Baseball players not playing for the 2014 Yankees.

"This was about 11 o’clock on Saturday morning before a Red Sox-Yankees game, second Saturday of the season, and Joe Girardi wasn’t just explaining why Derek Jeter wasn’t in his starting lineup — maybe you missed it, but Jeter’s retiring at the end of the season — Girardi was also showing you why it is so easy to root for him, and how well he does handling a job as big as there is in sports."

I sure hope ths is a mindblowing quote from Girardi.


“ 'I have to manage (Jeter) with a focus of winning games and keeping him healthy, not being a farewell tour,' Girardi said. 'I wasn’t hired to put on a farewell tour.' "

Yes, Jeter is old.


"Right there, before Hiroki Kuroda threw the first pitch on Saturday afternoon or a run was scored, ..."

On account of it being about 11 o'clock in the morning and the game started about 1 o'clock in the afternoon.


" ... Girardi had given you the money quote of the day, and the headline."

Jesus, you really don't even bother watching the games, do you?

McCann's two HRs didn't surpass that quote as the headline?


"But Girardi, who wasn’t being pressed on his decision or braced in the interview room, talked about that decision as if he wasn’t just playing to those of us sitting across from him in the interview area across from the Yankee clubhouse, but playing to the bleachers as well."

Well, gee.

A manager was using the press to communicate with the fans.

Maybe if Girardi kisses Lupica's butt just enough, Lupica will write a nice article.


"So Jeter was a story on Saturday because he wouldn’t be starting a day game after a night game."

Was Jeter a story? Was this a headline? Was this a money quote?

I haven't seen mention of these things anywhere else.

It's also not the first time this season that Jeter has been rested.


"But the more intriguing absent player for the Yankees is the one — Cano — who will be missing all the games this season, and next season, and the eight after that because he is playing for the Mariners. The Yankees try to beat the Red Sox and everybody else now without their best hitter and one of the best in the game."

Errr ... nice transition.

If you wanted to write an article about Cano, why didn't you just write an article about Cano?


"The Yankees lose Jeter next season. But now they’ve lost Cano forever, because of a business decision so clearly informed by what the end of Alex Rodriguez’s 10-year contract looks like, and the disaster it has become for them, and not just financially, even with Rodriguez off the books this season because of his drug suspension.

Once Jeter stood there at shortstop at Yankee Stadium and had Rodriguez, when he could still play and still hit, on his right and Cano, with his own immense talent for baseball, on his left. Both gone from Yankee Stadium. Rodriguez’s locker, no name plate on it, is next to Jacoby Ellsbury’s now. Cano’s locker, to Jeter’s right, near the entrance to the showers, belongs to Carlos Beltran, whose job it is to supply runs and danger in the middle of the lineup the way Cano did for a long time."

Thanks for the informative update regarding the layout of the Yankee locker room.

Guess what, everybody? Beltran's locker is near the entrance to the showers.


I don't get it. Are you trying to convince us that you were inside the Yankee locker room? We believe you.

The rest of the information provided is very old news. Jeter's retiring, Cano's gone, ARod is supspended, Beltran and Ellsbury have joined the Yankees.


"Still: Taking Cano out of the lineup is like taking a Cabrera away, or a Mike Trout, or a Papi Ortiz."

If Papi is on steroids, that is.

Yes, we are in total agreement. The Yankees lost their best hitter. That was in December. This is April.


"You have to know the deal with managers and coaches, whether they’ve got long-term contracts or not: They want to do everything in their power to make sure the farewell tour isn’t their own."

Money quote, Lupica! Money quote!

So your point is ... well, I'm not sure. It sure took a long time to get there.

Jeter is old, and Jeter no long plays with Cano or ARod, whose lockers no longer house their clothes, since they're no longer on the team, so why would their clothes be in that locker if they're no longer on the team? The manager of the Yankees will have to manage the players on the team instead of managing the players who used to be on the team, and some of the current players are old, and all of the current players are inferior to Cano, who is no longer on the team. and whose locker is now occupied by Ellsbury ... I mean, Beltran ... wait, who got Cano's old locker?

In summary, Alex Rodriguez.


"Oh, I get it:

Now Alex Rodriguez just wants to be left alone."

Yes, why won't your newspaper just leave him alone?

Or can you at least write something interesting about him?

In the last week or so, I've read a lot about ARod doing nothing.

Good investigative reporting about the empty nameplate on his locker. Almost as good as the article about how ARod was not going to be a MLB TV analyst.

Answering a question nobody was asking.

Unless someone was asking whether or not Alex Rodriguez would make a good TV baseball analyst.

I knew that while ARod was under suspension that the one-trick-pony so-called sportswriters at the Daily News would stretch the story past its breaking point.

In order to keep their ARod quota, they're just make stuff up out of thin air.

Nova isn't a big mystery.

"Five years into the Ivan Nova experiment, the Yankees still have no idea what to expect whenever the big fellow climbs a mound.

The maddening version of Nova showed up again at Yankee Stadium on Tuesday, when the Yankees lost a very ugly one, 14-5, to the Orioles. His pitches strayed way up in the strike zone, he was hammered by virtually every Baltimore batter and soon enough Nova was walking off the mound to a cascade of jeers, having given up 10 hits and seven runs in 3.2 innings."

He's a good pitcher, not a great pitcher.

He's a good pitcher who had a lousy game.

Besides, I thought it was Jeter's fault.


"Maybe he could have been a bit luckier. There was a moment in the first inning, a potential double-play grounder, when Derek Jeter might have rescued Nova. Instead, Jeter looked every bit his 39 years going to his left and the ball scooted under the shortstop’s glove."

Nice.

Jeter's lack of range is a thing now.

"In the first inning, after Nick Markakis had led off the game with a single to center field, the Orioles’ designated hitter, Delmon Young, hit a ground ball toward the shortstop side of second base. After a slow couple of steps, Jeter lunged but could not snag the grounder, which went into center for a single. A shortstop with better range than Jeter’s — he is rated near the bottom in most defensive metrics — could have turned that grounder into a double play, or at least a forceout."

It's going viral.

It's a meme.

Gee, this has been a Felz meme for 19 years. This was a Felz meme before Felz even heard of memes.

What next?

Are people going to notice that Gardner strikes out too often?

Jeter posing for his statue again.

"There was no pomp or pageantry at the Yankees' second home game of the season Tuesday. Nor much performance, either. A day after the fun of Derek Jeter's final home opener and a Core Four reunion, the Yanks fell flat against Baltimore in an ugly 14-5 loss in which they surrendered 20 hits.

Ivan Nova couldn't get out of the fourth inning and Jeter couldn't get to a ground ball up the middle in the first inning that might've saved the Yankees some headaches."

The Yankees lost 14-5 and Jeter hasn't had range to his left in the past 19 years.


"With an older infield of Jeter at short and Brian Roberts at second, infield range was one of the Yankee concerns entering the season."

Right.

Still, the Yankees lost 14-5 and Jeter hasn't had range to his left in the past 19 years.

So the Daily News has identified infield range as a Yankee concern ... and Jeter misses a ground ball in a game that the Yankees lose 14-5.

I suppose if you 're predisposed to look for something, you're bound to find it.

Slag on Teixeira all you want.

Few would disagree that Teixeira should bat lower in the lineup.

I just question the timeliness of this article, what with Teixeira being on the DL and all. It's kind of like explaining why Raul Ibanez should be dropped in the order.

Pondering the definition of "justice" a couple of days after the completion of a series in which Melky Cabrera hit three HRs against the Yankees.

Kiss the ring of Bud Selig, get a smaller suspension. Extortion in the pursuit of justice.

Alex Rodriguez story.

I had a feeling the Daily News crack staff would find itself twiddling its thumbs. You know, baseball season has started.

Alex, I'll take "things a hack sportswriter might say" for $1,000.

Actual summary to Mike Lupica's Mets' game story. Makes me wonder if "they" will find Amelia Earhart before Lupica finds a funny punchline:

"Carlos Torres and Scott Rice had come out of the bullpen behind Gee in the seventh and made you wish Mayor Bill de Blasio, who’d thrown out the first pitch, could come back in to pitch; both making you wonder if they find Jimmy Hoffa on this day before he found the strike zone."

I like how Jimmy Hoffa is still his go-to "missing object" reference.

