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.

For the life of me, I cannot figure out how the game between the Indians and the Yankees went to extra innings tonight. I watched the entire telecast, I know what's what. The Indians have somewhere on the order of 30 future Hall of Famers on the roster at any given moment. Or at least if all you knew about baseball were culled from Chip Carey's broadcasting, you'd be forced to think along those lines.

In the last two innings, the overt bias toward the Indians was as bad as I have ever seen for a broadcaster. Kenny Lofton led off the bottom of the 9th and hit a fly ball to center. According to Carey, Lofton spanked the ball. From what I saw, Melky Cabrera drifted maybe five feet to his left to catch it. Now I might need a ruling from a trained and licensed physicist on this, but I think it's safe to say that an outfielder should have to take at least 13 or 14 steps or break into a run before a ball can be considered to have been spanked by a batter.

Among the many things Chip Carey said this evening which bothered me, was Casey Blake's nickname "Mr. Shocker." I don't know if that's Blake's nickname in general, or one that Carey just gave him tonight. Either way, it's a stupid name. I didn't realize that he was so closely associated with his alma mater (Wichita State) to be called Mr. Shocker.

Of course Carey fell all over himself to tell us that Blake had two walkoff homers this season. Too bad they came against the Royals and the Tigers. That meant that he really should have ended the game with one swing of the bat in tonight's game. After all, if you can win a game against the Royals or the Tigers then Mariano Rivera is no match for you. As it was, Blake and his stupid Mountain Man beard hit what Chip Carey called a towering fly ball, which fell short of the warning track by a good twenty five feet.

Interestingly enough, when Posada flew out to the wall in right field in the next half inning, it was neither spanked nor towering. Perhaps he should have played for the Indians, then maybe he'd be worthy of Chip Carey's notice. Like Perez, the Indians reliever who did pitch very well. After his 1-2-3 top of the tenth, Carey said he dazzled. Of course Carey would probably describe Don Larsen's perfect game in the 1956 World Series as a workman like effort.

In the bottom of the tenth, when the Indians loaded the bases, Mariano Rivera threw a ball on the 0-1 count and Carey giddily remarked that there was no place to put the batter at the plate. With Mariano Rivera on the mound and a 1-1 count, who thinks of the walk? It's kind of like calling for the punt team to get ready when it's second and five in a football game.

Carey was the only part of this game more troublesome than the swarms of flies which showed up at the game as though they were a Biblical plague. I know Ohio is a blight on the rest of the country. I know most of the Indians, notable among them Hafner, Blake and Garko, practice such poor hygiene that insects flock to them as though they were pounds of rotting meat.

Why were the flies hovering around the players when there were so many thousands of losers and Ohioans watching the game? If ever there were fans who were a close second to Red Sox fans in deserving swarms of biting flies descending on them, it has to be Indians fans. These slack-jawed yokels react to every favorable development that befalls their team with so much surprise that it makes you wonder why they took out a second mortgage on the family combine harvester and bought playoff tickets.

If you don't believe me that Cleveland is full of dbags, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, look at this thread on a Cleveland sports site speculating that Eric Wedge and Casey Blake might have a little something something going on between them. Let's not forget, either, that the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland caught fire several times. Any city that has a river catch on fire has to be very, very, very pathetic.

There is, as the old saying goes, no such thing as a moral victory. However, the Yankees pitched much better in this game than they did in game one. Unfortunately, there is no room for gradual improvement in the playoffs. The Yankees aren't out of it, yet. And of the three teams down 0-2 so far (the Phillies and the Cubs being the others), the Yankees have far and away the best chance to come back from the dead.

The Phillies pitching is dreadful. The Cubs don't have enough speed to play small ball consistently, and outside of Wrigley their power is a lot less powerful. Plus the Cubs have a massive karmic roadblock in the form of that awful Aquafina commercial featuring Lou Pinella. But I'm not ready to write the Yanks off just yet. Perhaps because they're the only team that looks like they can beat the Sox, even though they aren't the same team that came back from 0-2 against the As in 2001. But on to the Red Sox vs. Angels game.

I have a hard time accepting some facts from the early portion of tonight's game. First, JD Drew came to the plate with the bases loaded in a two out situation and he didn't fail. Far from it. He drove in two runs. Now if the game were out of reach, one way or the other, I would have had less difficulty wrapping my brain around the fact. Who knows, maybe this is the start of something big for him in a Red Sox uniform? Or maybe this is just a calm before the storm and he will be an even bigger disappointment in a bigger moment yet to come.

The other thing that caught me by surprise is that the Angels fell behind 2-0 in this game, but bounced back with a vengeance to take a 3-2 lead. Admittedly they had some help when Manny Ramirez misplayed that ball in left, which was somehow not an error. As an aside, that is a terrible rule, that he misplays a ball but doesn't get an error because he didn't touch it. I think it should be a bigger error because he butchered a ball that was fairly routine and couldn't even get a hand on it.

Maybe I was wrong to sell the Angels short the way I did. Of course it's still too early in this series to be optimistic about their chances. It just might be that Daisuke Matsuzaka is tired out from this different style of baseball. Or maybe he got depressed when Buccholz came up and he was no longer the new sensation in the rotation. Either way, he slumped down the stretch, and maybe that's why the Angels got to him tonight.

Of course if the Angels get the kind of help like Coco Crisp gave them with his Little League level base running blunder in the sixth, they may prove more formidable than I led you to believe in my last few posts. How does a guy with his experience get himself doubled up on a fly ball to center field because he had rounded second but forgot to touch the base on his way back to first?

I had some rather unpleasant things to say about Mike Scioscia the other day. Now I think I have to take them all back and say far worse. How do you go into the last inning and a half of a tie game and manage yourself into such a terrible corner that you have to take your best offensive weapon out of the game? He pulled Guerrero to keep Reggie Willits in the game?

Even better, Garrett Anderson was still in the game at that point with his swollen eye. I will concede that I know a lot less about baseball than Mike Scioscia. But it seems logical, doesn't it, to leave the guy with two good eyes in the lineup, especially when he's your best power threat? Or maybe that's just too logical. That's exactly what they'd be expecting Scioscia to do. Of course, there are some who'd say that managing as though you were running some sort of bad caper in Get Smart might not be a good idea in a playoff game.

Of course it was all academic when Scioscia rode the percentages and conventional wisdom all the way to Manny's walk-off shot. All in all, this was not a good night for me. Sooner or later this team is due for an epic collapse. Perhaps this will be it. I doubt it, but there is a chance. Anaheim did win more home games than any other team in the league this season.

If it weren't for the tool who whipped the piece of pizza off the back of the bigger tool who ragged on the first tool for eating a pizza at a baseball game in Fenway Park this April, the douche who asked for an autograph from the fan who prevented the Angels catcher (Matthis) from catching Manny's foul popup in the 5th would have been the biggest tool in the history of Fenway Park. If Lowell's sac fly which tied the game had been a bit deeper, that skinny little wuss would have become a huge celebrity. As it is, he'll milk that novelty act 15 minutes of fame for all it's worth.

Speaking of tools, we have a small tool of note feature today, for the first time in a while. A long time friend of the blog forwarded this feature on the triumphs and trials of Donny Osmond from the Daily Mail in England. My heart bleeds for poor Donny Osmond, who had to bear the cross of being a teen idol. If his life was a bed of pain because people wouldn't accept him as a grown up and not the scrawny Mormon dork who ripped off Paul Anka's Puppy Love, then maybe there is justice in the world after all.

I particularly enjoyed this bit: "Say what you like, Donny is big on self-pity, which is why in the run-up to his latest tour he wants to talk about how hard it was being the Most Adorable Singing Child On Earth." Something tells me Donny Osmond for all his pain and anguish probably doesn't wake up each and every morning with a bad back, bad knees and callouses on his hands as though he worked for a living. People turned on a lot of 70s icons, so what? Just because he had more staying power than a-Ha doesn't mean he achieved anything tangible.

I also love the fact that Jesus is one of his heroes. I bet that really put a smile on Jesus' face and got Him packing His bags for the Second Coming. Or more likely, Jesus was probably trying hard to hide from Donny Osmond. If there is one consolation here, given his age, Donny will meet his hero face to face long before I do.

