It's amazing that in a world full of unanswerable questions, the biggest one on my mind right now has nothing to do with Bruce Springsteen's recent endorsement of Barrack Obama. This isn't so much a political complaint as a logical complaint. Given his recent track record, you'd think the Boss might go a different route, and endorse a candidate he didn't want to win, what with the fact that he hasn't backed a winner in what seems like a generation. But that's just me.

The real unanswered question of 2008 has to be why in the name of all that is good, just and holy is Mike Mussina still pitching. And more to the point, why did he think it was a good idea to pitch to Manny Ramirez. Generally, I like irony, and even those things we claim are ironic when they're mere coincidences. Not so much tonight.

The Red Sox under Dan Duquette's inspired regime brought Manny to town at what looked like a ludicrous price because, and only because, they were outbid by the Yankees in the Mike Mussina sweepstakes. Then, it looked like a panic move. Now it looks far too good.

Even with my extensive capacity to describe things that anger me, I am at a loss for words here. In the last season and a half, Mike Mussina hasn't aged. He hasn't decayed. He's fossilized. I would feel more comfortable taking the mound myself in a big game than letting Mussina pitch against a middle school girls' softball team. I was shocked to find that his ERA is still only 5.75.

There was always something funny about Mussina's career. Has another pitcher who won so many games in his career ever been so invisible? I know he played most of the best years of his career in Baltimore, but not all of those Oriole teams were horrible. A few made the playoffs. Ripken broke Gehrig's consecutive games played record. People paid some attention to Baltimore then.

And what do we really know about Mussina after a long and fairly successful career? He throws a knuckle curve. He won a surprising number of games when you look at his career stats. And right now he sucks so much it's not even funny. For the love of God, he was replaced in this game in the fourth inning by Jonathan Albaladejo. Now maybe this season will go down in history as the start of something bug for Jonathan Albaladejo, but it will surely be the sad finish to what was once a good career for Mike Mussina. And I'm pissed that he got two shots at the Red Sox before the curtain fell.

Apropos of nothing in particular, I also came across this interesting piece, attributing the reason the Mets acquired Johann Santana while the Red Sox and Yankees backed off in the end to the fact that the Mets turned a 30 million dollar profit last year while the Red Sox lost nearly 20 million and the Yankees lost almost $50 million. I just don't see how, even with their gargantuan payrolls, that the Red Sox and Yankees lost money last season.

The Mets landed Santana because they were desperate. They didn't make the playoffs. The Yankees did. The Yankees had the inside track on sports headlines in the offseason and in the early stages of this season with Joe Girardi replacing Joe Torre after over a decade of managing the Bronx Bombers. In order to stay even remotely relevant after last season's catastrophic collapse, the Mets had to make a big splash. They were more willing to part with prospects than the Yankees were to surrender young talent, some of whom have already played well at the big league level.

Assuming the Yankees don't come back tonight, they'll be 1 game down in the standings and 3 games down in the season series to the hated Red Sox. It's far too early to panic, since the Yankees are as young as they've been in a long time. They should get better as the season goes along, especially considering what Girardi was able to do with a younger, far less talented group in his one season in Florida. But when Bartolo Colon and Curt Schilling come back for the Red Sox, they'll still be fat and old.

And has any one asked why Schilling can blog and create new mods for his disturbing cyberLARPing fetish when he hasn't thrown a baseball yet this season? How will all the king's horses and all the king's men put Humpty Dumpty back together again if he's allowing himself to be distracted from his rehab? And as the presidential race heats up after the conventions, won't Schilling be distracted further by his efforts to keep McCain from winning by helping his campaign?

Sorry I haven't updated this site in a while. I know how desperately the two or three of you who read this regularly await each post and the host of insights it provides into the world of sports, life, the universe and everything. I just haven't felt much like posting.

I know a blog allegedly devoted to baseball, and the Red Sox in particular, ought to have had more baseball related content posted by this point in the season (to date, I think all I've done is a halfpost complaining about how fraudulent the season opening in Japan was and what a pointless waste of time the exhibition series in LA was). Hell, I haven't even gotten around to congratulating Kansas for winning the NCAA tournament thanks to my reverse jinx effect.

It's nice to see that the Red Sox haven't exactly lit the world on fire yet this season. I am going to wait a little before I celebrate, though. After all, a cursory check of the standings tells us that, at least at the start of tonight's games, the Baltimore Orioles are currently on pace to win 138 games this year. I wouldn't be much of a Catholic if I denied out of hand the possibility of miracles, but I just can't see this edition of the Baltimore Orioles demolishing the MLB record for wins in a season.

And of course we must assume that the Red Sox will only get better. After all, Curt Schilling is still rehabbing his injured shoulder and eventually he will come back. So what if he's more dangerous with his mouth (especially to Republican presidential hopeful John McCain) and his pointless blog than with his pitching at this point in his career. Humpty Dumpty will be back on the mound soon enough.

It was only a minor bump in the road when Beckett was roughed up by the Blue Jays in his season debut. After all, if Delcarmen hadn't allowed a grand slam to Frank Thomas, Beckett may not have gotten the loss. Then again, if Beckett hadn't stunk out the joint and left the bases loaded, Thomas might have had a hard time hitting that grand slam in the first place, but things will get much better for the Sox any day now.

Bartolo Colon and Mike Timlin are also going to come back at some point, we think. So this Red Sox team is best compared to a slumbering giant waiting to pounce on an unsuspecting American League. Other teams from whom big things were expected this year, like the Tigers and Yankees, can't be compared to slumbering giants, however. After all, I half-expected that the Yankees would just forfeit the season after Bill Simmons pronounced them the second most relevant baseball team in NYC right now.

I found that line amusing. The Mets may have acquired Johann Santana, but they'd have to win the next 13 or so titles in a row to overtake the Yankees in the hearts and minds of New Yorkers. Mets fans are a sort of New York equivalent to that guy who became a Red Sox fan in any other MLB city in the last 10 or so years. These people desperately want something to stick out their chest and feel big about, and rooting for the second biggest team in NYC or the second biggest team in America was one way to do it.

I'll believe in the Mets when I see them standing in the winner's circle at the end of the year. It seems every big ticket addition to the Mets takes at least one season to perform at the anticipated level. Carlos Delgado and Carlos Beltran took a year, and with the bigger deal, the bigger headlines and the fact that he's very old for a small power pitcher, makes me think that a slow April is just a sign of things to come from Santana this season.

Back to the Red Sox, I can't help but wonder when Congress will leave off investigating the likes of Roger Clemens and persecuting poor, innocent Bill Belichick to answer the real questions that vex those of us who observe the sports landscape. Based on a very, very, very small performance sample last season and countless pointless articles this offseason, I have been led to believe that Jacboy Ellsbury is the greatest outfield prospect since Mickey Mantle. And yet, he's bravely hitting .200 and hasn't made Coco Crisp expendable yet.

Just say that to yourself, out loud, one time. Jacoby Ellsbury hasn't made Coco Crisp expendable yet. And let's not forget that Coco Crisp has made himself expendable, making over $2 million to hit .220 (yeah, Crisp is hitting .250 at the moment, but I'm an incurable optimist) and produce an abysmally small number of runs for a number eight hitter in an AL East lineup.

Of course, there are intelligent Red Sox fans, like this blogger, who think one can bench the $2 million man in center and leave Ellsbury to founder and fail to fulfill his promise in center. Personally, I'd love that option. Using Crisp as a late inning defensive substitution would send a nice comment to those of us who sneer at the Red Sox attempts to out-Herod Herod (the Yankees), by wasting $2 million on a situational replacement. And forcing Ellsbury to play every day and founder under the criticism of the press and fans when he doesn't produce will, at the very least, imair this team's future.

I had intended to post about the inconveniences of holiday travel and a bit on the Celtics-Pistons game this evening. And then I checked email and looked at some of today's headlines. From that brief venture, I have come away with the conviction that Curt Schilling does indeed intend to seek elective office after he retires from professional sports. And thankfully, according to what ought to be the first law of democracy in practice, whatever benighted muckers elect him to represent them will get exactly what they deserve.

Schilling was recently quoted calling on Roger Clemens to give back the Cy Youngs he won since 1997 if Roger cannot clear his name in the wake of the Mitchell Commission report. I don't know if they taught Curt this one little point in any of the courses he's taken on the way to becoming the self-proclaimed voice of truth, justice and the American way, but a person is held to be innocent until proven guilty under due process of the law.

This isn't an American concept. This concept predates the founding of the United States by over 570 years. It predates the first permanent European settlement in North America by some 370 years. It comes from the Magna Carta, which (to put it in terms the average Red Sox fan can understand) is basically the OG of documents establishing the legal tradition for the English speaking world.

I will admit that I have been otherwise occupied over the last several days. Apparently, I must I have missed the proclamation which handed over ultimate authority over matters of common and constitutional law to a cat who looks like Humpty Dumpty and is one trip to the DL away from being a has-been.

So far, the chain of evidence against Clemens seems to include a former trainer who is, himself, under federal indictment and the admission of Andy Pettitte that he used HGH on two occasions. Now, I'm not a legal scholar, but it seems to me that extrapolating any illicit use of banned performance enhancing substances on Clemens' part must then rely on hearsay and conjecture. If I'm not mistaken, it can be devilishly tricky to build a case in a court of law on hearsay and conjecture, what with the fact that that sort of evidence is (at least de jure) in admissible in a court of law in this country.

