” – Tanya
- “Jordana does not date baseball players. She f—s them.” – Anna
“I was with him for TWO losing teams!” – Jordana
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.