Curiously, the article brought up his 1988 hit, Soldier of Love, which I don't remember. I was young in 1988, but I remember a lot of things from that time frame. Am I the only one who doesn't remember the song, or was it a song that hit 99 on a countdown and they're trying to be as nice as possible to Donny? I guess if they didn't do all they could to massage his ego, Donny Osmond would have to retreat to his compound in Utah. What a shame that would be.

Ladies and gentelemn, every so often an event so improbable unfolds in a baseball game and we realize that the whole enterprise is rigged to benefit the Evil Empire. How else can you explain a team coming off a stretch where they had lost 5 of their last 6 games (including the most recent by the emasculating, humiliating margin of sixteen runs) defeating the team with the most wins in their sport, coming off a four game stretch in which they scored 46 runs and were not defeated? That just shouldn't happen.

Of course, there might be people who could focus on trivial details that might make the Red Sox eight game lead look a little less impressive than it would on the surface. For instance, those four games in which the Red Sox scored those 46 runs (which, by the way, might not have been the 46 most impressive runs of all time but had to be in the top 136) were played against the Chicago White Sox. In case you haven't noticed, the White Sox are in the midst of an epic collapse which would be front page news if the Astros sinking ship weren't sinking in more spectaular fashion.

The Yankees, meanwhile, received their humiliation this weekend at the hands of the Detroit Tigers. Since news from the great American Midwest seldom seems to reach the elite in New England, I have the honor of revealing that the Tigers are fighting for their playoff lives. And the Tigers have had a nasty habit of beating the Red Sox this season. All that keeps the Tigers from taking the lead in the AL Central is the fact that Grady Sizemore and Travis Haffner haven't been told that they are in a penant race, so they don't know yet that they are due to choke any day now.

So perhaps it's not all that surprising that the Red Sox could lose a game to the Yankees. Believe it or not, even with the three game sweep in April, the Red Sox have managed to win only seven of the thirteen games they have played against the Yankees to this point. Granted 7 of 13 is more than half, but the way some Red Sox fans have yammered on about it, you'd think that the Red Sox had won 14 or 15 of the 13 games.

Even though the lead is still 7 games, there are some encouraging signs for people like me. For instance, JD Drew was fantastic tonight. I imagine there were many nervous citizens in Red Sox Nation when their $14 million right fielder took the plate as the go-ahead run against rookie Joba Chamberlain with two out and two on in the eighth. If Red Sox fans were given to (or perhaps capable of) introspection, this sitaution would trouble them much more than it does now. A ten year veteran paid an eight figure salary was at a distinct disadvantage against a kid who has to think twice about getting extra cheese on his Whopper and is barely old enough to drink the beer which was banished from the clubhouse this season.

It's been a while since I've had a good time at JD Drew's expense in this space. Part of it has been due to the team's overall success to this point. But part of it has been due to a state of catatonia induced by my old friend who brings me his Red Sox information. You might remember him as the man who claimed that JD Drew's numbers were comprable to A Rod's. Recently, he told me in confidence that next year, Red Sox fans will consider JD Drew to be a bargin at that price.

For several days, I was stunned into silence, but then I got to thinking. How could JD Drew be considered a bargin? I have a few alternatives to put before you. First, and probably least likely, JD Drew could stop sucking at his chosen profession. Second, the Red Sox could harvest his internal organs and sell them on the black market. He is, after all, a healthy donor specimen, but there are moral and legal qualms.

But, the most likely scenario I can envision to make JD Drew look like a good value is that the Sox are going to sign an even bigger fraud for even more money. I'm sure Red Sox fans will get their heads in a tizzy envisioning A Rod replacing Mike Lowell at third base. It all falls into place when you think that the same agent represents A Rod, Drew and Daisuke Matsuzaka. Then again, maybe Matsuzaka beaning A Rod once a game might not be the best sales pitch.

I really don't have much to say about tonight's performance. I am not as impressed with Matsuzaka's epic pitching performance as I anticipate Red Sox Nation is at the moment. As I said last night, I am not sold on these Cleveland Indians. To put it bluntly, if I had to pitch to Grady Sizemore or Travis Hafner with the bases loaded and nobody out in the last inning of a game I absolutely had to win, let's just say I wouldn't be quaking in my cleats. Sure they put up good stats, but they don't strike fear into opponent's hearts.

Two years ago, the Indians entered the last week of the season with a shot at catching the Chicago White Sox or maybe the wildcard. And they choked. They fell apart as though it were their sole purpose in life. Signs point to that same outcome for them this season. This looks like the beginning of the end for them.

I finally caught an episode of The Bronx is Burning. I thought it was pretty good. I'm not sure I buy Oliver Platt as Steinbrenner, but other than that I thought it was well cast and well written. And like most of the things I see in the course of a day, it got me thinking about other things.

For instance, if they made a series like that about a Red Sox team from that general era, would it be subtitled: Please put Jim Rice in the Hall of Fame, he had two really good years? Or How I triumphed over an IQ well below my uniform number and became a regional icon because I was mildly developmentally disabled by Bill Lee? Or You guys do realize I played for 20 years after that home run in the 1975 World Series, right by Carlton Fisk? Of course they wouldn't make a series like that about those Red Sox teams because no one would watch it, but a nation can dream, can't it?

Another thing that occurred to me is that Reggie Jackson was a lot like Manny Ramirez back in the day. If only Reggie didn't talk to the press, he might have been Reggie being Reggie long before Manny started being Manny. I also noticed that one of the executive producers of the show is named Joe Davola. Could that be the same guy that inspired the Crazy Joe Davola character from Seinfeld?

This is something that needs further investigation by some enterprising soul more willing to do the research than I am tonight. Because if this Joe Davola is the Crazy Joe Davola from Seinfeld, then there must have been a deal in real life that was kiboshed as the fictitious deal was which triggered Davola's hostility to Jerry and Kramer. I can't help but wonder what that deal could have been. Of course, I also need to get out more, but what can you do?

Finally, I thought it was awfully sporting of Bob Ryan to warn us about the danger of an NBA official fixing games three days after the story broke. I can understand that he wasn't due to write a column between the day it broke and the one that appeared in today's paper. I also think it would have been better not to call said piece a warning. As far as I know, you warn somebody before an event occurs, not after. Then again, what do I know? I'm not in the Max Mercy Hall of Fame.

Oh, and I think I see a way clear for me to be nominated for President of Red Sox Nation. I took a quick look at the celebrity nominations page, and I think I might qualify. Excerpts from my blog have appeared in Worcester Magazine and several times in BostonNOW. That might not be a hell of a lot on which to hang my hat and I'm not bragging about it, but at least I've heard of me. And that's more than I can say for Rob Crawford, Dennis Drinkwater and Rick Swanson.

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.

So many of our old friends have been up to so much, it's hard to know where to begin. Daisuke Matsuzaka was trounced by the Indians and chased from the game in the 6th. Kobe Bryant has found himself sinking into a morass of his own creation in Los Angeles, but he's mad as hell and he's not going to take it anymore. And to top it all, there is a rumor of a new football league in the developmental stage and the Benefactor is involved.

After so many wins, I am cautiously optimistic that the Red Sox are due to fall back to earth. With any luck, they'll go straight from dizzying height to terrifying low, bypassing the creamy middle. But for a change, I'm going to do my level best not to jinx this one. After all, Carl Pavano's to do list probably reads like this now: 1). have Tommy John Surgery. 2). track down and apply savage ass whooping to pseudonymous anti-Red Sox blogger who predicted 18 win season in 2007. 3). rehab from Tommy John Surgery. So no more on the Sox for the moment.

I really hate jumping on bandwagons at late stages, but I really do not like Kobe Bryant. For those of you who have been reading this space from jump street, you know that. You also know that I am a big Elvis fan. So when I heard the series of interviews with Stephen A Smith and Dan Patrick today, it reminded me of a relatively obscure country song Elvis released in the early 70s. The song's title is "It's Your Baby, You Rock It" and it includes the following line: "You made that bed you're sleepin' in and I'm tired of hearing about it friend."