Provided, of course, that the rule of law still rules in this country, there is no way a responsible court can punish Clemens. If no responsible court can punish Clemens, then there is no reason on the face of God's green earth to take the Cy Youngs back from Clemens outside of the fact that Curt Schilling has opened his mouth and spoken with the voice of God.

If Curt Schilling had an IQ sufficient to chart on any sort of reasonable test, perhaps he'd have realized by now that he does more damage to his image each time he flaps his gums on this sort of thing. Something tells me that John McCain might not be to thrilled that one of his foremost celebrity supporters just can't stop being a total douche for the benefit of the media. Perhaps Schilling should do us all a favor and abandon public life in favor of playing more Everquest.

Hell, he's already half a LARPer at this point. He might as well go all out and dress like an Orc and run around with the world's biggest tools and argue over who hit whom with what in some sort of hideous live action version of Dungeons and Dragons. The only reason I'm not demanding that he do so instantly is that it would make the CHB a very happy man, and that's not good for America.

I also find myself once again defending Terrell Owens. I think it's a good thing that TO suggested that Jessica Simpson give Texas Stadium a wide berth for the time being. Now I might be a very cynical person and a terrible human being, but I have the nasty suspicion that Jessica Simpson just might be in this budding relationship with Tony Romo to see and be seen more than out of any altruistic romantic motivations. But that's just me.

Consider this: what has Jessica Simpson done lately? Ostensibly, she is a singer and an actress. The only problem - she hasn't been in a film or released an album in a while. Of course, I could very well be wrong there. I didn't see Dukes of Hazzard or Employee of the Month, so I haven't been following her film career. I also pay very little attention to the ways and means of contemporary pop music, so she could have released 50 albums in the last year, for all I know.

What I do know is this: sooner or later, some kind observer usually finds his or her way clear to tell me when some momentous development in the entertainment industry breaks. Lately (as in since about 2004) none of these bulletins that have reached me under my rock have involved Jessica Simpson. Preening in a pink #9 jersey in a luxury box in Texas Stadium seems to be the only way she can get herself in the media, short of downing bottle after bottle of pills or turning herself into a train wreck.

As for the other side of this sordid little problem, there are those who can say that Tony Romo ought to be above this sort of distraction. It shouldn't matter how many of his celebrity girlfriends are in the stands at any given moment. But I say this, Tony Romo has really only been a celebrity for about 13 months now. It's still something he's trying to learn to live with.

Sure, Tom Brady didn't have the same type of problem with the confluence of his personal and professional life. But, at the same time, he wasn't as big as star as fast as Tony Romo has been. Dallas is still America's Team, and the Patriots didn't really get that kind of media exposure until they were well on their way to a second Super Bowl title. Plus Brady played at Michigan, as opposed to Eastern Illinois University.

Furthermore, Romo might not be a regular Alfred Einstein, but he is somewhat brighter than Brady. Where Tom Brady has barely enough grey matter to master the playbook and game plans of the Patriots, Romo is just bright enough to let the media distract him. And it's not exactly as though TO forbade her to enter the grounds of Texas Stadium. He just pointed out that she could be a distraction and wished that she wouldn't come to the games.

If any other player on any other team in the league had said this, it would have been a mildly amusing flap that would have died down within about 12 minutes. However, TO dared to be relatively quiet and blend in with his teammates as much as he possibly can this season. And for that, the media had to punish him. After all, TO's job isn't to excel on the football field, nor is it even to catch passes for the Cowboys. Rather, TO's solemn duty is to provide countless path of least resistance stories to the legion of media drones who don't want to break a sweat when they cover the NFL. And if that means mountains must be made of molehills, then mountains shall be made.

Consider this piece, suggesting that TO is responsible for the Cowboys' problems. First of all, how many teams would trade problems with the Cowboys any day? They are 12-2. They may have identical records with the Green Bay Packers, but they beat the Packers soundly, not three weeks ago. They have the inside track for home field throughout the NFC playoffs until someone takes it away from them. And yet they must be on the verge of collapse, at least until the media needs yet another new angle this season.

What with the way the Cleveland Indians seem desperate to save Major League Baseball from the indignity of a World Series that somehow lacks a major market team despite the fact that both Denver and Cleveland are much bigger cities than Boston, I spent a lot of time searching for something to watch. The Illinois vs. Michigan game would have been a great candidate but for three serious questions.

First, why do the Marching Illini wear capes? Are they super heroes? Even the silly helmets on the USC band (the real USC not that disco with books that stands out for its subpar academic repute in the desert of ignorance that is the SEC) look far less ridiculous than the capes.

Second, could Brent Musberger be more biased in favor of the Michigan Wolverines? Ryan Mallet fumbled two snaps, and Musberger still raved about him as though he threw for 300 yards and 5 TDs. In the drive to respond to the Illin field goal which tied it at 17, Musberger raved about Mallett as though he led a drive reminiscent of Joe Montana's game winner in Super Bowl XXII. The only differences between the two drives, Michigan gained the bulk of its yards on the ground, not through the air, and the drive ended in an interception not a TD.

Third, why is it that no one talks about Rashard Mendenhall from Illinois as a potential Heisman candidate? I know Matt Ryan has the inside track because BC plays the very best Division 1-AA has to offer and a very bad Notre Dame team. Just because Illinois will have to wait until it plays Ball State to hope for some crumbs of attention in a Jason Whitlock piece doesn't mean Mendenhall hasn't earned some consideration.

I would be remiss if I didn't talk about the Red Sox game to some degree. There is some consolation for a person with my viewpoint in Curt Schilling's performance. It means that he basically can dictate his contract terms to Theo Epstein. Of course Theo lost any slight degree of leverage he had when Schilling put his house up for sale in September and started saying that he'd like to play in a place like Tampa. There is no way that Tampa is an empty threat. Schilling would definitely go to a team that will likely lost 90 games next season to pass the twilight of his career.

Of course no one can fairly blame Theo for being manipulated and outmaneuvered by a fraud who plays Everquest for hours on end. After all, getting into a bidding war with the Yankees for the services of Roger Clemens couldn't possibly hurt the club as it makes its decision to pursue or not pursue Schilling. There's no way offering a prorated $18 million to Clemens will embolden Curt Schilling.

In part, it made sense to offer Clemens that type of deal. Why not? There was a chance they could sign him. And making the Yankees go all the way up to $28 million (prorated, to be sure) was a big dent in the vast, vast, vast resources of the Bronx Bombers. After all, Boston had a lot of appeal to Clemens, with the patient, tolerant and very nearly but not quite human media and all. And Clemens really needed to break the tie with Cy Young for most wins in club history to cement his legacy right.

The question now becomes, given the humble bearing and equanimity with which Schilling approaches every situation, whether Schilling will be avaricious enough to demand certain concessions from the team. After all, it wouldn't surprise me with the way the team bent over backwards to throw money at guys who had nowhere near the track record Schilling brought with him when he signed in '04, if Schilling felt himself entitled to demand that his General Manager clean his pool or serve as human foot stool. Could it really be any more humiliating than paying JD Drew the remainder of his $70 million over the next four years, because the grand slam tonight didn't really wipe the slate clean?

Even if the Red Sox come all the way back to go to the World Series, is it going to change the fact that Julio Lugo was paid $8.3 to be 1/2 of a baseball player? Will their be no repercussions for that little anomaly? Will Jacoby Ellsbury pushing Coco Crisp out of the lineup be sloughed off as a curious but not unpleasant quirk of the game? I understand that Red Sox fans are hypocrites, but Red Sox Nation might want to think twice about ripping the Yankee spending machine, even if it might be more intellectual activity than would kill a Red Sox fan or two million.

And speaking of hypocrites, it's been too long since I ripped Jay Mariotti. There is something very sickening about this recent column Mariotti wrote ripping the Bears for the Adrian Peterson performance last week. It seemed to me as though Mariotti was implying that the Bears somehow passed on Peterson despite Mariotti's urging and giggling while he did it. Perhaps I'm not as intelligent as Mariotti is, but I just don't see how the Bears could have drafted Adrian Peterson.

In a sense, it's possible to say that the Bears passed on Peterson by not taking a trade with the Washington Redskins which would have given the Bears the sixth overall pick in return for Lance Briggs. Mariotti did call for the Bears to trade for that pick, but he called for the Bears to acquire that pick with the express purpose of drafting Ohio State wide receiver/kick returner Ted Ginn Jr.

Ted Ginn is not playing particularly well right now, to be charitable. Moreover, he would provide the Bears with an adequate player whose skills might overlap with Devin Hester and Bernard Berrian without providing an upgrade on either player. Perhaps Adrian Peterson would do a better job running behind this offensive line than Cedric Benson, but there is no way to prove that. However, given the fact that Mariotti is a douche and universally loathed, perhaps it would serve his ends better to praise Cedric Benson than to bury him. Then, perhaps Benson would be benched.

Start spreading the news. The Yankees aren't quite dead, at least not for the moment. Maybe it was George Steinbrenner and his statement that Joe Torre would be looking for something to do with his time other than managing the New York Yankees if the team did not prevail in this series. Or maybe the announcers were right when they compared the Yankee offense to a 2 liter bottle of soda that had been shaken and shaken and was due to explode at any moment. Whatever it was, it happened. The Yankees won and they play again tomorrow.

Unfortunately, the Angels lacked the will of a warrior and fell victim to Humpty Dumpty and the Boston Red Sox. So now the Red Sox have a chance to rest and reset their rotation as they wait to see whether the Yankees can come back or the Indians will win their divisional series matchup. If this were another team with another group of players, perhaps one might worry that this lag time might dull their wits and adversely impact their readiness to play.