Oh, and he opens and closes with the Bill de Blasio joke. Because that joke is that damn good. But he explains that de Blasio had thrown out the first pitch, just in case you didn't get the subtle, subversive genius of the joke.

Insert PED joke here.

Nunez sent to minors.

Can't say the press didn't see it coming.

Gee, Mike Lupica is rooting against Jacoby Ellsbury.

While specifically dismissing the potential health concerns of Jonathan Niese and Grady Sizemore, he's predicting doom for Ellsbury. Because Lupica knows the future health of humans. I guess he knows because he's God.

A deity would probably understand the difference between pre-free agency deals and free agency deals:

"If you’re keeping score at home, the Angels keep 22-year-old Mike Trout on essentially the same deal that the Yankees had to give 30-year-old Jacoby Ellsbury."

And half of what Seattle paid for Cano and 40% of what the Tigers paid for Cabrera. More or less, numbers don't matter, anyway, when we round off to the nearest 1/2-billion.

Before you discuss MLB contracts, google "free agency" and maybe you can figure out how this works. It's basic stuff.

Matt Harvey a Yankee?

Well, no:

"We certainly can dismiss this as a story for another day, because Harvey cannot be a free agent until after the 2018 season, and so much can happen between now and then."

Consider it dismissed.

This is why I love Maddon as a manager.

He messes with the batters' heads:

"This spring, the club has utilized more defensive shifts against opponents – putting three infielders on either the right or left side against a pull hitter. And it’s not just against the David Ortizes or the Jose Bautistas of the AL East.

'Any little edge we can get. The numbers don’t lie,' first baseman Mark Teixeira said of the data behind the philosophy. 'We’re just trying to save a run here and there if we can.'

A sampling of pro scouts following the Yankees this spring have said it was inevitable; that the Yankees’ aging infield – with range issues at third base, shortstop and second base – had to evolve a better defensive strategy.

Others say it’s just a sign of the times, with more clubs hooked into statistical analysis."


Naturally, Teixeira doesn't see the value in picking his spots:

"The extra infielder in shallow right field has turned Teixeira’s share of would-be singles into outs, though it hasn’t altered his perspective.

'I’m trying to hit line drives, hit balls in the alley, hit home runs,' Teixeira said. 'When I start trying to hit groundballs the other way, it’s time for me to retire.' "

Is that a threat or a promise?

Baseball!

A 63.00 ERA sounds rusty to me.

Two diet cokes in five hours.

Put him in the Hall of Fame and then stop talking about him.

Not many hits, but Teixeira really enjoying being out there.

Jason Giambi forgives Barry Bonds, good to know.

Joey Votto says it out loud:

"It would have been challenging playing during that era, and certainly without using drugs it would have been challenging. Whereas now, if you use drugs you're kind of the black sheep, it seems like. Who knows how many guys are using something?"

Bill Madden is enabling Terry Collins.

Approximately one year ago, Collins was dishing some spiel about Johan Santana pitching 200 innings and every starting pitcher on the Mets pitching 200 innings.

With the understanding that nothing is impossible, Collins once again crosses the fine line between optimism and delusion. It's difficult to tell if Madden is speaking for himself or relaying Collins's over-the-top prognoses, but this article is basically predicting everyone on the Mets to be an MVP candidate:

"But while Collins’ attempts to keep his head while all of those above him in the Mets command are seemingly losing theirs by suggesting anything less than 90 wins from this Mets team this season will be viewed as a major disappointment, the manager at least has an idea of what he’s going to need to get from each of his players to achieve that goal. Injuries are not part of the equation, and while Collins’ expectations may have seemed, on the surface, a bit of a stretch in some cases, it’s not as if these players haven’t demonstrated an ability to attain them."


A bit of a stretch ...


"The time is now for Travis d’Arnaud, who must assert himself as the No. 1 receiver by staying healthy and catching a minimum of 125-130 games and hitting at least 15 homers, which he did twice in the minors."


In the minors?

I hit more than 15 HRs in a season lots of times. In fact, while playing Atari RealSports Baseball, I have hit 15 HRs in one game. Does that qualify as a demonstrated ability to attain this goal?

1) 15 HRs is not a lot.

2) HRs are not the only stat in baseball. He can be an effective offensive player if he has a lot of singles, doubles, and walks.

3) He hit one HR last season in 99 at-bats. Fifteen doesn't just sound optimistic, it sounds completely irrelevant. If his batting average is floundering below .240 at the all star break, Collins and Madden are just going to talk about how well he handles the pitching staff.


"No matter whom it winds up being — Duda or Davis — Collins agreed he needs to get a minimum of 20 homers and 80 RBI out of this power position."

20/80 combined from your first basemen? It's an improvement from last year. Still pretty bad.


"No matter where Chris Young plays in the outfield, Collins is looking for him to match or surpass his career bests of 32 homers and 91 RBI. No one expects Curtis Granderson to approach his 40-plus homer production of 2011-12 now that he’s playing at Citi Field, but anything less than 25 bombs and 90-plus RBI, especially if he also has 170-plus strikeouts, will be a huge negative for the Mets. In the case of Eric Young Jr., if he wants to keep his place in the outfield, he needs get on base more — think a .340-.350 on base percentage, as opposed to his career .325 number by using his speed to get more bunt hits. If he does that, Collins sees him scoring 125 runs and stealing 50-60 bases out of the leadoff spot. That, especially, is a major ingredient for a 90-win season."

Wow.

If Eric Young Jr. steals 60 bases and scores 125 runs, I'll give him the NL MVP and the Mets could win 100 games. Since we're being delusional, why not go all the way?

He is a 28-year-old with 173 career runs, but he's going to score 125 this year.

The Mets got Mike Trout on the cheap. Who knew?


"But considering the Mets’ uncertain bullpen, it is almost imperative for Collins to get 175-plus innings out of four of his starters. When it came to closer Bobby Parnell and his offseason neck surgery, Collins held up his crossed fingers and said: 'I’m going to assume Bobby will be fine, because I have to, and assuming that he is, I’m looking at 40-50 saves there, with 65-70 appearances from my set-up guys.' "

Fifty saves for Bobby Parnell?

In one season?

In the 2014 season, Bobby Parnell is going to save 50 games?

Bobby Parnell, out of nowhere, is going to lead the majors in saves and shatter the Mets' single-season record for saves?

The problem is, with Eric Young Jr. scoring 125 runs and everybody driving in 90+, you'll win all your games by too many runs. Parnell won't get enough save opportunities.


You know what? I'll go the other way. I'll predict less than 25 saves and losing the closer job due to injury or poor performance. How's that for an optimistic prediction?

Huh?

I think Joel Sherman is exploring dadaism:

"The Mets told Jhonny Peralta they had a Ruben Tejada problem, but only offered him two years to solve it or one fewer than the superior team in New York, the Yankees, were proposing and two fewer than arguably the best-run team in the whole sport, the Cardinals."

Who said what to whom about who?

To Bill Madden, everyone on the Mets is good.

Is that decimal point in the right place?

I thought he was gonna be good.

Justice

Productive player, lazy player.

"You should want the guy on the field helping his team win instead of making an unnecessary show out of sprinting for the sake of public perception. And Cano, through his supposedly unacceptable explanations, seems to realize that. It’s not lazy, it’s smart."

Of course I don't want a player to get hurt. I fail to see how running 90 feet is a dangerous act. If it is, then every motion on the baseball field is dangerous and the only way to avoid injury is to avoid playing altogether.

As for the statistical GP analysis of Cano vs. Jeter, plenty of players (Pete Rose comes to mind) hustled and also played long careers.


But let's say, for argument's sake, that Cano has avoided injury by jogging to first base. Let's pretend that Cano's lack of hustle is the intelligent result of his own cost-benefit analysis. He wants to stay healthy, and that's why he jogs on infield grounders. He's not lazy, he's "smart." (I almost choked on those words, simply because of the mere implication that Cano thoughtfully analyzed this in the first place.)

How do you explain jogging on doubles ... getting thrown out at second base on line drives off the wall?

How do you explain his unwillingness to catch throws from the catcher on attempted steals?

Or his unwillingness to dive after ground balls?

How do you explain his lack of stolen bases? Cano's 162-game average is 4 stolen bases with 3 caught stealing. Thurman Munson had more stolen bases per year. Thurman Munson had three nicknames according to baseball-reference.com: Tugboat, Squatty Body, and the Walrus.