Kobe really, really, really wanted Shaq out of LA. Since Bryant was the younger of the two superstars, management obliged him and sent the Big Aristotle to Miami. Shaq has gone on to win a championship with the Heat. Kobe has yet to carry the Lakers to the second round of the playoffs. And now Kobe says team management promised to build a title contender around him in the immediate future. Bryant's hurt, he's betrayed and they lied to him. And yet I am not in tears.

It seems incredibly unlikely, but I guess there is a remote possibility that Kobe Bryant doesn't know basketball. You'd think that he might, since he's played it since childhood, his father was a pro ball player and he chose it for his career. But that might not necessarily mean he knows the game. After all, if management told him they were looking to compete at the highest level in the wake of the Shaq deal, and he believed them, Kobe is either ignorant or full of something unpleasant, particularly in the heat of summer.

The Lakers traded Shaq for Carom Butler and Lamar Odom. Shaq, at that point in his career, was a veteran of 5 NBA Finals and a three time champion. Carom Butler and Lamar Odom may have won any number of titles playing NBA Live on X Box, but neither has played so much as a minute of basketball in the NBA Finals. Moreover, they're both power forwards. They play the same damn position. How could any one not see that as a bad deal for LA?

It is true that the Lakers parlayed Carom Butler into Kwame Brown, who was supposed to be the center of the future. At the time, in literary parlance, that was rather like the Ancient Mariner from the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner trading in the albatross around his neck that weighed him down for a large metal anchor. Since then, the trade has gone on to look much worse, as Butler made the Eastern Conference All Star team this season (yeah, the East kind of blows, but it is still an All Star team) and Kwame Brown is stuck in neutral. He might not be getting worse, but he surely isn't getting better either.

None of the Lakers other moves have panned out since they let Shaq go. Lately, the "brains" of their operation have been taking a lot of heat for failing to deal for Jason Kidd at the deadline. I don't see why. Can you honestly tell me that Kidd would have made the Lakers markedly better than any of the other seven teams that qualified for the playoffs in the West? I just don't think that would have been the case.

So I'm sick of Kobe whining. This was never about winning, this was about getting away from Shaq's shadow. Now Kobe has been jarred back into reality because everything that was his now belongs to LeBron and D Wade. Wade has a ring, and LeBron is fighting the Pistons to a standstill. They're younger and more dynamic than Kobe. Kobe needs to do something or he'll lose his league.

The trouble is, fans everywhere believe he forced management to sell Shaq for pennies on the dollar. Fans have been convinced after the scoring binges of the past two years that Kobe cares more about his numbers than his team. Kobe is in danger of becoming the answer to the trivia question: "Who scored the second most points in a single NBA game?" Would that he had chosen a more dignified route around his present course to oblivion.

Then there's the Benefactor. He's already on board with the proposed venture known as the UFL. Because the American landscape needed another professional football league. Because the USFL and the WFL and the XFL were all unqualified success stories. Because the NFL is much bigger, wealthier, more powerful and infinitely better prepared to adapt its product to the environment in which it exists than it was when the AFL challenged it in the 1960s. That's why the UFL is such a good idea.

What no one on the outside of the football business looking in on it's riches seems to understand is that the AFL succeeded for a reason. It wasn't because the upstart league was able to sign huge college stars like Namath or Mike Garrett, or develop guys like Len Dawson, Lance Alworth and so many others into household names. Those factors helped, but look at the USFL who went for broke luring Herschell Walker, Jim Kelley, Steve Young, Doug Flutie and others into their league and got pretty damn broke pretty damn quick.

The real reason no football league will ever compete against the NFL the way the AFL did is simple. Because there were no collective bargaining agreements, minimum salaries and pensions back in the 1950s and 1960s, there was room for a second league to come in and start a bidding war for the solid, dependable veterans that make up the guts of a professional football team. Now the NFL has all that infrastructure in place for all 32 of its teams.

Can you imagine how much capital would be necessary to start 8 new teams at once? Not to mention creating a league office to codify the rules, set up a draft, schedule all the games and make sure that each new team has a home city and a home stadium? And on top of those headaches deal with the fact that the 2,000 best football players in the world are currently under contract to NFL teams? Any one who thinks they can do that with 8 different billionaires who have no experience in football beyond watching a game or two here and there, no current common bonds and Mark Cuban involved is dreaming.

If this new league tries to get off the ground playing in the fall on Friday nights, they'll be destroyed. Maybe they'll get a few high profile college draft picks, some older stars looking for one last big score like an aging thief in a crime drama and some other assorted has-beens and never-will-bes. That might be enough to challenge for a Grey Cup or two, but not to take money out of Jerry Jones' pocket.

People don't often realize, since it takes a little more thought than the average tool is willing to put in to the sports he or she watches on the TV, but Namath made the guarantee and his teammates won the game. Randy Beverly and Johnny Sample were two former NFL defensive backs and they made huge plays in the Red Zone to stop big drives for the Colts. In the old days, guys like that were on the open market. It's just not the case any more.

And what is the Benefactor going to do? Spend like Dan Snyder? We've all seen where that has gotten the Redskins lately. I suppose I ought to shut my mouth. If he wants to waste his money on a colossal failure in the making, that's his business. And the sooner he gets back to his new favorite pastime of hiding and trembling lest David Stern smack him down again, the better for us all.

I am not a nice guy, nor am I tremendously sensitive. But even I have limits, there were some lines that I never intended to cross in this blog. I didn't want to do this, but with the way Red Sox fans find the fact that Matsuzaka hit A Rod and Jeter so piquant, I felt it was time for me to send a more serious message of my own. So without further adieu...

GREAT MOMENTS IN RED SOX HISTORY #7 - 8/18/1967

On August 18 in the middle of the Impossible Dream Season of 1967, Tony Conigliaro came to bat against Jack Hamilton of the California Angels. Hamilton's pitch hit Tony C in the face, causing massive trauma. Tony missed the entire 1968 season. He won the Comeback Player of the Year award, which now bears his name, in 1969, but he was never the same. By 1975 he retired because his eyesight was deteriorating.

Bob Ryan wrote a piece on the tragic event last year on its 39th anniversary. I thought this particular paragraph was worth noting:

But Aug. 18 is always a somber date for me, and, I'm sure, for many others. Tony C is the greatest of all ``What-Ifs?" in Boston sports history. When he stepped into the box in that fateful fourth inning, he was 22 years old. He was the Golden Boy, en route to the Golden Career. Who among us wouldn't have traded places with Tony C?

I just don't see how a fan base which professes to possess a sterling knowledge of baseball history can in one breath lament the pitch that ended Tony C's career but still enjoy the spectacle of Alex Rodriguez or Derek Jeter being hit because they wear another uniform. If Roy Halladay had hit David Ortiz or Manny Ramirez or JD Drew this evening, Red Sox Nation would have deluged Governor Patrick's office with demands that he call out the state militia and declare martial law to punish the offending pitcher.

Is it a really a coincidence that Red Sox pitcher Tim Wakefield has hit more batters than any other pitcher in Major League Baseball since the start of the 2003 season? Is it a coincidence that the Red Sox seem to dominate this Sports Illustrated feature on basebrawls, including this shot of Pedro Martinez getting his just deserts?

Pitchers who have spent significant time on the Red Sox currently rank 2, 3 and 4 in active leaders in hit batsmen.

The guy who comes to me with his Red Sox information has an insufferable bravado he uses when he talks about Red Sox pitchers hitting opposing batters "by accident." He pauses, which would add dramatic emphasis if his rhetorical gifts measured up to his opinion thereof. And it's typical of Red Sox Nation's reaction to the bullying tactics of the Olde Towne Team. And if you don't believe me, look at this shot of the famous moment when Varitek bravely stood up to A Rod.

It truly takes a brave man to stand up to another man whilst wearing a mask, helmet, chest protector, shin guards and a big leather catcher's mitt. Just ask a Red Sox fan, and that fan will tell you how tough 'Tek is and how that moment was an impressive achievement.