However, with this version of the Boston Red Sox, one needn't worry about any situation having an adverse impact on the wits of these players. In fact, with titans of the intellect like Kevin Youkilis, Dustin Pedroia and Jonathan Papelbon in prominent roles, one could fairly say that the wits are this team's least vulnerable spot.

It is a good thing that the Yankees came back tonight, if for no other reason than it redeemed Roger Clemens, at least until his next turn to pitch. Unlike a certain element of Red Sox fans, led by Bill Simmons, I harbor no resentment for the way Clemens left town. I don't believe athletes owe the fans a damn thing. Especially after winning a few Cy Youngs, having a couple of 20 win seasons and setting the MLB record for Ks in a game.

I'm not sure I'm ready to see Clemens retire. He's been such a big part of my memories of watching baseball for so long, I just don't remember a time when he wasn't pitching. I think Bill Simmons is just a total d bag. After all, he whines about the Yankees bringing Ronan Tynan in to sing God Bless America in the seventh inning stretch. Even if it is a long version, it's still the best rendition out there now.

Perhaps the Yankees should trot out 14 year olds who couldn't carry a tune if their lives depended on it, as the Red Sox have been known to do. Or maybe they could resurrect hard rock has beens who haven't had a decent song since Carter was President like Steven Tyler. Speaking of Aerosmith, I wish someone could explain their comeback. Outside of Dream On, their songbook is weak, to say the least. If Run DMC hadn't covered Walk this Way, would anyone have remembered them to stick a banal song on the Armageddon soundtrack?

To make a long story short, I still have hope that a team can step in and stop the Red Sox. And the Indians, even with Carmona and Sabathia don't seem to be the team to do it. I realize that Colorado and Arizona had success against Boston earlier this season, but that was a long time ago now. Plus I don't see the Red Sox folding like the Cubs. Nor do I see the Colorado lefties laughing at Ortiz and the other Sox lefties the way Howard and Utley did.

No matter what Red Sox fans tell you, you know that they fear the Yankees a little bit. 2004 is ancient history. Beckett might have been lights out in Game 1 against the Angels, but there's no guarantee that he can do it again. And if Matsuzaka pitches the way he did in Game 2, something tells me the Yankees might do a tad more damage than the Angels did. And Schill might want to sit this one out, unless he can whip up another ready-made "blood"-stained garment for the occasion.

As for this weekend's football games, Notre Dame finally won. Say what you want about the UCLA quarterback situation and their offensive ineptitude, but the Irish won a game no one thought they could. This could be the start of something interesting. I'm not holding my breath, but it's possible.

The Patriots continue to roll, but then who really thought the Browns would be the team to end the streak. The Chiefs and their subpar offensive line continue to drag my fantasy team down because they can't block for LJ. Far more vexing is the fact that I shall soon lose Travis Henry to his pending suspension for violating the league's substance abuse policy for the third time.

I'm not going to be the guy to pile on him when he's down. I just have to laugh a bit at his grand sense of timing. Henry was due to rotate out of the substance abuse program on October 1st, and he had to get high in September. I realize that a guy might need a little pick me up to take the edge of the whole 9 illegitimate kids situation. But it might have been nice if he thought of me and my fantasy team in all of this.

I think the real story of the NFL weekend came from the Seattle Pittsbugh game. It was a very good thing that the Seahawks were motivated by the outcome of Super Bowl XL. Otherwise the 21-0 beating the Steelers hung on them this afternoon would be quite humiliating. Perhaps this was some novel strategy of Mike Holmgren's. After all, letting Denver score a TD to get the ball back in Super Boxl XXXII worked so well, maybe letting Pittsburgh score three unanswered touchdowns today is just setting them up for some vague game to be played in the not too distant future.

I hate to see guys like Matt Hasselbeck and Shaun Alexander unhappy. They have done so much to elevate the profile of the NFL the way they whined about the officiating in that Super Bowl, they deserved better than what they got today. I think the only way to evaluate that officiating, which did leave a lot to be desired, is to ask whether Seattle would have objected had calls like that gone in their favor. If they would have been quiet if the calls went against Pittsburgh, then they should let it go at this point.

In tonight's Bears vs. Packers game, I was interested to hear John Madden mention that the Green Bay Packers expect AJ Hawk to start having a bigger impact on their defensive performance. Perhaps they need to find the man who wielded the ugly stick to such great effect on Hawk's wife, the sister of Brady Quinn and the fleabag who sported the trashy makeup and jersey tailor made to show her divided loyalty when the Irish met the Ohio State Buckeyes in the Fiesta Bowl two years ago. Surely he could motivate Hawk to perform up to expectations.

I have been defending Cedric Benson for so long now, it has become a habit. He did get plenty of carries tonight, for a change. And he didn't gain enough yards to justify his salary, or the Thomas Jones trade today, even though Jones didn't exactly reverse the rotation of the Earth in the Giants Jets game. He had some very promising runs, but he wasn't consistent.

I thought the offensive line was better tonight than they were against Detroit, and better than they have been in any game this season, for that matter. That said, this group still hasn't been good enough at any point in 2007. For what the Bears do in running the ball, relying on play action passes and using deep drops in the passing offense, the offensive line needs to stay on their assignments longer and generate more push up front. So I'm not ready to turn on Benson yet. I think I'll wait until Mariotti praises him.

Even though Griese finished with 2 TDs and came out on the winning end, I'm not thrilled about him as the Bears try to dig their way out the hole that they still haven't escaped. It was good to see both TEs involved in the game plan. The Bears still have albatrosses around their neck and will have them as long as the O-line underperforms, and they need much more production from the wide receivers. Tonight the best wide receiver on the team was Mark Bradley, and that just can't happen every game if the Bears are to get back to where they were last season.

For all the Bears did, and with Benson's decent numbers, I still need a very good game for Tony Romo and Terrell Owens tomorrow night. So I have a lot on the line, with the Yankees playing for their lives, with the Cowboys playing for my hopes of a Patriots humiliation and my fantasy life (I am one game back in a playoff race, with a log jam at 2-2). So I'll either be very happy, or very unhappy tomorrow. Even if the Cowboys are outstanding, but the Yankees fail, I will be disappointed, in case you care.

I should, while I think of it, address the recent comments on my posts. To answer Alle, yes Guerrero might have left on account of the pitch that hit him. But unless he needed some sort of critical operation, there is no reason a guy should leave a game his team desperately needed to win. If he can hold a bat, he has to stay in that game.

And to the author of the anonymous comment pointing out that I was mistaken when I attributed the song "Uncle Albert" to the Beatles instead of Paul McCartney, I would apologize, provided that I gave a damn. I guess the only reason the song impressed me as having any merit is that only one of the Beatles was involved in the project so the collective power of the suck factor couldn't taint the entire song. So my bad.

It seems my panic about my fantasy team was all just a big waste of time. Thanks to a great second half from Tony Romo and TO, me team came back from the dead. It is still possible that I could lose, but it would require an earth-shattering performance from Anquan Boldin to bring my opponent back into striking distance. It almost makes me feel guilty for calling him Mr. Bean's stunt double in last night's post.

Today was a pretty good sports day, all things considered. My fantasy team is winning going away, so I don't have to eat all the trash I talked in the week leading up to the game. And things shook out as they should have in the New England sports scene. The Red Sox lost and the Patriots were caught cheating. Maybe not a perfect day, but I'll take it.

Scott Kazmir once again emasculated the mighty Red Sox lineup, employing his vast array of spit, shine and various and sundry other illegal balls to prevail in a 1-0 decision. You know he had to have cheated because the Red Sox hitters can't be thwarted so completely without some sort of chicanery being utilized against them. Unfortunately, this outcome cannot stand. Surely MLB will review the sublime performance of Curt Schilling and award him the victory to prevent him from suffering any indignity.

I must keep this brief tonight, as I am stunned into silence to see that the New England Patriots have been accused of stealing signals from their arch-rivals the New York Jets. I will not sit here and listen to any hint that a team coached by Bill Belichick could stoop to an underhanded, laughable psyche out ploy like this. Next thing you know, you'll be telling me that Belichick was the sort of guy who might be labelled a home wrecker in a nasty divorce case. Or that the team owner would be deprived of one of his world championship rings by a ruthless despot.

In other news, in a shameful ploy to exploit their new connection to Japan, the Red Sox will open the 2008 season in Japan, playing against the perennial underachievers from Oakland. The good news is that this will provide Red Sox fans with a convenient excuse when this team stumbles out of the gate next season. I should, perhaps, be a little bit more circumspect on this matter, since I have been assured that JD Drew will be a bargain next season. Maybe this trip to Japan is just a front to help him find his mojo.

For some reason, I have developed a knack for spotting tools in the crowd shots as I watch football games. Tonight's top tools include a guy in the Bengals stadium sporting a storm trooper costume from Star Wars painted orange with black stripes. If I had a picture to caption and a penchant for pathetic plays on words, I would caption said picture: "Attack of the Clowns." And then there was the guy in San Francisco who elected to rock a beanie with a propeller and a team logo beach towel or blanket as a cape. If that weren't enough, he meandered through the crowd playing a banjo. The ensemble is so pathetic it defies my ability to come up with an insult.

As I spoke about this with a friend this evening, the question came up as to whether one or the other could compete in a tool-off with the South Florida fan who wore a singlet to the Auburn game. I would give the edge to the guy in the singlet, since a man should never wear any skin tight garment in public. That is a woman's prerogative, provided that she's attractive.