How do you explain getting caught twice in one season on the Jeff Nelson fake-to-third, throw-to-first pickoff move? Twice! In one season! That has to be a record. Was that a smart play because the possibility of running 270 more feet was too much for his hamstrings to take?

Is he a $24 million-per-year DH who will never get an infield hit or take an extra base?

Because if running the bases and playing the field is too dangerous for a professional baseball player, I'm not too sure what's left. Walking (which he doesn't do too often) and hitting homeruns.


Look, on balance, Cano's positives far outweigh his negatives.

But please don't call me crazy for pointing out the obvious all these years; please don't turn laziness into an asset; and please, please, please, most of all, PLEASE don't insult my intelligence by proclaiming Cano's lack of hustle is a well-thought-out strategy.

I don't doubt that Cano spends a lot of time in the batting cage. Like I said before, that activity can only be described as "work" to a professional baseball community who has forgotten what "work" is.

Calamity!

"The Yankees are set up for the same calamity this year that befell them a season ago. They have areas of real fragility and little in the way of strong second-tier options."

If the Yankees' 87-win, third-place finish is a calamity, I wonder what noun Joel Sherman uses to describe Toronto's 2013 season .... or Houston's 2013 season.


"In 2013, as they used a franchise-record 56 players, that meant fire-drill acquisitions of underwhelming players such as Ben Francisco, Lyle Overbay and Vernon Wells, and too many at-bats ultimately for lightweights such as David Adams, Reid Brignac and Luis Cruz."

Overbay was 2nd on the team in RBIs and one of the best investments in the league. The Yankees got 14 HRs and 59 RBIs for $1.25 million. Not that Overbay was overwhelming, he was just wasn't that underwhelming.


"Well, 'The Day After Tomorrow 2' is in pre-production. The Yankees began the offseason with voluminous holes and budgetary constraints on how much could be laid out for 2014. They went big for Carlos Beltran, Jacoby Ellsbury, Brian McCann and Masahiro Tanaka. The result is the Yankees have a terrific top 15 players on their roster."

Awesome.

Let's hope they stay healthy and the Yankees win the World Series.

In the meantime, I'll rent "The Day After Tomorrow" so I can keep up with your pointless pop culture references.

After he leaves, critics are public with their criticisms.

Somebody has never heard of Eduardo Nunez and his 10 career homeruns.

You answered your own question.

He fought because he had nothing to lose, other than lawyer's fees. His career is over either way, right?:

"There’s no way he’ll ever play for the Yankees again. The team’s hierarchy would just as soon buy out the remainder of Rodriguez’s contract than allow him back in the clubhouse. Rodriguez’s teammates are long past the fatigue factor with his controversies. Don’t think for a minute they wanted him to show up in Tampa this month."


I think they'll buy him out.


"So where does A-Rod land in 2015? Finishing out his days with another team is a long shot at best. No owner would risk Selig’s wrath by signing the most hated man in the game’s modern history. Selig used his own scorched-earth policy to finish off Rodriguez, making it clear what happens to his enemies."


Well, Selig won't be commissioner anymore, but it's a lovely thought. The ex-commissioner doling out justice, deciding who gets to play major league baseball. Selig should return all his career earnings and live out the rest of his days on a park bench.

As for a MLB team's willingness to sign ARod, they probably question ARod's ability to produce.


"That’s Selig’s enduring legacy, proving he’d go to any lengths to wipe out PEDs. Rodriguez’s camp never got over the shock of discovering that Selig was even tougher and more ruthless than the slugger himself. And that sent a chilling message, not only to A-Rod, but anyone else considering using performance enhancers."

This is a misinterpretation of reality.


"But that’s not to say Selig’s victory was complete. It is not. The truth is, Rodriguez would’ve never been caught had it not been for a disgruntled employee at Biogenesis. Had Anthony Bosch not been hard up for cash and paid his workers in a timely fashion, incriminating documents — the ones that cemented A-Rod’s guilt as a drug user — never would have ended up at the Miami New Times.

Rodriguez claimed — rightfully — that he never failed a drug test between 2009 and 2012, when he was involved with Bosch. It’s a fact that sends its own warning to the commissioner’s office. The sport administered thousands of random drug tests in 2013 and was unable to unearth a single positive result."

The owners and commissioner sure cashed in.

While Selig uses a $100 bill to light a retirement cigar, he has a quick retort to Klapsch's claim: "You don't think MLB's drug use has unearthed any positive results? Have you seen my bank account lately?"

Truth Prevails

Which is terrific, because the obfuscation of the Truth is always bad:

"This is what you were told, for months, about the guy who used to play third base for the Yankees:

You were told that it was a witch hunt. You were told, by a marching-and-chowder society in the media whose membership somehow kept declining as the facts of the case came out, that commissioner Bud Selig needed to testify in an arbitration case, or the world would stop spinning on its axis."

It still was a witch hunt and Bud Selig is still a fraudulent turd.

I don't know what marching-and-chowder society even means.

I don't feel ignorant, either, because the author of this stupid phrase has a decades-long history of saying stupid things.


"You were told that anybody who kept pointing out that the guy never told his version of things under oath had some kind of agenda. So it was Major League Baseball who was out to get Alex Rodriguez, or the New York Daily News, or the New York Yankees, or their team doctors, or Columbia-Presbyterian."

Personal animus towards one man, as demonstrated by several of the parties listed above, led to a 211-game suspension instead of the 50-game or 100-game that all the other cheaters were given.

The Daily News had no influence; the doctors were most likely competent and unfairly accused; the Yankees and MLB? No doubt they were out go get ARod.


"Rodriguez wanted you to believe that after all those players in the Biogenesis case got suspended in one day last summer, 13 players, the most sweeping set of sanctions in nearly 100 years in baseball, that Selig needed to make an example out of Rodriguez, professional victim."

This is accurate. ARod overplayed his lying hand. I don't think many people believed ARod after the others accepted their penalties.

The thing is, when you start with the idea that "truth prevails," and then you fail to suspend David Ortiz or Chris Davis ... then I am justified in telling you to get off your high horse. You look quite ridiculous up there. You're a wee man and your feet can't even reach the spurs.


"And somehow he kept getting people to go along with him, to act as if Al Rodriguez was the most falsely accused man since Al Dreyfus."

Nobody knows who Al Dreyfus is. I had to look it up on Wikipedia. Just because they both have first names that begin with "Al" hardly makes this an apt metaphor.

Must I explain the purpose of metaphors?

The purpose of metaphors is to simplify a complex subject. If your readers are having difficulty understanding Alex Rodriguez's victim strategy, perhaps you can point them towards a separate well-known victim and your readership would quickly understand.

You referenced a French story from 1894.

Again, perhaps I'm ignorant of something that everyone else knows about, but I doubt it.


"You were supposed to believe that the real issue was the methods MLB had used to enforce its drug policy, not the methods Rodriguez had used to get baseball drugs from Anthony Bosch and use them."

Both things are issues.


"Baseball’s investigators were the bad guys, not the player who seemed to have redeemed himself after his drug admissions of the spring of 2009, who helped the Yankees — mightily — win a World Series and then went looking to Bosch for a different kind of help, almost as if he went straight to Biogenesis from the Canyon of Heroes."

Both are bad guys.

Either/or is a child's way of perceiving the world.


"You were supposed to believe that A-Rod only went to Bosch for diet and nutritional advice. Or that Bosch couldn’t be trusted because he was some lousy grafter drug dealer, and never ask — if that was true — what Rodriguez was doing with him in the first place."

Yeah, that Francesa interview was nuts. I think it should win a Pulitzer Prize ... Francesa got ARod to lie to his face on record. Most compelling radio sports interview I've heard since Lupica had a parade of nameless ESPN hacks on his afternoon show ... the radio show which constantly interviews ESPN personalities in its unending pure search for the Truth ... the radio show which plays Coldplay for its theme music, as if listening to Lupica's screechy voice wasn't torturous enough.


"At long last, all those who kept saying he had been overcharged and overprosecuted saw why the arbitrator, Fredric Horowitz, ruled the way he did. No longer was it about irrelevancies, or the circus the whole thing became. It was about that."

Well, technically speaking, Horowitz ruled that ARod was overprosecuted ... he got his sentence reduced, after all.


"The circus leaves town now six months after it really began last August. Alex Rodriguez finally faces facts, even if he never told his version of them under oath. He could never make the evidence go away. He goes."