Maybe I'm being a little too harsh in reminding New Englanders of a superstar cut down in his prime and dying before his time because he was hit in the face by a pitched ball. But that is the end result of throwing 96 mile per hour fastballs as you learn to pitch inside, or try to remind the world that you own the inside part of the plate.

I understand that pitching inside is part of the game. But I don't believe that the Red Sox make mistakes when they hit opposing players. I don't know much about baseball as it's played in the Japanese League, but I highly doubt that they only pitch to half of the strike zone in the Far East. I just find myself imagining that it's more than a little coincidental that the two hitters beaned by Daisuke Matsuzaka were either notoriously successful against the Red Sox (Jeter) or on pace to break all records for hitting in the month of April (A Rod) while he learned the subtle nuances of pitching in North American baseball.

I think we all know how Red Sox Nation will react should the next message pitch hurt one of their heroes. What I fear in this situation is that Red Sox Nation will show as much dignity as they have in all of this discussion of the A Rod and Jeter incidents should another unfortunate incident like this

befall and opposing player in Fenway.

You're walking away and they're talking behind you
They will never forget you 'til somebody new comes along
Where you been lately? There's a new kid in town
Everybody loves him, don't they?
Now he's holding her, and you're still around
Oh, my, my
There's a new kid in town

-from The Eagles song "New Kid in Town" written by Don Henley, Glenn Frey and John David Souther

Tonight marks the one year anniversary of the first post in the history of Sedition in Red Sox Nation. And what a night for it. There's nothing like seeing the mighty Red Sox fall victim to a 21 year old pitcher throw seven innings of no hit ball. If that weren't enough, there were two subplots that may go largely unnoticed as the mainstream media and the fans of Red Sox Nation embrace their small moral victories and silver linings in the form of Daisuke Matsuzaka shutting Ichiro down and JD Drew's seeing-eye single to end the no-hit bid.

The impressive pitching performance of Felix Hernandez inspired me to preface tonight's post with that quote from The Eagles' "The New Kid in Town." Matsuzaka was the new kid in town, but it was the younger, less heralded Seattle starter who stole the show. It would have been too perfect for him to throw a no-hitter in Friendly Fenway tonight. That's why I don't feel too bad that I was in the process of dialing the guy I go to for my Red Sox info (not to be confused with the guy who comes to me with his Red Sox info and told me that he'd be happy with a 12-7 split in the Red Sox favor against the Yanks last year, since I have multiple friends in Red Sox Nation, most of whom have been uncharacteristically if not unexpectedly silent tonight).

I am not going to go on at greater length on the pitching performances in tonight's game. Orel Hersheiser, who is a Cy Young winner, former 20 game winner. World Series MVP and a paid professional baseball analyst, summed it up far better than I could, even if he lacked my wit, rambling verbosity and boundless capacity for personal rancor. In his opinion, he saw more velocity on the fastball, a greater capacity for changing speed, sharper breaking pitches and a younger player when he compared Felix Hernandez to Daisuke Matsuzaka. Far be it for me to dispute such sage analysis, especially when it favors an opponent of the Red Sox.

First, and perhaps most intriguing, is the demise of Jason Varitek. This blog has not been very kind to Jason Varitek over the past year. I hate Varitek, more so than any Red Sox position player with the possible exception of Nomar in the last 20 years. I've been like John the Baptist (in the least blasphemous possible sense) crying out in the wilderness that Varitek is overrated, that Varitek is a fraud, that Red Sox Nation is due for a rude awakening. And after tonight, I think I won't be alone in that regard for much longer.

For years, I've listened to Red Sox fans talk about how tough he is, how much value a switch hitting catcher adds to the lineup, how well he handled the staff and how great his defense has been. I have never believed it. In fact, I went to great lengths to dispute Varitek's toughness in a post last April.

Tonight, Varitek just might have shown Red Sox Nation that I've been right about him all along. With the possible exception of the aberration in yesterday's home opener, Varitek has done little or nothing at the plate to justify his spot in the lineup. He could hang his hat on the fact that he was an adequate defensive catcher and he handled the pitching staff effectively. Varitek was covered under the "I Want You, I Need You but There Ain't Know Way I'm Ever Gonna Love You" principle of Meat Loaf's Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad Postulate.

Unfortunately, Meat Loaf has been preoccupied with demolishing Bill Simmons in Celebrity Fantasy Basketball, and he has not been able to offer any guidance for how one ought to handle a situation where only one of three requirements is met. Red Sox Nation might be sorely in need of his guidance, as Varitek's defensive prowess has apparently deserted him. First, he lost the ball on the tag while the Mariners scored the first run of the game. Then the ball bounced off of him as he endeavored to block the plate against the second run, which scored anyway.

Now, one might argue that Manny should have made a better throw to the plate to stop the first run from scoring. We live in an imperfect world, and a good defensive catcher would have turned that less than perfect throw into an out instead of the eventual winning run. I would offer Johjima as a counter example (especially since he hit Matsuzaka sharply), but since no Red Sox runner managed to get to scoring position, let alone home plate, the point is moot.

As for that throw that bounced off of Varitek, it allowed Adrian Beltre to advance to third base. One might argue that said runner would have gone on to score the third and final run of the game on the subsequent single by Jose Vidro. However, the fact remains that Varitek took much more from the table by failing to hit safely and submitting a sub par effort defensively than he brought by handling the pitchers, even one who hails from a different culture and speaks a different primary language.

As an aside, I wonder how badly Daisuke Matsuzaka needs his interpreter. I can't say I blame him, because I would jump at the chance to place any buffer between myself and the Boston media I could should my job require me to interact with them. It's just that I've been hearing of the general excellence of Japanese schools and their marked superiority to their American counterparts for years now. I can't help but think that Matsuzaka probably speaks English with a proficiency that could not help but put many of his American fans to shame if they compared his skill to theirs and they had sufficient mental capacity to feel shame.

The other subplot I noticed is that the bullying tactics favored by the Red Sox, and perhaps imperfectly employed by their new pitcher tonight, seem to have backfired. Brendan Donnelly, apparently not realizing that he was not one of the Black Donnellys, was very, very, very brave after he struck out his archnemesis Jose Guillen while on the favorable side of a blowout yesterday. It is also well documented that he drilled the next hitter with his "fastball" before getting the gate.

Apparently, Guillen was not intimidated. He drove a pitch from Matsuzaka off the Green Monster and later scored in his first at bat. Since I am they type of person who believes in coincidence only when they benefit my side, I have to think that it wasn't an accident when a pitcher who commands all of his pitches as well as Daisuke Matsuzaka hit Guillen in a subsequent at bat. Unfortunately, the Mariners were not intimidated tonight.

More attention will be paid to the bullying tactics of the Red Sox in future posts, but I am tired, hungry and eager to celebrate the defeat of Daisuke Matsuzaka by watching the new South Park at midnight before I go to bed. So, good night and bad luck the the Red Sox.

I don't know how I missed the trend, but when did Easter become a big deal again? I understand the religious aspects of the day, but as the Christian population of this country becomes incrementally less Christian with each passing year, you'd think that Easter would come and go with little notice. And then last night as I watched that travesty in Arlington, Texas, I noticed two fat guys in Red Sox jerseys sitting in the crowd wearing bunny ears.

Maybe that's what Easter is in the process of becoming, spring's answer to Halloween - a day which once had religious significance but has become an excuse for adults to act like children and for children to act like even bigger morons than they are on any given weekday. Unfortunately, thinking about Easter more as a day for masquerading than as a day for rebirth might take a little of the bloom of yesterday's impressive triumph over a very mediocre Texas Rangers team.

If you read Curt Schilling's blog post on the win, you'll believe that it was a tremendous performance by Jonathan Papelbon. Of course if you remember the press coverage of the decision to return Papelbon to the bullpen, you might recall that the team was to make a concerted effort to limit him to one inning appearances to protect his shoulder. Morgan and Miller pointed out that Francona is also talking about pitching Papelbon in the 8th and bringing in another pitcher to throw the 9th.

Of course, last night Papelbon pitched an inning and two-thirds. He came in with runners at the corners and only one out. He faced Michael Young and Mark Teixiera in that situation and put the kibosh on the Ranger rally. And somewhere between the Bronx and Minneapolis, Joe Torre would have started preparing his explanation for The Boss when the Red Sox win their first AL East crown of the millennium had he not been so utterly traumatized by the supremely dominant Papelbon.