I'm not sure if I should give you this link, but it's pretty damn funny. I would recommend that you exercise caution before you click it, as it is a bit loud and might be construed as offensive. I don't want to hear any complaining if you get your dumb ass fired opening this in an office or place of business. But it is a few laughs, so check the video out when you get a chance. And if you get offended, well, I tried to warn you.

MAX MERCY HALL OF FAME #5

I didn't want to do this, but I feel I owe it to intellectual honesty. Jason Whitlock has to be inducted to the Max Mercy Hall of Fame. It's difficult for me because I really like his writing in general. I was glad to link his piece ripping the Mavericks and Dirk Nowitzki for all the whining they did following their collapse against the Heat two NBA Finals ago. But no one can write a sentence like this: "No one in America writes more provocatively and intelligently about football than yours truly."

If George Orwell (who wrote more provocatively and intelligently than any other writer about everything) had written about sports, he couldn't make that statement and look himself in the mirror. If Chinua Achebe (not dead, but my favorite living black author) wrote about sports, he couldn't make that statement. If Dr. Martin Luther King had written about sports, he couldn't make that statement. If Frederick Douglas had written about sports, he couldn't make that statement. No one who writes about sports can make that statement.

Hell, no one who writes about anything can make that statement. No one with any sense of propriety or intellectual moral rectitude can say that they write anything about anything more provocatively and intelligently than every other writer in America. How big does your ego have to be to make a statement like that?

This is obviously a delicate area for me, not so much because Jason Whitlock is the first African American writer to receive this dubious honor, but because I am calling a writer's ego into question when humility is not one of my virtues and when I have devoted a shocking amount of space in a blog primarily about the Boston sports landscape to defending Terrell Owens who has quite an ego of his own.

I think the difference between TO's man crush on himself and Jason Whitlock's boasting is that TO has to step out on a field and prove his worth against 11 guys on the opposing team who want to rough him up every time he touches the football. Jason Whitlock has to type up a column, get it past an editor and hope emotionally stunted people with social problems stumble across it on the Fox Sports website. There are objective criteria against which TO's performance can be measured to see if he is earning the right to his arrogance. That isn't exactly the case for Jason Whitlock.

The sad thing is, if you took the time to comb through all 194 posts on this blog, I'm sure you'll find instances where I did basically the same thing. Particularly if I'm whining about the CHB or Mariotti being paid handsomely to write garbage whilst I labor in obscurity. Of course, my standard defense is that I abhor all forms of hypocrisy but my own. Even more depressing, I published my 100th post in early March of this year. So in those 5 months and 10 or so days, I've published 94 times. I really need to get a life.

I don't know if you happened to catch any of the Tigers Yankees game this afternoon. I was grievously offended that MLB allowed Clemens to return from suspension and overshadow Curt Schilling's quest to win for the first time since coming off the DL on August 6th. And as for that nifty little play where Clemens struck out the batter at the plate and then Posada deked the runner on third into the third out, that was but a silly little farce. Varitek and any of the Red Sox pitchers could do that at will if they weren't about such tactics which pervert the spirit of the game, or if they had the brains to think of something like that.

For a little while, I found myself wondering whether I had been a bit unfair in my diatribe against the state of Connecticut. However, it is with a clear conscience and a wish that I could add even more unpleasant things to what I said earlier that I sit down to write this post tonight. You see, today I found myself driving through Connecticut and stuck in a traffic jam because for some reason, the right hand lane of I-95 North had to be closed so that the grass on the shoulder could be manicured with a weed whacker.

Now of all the days to do this, a Friday in the summer seems like an extremely poor choice. Perhaps no one alerted the powers-that-be in the CT Highway Department, but people like to flee NYC for summer destinations on Friday at noon. So closing off a lane of traffic so that a guy could trim the grass is not tremendously cool. Especially since that artificial traffic jam south of New Haven at noon puts people heading for Boston, the Cape or points north in pole position to hit traffic coming through Providence and then again as they get closer to their ultimate goal.

Of course I would be remiss if I didn't mention the fact that the Massachusetts transportation bureaucrats managed to turn the terrible tragedy of the manhole cover on 128 North into a traffic catastrophe of epic proportions today. But to be fair to MA, that was an unforeseen event that called for an immediate reaction and not a poor decision by a bureaucrat.

But there are other things to talk about tonight. We have one more feud where it seems impossible to take a side. Barry Bonds didn't like the Bob Costas show about him, so he called Costas a midget. Costas shot back that he may be all of 5-6 and 150, but he came by that physique naturally. Personally, I think some kind soul out to play the scene from Full Metal Jacket where the Drill Sergeant has unkind words for the Texan who tried to exaggerate his height for Mr. Costas, but that's just me.

I don't like feuds like this because they put me in a position of choosing between two people that I can't abide. In this instance, I think I have to be with Bonds because I hate Costas even more than I hate Bonds. Costas is a whiny midget and a jock-sniff who desperately tries to bring gravitas to the stories he covers. Unfortunately for him, pipsqueaks can't bring gravitas to much of anything. Thanks, though, for carrying your Mickey Mantle card in your wallet for so many years. That gives you street cred...

In other news, we can leave off worrying about the surging New York Yankees. Curt Schilling was phenomenal in his second rehab start. The season is once again over. One good thing about the return of Big Schill is that we now have a ballpark date for when the World of Warcraft craze will end. 38 Studios comes out with their own game along that line (but allegedly much better) sometime in 2010. So America's fascination with these games will end sometime about a week before the 38 Studios title hits the shelves.

I thought it was mighty decent of the Globe to throw the picture of Schilling's image as Everquest character on the front page of the business section. Since he's been on the DL, I've had very few opportunities to criticize Humpty Dumpty. But seeing his animated likeness in a suit of red armor, that's like a gift from Heaven. You didn't hear it from me, but rumor has it he chose Everquest over World of Warcraft because his online persona lives in mortal fear of our old friend Leeroy Jenkins and his penchant for leading unsuspecting gamers into ambushes.

Finally, tonight marks an auspicious night for the performing arts in the Greater Boston Area. Not in the 377 years since the Puritans settled Boston has one night seen such cultural significance as tonight, and maybe tomorrow. Two acts of tremendous eminence will grace stages in our city and we can tell our grandchildren we lived to see it.

In case you can't tell, I am unimpressed with the two showstoppers playing the Tweeter Center and the House that John Henry uses to shake down New England. I am so unimpressed that I am having a hard time determining which show impresses me the least. Under ordinary circumstances, I would have to say Kenny Chesney, as he basically ripped off his entire musical persona from Jimmy Buffet (whom I do not particularly like, as I don't smoke dope and prefer beer to tropical drinks) without the redeeming quality of having received a beating from the real life inspiration for the sheriff from Walking Tall (as Buffet did).

But the Police are impressing me less than Kenny Chesney at the moment. First, they were never that good, not even in the 1980s. Their hits are vastly overrated. Roxanne isn't good, it's annoying. Every Breath You Take was actually improved by Puff Daddy when he covered it. Take a minute to let that sink in. That's how bad the song was. A notorious cheese ball like Puff Daddy made the song better.

But since the Police had the good manners to have a controversial break up and flirt with this reunion tour for the last 20 years, people forget just how pathetic they were. Let's not forget, either, that Sting was in Dune. It's like the John Cougar Mellencamp comeback all over again. These frauds stay away for so long that people forget how bad they were, then people realize they like the political stances the artists have taken and next thing you know, the inherent artistic deficiencies are dismissed and we have this comeback.

Without a doubt, what bothered me the most about this Police appearance at Fenway is the fact that all of a sudden tickets for the previously sold out shows all of a sudden went on sale again 10 days ago. Maybe I'm paranoid, but I can't shake the feeling that something underhanded is going on here. I don't buy the cover story that due to a change in the positioning of the stage more seats suddenly became available. I think the shows weren't selling out, so they pulled back some tickets and trumped up this little gimmick to add a sense of surprise and urgency to unload tickets at the last minute.

That bothers me to no end. I can't really fault the Red Sox or the promoter who came up with that little scheme. It's a nice one, after all. If Red Sox fans weren't sheep, the team ownership would have a lot of trouble shearing them. But Red Sox fans are sheep, so management can manipulate them and shake them down as they see fit.

It's been a very long time since I attacked Jay Mariotti in this space. With the Red Sox roaring out to that 14 and 1/2 game lead in the first two months of the season, I was just too depressed to read Mariotti's appallingly dishonest carping. I just couldn't handle it. But with Humpty Dumpty falling flat on his face for the second time in as many starts, I thought I could handle it. I was wrong.

What bothers me most about Mariotti as a man and as a writer is the fact that he acts as though he were tough as nails right up until the moment confrontation could become conflict and then he backs off, whining with his tail between his legs. Just look at that infamous dust-up with Ken "Hawk" Harrelson when Mariotti said "I ought to slug you" only to back off and threaten litigation when Hawk showed signs that he intended to do harm to Mariotti.

A close second in the treasure trove of inadmirable character traits that make up the man, the myth, the fraud is his complete lack of scruple and honesty as a writer. The man has no sense of irony, either. Consider this piece he wrote for Monday's paper on the US Open. Mariotti calls Tiger Woods into question for his inability to catch Cabrera, while barely conceding the fact that Mariotti believed that Eldrick would win the tournament.

It's almost as though this column, which appeared in Suday's paper had never been written. I realize a two or three paragraph apology for the tortured logic, mangled metaphors, left-handed compliments, phony tough and crazy brave rhetoric and general poor taste exhibited in that piece would be out of the question, but a brief, humble little digression along these lines: "Look, I made a mistake. I thought the guy was going to win. I had a deadline and might have gotten carried away thinking I was a much better writer than I am. But I was wrong and I'm sorry" would have been nice.