It will be interesting to see which Yankee player becomes Lupica's new target. Maybe throw us a changeup and go after the Mets who take steroids.

Because, you know ... your readers celarly value the Truth above all else.


"All winter long, we heard that Hal Steinbrenner had to channel his dad, absolutely do that, 100%, and spend as much money as the media kept telling him to spend on the 2014 Yankees."

It's still winter, you yutz.


"But you know how Hal could really channel the old man?

By making somebody or anybody accountable one of these days for the state of the Yankee farm system."

Well, sure. The Yankee farm system is definitely in trouble, but we pretty much know the reasons why and the difficulties of getting good draft picks when you win the division 20 years in a row.


Funny how Lupica sort of defends George Steinbrenner after decades of ripping George Steinbrenner.

So now that George is dead, just replace the name "George" with the name "Hal" and use the same template.

I like criticizing the Yankees' front office, and the readers seem to like it, so I'll just do that some more.

Nice work, hack.

Joe Tacopina v. Daily News

I don't know what to expect from this lawsuit, but I can guarantee that the Daily News sports reporters will treat Mr. Tacopina with fairness and journalistic impartiality.

You're so vain ...

You probably think this article is about you:

"Now Rodriguez supposedly 'disappears' from baseball for a year. But don't be surprised if he somehow finds a way to stay in the news. He always does. He'll probably resurface somewhere, throwing off more fake sunbeams about how restorative this 'timeout' will be, when the truth is seeing his career and legacy come to this has to be killing him deep down inside."

If you are going to write an article about him, please don't complain about his unending news coverage.

This ought to be good ...

Actually, I kinda agree with the felon.

The Bronx is Vernon

Repent your sins to your Lord.

Kiss the ring of Selig and you might get a nice writeup on MLB.com.

I almost stopped in the middle of the first sentence ...

"The Yankees missed the playoffs in 2008 and immediately went out and spent around $425 million to get CC Sabathia — the way he is losing weight, he is probably just C Sabathia now —"

Did you laugh at that joke?

Did you find it humorous?

CC Sabathia is losing so much weight, his name is probably just C Sabathia.

Well, I have bad news for you. If you laughed at that, you should probably remove yourself from society.


"and A.J. Burnett and Mark Teixeira. Now they miss the playoffs in 2013, and money like A-Rod’s has come off the books and they spend nearly $475 million on new baseball players, newest being Masahiro Tanaka, greatest pitcher Yankee fans have never seen, but one they absolutely had to have or the monuments would all fall down."

Lupica doesn't understand simple finance.

The Yankees didn't actually spend $900 million in two off-seasons. They committed to spend $900 million, divided by several players, over the course of several years.

There is a big, big difference.


Also, I don't think "missing the playoffs" affects the spending patterns of the Yankees as much as he seems to think.

Even in the midst of a three-peat, was there a sudden reluctance to sign free agents? Did the Yankees become penny-pinchers in 2010?


"That is $900 million in total contracts in just two cold baseball winters, so you can only imagine what might happen next winter if somehow the Yankees, spending the way they always have, can’t win their division or get one of the two wild cards in the American League."

I can only imagine!

I think, if the Yankees miss the playoffs this year (shorthand for "can't win their division or get one of the two wild cards in the American League"), they will spend approximately $2 trillion in free agents signings in the 2014 off-season.

Bullpen alone? $400 million.

They will buy every left-handed pitcher in baseball just to get them off other teams. Send them to the minors if you have to or just pay them not to pitch in the majors.

They will sell Yankee Stadium and become a modern-day barnstorming team, intentionally splitting the games of a double-header ... and then charging extra for the tie-breaking third game. Their team will be sponsored by Chico's Bail Bonds and all the monuments will be torn down and replaced by a Bingo Long statue.

I feel relieved that others criticize Selig.

As Selig plans his farewell tour / PR blitz, it ought to be obvious that the ARod takedown was a personal vendetta.

With all due respect ...

... you really have no idea:

"The testosterone creams and lozenges, the human growth hormone, the IGF (insulin-like growth factor), the pregnenolone (steroid that may hide the use of anabolic steroids), the clomiphene (fertility drug also used to increase testosterone levels), the DHEA and the GHRP 2/6 (banned hormones said to increase output of HGH, and all the rest of A-Rod's complex drug regimen amounted to what the head of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency Wednesday called 'the most potent and sophisticated drug program developed for an athlete that we've ever seen.'

And that includes Lance Armstrong's sophisticated protocol."

Popping a bunch of pills on a schedule now qualifies as sophisticated. The pills that gave Alex Rodriguez the immense power to hit baseballs to the warning track.


"We have ever seen" seems to be the key phrase.


World War II, a mathematician was charged with developing the most efficient armor for fighter planes. The initial study involved examining the bullet holes on the planes. Seems obvious. Put the armor in the places where planes get hit the most.

But, no.

These were the planes that made it back.

The planes that got shot down? We can't study their bullet hole patterns.

The answer is in the data we can't see. The planes that made it back survived the attack. The planes that didn't make it back needed to be strengthened. So the armor needs to go where we don't see the bullet holes, ensuring maximum protection.


It should go without saying, but here it is, anyway.

The most sophisticated doping regimens are precisely the doping regimens that are evading your detection.

I don't blame the arbitrator.

He's a pawn in Selig's final PR blitz.

Comforting to see that not everyone is buying it:

"At the end of the 60 Minutes report, all is ugliness. A-Rod is guilty and lying, surely, Anthony Bosch seems a first-class lowlife, Rob Manfred comes across as Old Man Potter from 'It’s a Wonderful Life,' and the only winner in the whole mess — THE ONLY WINNER — seems to be the drugs themselves, which apparently work miracles and, if used right, are undetectable.

So what point of all this again?

Scott Pelley ends the report like so: 'And Bud Selig has announced his retirement from the game. Part of his legacy is the establishment of the toughest anti-doping rules in all of American pro sports.'

There it is. Bud Selig, who has been commissioner over the worst drug scandal to ever hit American sports, who presided over a game that ten years ago DID NOT TEST for drugs, got 60 Minutes to put that line at the end. Part of his legacy is this glorious chapter of buying papers from Bobby, threatening and paying off Boesch and nailing Alex Rodriguez.

The report ended and only then, if you watch the Internet videos, do you get the biggest lesson of all. You get to see who sponsored the report.

Viagra."

Madden gets his pound of flesh.

"Through all this disgrace, A-Rod sounds as if he still thinks he controls his destiny in baseball.

Well, here’s a bulletin for him: He controls nothing."


Maybe you can lend him some of your incontinence medication, you miserable old turd.


"It was not surprising, given his narcissistic, delusional nature, that A-Rod’s immediate response to the record drug suspension baseball arbitrator Fredric Horowitz levied on him Saturday was defiance. The deck was stacked against him from Day 1, the arbitrator was biased, Major League Baseball was corrupt in the manner in which it made its case against him, the Yankees and Randy Levine conspired with MLB to get his contract voided and, by golly, he is going to court to get exonerated for all of this."

Let's go through it:

Deck was stacked; arbitrator was not biased; MLB was corrupt; Yankees and MLB did not conspire, but they Yankees are happy that MLB did their dirty work for them.

So ARod is correct in 2 out of 4 of his complaints summarized herein.


He is guilty of taking steroids. That should be 50 - 100 games, like everyone else. (Yes, he foolishly turned down a shorter banishment, but that was before Bosch came forward. When hit with 211 or threatened with a lifetime ban, I'd imagine the cost-benefit analysis shifts.)

He is guilty of being a narcissist. Not a crime. Zero games.

Hie is guilty of being delusional. Not a crime. Zero games.

In fact, many of the ballplayers who Madden happily covers are guilty of at least one of these things, if not all three.


While Madden briefly mentioned the idea that ARod ratted out other players, that is a worse crime than anything mentioned above. It may be true, it may not be true, it's kind of hard to tell. Lots of leaks.

Some rumors indicated that ARod was co-owner of Biogeneis or got a finder's fee.  If so, that's not just a suspension, that's prison.

But here's what gets me the most. Boschs' reliability is questionable for sure, but Bosch suggested on "60 Minutes" that ARod threatened Bosch's life. I have not seen one columnist recoil in horror at this suggestion (though I briefly heard Stephen A. Smith on the radio). Again, that's prison.

I truly wonder if Bill Madden thinks that narcissism is a worse crime than, you know ... Crime crimes.