As Curt Schilling astutely pointed out, the Red Sox return to Fenway for their home opener after having gone .500 on the trip. Things could be worse. And they should be a hell of a lot better. The Red Sox payroll for 2007 is higher than the combined payrolls for the Rangers and Royals. Perhaps I'm being unfair. After all, Larry Lucchino has said that he doesn't like talking about payroll, since it could put the Red Sox at a competitive disadvantage, and I wouldn't want to do anything to hurt the team. So I'll just remind you that neither the Rangers nor the Royals finished last season with a winning record.

I must say, I am not as worried about Papelbon's performance as Red Sox Nation should hope. First, I am not impressed with Mark Teixeira. After his 0 for in the World Baseball Classic (I remember how often I have disparaged that farce, which is why not even getting a hit in it is doubly pathetic) and his slow start last season, I just don't think he's as good as advertised. To be fair, he is currently hitting a very impressive .211 with an RBI to date this season.

Also, I don't think the Rangers lineup is as good as some have said. The entire world may love Michael Young, but it doesn't change the fact that he's hitting .154 at the moment. The team is currently struggling to find timely hitting. Let's not forget that the Rangers came into the Boston series reeling after being swept by the Angels.

So yes, the Red Sox bounced back in a big way yesterday. Schilling looked a million times better than he did against Kansas City. Papelbon slammed the door on the Rangers with authority. Ortiz came alive offensively, hitting his first two home runs of the season. And Manny hit the ball pretty well, even though he had little to show for it but some loud outs.

And yet I think this team ought to be more than a little concerned going forward. Big Schill may have had his groove back, but is the 7 inning 102 pitch performance an indication of great pitching or bad hitting? I would say a bit of both, but I'm an incurable pessimist.

Papelbon slammed the door shut, but he did so against two boppers who might have a little trouble hitting the floor if they fell out of bed at this point in the year. Plus, would Francona have gone to his fragile closer for five outs in the eighth inning of a game on the road in April if he had anything but warm bodies in his bullpen? I think not.

As well as one can hope Schilling, Beckett and Matsuzaka will pitch, I just can't see Red Sox Nation feeling confident in Tim Wakefield and Julian Tavarez at the end of the rotation. JD Drew is 9-23, and hitting .391 in his six games in right field. But what happens if he should slump? Julio Lugo is only hitting .261 at this point. Kevin Youkilis is due to turn back into a pumpkin any day now.

I am aware that the Yankees had a bigger advantage in terms of payroll disparity over their two opponents. And their starters have yet to see the sixth inning. And their defense looks pathetic. But I'm not a Yankee fan, I only root for them because every win for the Yanks is bad for Red Sox Nation. As long as things look bad for the Red Sox, I'm happy. And I get the feeling that things aren't going to go well against the Mariners.

Thank you to the anonymous comment poster who pointed out that I managed to insert the wrong link in place of the the proper link to the CHB piece on the hype preceding Daisuke Matsuzaka's debut yesterday. These things are bound to happen, especially in a long post like that on several different topics. The hell of it is that I wasn't even drinking last night, even though you might assume that based on my track record and the fact that the Red Sox won.

I think I managed to fix the link issue. But in case you don't feel much like reading yesterday's post or you're as lazy as I am, here's the link again, it's worth going to the page to see Shaughnessy in all his glory, or lack thereof. He's not looking very good. He looks tanned in the sense that leather is treated with chemicals to make it into a durable, wearable material and not in the sense that he was out in the sun for a while. Yikes.

At the risk of piling on the CHB today, check out today's column. He called Daisuke Matsuzaka "Pocket Rocket" at one point. While Red Sox fans of a certain age will understand that it's a reference to Roger Clemens, there are some who might mistake the CHB's meaning. Take a gander at the list of definitions Urban Dictionary offers for the term "pocket rocket." It's not exactly complimentary, and one would expect a little more sensitivity from a columnist employed by a major metropolitan newspaper.

By the way, watching baseball games over the last few days, the Just for Men ads have caught my eye. I've been meaning to complain about them for a long time now, but more pressing issues have always intervened. As trite and shallow as the Keith Hernandez/Walt "Clyde" Fraiser spots are, my real problem is the fact that they are spokespeople at all. Outside of people who lived in New York in the 1970s/80s, with whom are these ads supposed to resonate?

Let's face it. If you're in the market for Just For Men, you might as well come to terms with the fact that you are no longer attractive enough (if you ever were) to attract the interest of a young, attractive woman. Grey hair is probably the least of your problems. The beer gut, the forty five year old wife who doesn't like you anymore, the two point three aggravating brats and the minivan are doing more damage to your rep than a few stray grey hairs.

Between that and the "Are you there God? It's me, victim of male pattern baldness" Vive For Men Thickening Shampoo spots, it gets very depressing trying to watch baseball. People ought to age with dignity. Who knows, maybe the younger generation isn't watching baseball anymore. Or maybe I'm one of the only male baseball fans under thirty who isn't stockpiling hair loss pills, ED pills, Just For Men and that thickening shampoo for that day when the rain starts falling. Or at least that day when the hair starts turning grey or falling out or both, and the sun is the only thing that can be counted on to rise.

In hindsight, I probably should not have reminded the universe of the remarkable coincidence on Monday afternoon. After today's victory against the Royals, the Red Sox are in first place in the AL East. It is true that the Yankees are playing at the moment, and technically have yet to lose a game, but Major League Baseball will announce at any moment that the aberration on Monday evening will not count against the Red Sox in the standings.

Plus Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched seven strong innings struck out ten Royals and allowed only one earned run. That ought to be enough to offset minor inconveniences like a loss here or there. I think most teams are simply going to give up the ghost now that John Buck, Royals catcher and keen baseball mind, has decreed that Matsuzaka has ace-type stuff.

As much as Daisuke's stellar regular season debut is a blow to Sedition in Red Sox Nation, it's just one game against a team that has managed to lose quite a few games over the last two decades or so. It reminds me of another highly touted prospect who made a debut almost twelve years ago for a team I do not hate. I don't know if you remember the Ron Powlus era at Notre Dame. I do. He came in as the most highly recruited player of the year, he was going to join the Pantheon of greats at Notre Dame and a funny thing happened on the way to immortality.

It turned out he was overrated. After a nice debut against a very bad Northwestern team, things just kept getting worse for Ron. Now, he's back at Notre Dame as quarterbacks coach, preparing touted recruit Jimmy Clausen to replace Brady Quinn. That is not making me happy to be a Notre Dame fan next season, but what can you do? Just something to think about, there's a lot of room for regression after today's performance by Daisuke.

This piece by the CHB on the hype leading up to Daisuke's debut isn't worth reading, but it is worth taking a look at him in that video that accompanies it. Holy crap, he looks like Kramer from that episode of Seinfeld where he turned his apartment into a smoking lounge and hyperaged himself in a couple of days. He's kind of like the Picture of Dorian Grey, and not just in the sense that he's unreadably pretentious. Finally the man on the surface matches the madness within.

Not only did the hated Red Sox prevail, but ESPN interrupted its regular lineup to bring us the breaking story about the fate of the Florida junior class following their repeat performance this week (also part of the payback for me celebrating the Red Sox defeat and TMC showing Cromwell). Who cares? This draft is about Oden and Durant.

And this Florida team isn't a top 5 or 10 all time team. Remember, these guys only came to college because they weren't good enough to go pro right from jump street. College basketball was better this year because people had to go for at least a year after high school under the new age limit rule. But imagine if no one went pro straight from high school for the four or five consecutive drafts? Only then would it be fair to measure this generation against the past.

Finally, there is the Miami-Cleveland game tonight. I was looking forward to watching it, because it is an increasingly rare occurrence that a sporting event should take place where I actually like both teams. However, the universe could not allow me to enjoy it after the indecent enthusiasm with which I celebrated the bone the universe threw me on Monday. No matter how the game shapes up on the floor, Turner Broadcasting is continuing the universe's campaign against me.