That is far from the only instance. Earlier, before the US Open, Mariotti wrote this piece ostensibly feeling a bit of empathy for Phil Mickelson in his hour of difficulty. Then, after Mickelson missed the cut, Mariotti wrote a column to demonize Mickelson for complaining about the rough. I can't believe that editors, TV producers and the vast public tolerate him. Outside of a blogs, like fireJay.com, Jay the Joke and Boise Wants Jay, hardly anyone calls him on this nonsense.

Mariotti is currently lining up Mark Cuban for this treatment. At the moment, he is in favor of the rumored interest in acquiring the Cubs shown by the Benefactor. Part of it is due to the fact that Jerry Reinsdorf hates Cuban and Mariotti hates Reisndorf. I'm sure there must be, somewhere in the dark recesses of the back corners of Mariotti's oh so prodigious mind, the faint hope that Mark Cuban will buy the Cubs and bring his little freak parade to Chicago. I'm sure that will mean weeks and weeks of columns and hours of TV time for Mariotti to rip Cuban and the Cubs with very little intellectual effort. But I'm sure a nice guy like Jay hasn't thought of that.

Now it's time for me to go back to hating the Red Sox, at least until the fall. Once the Bears start playing again, I'm sure Mariotti will be writing articles like this more often. After all, when can a middle-aged never-was bully a massive, three hundred plus pound world class athlete? Perhaps that is the root of his appeal to whatever demographic Mariotti appeals. All the other frustrated Monday morning QBs must look to him to take the big and the strong down a peg since they can't do it themselves.

Life is full of situations that have many shades of meaning. For instance, there are those who believe that the Red Sox made a statement by sweeping the Giants. After all, over the weekend they added one game to their lead over the Yankees who could only take two of three from the reeling Mets. Even with fact that the Mets were losing games left and right, they're still a much better team than the Giants. I think the Metropolitans managed to prove that in destroying a Minnesota team that is supposed to be fairly good tonight.

As you would expect, given the title of this blog, I found myself singularly unimpressed with this weekend's sweep. Yes, the Sox held Bonds to one home run in what John Updike once described as their lyric little bandbox of a ball park. And they managed to touch up Barry Zito. But I must confess, I have never thought too much of Barry Zito. I've been wondering since he signed that massive contract this offseason whether he is better described as overrated or overpaid. Time will tell.

I did think it was shockingly generous of the umpires to give Daisuke Matsuzaka a win in Saturday's start. That 3-2 pitch to Rich Aurelia was never in the strike zone, at least not in this physical model of the universe. The bases were loaded and had Aurelia walked, Matsuzaka would likely have overreacted as he has done consistently when he feels upset at ball and strike calls. The Giants could have gotten a second run out of it, but at the very least, the game should have been tied.

I didn't bother to watch Sunday's game with the US Open on and all. I wasn't rooting for Angel Cabrera, but when I saw this quote: '"There are some players who have psychologists," he said. "I smoke.",' I wished that I had. I thought it was refreshing that he was smoking on the course. Most players are so afraid of creating a negative impression that they're afraid to do anything at all. It was nice to see someone not care.

Unfortunately, today I learned that I agree with Skip Bayless on a point. He thinks that there is a hole in Tiger Woods' legacy as a golfer. He has come from behind on a Sunday in exactly zero of the 12 major championships he's won. Nicklaus did it eight times. You'd think Eldrick would have managed to do that by now.

In a way, Woods reminds me of Tom Brady. Every time I hear people compare Brady to Montana, it bothers me. Yeah, Brady has led game winning drives in playoff games and Super Bowls. But it's never come when they needed something more than a field goal with less than two minutes. And he's always had Vinatieri. Until he has a moment like the Catch, or that drive against Cincinnati in Super Bowl XXII, Brady will always be a sunshine soldier in my way of thinking.

At the end of the day, it won't matter how many actresses Brady's knocked up or supermodels he's dated that will define his legacy as a quarterback but how many times he got his team only so far and handed over the ultimate responsibility to a place kicker. And when it's all said and done for Tiger Woods, if he's beaten Nicklaus' record of 18 majors without coming back in the final round to take one away from somebody, it's not quite as impressive as Nicklaus' record of 8.

Finally, the Sox are going to be out of town for a few days. I hope that the trip ends as well as it began tonight. Humpty Dumpty took the hill in Turner Field, and he seems to have finally (and somewhat refreshingly) put to rest that appalling inconsistency he's shown of late. Instead of following a terrible outing with a good one, he followed a terrible outing with yet another terrible start. With any luck he can continue down this path. Of course, 38Pitches might not be such a fun read for a lot of people, but I think I could find a way to enjoy it.

It seems strange that Tim Wakefield, who has had ever so much trouble against every opponent he's faced to this point, should go eight depressingly strong innings against the Colorado Rockies but Curt Schilling could barely make it through five against essentially the same lineup. Did the Rockies not get the memo that these things simply do not happen in Fenway? Did they not read the million and one blog posts glorifying the near-no-hitter in Oakland last Thursday? Do they not consult 38Pitches? Inquiring minds need to know the answers to these questions.

Even better, while all the king's horses and all the king's men could not put Humpty Dumpty back together again in Fenway, the New York Yankees were otherwise occupied defeating the Arizona Diamondbacks. The lead is now down to 8 and 1/2 games with just under 100 to play. I haven't heard any snappy banter about what the Sox magic number looks like now. It's funny how the near sweep at the hands of the Athletics took a little of the wind out of the Red Sox sails.

I wonder if I'm the only one who wonders where this team goes from here. If the pitching starts to let this team down, what else is there? Ramirez has picked his game up, as I feared he would. But the rumors that JD Drew had found his stroke again (based on the pair of three run homers he hit in the desert this weekend) appear to have been greatly exaggerated. As I may have mentioned last night, the two broken toys who should have been leading off are locked in mortal combat to see who can dip below the Mendoza line first at the bottom of the order.

Maybe it's wishful thinking on my part, but I can see trouble on the horizon for this team, and I'm not the only one. What if they do run into a couple of weeks worth of bad luck? Will the fact that Tavarez said that Josh Beckett would be on the DL if Beckett had a blister like the one with which Tavarez is currently pitching every start come back to haunt this team? Will the cute little debate about whether Youkilis is faster than Pedroia grow into something more serious should one, the other or both run into a slump? I think these things could happen, but one can't expect the author of Sedition in Red Sox Nation to be particularly objective where the Red Sox are concerned.

I ran across something of interest in the pages of BostonNow today. There was a review of the CHB's latest "opus" Senior Year. I enjoyed the reviewer subtitling the review with this little epigram: "Memoir not very memorable." What surprised me was that the reviewer seemed somewhat surprised that the CHB should submit a lackluster, egocentric and out of touch book and expect his public to pay 25 bucks for the right to read it. That seems like it encapsulates every aspect of his career as author and columnist and all-around D Bag.

Unfortunately, I find myself again compelled to blog briefly about NASCAR. Hendrick Motor Sports has apparently signed the biggest free agent in the history of sports. That's got to be considered triply amazing, given the facts that NASCAR is not a sport, that it outgrew its market share (which is why ratings are declining) and that 90% of sports fans in blue states watch NASCAR for novelty purposes.

Even if Dale Earnhardt Jr should manage to win more than three races in a season (to say nothing of a championship, as one must walk before one can run), he's got a hell of a long way to go to be more than just the son of a famous father. Maybe I'm being unduly harsh, but is there anyone out there who could tell me that he'd be on this circuit if his name were Dale Smith? He's not the biggest free agent in the history of sports.

Little E may bring a large chunk of sponsorship revenue to the Hendrick stable, but it's not as though the team owner has to decide between chassis modifications and putting food on the table. But at the end of the day, he's just another semi-literate redneck driving around an oval filled with semi-literate rednecks. Worse, it seems like he's finishing a lap behind the more talented semi-literate rednecks.

In case tomorrow's game turns into a blowout, either in the good way like tonight (a three-for as they say, since the Sox lost, Big Schill was humiliated and I got to watch Assault on Precinct 13 on FX all at the same time) or in the bad way (where the Sox win), I have something to suggest. As long as you're a COMCAST customer and have access to their free movies OnDemand option, you might want to check out Career Opportunities. It's only available through tomorrow, and it's pretty damn funny. Just a suggestion.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am not here tonight to say too much about my disappointment that Humpty Dumpty needed very little help from all the king's horses and all the king's men to prevail over the As today. I am still happy enough that the Sox lost four straight. I must ask, with apologies to Bob Lobel, why can't the Red Sox get players like Lenny DiNardo? And thanks to Gordon Edes for breaking the story that Daisuke Matsuzaka probably won't be an all star this season. What tipped you off to this Gordo? The ERA over 4.5? Losing a game to a guy the Sox cut to bring in JD Drew? What next? Will he break the story that water is wet or that what goes up must come down?

Tonight's post is about a heartless Fortune 500 corporation ruthlessly victimizing its patrons. The corporation is Best Buy and the victim in this sordid little mess is yours truly. It was a simple little matter, the attempt to purchase a DVD from a Big Box electronics retailer. All I had to do was pick it up from the shelf and walk to the counter. And it turned into an ordeal. The first problem was that I went to the store over by Fenway Park in the Landmark Center. Go figure, I get a scam perpetrated on me in the heart of enemy territory.