So we got the evidence, MLB's case is strong enough for an arbitrator. A criminal court would have probably tossed all of it, but this isn't a criminal court.

But unless we have evidence that ARod worked for Bosch or threatened Bosch, then I still don't understand why he should get more than 50-100, like everyone else.

If there is evidence that ARod committed those crimes, then call the cops and get him out of here. It's out of MLB's purview at that point

Selig's PR strategy will work.

"But this whole ordeal was completely necessary. And it was done through a process that by now is regarded as time-tested and fair.

Baseball doesn't necessarily 'win' in the literal sense when one of its biggest names is suspended for one year for violating the collectively bargained drug policy. But baseball did what it had to do in this case, to preserve the integrity of its drug-testing program and to preserve the integrity of the game itself.

On Saturday, an arbitrator hearing Rodriguez's appeal of a 211-game suspension ruled that Rodriguez would be suspended for 162 games, the entire 2014 season."


ARod never failed a drug test. So tell me about the integrity of its drug-testing program again?

Ponder the amount of time and effort MLB used to get this suspension against one player. Now imagine they used those resources against every other player.

This is why this strikes a lot of people as unfair.

It's not that ARod is innocent, it's that the "integrity of the game itself" is laughable when Big Papi is handed the World Series MVP by the same man who crusades against ARod.

You tell me if it's a personal vendetta when Selig is on "60 Minutes" claiming he'd never seen anything like it in 50 years. Yeah, that's because you weren't looking, pal.

Three Winners

"It could very well be that Sept. 25, 2013 vs. the Rays was Rodriguez’s last game.

The winners also are obvious: Bud Selig and the Yankees."

Alex Rodriguez's lawyers also won, unless they are refunding their money.

The whole steroid era.

I like the guy who says he won't vote for anyone from the steroid era, but then votes for Jack Morris.  It also means he will never vote for any baseball player ever again.

Because nobody cares about wild cards.

I challenge anyone to remember 2013's MLB exciting wild card one-game matchups.  Just name the four teams involved.  You can't do it, can you?

Thanks for the free advertising, by the way.

"Praise the Lord and pass the checkbook, if the Yankees outbid everybody for this kid Tanaka, perhaps our long national nightmare — and obsession — about a $189 million payroll for the Yankees might finally come to an end."

I don't quite understand the focus on $189 million, either. I always considered it a negotiation tactic more than anything else, though there may be some movement to cut payroll slightly.

Tanaka will sign with the Red Sox, which will trigger effusive Cherington praise from Lupica, and then Tanaka will be a disappointment in the American major leagues. That's my prediction.


"The coverage, of course, will be that Hal Steinbrenner has finally come to his senses, as if the Yankees going past $200 million again guarantees them World Series No. 28."

The coverage will be the Yankees are a third-place team.

No legitimate source in the entire world will guarantee a World Series for the Yankees.


"But Hal Steinbrenner has a right to look at the bottom line on his own bottom line."

No, he doesn't.

It is against the New York State Constitution for Hal Steinbrenner to look at the (ahem) bottom line on his own bottom line.


"He has a right to look back over the past decade, just since the luxury tax found its way into Major League Baseball, and not only see the $250 million the Yankees have had to shell out because of that tax (out of a total of $280 million in all of baseball), but the $200 million-plus his team pays out every single year in payroll.

You do the math on that."

No.

You do the math.

The big boy math.

Revenue, expenses, income before interest and taxes, return on investment, return on equity, total assets, etc.


"Oh sure, go ahead, do the math on payroll plus taxes as you remember that the Yankees since 2000 have won the same number of World Series as the Marlins and White Sox, one fewer than the Cardinals, two fewer than the Red Sox.

Steinbrenner has been portrayed as some kind of narrow-minded cheapskate for asking his baseball people to just spend an amount of money that is more than any team in baseball — other than his own — has ever spent on a World Series-winning team, in all of baseball history."

I have not seen any person describe Steinbrenner as a narrow-minded cheapskate.

Nor have I seen any person guarantee a World Series championship for the Yankees.  90 wins is the most optimistic prediction I have seen, and that included Tanaka.

Everyone knows the Yankees are not winning championships and everyone knows they are no longer a top-tier team. Lupica is either arguing with the Yankees PR crew or with voices in his head.

As for the success of the past decade, measure it in franchise value and it has been incredibly successful. The real story is that this asset train keeps rolling along despite a lack of titles.

Who watches the watchmen?

Sportswriters judging the character of baseball players.

Sportswriters, who seemingly rate a player based on the player's willingness to conduct locker room interviews.  I'm surprised sometimes that they let Eddie Murray in.

"Need" is a funny word.

Not sure why the consensus seems to be the Yankees "need" a Japanese pitcher.

The thing is, it's only $20 million.

Bartolo Colon's contract is smaller than Phil Hughes's.

It's lot of things, but it certainly is not a blockbuster contract:

"So perhaps it’s appropriate the Mets celebrated this milestone anniversary by blowing the dust off that wallet Sherman referred to and signing Bartolo Colon to the kind of two-year, $20 million deal that had disappeared from their arsenal not long after however many hundreds of millions of dollars disappeared from their Madoff accounts.


Maybe this really is a sign the Mets are back in the business of brandishing, pairing the Colon signing with Curtis Granderson and seemingly stating, for the first time in forever, Madoff’s $50 billion lie finally has stopped chiseling away at their finances and their foundation."

It's a low-risk, low-money, probably low-reward contract.

In terms of 2013 MLB, it's not a blockbuster. You'll need to add another zero to the $20.

Marvin Miller is an American hero and a savior of Major League baseball. Bill Madden? Not so much.

The sport Marvin Miller saved allows Human Garbage like Bill Madden to make a living, and that's kind of a shame:

"You want to know why Miller, who missed by only one vote in the last Expansion Era election three years ago, didn't come close this time? You probably need to look no further than his repeated statements prior to his death in November 2012, decrying the players union's agreement to drug testing."

1) Miller was 100% correct. You want a drug test, you get a Court order.

2) Doesn't explain why Miller wasn't elected long before 2012.

"Almost to a man, the Hall-of-Fame players have condemned the alleged steroids cheats — Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Roger Clemens et al, who have obliterated their records or passed many of them on the all-time lists — and Miller's adamant stance against taking measures to clean up the game has diminished him despite all his accomplishments on their behalf."

Colon to the Mets!

Because Bill Madden cares about ethics!

Or maybe Madden just has an affinity for colons, since he's a 6-foot piece of crap.


"And lest anyone still believes this is still an owners' conspiracy to keep Miller out of the Hall of Fame, again, there were only four owner/executives on the 16-man committee. The rest were either senior baseball writers, historians or former managers. It was not much different from the first Veterans Committee ballot Miller appeared on in 2001, which then was comprised of all the living Hall-of-Famers, most of them former players who were Miller's constituents, and he fell short by more than 10% of the necessary 75%."

No one said Hall of Fame ballplayers were intelligent people.

They owe Marvin Miller just about everything, and so does Bill Madden.

If Hell has a newspaper, Bill Madden will have all Eternity to write its Ethics column.

Curtis Granderson

If you want to improve your status in the Daily News, simply sign with the Mets.

Andy Martino compares Granderson to HOFer Catfish Hunter:

"When Hunter signed a then-historic five-year, $3.35 million contract with the Yankees before the 1975 season, his arrival augered a better age for a team emerging from its darkest phase.  The onetime Oakland ace ended up a pedestrian 63-53 for the Yanks, though he contributed in key moments.
But that was hardly the point.  Hunter was George Steinbrenner’s first big catch, before Reggie, Goose, or any of the others who headlined the late-70s dynasty. Catfish was the beginning of Yankees spending, the true end of the doldrums of CBS ownership, the signal that the team was emerging again.

Thirty years later, the Mets employed this same approach, using significant offers to Pedro Martinez and Carlos Beltran to signify that they were back after a few seasons behind the shadows, ready for relevance in the Omar Minaya age.  That plan never resulted in a championship, but did give the team and it’s fans several years of intrigue and excitement. Martinez and Beltran were worthwhile contracts for the Mets, and the latter was greatest free agent acquisition in franchise history."

I get what he's trying to say, but Granderson is not that thing.

Also, the Mets signing of Pedro was a disaster.  $50 million for 32 wins.