Reggie Miller, Doug Collins and Kevin Harlan are calling the game. Things are being taken away from the table at an alarming rate. Early in the first quarter, Shaq hit Haslem with a no-look pass. Perhaps jarred by the fact that Udonis "Hand of Stone" Haslem caught said pass, Miller went on a mini-tangent about the pass. In his ecstasy, Miller giddily narrated the replay and marvelled at the fact that Shaq's eyes didn't stray in Haslem's direction, after telling the viewers that a no-look pass was coming.

Now I didn't attend that celebrated disco with books that is the University of California in Los Angeles. But it seems to me that the fact that Shaq did not look at Udonis Haslem whilst passing the basketball to him is what makes it a no-look pass. Of course, I may be wrong. But redundancy in engineering complicated systems is a good thing, and redundancy in broadcasting is a bad thing. Reggie Miller is not helping fans enjoy the game.

TNT would be better served to let Barkley and Kenny Smith call the games. Even better, throw Tommy Heinshon in the mix. Maybe a fourth guy like Ernie Johnson as a referee/moderator. These are intelligent guys who love basketball and know the game better than anyone. More importantly, they're honest, they have integrity and they aren't afraid to speak their mind.

I'm sick to death of announcers trying to pretend that a bad game is interesting, exciting and/or intrinsically watchable simply because it's basketball. Also, keeping abreast of current events would be helpful. And by that I don't mean world news, arts, literature, politics and so on. I mean what happens in the game. For instance, Kevin Harlan just announced that Antoine Walker made his first appearance of the game at the 11:11 mark of the second quarter. Toine was on the floor in the first, I know it for a fact. I saw him. Wearing number 8.

Good broadcasters would now something like that before they said it, or they wouldn't bring it up. A team like Barkley, Smith, Heinshon and the moderator might make a mistake like that from time to time, but they'd call one another on it. They'd make a bad game watchable because they have personalities. They'd tell you it was a bad game, start talking about other things and telling stories about a bygone age when basketball was basketball and players passed, played defense and we were as kings.

I know every broadcaster tries to do some or all of those things, but 95% of people in the world can't tell a story to save their life. It's a natural gift. Something you can't be taught. A good storyteller has a rhythm. A certain vocabulary, maybe a patois (as much as I hate pretentious, foreign words like that, but there isn't a good English alternative). It's not about using big words or small, complicated words but about using the words that come naturally to you from your environment and experience.

Guys like Barkley and Heinshon can be offensive because they speak their mind extemporaneously. I remember an All Star Weekend event (I think it was a celebrity game), Barkley was calling it with Ainge and a couple of other people. Two WNBA players were on the floor and Ainge said that we were seeing two of the best point guards in the world. And Barkley cut across his point and said, slightly derisively: "You mean for girls, right."

Now that was a little bit sexist (or a lot sexist). But he said what a majority of the audience was thinking. Men are better basketball players than women. Fundamentals are important, but they take a back seat to the ability to play above the rim. I complain a lot about the way basketball is played in the NBA, but I flat out refuse to watch the WNBA. The fundamentals are so good in women's basketball because they aren't athletic enough to get away with anything else.

Barkley wasn't excessively hostile toward the idea of women's basketball, and he wasn't saying that the two women didn't belong on the court in general. But he was right to point out that the two women could play in the All Star Weekend exhibition against retired players and celebrities, but they weren't talented enough to play top flight pros from the NBA in a genuine, honest to goodness, no fooling NBA game. That's the truth, more to the point it's one man's honest opinion, untainted by fear.

A certain amount of sensitivity is important, but not more than honesty. In that celebrity game several years ago, Ainge was right in the sense that the two WBNA players of whom he spoke are among the best point guards in the world because they can play better than the vast majority of human beings on the planet. But the two of them were not better than even the worst point guard in the NBA at the time, so in that sense they were not two of the best point guards in the world.

Barkley just said during the halftime show that Dallas needs to pick up their intensity or they might lose to Utah in a potential second round playoff matchup. There are a lot of reasons to dismiss this out of hand, Dallas has won 62 games this season. They've won 9 out of their last ten. But Barkley says Dallas has not been as focused on its defense lately, and now is not the time to sleep on Utah.

He may be wrong, I hope he's right. But then I may be attracted to that line of reasoning because I hate Dallas. But he's obviously thought about it, he didn't shout that prediction the way a lot of commentators do these days. He didn't say it to take the other side of the trade the way a lot of talking heads do. It's something he thinks, and he threw it out for people to take or leave. If he's wrong, he'll admit it, and if he's right he'll throw an "I told you so" or two at us, but he won't be a tool about it. That's why he should be calling games.

For his part, Tommy Heinshon is no stranger to saying some things that aren't tremendously sensitive. There was the Dikembe Mutumbo comment about hunting lions. And the Yao Ming chopsticks comment. His sensitivity could improve, but he has a gentleness about him that leads people to overlook his comments, which are very few and far between. People will always forgive a guy they like for minor transgressions.

That's the difference between the insensitivity from Barkley and Heinshon going largely unnoticed and the firestorm that greeted the Billy Packer "fag out" comment. It's not just that the audience in Heinshon's case is fairly small, because there could not have been more than 100 people watching that particular Charlie Rose. After all, you can't tell me you know more than three people who watch him.

It seems that hating Billy Packer is the one thing that makes us all Americans at heart. And unlike TO or Tank Johnson who are widely criticized but defended here and Ozzie Guillen who called a sportswriter I loathe a fag and was defended in this space, I will not defend Billy Packer. I really don't care if he called Charlie Rose a fag, or implied that Rose is a fag. While I would like to see him retire, I am not going to attack him for this.

I want CBS to show him the door because he's a bitter old man who seems to hate what he does. He has no sense of timing. It seems like there are moments when a small aside comparing a contemporary team or player to one or more from the past works and then there are moments when Packer does it. And never the twain shall meet. Plus, it's never a short aside. It seems like 15 minutes of game time elapse while he's talking about what Dr. Naismith told him about throwing the spheroid into the peach basket.

Maybe I would hate him less if he didn't work with Jim Nantz. Jim Nantz with his voice stuffed full of fake sincerity and fake emotion and fake gravitas will exercise his formidable talent at turning what should be a legitimately dramatic moment into an artificial, saccharine schmaltz fest as fake as Natntz' own claymation character hairline. He's the only reason not to look forward to the Masters.

Hearing him say "Amen Corner" or azaleas or "What a moment" or "the Masters on CBS" in his phoney "I alone understand the full signifigance of this moment" voice makes me wish that the tree the course owners would not remove for Eishenhower would fulfill its destiny and fall on Nantz' head. It's going to be a long weekend.

PS- Antoine Walker had 20 points in Miami's win tonight. Danny AInge would be rolling over in his grave, if he'd only drop dead.

Every once in a great while, there is a coincidence so perfect that it reaffirms my faith in a higher power. Today, as the mighty Boston Red Sox sent the best team $145.7 million dollars could scrape together against the lowly Kansas City Royals in Kaufman Stadium, Turner Classic Movies showed Cromwell.

Since today's educated American seems to possess a knowledge of history gleaned from the drivel passed off as fact by the competing political and intellectual factions and very little genuine learning, I feel compelled to point out that Oliver Cromwell led the English common people to victory over Charles I in the English Civil War. I am aware that as an American of Irish descent and a Roman Catholic, I have two reasons to despise Cromwell, since he was virulently anti-Catholic and committed vicious atrocities against the Irish in repressing their rebellion, but it's difficult not to admire a man with this type of curriculum vitae.

It is only one game, and the start of a very long season. But a tyrant took the field in Kansas City this afternoon. A tyrant compared to the Beatles (fittingly) and to Elvis (blasphemously) by the region's chief sportswriter fell to the Royals. At the end of the day, Daisuke Matsuzaka couldn't save them, and it didn't matter that Jonathan Papelbon returned to close games. Even if it were only for three hours and a bit on April 2, 2007, a team led by Mark Grudzelanik and Tony Pena Jr. was better than the team with Manny Ramirez, Curt Schilling and David Ortiz.