The DVD in question was 16 Blocks. I should have picked it up a year and a half ago when it first came out, but I never got around to it. But the other day, I happened to see it on HBO so I went over to Best Buy. And that's where THEY got me. You can't buy an individual copy of 16 Blocks at that Best Buy in the Landmark Center. I know. I asked a blue shirt. So I sat there in Best Buy, weighing the cost/benefit analysis of purchasing the movie I wanted packaged with a movie that no one could ever want. In the end, I bought it.

Now I have buyer's remorse. I loved 16 Blocks when I saw it in the theater. I loved it the other day on HBO. I'm looking forward to watching it this weekend when the Cavs aren't being robbed by the Spurs. But Best Buy sold me a queer giraffe to quote Proximo from Gladiator. It was a plan devilishly clever in its simplicity. And ordinarily I would not have allowed the store to victimize me. But I wanted 16 Blocks and I wanted it now.

In case you care, the queer giraffe here was Exit Wounds. The classic Steven Segal/DMX effort. No one would go in there to buy that on their own hook. I don't even think DMX's family would purchase the movie (I don't think Segal has a family, I think he was grown from the left over parts of lesser talentless tools in a lab somewhere). But I am now the proud owner of a copy of Exit Wounds on DVD.

I don't think the government should allow these things to take place. It's not my fault that Best Buy purchased more units of Exit Wounds than it can sell. Why should they be able to unload their bad decisions onto the movie that I really want? So we have to take back our opportunity not to purchase terrible films wrapped in cellophane with cinematic tours de force. You should call your legislators, mayors, governors, presidents, bishops, ministers and call the police. I would, but I don't want to end up some registry of public nuisances.

I think the ultimate indignity of this whole episode was that they stuck a sticker on the package screaming for all to see that Best Buy was offering two hot movies for one low price. As my friend suggested, the only way that both of these movies are hot is if they fell off the back of a truck. Even better, I stayed in the store agonizing over this decision for so long that I ended up staying in the parking lot for over an hour (I ate dinner as well, so I didn't waste more than an hour in the place). So it cost me an extra dollar to redeem my car from the Landmark Center lot.

On the plus side, I did all my Fathers Day shopping. I'm going to give the Old Man Exit Wounds. Hell, he has a problem with watching Steven Segal movies when he flips by them as he changes channels. It's awful. For the love of God, Marked for Death and Hard Target have not improved in 15 years. They sucked in 1990, they still suck. So that's his payback for making me watch the Glimmer Man. He gets a terrible movie for Fathers Day. Either that or I might try to take it back to the store. They'll probably boot me right out on the street if I try to bring that back to them, though.

I really didn't intend to post tonight. After all, I've been drinking for a long time now, and my drunken posts have been unmitigated disasters. But several things need be said about several topics and if I don't do it, who will? The Coast Guard? And the kick in the ass about blogging whilst somewhat intoxicated is that I do not know where to begin.

I suppose I'll start where I left off last night. I have been reluctant to talk about this particular subject, since I have a way of jinxing players and teams, but in the wake of last night's epic performance, I don't think I can jinx LeBron. Hell, even Bill Simmons is on board, and he's only permitted to notice trends which David Stern and Mark Cuban allow him to notice.

LeBron deserves at this point to hold the title deeds to every team and every property associated with basketball in the NBA's Eastern Conference. Every game he plays is a two-fold kick in the ass to the NBA league offices. First, he is triumphing in the face of the system. The Celtics since the Walker trade should hold themselves fortunate to depend on LeBron's mercy for the right to rebuild.

No one will admit it, but the NBA feeds on its superstars. And yet the league allows manifestly inferior players (like the entire Pistons roster, none of whom is fit to unfasten LeBron's oh so very unMessianic sandals) to flop and hack until the only player worthy of shaking hands with Bird, Russell, Heinshon, Cousy, Havlicheck, Jones, White or Cowens is shut out of the NBA Finals. So there are (and have been) two sets of Jordan rules. Superstars get most of the breaks, but when they don't it's OK to maul them in much the same fashion as a tiger mauls its dinner.

But tonight's was to be a baseball post. After all, the Yankees are back in town. And in my opinion, they should have erased not one but two games from the lead the Red Sox are oh so close to frittering away at this point. You may not have noticed, as it's Friday and all those with social lives were socializing, but the Red Sox managed to lose a game that should have been lost by a much larger margin.

In the early stages of the game, I found myself wondering if Chien Ming Wang had run over the umpire's dog. Red Sox fans might not agree, but Kevin Youkilis struck out in the bottom of the second. There is no way in God's Earth that the 2-2 pitch Youkilis took was a ball. It was at the knees and on the inside corner, a perfect pitch. In a logical world it was strike three.

Hell, Schilling would have thrown a towel over his head and wept as though he were trapped in the Old Testament Book of Lamentations until an ump gave him the call he felt the world owed him on a pitch like that. In a perfect world, some person would have emerged from nothingness to throw an hellacious beating on Youke for no apparent reason before he was called out on strikes.

Then, in the bottom of the fifth, Doug Mirabelli achieved one of the more remarkable feats one could imagine in a professional baseball game. He threw out a runner at third base who could not have done much to be safer. And any one who thinks Abreu was actually out is either a shameless Red Sox fan or a total and complete moron. Although, to be fair and to quote the Sinatra song at the same time, you can't have one without the other.

And there is very little that a Sox fan can do to try to answer my allegations. Not only because the average Red Sox fan barely has the intelligence to invilve him or herself in a "Less Filling" "Tastes Great" debate, but because the Lizard King of Red Sox Nation is on my side. If you watch the footage again, you'll see that the Remdawg agrees with me in both cases. The Sox got all the calls and still lost the game. And that's why I think the Yanks should have picked up an extra game out of this exchange.

Even with a 21-10 start and Josh Beckett pitching very well for the moment, there just might be a little trouble in Paradise. And it's brewing over something of marginal importance at best. Curt Schilling and David Ortiz have found themselves on the opposite sides of the Barry Bonds question. The real question is why are they talking about Bonds when they don't play the Giants for weeks?

To be fair, Schilling was responding to a question asked while he was appearing on Dennis and Callahan when he made his comments about Bonds. It probably would have been better had he no commented, though. Why give your opponent bulletin board material? Why take attention away from important stories like Josh Beckett preparing to fall back to Earth any day now?

Schilling is right that this whole thing has nothing to do with race, at least for the vast majority of fans. What people seem to ignore when they try to make this an issue of race raised is the Barry Bonds is an African-American chasing another African-American's career home run record. This is an issue of a guy who spent 20 years alienating people wanting them to embrace him now as he rides off into the sunset.

The real problem with Barry Bonds is that he spent his entire professional life being a douche. He isn't a good guy, he's been abrasive with fans and media. He has not honestly and genuinely addressed the steroid issue. He hasn't even had the good manners to come out and lie to us. At the end of the day, most people think he doesn't deserve his record because one cannot explain why he looks so much different now than he did when he came up with the Pirates.

Roger Clemens came into the league around the same time Bonds did, give or take two years. Clemens is now bigger than he was at twenty, but it doesn't seem unnatural. Who maintains the same weight into their mid-40s as they did when they were twenty? Barry Bonds came up as a leadoff hitter. Life may begin at forty if you're a menopausal baby-boomer, but even with advances in nutrition, weight training and medical care, life doesn't begin at forty for a baseball player.

Far more interesting were the comments made by David Ortiz in support of Barry Bonds. David Ortiz must know that this could be the last mistake he ever makes. You just don't disagree with Schilling. That's how people end up having to pay a clubhouse attendant to start their cars. It's like trying to kill the don in a Godfather movie.

I found it odd that Ortiz admitted that he may have taken steroids unwittingly with very little prodding. It seems like the sign of a guilty conscience. Maybe that and not the inspired tutelage of former hitting coach Ron Jackson is the real secret of how he went from a marginal player on a marginal team in Minnesota to the most feared left handed hitter in New England in the span of a year. Maybe Theo isn't quite the genius we thought. I guess it explains why Jackson was expendable in the purge of the staff following last season's collapse.

Over the course of this blog's history, I have not had many occasions to compliment Schilling very much. But, as the cliche goes there is a first time for everything. So tonight, I think I ought to congratulate Schilling for saying that he won't bean Bonds. After all, I have criticized the team for its penchant for sending messages by beaning opposing hitters.

So I salute Schilling for that particular comment. I like the idea of a pitcher matching his skill against the batter's hitting prowess. It seems to me that when you get right down to it, that's the object of the exercise. I like to see a strong power pitcher throw his best stuff up against the best hitters in the game. Schilling is proud, maybe too proud, but a proud pitcher ought to challenge a guy like Bonds.

Red Sox fans ought to be ashamed if they're afraid to have what they deem to be the best pitching staff in baseball pitch to Bonds. And if they really want to admire the pitchers for whom they cheer, shouldn't they want to see those pitchers deflate Bonds' massive ego? At the very least they ought to think twice before they puff out their chests with pride in a team that has to bean the best hitter on an opposing team to win games.

PS - I don't think that Bonds has actually lied about steroids. I think that nonsense about flaxseed oil and arthitic balm is more a half truth than a lie. I'd have much more respect for him if he came out and said: "Hell no, I never took steroids."

Today, the Max Mercy Hall of Fame welcomes its fourth member. It's been a long time since the last such ceremony. It is difficult, though, when almost all of the sportswriters cited in this space frequently (Bob Ryan, Jay Mariotti and Dan Shaughnessy) have been inducted. Jackie MacMullan is safe, for now, because her feature on the travesty that is the Celtic business model was too good.