Lupica's predictable endorsement of All Things Mets feels like the Geno Smith Kiss of Death:

"Curtis Granderson won’t hit as many pitching-wedge shots over the wall at Citi Field, but he will help the Mets a lot, and probably go back to being the kind of hitter he was when he was with Detroit."


Granderson hasn't been a Tiger since 2009.

Why would a 33-year-old be as productive as he was at his peak at the age of 26? 

At the end of this contract, the 36-year-old injury-prone OFer is going to hit 20 triples just because CitiField plays large in the power alleys?

Granderson's age is a non-issue, but age is all you hear about when the subject is Beltran, Ellsbury, Soriano, etc.



I am not slagging on Granderson. I think it was a good signing for the Mets and would be a good signing for any team.  (Same goes for Ellsbury, McCann, and Beltran.)

Thing is, Granderson is not the Pied Piper putting an entire sub-.500 franchise on his shoulders.  Fans aren't going to clock to CitiField to see the 100th-best player in baseball.

Granderson is also not the owner of a time machine.

The Daily News is simply insistent on pushing a pro-Mets/anti-Yankee agenda.

Should the Yankees sign Bartolo Colon?

Bill Madden wants the Mets to sign Colon.

I have a hunch that Madden wouldn't even consider Colon for the Yankees because Colon is too old for the Yankees and too suspended by MLB. Is there a single player that Madden wants the Mets to sign who is not a steroid cheat?

I just heard the song "Car Wash" in the supermarket.

I was thinking the hand claps at the beginning are probably sampled a lot.

What does that have to do with baseball?

Alex Rodriguez:

"Maybe Yankee fans can start organizing weekend car wash events if that’s what it will take for their team to pay off Alex Rodriguez and tell him to go away."

I don't get it.

 

I get what Lupica is trying to say ... Yankee fans don't want ARod around anymore.  

 

But I don't get why he brought up a car wash.  

 

Is that supposed to be funny?

Besides, the Yankees probably have money-printing machines right behind Monument Park (yuck yuck).

 

 

"This isn’t about whether the Yankees can afford Cano; of course they can afford him, they’re the Yankees and probably have money-printing machines behind Monument Park."

 

Exactly!

 

"But Cano’s contract will be a bad one at the back end the way CC Sabathia’s will be a bad contract at the end, the way Rodriguez’s contract turned out to be the worst contract in all of world history.

So here’s the deal if they do go to eight years and $200 million at the end:

When he breaks down in three or four years, nobody is allowed to be surprised."
 

Like every Yankee and every non-Yankee.  But I don't recall the same scrutiny applied to Johan Santana, Dustin Pedroia, and David Wright.

 

In fact, it would be amusing if Cano actually signed with the Mets. In Lupica World, Cano would instantly go from overrated and overpaid to the Greatest Athlete in New York History (outside of Geno Smith and Tony Womack).

 

A well-respected organization.

Meet your new hitting coach.

Oh, we already know each other.

Oh, yeah!  Say "hi" to Dr. B. for me next time you see him.

2013 NL MVP Poll

 BBWAA

Name	Points
Andrew McCutchen	409
Paul Goldschmidt	242
Yadier Molina	219
Matt Carpenter	194
Freddie Freeman	154
Joey Votto	149
Clayton Kershaw	146
Hanley Ramirez	58
Carlos Gomez	43
Jay Bruce	30
Craig Kimbrel	27
Shin Soo Choo	23
Jayson Werth	20
Andrelton Simmons	14
Yasiel Puig	10
Hunter Pence	7
Troy Tulowitzki	5
Allen Craig	4
Adrian Gonzalez	4
Buster Posey	3
Adam Wainwright	3
Michael Cuddyer	3
Matt Holliday	2
Russell Martin	1

Felz Poll

Name	Points
Andrew McCutchen	19
Paul Goldschmidt	13
Matt Carpenter	7
Gary Carter	4
Hanley Ramirez	4
Joey Votto	4
Jay Bruce	2
Michael Cuddyer	2
Freddie Freeman	1
Buster Posey	1

2013 AL MVP Poll

 BBWAA

Name	Points
Miguel Cabrera	385
Mike Trout	282
Chris Davis	232
Josh Donaldson	222
Robinson Cano	150
Evan Longoria	103
Dustin Pedroia	99
Adrian Beltre	99
Manny Machado	57
David Ortiz	47
Jason Kipnis	31
Max Scherzer	25
Adam Jones	9
Edwin Encarnacion	7
Greg Holland	3
Carlos Santana	3
Coco Crisp	3
Jacoby Ellsbury	3
Torii Hunter	2
Hisashi Iwakuma	2
Koji Uehara	2
Yu Darvish	1
Felix Hernandez	1
Salvador Perez	1
Shane Victorino	1

 Felz Poll

Name	Points
Miguel Cabrera	24
Chris Davis	10
Mike Trout	6
Gary Carter	4
Josh Donalson	4
Adrian Beltre	3
Robinson Cano	2
Adam Jones	2
Adam Longoria	2
Alfonso Soriano	1
Koji Uehara	1

I think ARod is lying.

Not because I analyzed his body language, but because I analyzed his language language.

2013 NL Cy Young

 BBWAA

Name	Points
Clayton Kershaw	207
Adam Wainwright	86
Jose Fernandez	62
Craig Kimbrel	39
Matt Harvey	39
Cliff Lee	32
Jordan Zimmerman	21
Zack Greinke	18
Madison Bumgarner	3
Francisco Liriano	3

 Felz Poll

Name	Points
Clayton Kershaw	20
Adam Wainwright	11
Gary Carter	4
Jordan Zimmerman	4
Jose Fernandez	3
Francisco Liriano	2
Zack Greinke	1
Craig Kimbrel	1
Kyle Lohse	1

2013 AL Cy Young

Not much interest in my poll this year, including respondents who didn't bother to figure out which league the players are in, but here you go.

 BBWAA

Name	Points
Max Scherzer	203
Yu Darvish	93
Hisashi Iwakuma	73
Anibal Sanchez	46
Chris Sale	44
Bartolo Colon	25
Koji Uehara	10
Felix Hernandez	6
Matt Moore	4
Greg Holland	4
James Shields	2

 Felz Poll

Name	Points
Max Scherzer	24
Bartolo Colon	9
Yu Darvish	6
Gary Carter	4
Felix Hernandez	3
Anibal Sanchez	3
Adam Wainwright	3
Zack Greinke	2
C.J Wilson	2
Phil Hughes	1
Hisashi Iwakuma	1
Cliff Lee	1
Mariano Rivera	1

Describing Bill Madden as a hypocrite is an insult to hypocrites.

"But if he doesn’t get Granderson, where might Alderson go for the bats he needs? I say he should think Biogenesis.

After all, Alderson has never seemed to have a problem with drug-tainted players, going all the way back to his days in Oakland when, whether he knew it or not, the Bash Brothers, Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire, were alleged to have been shooting up steroids in the bathroom stalls of the A’s clubhouse.

...

There is one other added advantage in signing Cruz or Peralta. Both of them have demonstrated they know how to beat a drug test."

Not that a clown like Bill Madden ever sought noble goals such as "journalistic integrity" or "consistent principles," but the next time the name "Alex Rodriguez" is moving up his throat, he should choke on it.

I know nothing.

I would have bet the ranch on Farrell.

Mount Rushmore of Heroes

Mike Lupica can't think of anything interesting to write about the Yankees or baseball.

If you don't believe me, ask Mike Lupica:

"There was a time, and it wasn’t so terribly long ago, when you got the idea that you could lead a paper like ours with Yankee news in or out of season, like they were the big game in town no matter what else was happening in football or basketball. But those days are long gone, starting with the way pro football has gotten as big as it has over the past several years, because of the Giants winning two Super Bowls that stand with any dramatic World Series the Yankees have ever won.

There is more to it than that, you know there is. Rex Ryan got to town and was an immediate game-changer for the Jets until things went sideways for them. There is this arms race between the Knicks and Nets now in New York, the teams and their owners apparently as obsessed with beating each other as they are with beating the Heat or the Bulls or the Pacers in the Eastern Conference.

You even wonder what happens to the whole dynamic of the baseball summer if ’14 is the year when the Mets make another run at the playoffs.

(What, a guy can’t dream?)"

I think the problem is that you are unskilled at your profession.

Worse, you are whining about it in public.