There is no need to point out that the Yankees have a considerably larger payroll than the Red Sox. I will concede that point, but can you defend the team that spent this season attempting to out-Herod Herod? It was the Red Sox, after all, who who outbid their nearest competitor in the Daisuke Matsuzaka sweepstakes by more than ten million dollars. Furthermore, they entered into a corrupt bargain with Scott Boras to sign Matsuzaka. They didn't sign JD Drew for any other reason than he was part of the price to land Daisuke.

Maybe it is unfair for the Yankees to bestride the narrow world like a Colossus, in the words of Shakespeare from Julius Caesar. And Henry and his cohorts may raise prices and squeeze more money out of Red Sox Nation to compete with the influx of capital that will come from a new Yankee Stadium. It is their right as businessmen and, as no one can force the fans to pay it, no authority but the fans can stop them.

My sympathies in this matter lie with the Yankees because whatever else they may be, the Yankees aren't hypocrites. They spend monstrous sums of money, they choke small market teams and in the long run they are probably bad for the overall health of the sport. But they have the good manners to go about their business without trying to make themselves out to be victims.

The Red Sox are a papier-mache version of the Yankees. They spend every nickel they can to compete with the Yankees. In the long run, the Red Sox are as bad for the health of the sport as the Yankees. And they're worse for the overall well being of sports, since they spend what they can and expect pity because they won't build a new stadium. It's not Steinbrenner's fault that Boston is smaller than New York geographically and demographically. It's not his fault that he had a network making more money than NESN. It's life.

Charles I was executed on film, and the tyrant Red Sox fell on the field in Kansas City today. With any luck, they tyrant Gators will fall in Atlanta tonight. I will have a comment on that game and on Noah's future tomorrow.

I don't know if you happened to see this past week's episode of South Park. It was highly entertaining and strangely thought-provoking. The episode title is Lice Capades, and the plot revolves around an outbreak of lice in South Park Elementary. There is a parallel story from the perspective of the lice on one student's head where one louse tries to convince the others that the world has become aware of their impact and is trying to destroy them. No one listens, and tragedy ensues.

That one lone louse who tries to convince the community that they're wrong and he's right reminds me of me as spring training winds down. I know it's not a very flattering comparison, but it seems very appropriate since I am about as significant as a louse, writing an anti-Red Sox blog against a vast tide of material embracing the team. And it seems like I am the only one who has even considered the possibility that Daisuke Matsuzaka will not take the world of North American professional baseball by storm.

After watching a couple of spring training starts, Bill Simmons sees a young Pedro Martinez in him. Matsuzaka has a comparable array of impressive off-speed pitches, apparently, even though he isn't quite the intimidator that Pedro was. No word yet on whether the Baltimore game when two guys from the minor league squad took the fearsome Matsuzaka deep was one of the games Simmons happened to see.

I find myself wondering from time to time when I read something about sports if I am the last person who remembers minor, trivial details. But there is this little chestnut about Pedro. It happened about ten years ago, long past the point at which the statute of limitations on memory which enable the mental gymnastics that make a Red Sox fan a Red Sox fan expires.

The real difference between Pedro and Daisuke is that Pedro proved himself against real, honest-to-goodness major league batters before he came to Boston. Pedro even won a Cy Young before he came to Boston. Until Daisuke proves that he can handle a long season in a tough town, I think people would do well to give him a chance to fail before they canonize him. The way it stands now, if Daisuke has a bad run, it's on for him. I hope he can handle it. Personally, I am looking forward to the day this offseason's panic signings blowup in the face of the Nation.

Sports Illustrated has just come out and celebrated the arrival of Daisuke Matsuzaka in a cover that is sure to warm the cockles of Red Sox Nation's collective heart. Even if you don't believe in the alleged SI Cover Jinx (I don't, but anything that works against the Red Sox is good for me), it must stick in the throats of Red Sox fans to see Matsuzaka's picture with the tag line "Fever Pitch."

So many Red Sox fans must resent that movie so much. I just can't imagine it myself, not suffering from the curious mental deficiency that makes a person a Red Sox fan, but I wonder how it must hurt Red Sox Nation. After 86 years of heartbreak, how many of them must have wished they could have run onto that field in Saint Louis to celebrate with the team. And then to find out that the new celebrity poster child for Red Sox Nation, Jimmy Fallon, and Drew Barrymore were among the first to join the players celebrating that most improbable of events. Oh, the humanity.

Daisuke Matsuzaka is pitching in a foreign country, against teams with incredible resources for scouting their opponents, against some (if not all) of the best players in the world. And this time it's for real. It's not some bogus exhibition with a fancy title. This is how these guys earn a living. And on top of that, he is going to pitch every fifth day instead of every sixth day.

And then there's the fact that he's going to have to do a considerable amount of travelling this season. Much more traveling and more often than he ever had to do in Japan. I don't know if you've noticed (and if you're a Red Sox fan, odds are you haven't), but America is a big country. Much, much, much, much bigger than Japan. There are at least two or three more 3,000 mile flights in store for Daisuke than there were last year.

But I'm crazy, right? I'm just pointing this stuff out because I'm a bad person who wants the Red Sox fans to be as miserable as I am, right? As much as there is a grain or truth or two in the first statement, the second one isn't true. I want the Red Sox fans to be infinitely more miserable than I am. But even more than that, I want just once for fans and media people to wait until there is an event and a story before they cover it to death.

After all, should August 1 roll around and the heat of summer and the fatigue of the shorter rotation take its toll on Matsuzaka, I'm going to be writing this blog for my 7 readers saying I told you so. But the fans and the media will be saying and writing that we should have seen this coming with no mention of the fact that they created the hype that failed. And that's going to make me sick to my stomach and even more bitter than I am now.

First, I'm sorry about that last post. It just wasn't funny. Between that and the extended rant on the Country Music Television 100 Greatest Duets of All Time Countdown, my readership has dropped significantly. Part of the problem is that I'm a bad blogger. I just don't want to post as often as I should to draw enough traffic to this site consistently. I also don't want to be that guy that writes one or two original sentences and then blogs about what every other blog is blogging.

The rest of the problem is that I've been in a bad mood lately. Baseball season is starting up again and the optimism of Red Sox Nation has been aggravating me. Not that you haven't heard 10,000 times at this point, but Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched a near flawless round of batting practice the other day. I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it again, but enough already. JA Adande was absolutely right on Around the Horn today. Until he pitches and wins in a game that counts, who cares?

The answer to that not entirely rhetorical question is apparently 2 million Red Sox fans who hibernate until spring training starts. I think it was growing up with this phenomenon every time football season ended that turned me into the bitter enemy of Red Sox Nation that writes this blog in my darksome lair. Actually, it's only dark because I don't feel like getting up and turning on the light. Plus, when does anyone ever get a chance to use a word like darksome in this day and age. But back to the matter at hand...

Red Sox pitching coach John Farrell assures us that Matsuzaka is as advertised. Leaving aside for a moment the question of how serious were Red Sox hitters taking a batting practice session this early in the training program, the real question is what did we expect the pitching coach to say? Could it be lost on Mr. Farrell that he got the job because the pitching coach was one of those purged in the race to play the blame game after last season's collapse? Is it not present in the back of his mind that Francona probably won't survive another season if they don't make the playoffs?

I would be much more convinced that he's giving the media his honest opinion had he come out and said that Matsuzaka had this, that and the other thing to work on going forward. I didn't really expect him to come out and say that Matsuzaka sucked, but I just want to see one other person in New England who isn't out to praise or bury Caesar until some results are in. I guess that isn't entirely honest, since I'm hoping like crazy that Daisuke comes in and falls flat. But at least I'm waiting for it to happen before I start shooting off my mouth. Of course having to climb out of the burning wreckage of the Bears bandwagon a few weeks ago has tempered my eagerness to predict any outcomes for a while.

One thing I resent about this story is that for as much ESPN coverage as I watched over the weekend, I had to wade through half of that article in USA Today before I found out that the hitters Matsuzaka faced were minor leaguers. Even if he faced Ortiz, I would not have put much stock in the performance at this stage (considering pitchers and catchers have already been in camp for a week, and should be somewhat less rusty than position players). But to get all kinds of crazy over pitching to four minor leaguers on February 24th? That seems insanely optimistic, even for Red Sox Nation.