So that leaves the man, the myth, the loser ... Bill Simmons. You know him in his capacity as the Sports Guy on ESPN.com's Page 2. Of late, when I talk to the handful of people who have followed this blog since the beginning, I've been calling Simmons the Zach Braff of sports journalism. Never having seen any of Braff's films, I draw the comparison from the sitcom Scrubs, where he plays the somewhat less than masculine Dr. John Dorian.

I don't know Bill Simmons, so I might be off base here, but I could see him sitting in front of his computer daydreaming about a floating head sportswriter. In Scrubs, Braff's character daydreams that his head and his body can detach so that he can accomplish two slightly less than masculine pursuits at the same time. I could see Simmons wishing that he could leave his body walking on the treadmill while he watches the View or whatever he watches to psyche himself up to do what he does.

In addition to his resemblance to Zach Braff, I have other problems with Simmons the writer. First, he made himself into the "celebrity" that he is ripping guys like Isiah Thomas and saying some harsh things while he did it. That was fine, but as soon as a blog like Deadspin dares to crack a joke or two at his expense, Simmons starts whining about how evil blogs can slander people with impunity.

Then there is the fact that Simmons continually reminds his minions that he is a basketball expert and has seen every meaningful Celtics home game in person from the mid 70s to 2003. I do not necessarily feel competent to dispute his status as an expert, but I would like to remind those few who will read this that Simmons didn't begin to criticize Ainge and Banner 17 for the mockery of a great franchise that they have foisted on the people of Boston until the tail end of this season. Let's not forget that Simmons didn't always seem to disapprove of tanking games.

So what if none of the sports media figures in New England had dared to/bothered to do same? Does that somehow give Simmons credence because he willfully ignored the dreadful effects of the Walker trade until very recently? I have been ripping Ainge for the benefit of my small body of readers for a year, which doesn't seem very impressive but can be explained because this site is barely 13 months old at this point. I haven't gotten a cookie for my efforts, so I don't think we should give Simmons one either.

For a long time, I've been thinking about bestowing this honor on the Sports Guy. I held back because I thought he was funny, a virtue which covers a multitude of sins for a writer. His most recent effort on the big fight and the announcement of the Yankees signing this weekend wasn't funny, though. I think after all these years, Simmons is now a prisoner of his gimmicks like the unintentional comedy scale and anecdotes about his super-cool friends. Any chance he had to progress as a writer is probably gone by now, so it seems like as good a time as any for his induction.

Bill Simmons has ten reasons he is happy the Yankees signed Clemens. The underlying premise of his list is that he has never forgiven Clemens for leaving Boston in the manner in which he left. See, this all unfolded in the days before Simmons became an online celebrity so Roger Clemens was not informed that he owed Bill Simmons, as the voice of Red Sox Nation, something more than 192 career wins.

Maybe Clemens could have worked harder to stay in shape over his last seasons in Boston, maybe he shouldn't have confirmed for every one that he was in fact mailing it in by coming alive and striking out 20 Tigers at the tail end of a mediocre 1996 season, but he did. Maybe Roger shouldn't have waxed poetic about leaving Boston to play close to his home in Texas before he signed with Toronto, but he did. And when he was traded to New York in 1999, he really hurt Bill Simmons. Red Sox fans have gotten over that for the most part, and it's time Simmons did as well.

I found the repeated efforts to drop so many not even remotely subtle hints that Clemens has prolonged his career through the use of banned performance enhancing substances to be in poor taste at best, and questionable ethically at worst. Leaving aside for a moment that the only link between Clemens and performance enhancers comes out of the Jason Grimsley trial (which makes it sort of like using material from McCarthy's hearings), there is the fact that Clemens has not undergone any inexplicable physical transmutations like Barry Bonds and his gargantuan cranium.

As for the simple question of his age, Nolan Ryan did break down in his mid-40s, but he also threw a no-hitter in the season in which he turned 45. And contrary to popular opinion, Cy Young won all of his 511 games by the time he was thirty. No pitcher has been able to perform in his mid-40s ever, in the history of Major League Baseball. Not even once. Unless they had chemical help.

Hell, did you think that the legendary Satchel Paige pitched as long as he did through good fortune and hard work? Come on. He was famous for saying he kept himself young by swinging his arms as he walked to jangle his juices around. The operative word there is juice.

Also, it was quite mature of a man who spends 90% of his professional life waxing poetic about his various roadtrips and sojurns in the warm summer rain with J Bug and Hench and Joe House to beat to death the joke that Clemens and Pettitte might be more than friends. It's good to see the voice of Red Sox Nation rise above the frat-boy homophobia that so endears Red Sox Nation to mature Americans secure enough in their identity to refrain from making childish jokes.

There were a couple of other gems in this piece. I liked his little joke about Josh Beckett maybe winning 30 games. I, for one, would love to see that. Not so much because it would carry the Sox to their first division title in many years, but because it would hurt the franchise down the road, and hurt it badly. After winning 30 games in 1968 derailed a promising career for Denny McLain, no pitcher will ever challenge that mark again. It's like setting the record for carries in a season by a running back in the NFL. The record might as well come engraved on a tombstone.

I also love the fact that Simmons missed the real error made by the Red Sox in this situation. It wasn't allowing Clemens to get away and sign with the Yankees, it was making an offer to him in the first place. In case you may have forgotten, Schilling is planning to play at least one more year but he is only under contract for this season. So in offering a prorated $18 million to Clemens, the Red Sox may have unwittingly raised the compensation and benefits package they will have to offer Big Schill to retain his services.

I do not mean to imply that Schilling will want to travel on his own terms the way Clemens does. Or that Schilling will wait until a team with deep pockets and a big hole needs to scare up a pitcher in May or June. But he is going to have it in the back of his mind that they offered Clemens a considerable salary and assented to his other demands just to try to keep him away from the Yankees. And there is plenty of space in that massive dome to hold onto simple facts like that, since it's not exactly bumping up against profound insight into the mysteries of the universe.

Then again, if Simmons didn't miss points, he probably would not have made it all the way to the Max Mercy Hall of Fame. Now there is little to do but wait for some enterprising soul to write a companion volume to Simmons' epic "Now I Can Die in Peace". I would suggest "Well...We're Waiting" for a title since he's so fond of quoting Caddyshack.

Was any one really surprised when the Yankees announced today that Roger Clemens will be rejoining the team in the not-yet-determined but not-too-distant future? THe Yankees have the money, and they really need pitching help, what with the rash of injuries and the fact that Carl Pavano may or may not have left the team to track down a pseudonymous blogger who hates the Red Sox and rashly predicted that a guy who'd barely managed to start 19 games in his tenure with the Yankees would win 18 games this season thereby jinxing said pitcher as little has been jinxed in the history of jinxes. In an unrelated story, I am moving from location to location trying to stay one step ahead of a different nemesis with the initials CP.

Signing Clemens is a huge media coup, but how much can he really deliver for the Yankees at this point in his career? I hope he has quite a bit left in the tank, since the Red Sox were among the prospective suitors. A dazzlingly successful return would be win-win for the purposes of Sedition in Red Sox Nation, as every game Clemens should help narrow the gap between the Sox and Yanks and it will make the Red Sox look bad for not signing the player who is currently tied with the immortal Cy Young for the most wins in the team's 104 year history.

Unfortunately, while the Yankees were busy signing Clemens, the Minnesota Twins were hard at work almost but not quite battling back to defend their home field from the Red Sox. It was a day of good signs and bad signs for me. Among the bad signs, Schilling pitched entirely too well. The good sign is that Okajima allowed a run to score, so maybe he'll tire as the season progresses.

But this day was all about Clemens. Back in October, I had a dream that Clemens was putting away a pinstriped jersey with the number 27 on it. I am a superstitious guy. I believe in the power of dreams and the occult and suchlike things. Looking ahead, I just don't see how this Yankee team can survive the season, let alone advance to win a World Series.

It just seems like a strange, uncomfortable mixture of youth and experience. The young players, especially the pitchers, seem too young, and not ready for a serious pennant chase. Some of the more experienced players just don't seem like they have the chemistry to make a champion. The guys who have rings don't seem as hungry, and the guys like Giambi and A Rod who haven't won yet don't seem like they know how to pull it together at the right time to get the big hit.

The Yankee championship teams of the late 90s didn't have a lot of guys who produced inflated stats. They had smart, unselfish guys who could do a lot more than simply playing for the big three run homer. This current Yankee lineup has players who can do everything on the field, but they've gotten in the habit of waiting for some one else to do it. I wonder, since I don't know, if this is what the Yankee teams of the end of the 1960s were like.

Even if Clemens return takes a lot of pressure off of the starting rotation, that's only half the battle. And since this isn't the human interest moral of the story spot at the end of the old GI Joe cartoons, half the battle is a whole lot of nothing. At his age, Clemens can't be counted on pitching into the seventh inning in every outing. He might not be able to do it more than once in every three starts.

So that leaves the massive problem of the bullpen, which was supposed to be rebuilt around Viscaino in the offseason. Right now, it looks like that particular portion of the Randy Johnson trade is not working as advertised. I don't think I've ever seen a bullpen come out of spring training with so many tired arms. If you think about it, it's not as though these guys started strong and were tired out because the starters have been injured and ineffective. The bullpen was no good from jump street.

It's not just Rivera. I think he's going to go on a run where he saves 18 or 19 in a row any day now. I don't know if that's keen insight or just a part of my brain that isn't prepared to see a guy who has been locked in for the last 11 seasons go out like this. Closing is a tricky business, but Rivera and Hoffman have been like death and taxes over the years. Sooner or later (and probably very soon at their ages), their dominance had to end. I just wasn't expecting it to be quite this soon.