"If you’re a Yankee fan, and you’ve been watching the way teams like the Cardinals and San Francisco Giants and now the Red Sox win the World Series, are you really willing to pay Robinson Cano whatever he wants?"


Of course not.

I also didn't pay much attention to the World Series because that has little to do with my analysis.

I did pay attention to the 2013 Yankees ... I know that's boring torture for you ... being your job and everything.

Listen to what you're saying, part two.

MLB is accused of singling out ARod and putting emotion ahead of prudent, blind justice. Rob Manfred responds by emotionally singling out ARod.

Manfred also inadvertently accuses MLB of either ignorance or injustice:

"Mr. Rodriguez's use of PEDs was longer and more pervasive than any other player, and when this process is complete, the facts will prove it is Mr. Rodriguez and his representatives who have engaged in ongoing, gross misconduct."

Either:

1) MLB knows of a lot of other players who took PEDs and evaded punishment.

2) MLB has no idea how many other players took PEDs.

Scenario #2 is more likely.

But if that is the case, then Manfred shouldn't proclaim with certainty that ARod took more PEDs than Sosa, Dykstra, Canseco, Bonds, and ... most likely ... some AA muck-a-luck catcher who never batted above .250.

Listen to what you're saying, part one.

Jon Lester defends David Ortiz against Colin Cowherd's accusations:

"You couldn't be more wrong," Lester said about Ortiz. "You really haven't seen the power numbers spike up. He's really just become a more complete hitter. It's not like he's all of a sudden hitting 50 homers and driving in 140. He's done it the right way for a long time."

Right.

It's not like he's hitting 50 HRs and driving in 140 ... like the first time he used PEDs.

Mike Lupica had several weeks to come up with this zinger.

"They had done everything else over the past 10 seasons, taken out the Yankees and then won their first World Series since 1918 in St. Louis and then won another one three years later in Colorado. The Red Sox had done everything except win a World Series at Fenway Park in all the years since 1918. Like there was one more monster to slay. Just not the Green Monster."

Not the Green Monster.

Lupica is a pro's pro.

I'm a sheriff and I'm a'huntin' for PED users.

Got him! I found another one!

Miguel Cabrera, of all people, is featured in a car commercial which takes a moral stand against PEDs.

Makes me wonder if the Average American thinks PED use is worse than drunk driving.

I think the Average American really does.

Certified check. You can get them at any branch office.

"While I usually enjoy Mr. Francesa’s show, I submit he may be drinking too much of the A-Rod Kool-Aid lately. People with experience in criminal law understand that when dealing with criminals or even just the average guy in the street, cash is king."

Right.

When dealing with criminals.

Which is precisely why MLB should not be conducting its legitimate business in secret, in cash.


"In other words, In God We Trust, but all others pay cash."

For real?

When you wrote this column for the Daily News, did they pay you in cash?


"Thus, assuming that MLB investigators made a legal deal to purchase documents, I suspect the seller of the same would insist on cash. Why? People in these types of situations always think a check could be canceled. The person usually thinks taking cash somehow gives them anonymity."

Exactly.

Which is why MLB should not conduct their legit business in cash. Unless they are trying to hide something. Something they may be trying to hide, for example, is the purchase of stolen documents.


"Mr. Francesa also railed about IRS violations the MLB investigators may have committed by paying 'cash cash' for the document, as if it was the crime of the century that would diminish the evidentiary value of the document(s). The reality is that the finder of fact typically will not be swayed by such issues, unless perhaps the allegation is that the documents were forged or altered."

Not the crime of the century.

Just a regular run-of-the-mill shady tax evasion.


"The fact that Mike Francesa is even talking about MLB’s possible malfeasance shows the Yankee third baseman’s attorneys have been at least somewhat successful in clouding and obfuscating the real issues: did A-Rod take PEDs and thereafter impede MLB’s investigation? It seems Mr. Francesa thinks this circus hurts the sanctity of baseball, and for MLB to participate in this circus by using hardball tactics damages the institutions of baseball itself. Point taken."

"Point taken," he says.

So you're doing a tremendous job agreeing with Francesa.

Which is weird since you started this whole thing out by suggesting you were disagreeing with Francesa.


"Lost in this mess is the legal issue of whether Alex Rodriguez deserves his 211-game ban or something less. If the former All-Star did not use PEDs, there is no issue, and he should not agree to even a one-day suspension."

We're so far past this, for crying out loud. Fifty games, like everyone else.


"There certainly seems to be a colorable legal argument that since A-Rod was never officially 'caught,' that under the MLB Drug Agreement, his suspension, if he did use PEDs, should be 50 games. Many attorneys would argue that using multiple drugs over a period of time cannot result in more than a 50-game ban under the MLB agreement if the player wasn’t officially suspended for each violation separately."

FIFTY GAMES LIKE EVERYONE ELSE.

Of course it's the number of times you're caught. Nobody who takes steroids takes one steroid.


"If A-Rod did take PEDs, after the circus he has created, it sure seems hard to think he doesn’t deserve the entire 211-game suspension, if not more. Indeed, it seems to match the number of lawyers he has working on this matter."

Weird conclusion that is not aligned with the rest of your analysis.

So MLB should function like the FBI

"In many of the major Mafia cases prosecuted in New York in the last 20 years, our federal government cut deals with murderers, money was paid and testimony was provided by cooperating witnesses who had supposedly been reformed.

The reality is that a number of active and retired MLB players have repeatedly lied, some even under oath, when asked about illegal drug use, and thereby made a complete joke out of the Joint Drug Agreement and our courts."

I think the people at the Daily News have convinced themselves that Alex Rodriguez is an actual murderer.

Matt Williams was just hired as a manager of the Washington Nationals. At the same time, MLB is going after ARod with the same zeal as the FBI goes after the Mafia. This sounds like testimony for the defendant.


"The reality is that MLB investigators — many of whom are former FBI and NYPD police officers — used the same investigative techniques they used for years when they were on the job, chasing con men and criminals.

Sorry, but I don’t see anything wrong with that just because it is A-Rod. In fact, maybe there is something right with it."

Of course that isn't right.

MLB should not be using the same investigative techniques as the FBI and the NYPD.

This Week in Bill Madden

Terrific insider "confidential" stuff by Bill Madden. Not one, but two columns in which Madden reminds the Yankees to follow the strategies of the teams that are in the World Series.

Which would also be good advice for the 30 teams that are not in the World Series.

Phase 1: Collect underpants
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: Win World Series


It's difficult to describe Madden as a "hypocrite," because a hypocrite first needs to have a coherent point of view in order to violate the tenets of that point of view.

Madden's garbled nonsense does not even qualify as a coherent opinion, it seems more like a random word generator ... a baseball_ebooks twitter account, or something.

But if a mushbrain can be a hypocrite, I suppose this is pretty close:


Madden on 9/21/2013:

"And there is also this to consider: In years past, the Yankees had an added advantage in the free-agent market besides just money: As a team that was always assured of being a World Series contender, players wanted to come to the Bronx. Now they are back to where they were during George Steinbrenner’s manic ’80s, a purgatory the Mets have been mired in, seemingly forever, without a championship-caliber team and having to overpay for free agents in order to get them to come to New York."



Madden on 10/19/2013:

"With the Yankee high command left little choice but to fill their multiple holes through the free-agent market, it was interesting that Scott (Avenging Agent) Boras should suggest the other day that they’re going to need to prove to the major free agents they will be competitive next year. Coming from Boras, the ultimate 'money talks' and 'sold to the highest bidder' agent, this is laughable."

So Boras is "laughable" when he comes to the same conclusion you made a month earlier.

Don't blame the teacher.

"Twenty years later, the lesson hit. Terry Collins was standing a few feet from Jim Leyland and Barry Bonds on that day in spring training, 1991, when Leyland howled at his superstar, 'don’t you f--- with me!' and ended up with more respect from the player because of it.

Bonds has been sulking all spring about losing his arbitration hearing, and one morning began cursing at a photographer. Bill Virdon, an old baseball lifer and coach on Leyland’s staff, told Bonds to stop, and Bonds was soon swearing at Virdon; Leyland would not have anyone disrespecting his coaches, so he stuck his face into Bonds’ and started yelling. Bonds later called Leyland the best manager he had ever played for.

How, wondered Collins, then a bullpen coach and aspiring manager, did Leyland pull that one off?