I have some concerns about the proposed three strike conduct policy being bandied about NFL circles these days, but you'll have to wait until tomorrow (on the off chance that you care what I have to say). The rest of today's post will be devoted to a disturbing trend that is creeping me out this week. I've had enough of people shaving their heads. First it was Britney Spears. Now it's Sean Salisbury.

I know that's not a link to a story on his shaved head. I'm not sure any stories exist on it at the moment. It's only an hour since I saw it on Sportscenter. But I found that site and had to link it. Join his online team at your own risk. I just think it's gone too far. He looks horrible, even though he wasn't exactly a looker in the first place. Britney looks terrible, but she wasn't better for the alleged drinking and drug use. So no more head shaving. Of course if I find out that he has cancer, I'll be looking to crawl into a hole and die of shame, but what would this blog be if I didn't have to come out and apologize for a statement that made me look like a giant tool every couple of weeks or so?

At the risk of being a giant hypocrite, you have to read Deadspin today. There are so many things worth noting. First, Rome is Burning will/might be preempted next fall for an NFL Live style show on college football with the Gameday crew. This is great news, even though I hate Lee Corso and Chris Fowler because I hate Jim Rome much more than the two of them combined. And the tool from Kentucky would have been perfect for a tool of interest segment if they hadn't beaten me to it.

Also there is the camouflaged Bible. I never realized how many defenseless animals go unshot because unwitting hunters scare them off with the Good Book. Now, if this were one of those fake Bibles hollowed out to hold booze bottles, I could see a market for it. Who knows, maybe I'm on the road to being a good blogger? Today, blogging about other blogs...two days from now...daily posts.

In my spare time, I've been looking around for a new tool of the week segment. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a tool who stood head and shoulders above the run of the mill tools that make up a good 3/4 of the American population. Since it's been well over a week without a tool, I'm giving up for the time being and renaming it the tool of interest segment, or maybe the tool of note segment. I have some time to decide, since I don't need to run one for a while.

To fill the tool void, one need go no further than boston.com, where one can discover strong evidence that the tools among us haven't gone to sleep just yet. There is, after all, Dan Shaughnessy and his never-ending stock of shallow premises, faithful obedience to John Henry and half-assed attempts to be hip.

I know I spend a lot of time attacking Dan Shaughnessy in this blog. To be fair, however, he is a terrible writer with no redeeming vices. He's lazy, opportunistic, a shameless puppet of Red Sox ownership and for some reason has been waging a one man war against Manny Ramirez for some time now. In case you're interested, a redeeming vice would be a good sense of humor, the knack for incorporating an interesting or relevant external reference into his work once in a while or evidence of some effort expended to earn his paycheck.

In this recent effort, he dragged down the 1960s band Procul Harum by dragging their song into this piece of sycophancy (not really a word in common use, but it should be) directed at John Henry. It might seem, for an instant, that the CHB isn't giving his real boss a back rub. But when you look at all his tough talk, it's directed at Henry's partner in his racing endeavor, Jack Roush.

A legitimate columnist would have devoted more than three sentences to the fact that the Red Sox have the highest ticket prices in the land. It's small matter that they could charge more. Just because you can do something, that isn't moral justification for it. But John Henry is one sharp cookie, he reads about commodities and investments at 4 AM. I bet Warren Buffett is cowering in terror in his Omaha empire, just waiting for the day that John Henry becomes America's most renowned investor.

One would think that his status as Henry's mouthpiece would make him less likely to wage a crusade against Manny Ramirez. But then one must remember that Henry's regime has been characterized by a number of hints and hopes that Manny would continue being Manny in some other uniform. Rumors of trades and demands for trades have been floated so often, one no longer pays them much attention. It does seem clear that this team has been trying to make Manny expendable. Why else did they bring in JD Drew?

Consider it for a moment. JD Drew has come to a team at great expense to play the outfield. The team already has Manny Ramirez, Coco Crisp and Wily Mo Pena manning the outfield positions. Depth is an excellent thing to have, but is it a commodity to be purchased at the rate of $70 million over the next five years. One thing is clear, the Red Sox could never dare move Manny without a big name to fill the hole in the lineup and in the fan's hearts.

The real problem with Manny as a baseball player and a man isn't that he's eccentric. Rather, it is that he hasn't shown the proper veneration for Dan Shaughnessy, baseball expert, genius, writer and man. Instead of genuflecting and kissing the CHB's ring as though he were the Pope, Manny hustled even less after the CHB upbraided him for not hustling enough. I'm sure legislators the world over will finally get off their asses and make that a capital crime any day now, but until them, maybe the CHB will learn how to live with disappointment.

This article is a representative sample of the campaign against Manny. It begs the question, what does Manny Ramirez owe to the team, the fans and the media? He is paid to hit, and he does. If he lives in his own world, but produces big offensive numbers he doesn't need to live the way the CHB thinks he ought to. Ironically, a Red Sox outfielder who produced fantastic numbers but enjoyed a stormy relationship with the Boston media was the subject of a vast number of puff pieces written by our fickle friend the CHB.

Manny Ramirez isn't Ted Williams. He's not the player Ted was, not the patriot that Ted was and not the philanthropist that Ted was. But he shows up and hits for power and average, and he drives in runs. Beyond that there is no obligation he must meet. The CHB conveniently mentions that the rest of the team is furious with Manny, but doesn't dare criticize him. Without a player on record, either the CHB is making it all up, or the team is full of gutless frauds. Either way works for me, since a team full of gutless frauds won't win it all and I hate the CHB.

It's amazing to me that he can criticize Manny for shutting it down early last season while signing the return of JD Drew with bated breath. Apparently, Red Sox Nation is dumb enough to believe that this leopard will change his spots. JD Drew is selfish, injury prone fraud and he'll be inserted in the line up on Opening Day. Just wait until Red Sox Nation wakes up to find out that it missed Trot Nixon when Drew plays 100 games and has an even more mysterious injury than the one that felled Manny late last season.

It is entirely possible that this was part of the deal to net Matsuzaka, as many have speculated. And we all know that Daisuke Matsuzaka has already been engraved on the CY Young Award for the American League for the next 12 years. So it's win-win, even if Drew flops in Boston, as illogical as that seems to the man who isn't enamored of the Red Sox. Even if Drew never gets a hit, the Red Sox win twice because Matsuzaka will be the greatest thing ever to come to America.

Perhaps the optimism that surrounds a pitcher that has yet to throw so much as a pitch in North American professional baseball is so shocking to me because I was born a pessimist. Or maybe my hatred of the Red Sox has clouded my capacity for rational thought. Or it's possible that I'm right. Who knows. All I know it that the CHB is own way probably jinxed Matsuzaka in a misguided effort to be cute and folksy by calling him "Elvis Matsuzaka."

And Shaughnessy had to go and ruin one of my predictions. He ran a deathwatch column on a Red Sox alumnus and it wasn't Carl Yastremski. In my post where I introduced the idea, I predicted it would be Carl Yastremski because the only other Red Sox alumnus I could think of who might reasonably stir enough fan interest to excuse the laziness on the part of the CHB was Johnny Pesky. And if it weren't for the pole in right field and the fact that he hangs around the team day in and day out, who would even know him?

Of course, if I even thought about him, I would have immediately gone with Dom DiMaggio. Not so much because he was a star (he was good in center field, but not great), but because of the massive celebrity of his brother Joe. Knowing the CHB and his vanilla writing style and complete lack of creativity, I should have seen this sentence coming:

There were nine kids in the home of the Sicilian immigrants at 2047 Taylor St. in the North Beach section of San Francisco. Dad Giuseppe was a fisherman, mom Rosalie a former schoolteacher, and three of the five boys would become major league baseball players -- one of them rising to the level of American icon, celebrated in literature by Ernest Hemingway and in song by Paul Simon.

Wow, how cool is that. Not only did he have an intern look into DiMaggio's vital records, but he listened to Mrs. Robinson and might have perused The Old Man and the Sea. God help us all.