Among the other things that surprised me lately was the ease with which Ottawa brushed aside the New Jersey Devils. I haven't had a chance to watch Ottawa much this season, since hockey is below old movies on the radar screen in my world. To be fair, so is virtually every sporting event with the exception football and compelling baseball and basketball games.

But the Devils were like the Yankee teams that won titles a few years back. The Devils had that same mix of smart players who knew their roles and came up big in crucial situations. And like Rivera, the Devils had the most feared weapon of the era in Matin Brodeur. Now, it seems like the Devils had a blend of guys who could score like Gomez, Gionta and Elias and guys who could defend like Madden and Pandolfo.

The trouble was they weren't young enough and athletic enough to score with Ottawa, nor were they solid, patient and tough enough to offset that deficiency with their defensive play. They have yet to recover from the retirement of Scott Stevens and the departure of Scott Niedermeyer. Rafalski and Colin White are good defensemen, but the unit is not what it once was across the board. I knew all that going into this postseason, but I expected to see the Martin Brodeur I used to know. It just didn't happen.

I guess it's funny, the way a team can age so much in a week. Like the Heat against the Bulls, or like the Yankees when the season opened. The Devils and the Heat were battle tested, they had championship experience, but they ran into opposing teams with youth, athleticism and depth in a combination that proved to much for the seasoned teams with the championship pedigree.

The Yankees should be potent enough on offensive to emerge from the long, long, long season. But what will they look like when they do? They are going to be an old, tired team in October. We all ought to know this, since they look like an old, tired team in April and they looked like an old, tired team at noon today. Obviously they didn't get younger by signing Clemens, but they might be fresher and deeper now.

Clemens has always had guts on the mound. Whether he always pitched with them is an open question. I don't really want to debate Game Six of the 1986 World Series, and his commitment to the Red Sox organization in the mid-1990s left a little to be desired. But Clemens gave his best in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series, in Game 4 of the 2003 World Series, in Game 7 of the 2004 NLCS and in his start against the White Sox in the World Series in 2005. This Yankee team needs his toughness right now.

It just won't be enough. The old players are too old. The young players are too young. The tough players aren't tough enough. The hungry players aren't hungry enough. I don't see the Yankees going deep into this postseason. This team doesn't appear to have done enough to address the deficiencies that have contributed to early exits in 2005 and 2006.

But before you get your knickers in a twist and start planning the victory celebration, Red Sox Nation, do me a favor and remember one thing. This Red Sox team is built for one purpose and one purpose only. And it's not to win a World Series. It's to beat the Yankees. They look like they can do that this year. But the bullpen isn't deep, the closer is fragile and the offense isn't what it was back in the dark days of 2004. The Sox aren't going to win a postseason series this year.

And one other happy note this evening. Read this review of some movie I have no intention of seeing from Slate. Just look at the first paragraph and try to remember the last time you read something that jarring that quickly. And then read the rest of the article and see if you can't figure out why we even bother trying to live with one another.

There are some things in life that come down to a question of perspective. For instance, one man's glowing tribute to a deceased icon from another team in another sport in another era can also be another man's shameless attempt to exploit a populace of sheep when the market for a given team's paraphernalia is saturated. Apparently every fan who wants them must already have all the pink shirts and red shirts and blue shirts that they could justify owning. So the Red Sox brass cooked up a blatant, disgusting sham of a tribute to Red Auerbach tonight.

Perhaps I'm too cynical, and I allow my hatred of the Red Sox to cloud my mind. Maybe that's why I think it strange that the Red Sox chose the night of their first home game against the New York Yankees to lament the passing of the greatest basketball mind since Naismith. I'm sure it was just coincidence that it should happen to be a Friday night and a national TV game. There is no way that this fine event could have any ulterior motive.

Giving the devil his due, I must congratulate whichever of Henry's minions was responsible for engineering and marketing this "tribute." Even I, believing it to be artificial and in poor taste as I do, think it was brilliant. Bringing the 16 banners from the rafters across town to adorn the Green Monster before the game started was the mot juste. I only wish that I and my small band of loyal readers were that clever and that shameless, maybe then I'd break the century mark for daily hits.

Fortunately for me, the universe has a way of evening the scales. Somewhere, I think Red might have cracked a smile about something that happened in Boston sports for the first time in years after A Rod took Big Schill deep in the 4th. It was also edifying to see Mientkiewicz advance two runners with a sacrifice bunt to help the Yankees manufacture their first run of the night. Up until Varitek tied the game with what I can only assume to have been Sammy Sosa's infamous batting practice bat and Crisp hit that triple, I was convinced that the bottom three in the Red Sox order would struggle to manufacture a case of athlete's foot.

Interestingly, down by 3 in the seventh, Francona elected to pinch hit Wily Mo Pena for Pedroia with runners on first and second rather than sacrifice to advance the runners. Perhaps Francona was thinking (assuming he can, in fact, think) that Petite was tiring. Unfortunately, that was not the case. He struck out Pena, and Proctor came on to retire Lugo and Youkilis. It is also possible that Francona may not have even known the situation. Or maybe he just had no confidence that the top of his order could drive in runners from second and third with one out should he call for the sacrifice.

I understand that one run one run isn't going to tie the game there, and it is now a moot point because the Yankee bullpen made the lead go away in the 8th. But at least it's more proactive to sacrifice and advance runners to second and third with one out than it is to sit back and hope for a big inning. But I blame myself for the 8th inning rally more than I blame the Yankees or credit the Sox. I jinxed the Yankees, because I had written this joke: "that rally just died in Jason Varitek's arms as though it were the 1980s band Cutting Crew" as he stepped to the plate. I feel like a tool right now, but I leave it in for the sake of intellectual honesty.

And Francona was lucky that burning Pena by pinch hitting him when he couldn't field Pedroia's position did not come back to haunt him tonight. The fact that it would have made infinitely more baseball sense to pinch hit Cora and have him execute the sacrifice or strike out like Pena did than wasting Pena in the first place did should temper the pride Red Sox Nation derives from tonight's comeback victory ever so slightly. I will concede that pinch running for Giambi made perfect sense right up until the point where a spare part from and made up of lesser spare parts unknown made the last out of the game batting fifth.

The Red Sox had no confidence going into that 8th inning. You could see Schilling's man-and-a-half sized ego deflate when A Rod hit his second. Personally, I think that it should have counted as a grand slam, even though only two men were on base at the time. After all, Coco Crisp managed to fall out of the field of play into the home bullpen, very nearly breaking his back in the process. The total, complete and utter humiliation for the player and the team in that one shining moment ought to be worth at least one additional run on the scoreboard.

Even in the ninth, when the Sox sent Hideki Okajima out to pitch to the heart of the Yankee lineup, it could not help but remind Red Sox Nation that Papelbon must be treated with kid gloves as though he were Samuel L. Jackson's character in Unbreakable this season. But Okajima rose to the challenge. He was a little upset with some of the calls that led to the Abreu walk. And maybe he had a point, but Abreu has a reputation for having a good eye, and reputation goes a long way. There was a time when Greg Maddux could bounce the ball like a cricket bowler throwing a googly and still get a strike call. That's the way it goes.

The guy I go to for my Red Sox information actually called me before the game to get in my eye about the green uniforms. His quote at the time: "Think Notre Dame." Of course, I didn't point out that Notre Dame hasn't exactly produced the desired result in their last few green jersey games (last year's game against Army doesn't really count). I was saving that for a big moment, like the second A Rod homer, but alas, he wasn't taking my call.

I do have to give him credit on one point, he said that he saw Schilling letting up at least five runs tonight. And he had that part right. He wasn't concerned when I spoke to him before the game, because Pettite didn't scare him. I guess he was right about that too, since Pettite was good enough when he had to be, but not exactly dominant over his 6 and 1/3 innings of work.

Even with the Red Sox having all the momentum because of their impressive comeback, this shapes up to be an interesting series for the Yankees. It is not going to be easy to win tomorrow or Sunday, with Karstens and Chase Wright making their Fenway debuts. Pettite came up big for them, and it would have been nice not to have wasted his performance. It would be nice to have the Sox lose two games this weekend and a sweep would have been awesome, but that's obviously impossible now.

I must say I wonder whether the artificial confidence a sweep for the hated Red Sox would instill in Red Sox Nation might have been worth all the bragging bravado I would have to endure. After all, sweeping that mighty lineup would not be a miracle (or even a fair sized country wonder to borrow an expression from Edwin O'Connor) with the starting rotation decimated by injuries to Wang, Pavano and Mussina. A comeback against Rivera is nice, and three blown saves for a closer of his stature is not exactly encouraging even if it is only April.

Rooting against the Red Sox is far more important than rooting for any one team. I will enjoy the inevitable collapse of this team with its suspect fourth and fifth starters, still not exactly proven middle relief and pathetic hitters manning the last third of the order. The bullpen held the fort and even chumps like Varitek, Crisp and Cora can't get out all the time. It is possible that I should be more repentant or keep silent, but I'm just not that kind of guy.

After all, I can't help wondering now that all the king's horses and all the king's men managed to put Humpty Dumpty back together again...how humble is Humpty Dumpty? I'm surprised he hasn't posted yet. I wonder, since my technical consultant tells me that a hit on this site has originated from a password protected area of wordpress (which supports his blog) twice in the past two weeks, whether he's waiting on me waiting on him?