Two decades (and two failures in with Astros and Angels later) the Mets manager understands. 'What I got from him was that I always had to be myself,' said Leyland’s longtime friend and acolyte on the day of the 68-year-old’s retirement in Detroit. 'Then there was what happened in Houston. Then there was what happened in Anaheim.' "

The implication seems to be that he has succeeded in New York.


"But then there was what happened in New York: Close relationships with star players, and a strong hold on the clubhouse despite three years of losing records. So it took 20 years for the deep lessons of Leyland to take hold inside Collins?

'Exactly,' Collins said."

Congratulations on your close relationships with star players and a strong hold on the clubhouse despite three years of losing records.

The World Series counts more.

Top Ten list of best playoff hitters which does not include Reggie Jackson.

Rules of evidence.

"A source familiar with the proceedings said Manfred admitted to Rodriguez’s attorney Joseph Tacopina, during cross-examination, that a member of MLB’s investigative team made two cash payments — one for $100,000 and a second for $25,000 — to Gary Jones, a former Biogenesis employee, for the information. The documents turned out to be stolen from Biogenesis founder (and now MLB’s star witness) Tony Bosch, though Manfred testified he did not know that at the time."

How was I supposed to know this information was stolen?

When he asked for payment in a brown paper bag in non-consecutive, unmarked bills ... I just assumed he didn't have a paypal account.

Nobody ever remembers Jose Veras. Poor Jose Veras.

One team will win the World Series in 2013. That team will consist of a lot of player who used to play for other teams:

"Today’s installment of 'Former Yankee Chronicles' is brought to you by the Detroit Tigers, who are hoping Austin Jackson and Phil Coke, two pieces they acquired in the Curtis Granderson trade, can help them in the AL Championship Series against Boston."

Austin Jackson is a former Yankee in the sense that he never played a single game for the Yankees. He's a former almost-Yankee.

Randy Choate is on the Cardinals. I always liked Randy Choate. He was walking off the field and they flashed a graphic that he got 8 outs on 20 pitches. Way to go, Randy Choate.

The prosecutor is the judge.

"Alex Rodriguez’s doping-ban arbitration hearing resumes Wednesday for three days of testimony during which Manfred, MLB’s chief operating officer, is expected to take the witness stand and outline the investigation that led baseball to suspend Rodriguez for 211 games.

Manfred, a member of the three-person panel hearing the appeal of the suspension along with Players Association lawyer David Prouty and arbitrator Fredric Horowitz, is expected to testify about what MLB knows about Florida’s now-shuttered Biogenesis clinic, the source of performance enhancing drugs for more than a dozen players. Rodriguez is the only player appealing his suspension.

...

Manfred will vote to uphold the suspension, which was handed down by commissioner Bud Selig, while Prouty, as the union rep, is expected to side with the player. Horowitz, the arbitrator, will cast the deciding vote on A-Rod’s punishment."

Yes, I suspect Manfred the arbitrator will be convinced to uphold the suspension. I wouldn't expect Manfred the arbitrator to spend much time questioning the testimony of himself.

Red Sox players secretly complaining about Peralta's PED use.

Peter Gammons is in the writer's wing of the Red Sox Propaganda HOF ... I mean, the actual Major League Baseball HOF.

Yes, the one in Cooperstown.


Though I guess I shouldn't complain about this article.  Gammons at least points out the ongoing benefits of PED use.

The monetary benefits clearly outweigh the costs.

The reputational costs are fatal, yet selective.

The long-term health costs may be tragic.  I wouldn't take steroids, I'll tell you that.  But I also understand the allure of a pro sports contract.


Mike Lupica makes passing mention of a local steroid cheat, but still can't generate any legitimate disdain.  He can only use it as an opportunity to slag on ARod:

"Kellen Winslow must have gone to the PED store because he thinks using PEDs is working out so well for everybody else."

A PED cheat just hit a game-tying grand slam in the playoffs.

In the same game, Peralta's fly ball died on the track ... I'm guessing it would have had a little more kick if he had hit it earlier in the season. Funny how the wind was blowing out earlier in the season.

Off the top of my head? ... Colon, Byrd, Cruz, Peralta played for their teams in the 2013 MLB playoffs ... McGwire has a good chance to get another ring in his role as Ironic Hitting Coach.

Who knows how many current playoff participants weren't caught?  We know the MLB tests are insufficient ... biogenesis proved that, as if we didn't already know.

So you take a couple of months off and rest up for the playoffs.  It works out fine for the player and for the team. 


Kellen Winslow will miss four games and no one will care.  The head coach of the Jets already said the backup tight end is an acceptable replacement.  Winslow will be back in a month ready to go.

Bill Madden and Mike Lupica won't even be able to feign outrage.  They're not repulsed by steroid use; they're repulsed by ARod.


"Well, if it turns out that the Yankees really are hot on the latest Japanese pitching phenom, it means they do have a farm system after all:

The Nippon League."

Right.

I don't understand why that is intended as an insult.


Look, the US draft is rigged. It is intentionally rigged -- that is the whole point.

The Yankees are at a big disadvantage because they made the playoffs for 2 straight decades, give or take.

The Yankees would be better served to eliminate their entire minor league system and buy the entire island. Spend $100 million on 1,000 17-year-olds and hope 3 of them become Bernie Williams.

Girardi signs with Yankees.

Daily News 0-for-2013 in the prediction department.

I suppose I give Klapisch credit for trying.

He is actually watching baseball games and writing about them.  Not that anybody around New York will care ...

No wonder he jogs to first base ...

... he is exhausted from working the night shift at the factory:

"You are not the only one who has seen Robinson Cano jog to first base, exerting a tepid effort that harms his reputation and, perhaps, his earning power?
Joe Girardi and his coaches reveal scores of appeals to Cano about how bad the visual looks — both to the fans and to impressionable younger Yankees — and that it is, quite frankly, not the way any major leaguer should play.
Yet the same folks disappointed in this aspect of Cano’s game nevertheless vouch for his work ethic, commitment to winning and belief that a lucrative long-term contract would not diminish either of those elements."

I don't doubt that Cano spends a lot of time in the batting cages.

You and I would consider that "recreation," but in the rarefied air of a pro athlete, I suppose that could qualify as a "work ethic."

I see no indication that he takes his craft seriously.  Situational hitting, base running, straddling the bag on throws from the catcher, all the things I learned in Little League.


"It is the Cano disconnect — the player not trying hard, except he is. The guy giving off a terrible impression in public, doing the opposite behind closed doors for his teammates. The loafer with impeccable work habits."

I just think you're sort of diminishing the meaning of the word "work."


" 'When he hits a groundball to the second baseman or shortstop, I know what it looks like,' Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long said. 'I get it. I know it is part of the perception. He’s been talked to a million times about it. But I am telling you that is not a true picture of how hard he works or cares, and so if that is his only downfall, it is not the worst thing in the world.' ”

1) Perception is reality.

2) It "looks like" he is jogging to first base because he "is" jogging to first base.

3) If he has been talked to a million times about it, and he refuses to change, then someone needs to be fired ... or Cano needs to be benched for insubordination.


"Ask those around the team and different theories abound:
1. This is just the way the game is now — you have players who don’t always go hard at every moment."  Every moment?  How about nevery moment?


 "2. He is trying to preserve his body. Reggie Jackson used to say he could dive for an extra 10 balls a year in right field or bat 600 times, you can’t have both and which do you want? This theory holds that Cano knows his body and over-extending on what is a routine out 499 out of 500 times doesn’t make sense in risk-reward."  It's more like 49 out of 50 times and Professor Reggie Jackson's analysis is completely wrong.  No one is demanding a player ruin his body by recklessly crashing into walls.  Run 90 feet one time in your entire career.  Then make it a habit.


"3. Cano is so smooth and graceful that — like a prime-aged Carlos Beltran — he does not look like he is giving full effort, even when he is."  Ever notice how Cano almost never makes a diving stop at second base?  Maybe once or twice per season.  It is an impossibility that this is because he has fewer opportunities to do so.  It's because he refuses to dive for a ball and alligator-arms it rather than strain himself.

He does not makes hard plays look easy.  He makes easy plays look hard.


 "4. His frustration gets the best of him when he rolls a ball over. Paul O’Neill — who George Steinbrenner dubbed “The Warrior” for his intensity — used to jog to first after hitting routine grounders, so angry was he with wasting an at-bat. He nevertheless was beloved. Cano is not in nearly the same way. Is this about championships? Skin color? Something else?"  Abreu on the warning track would be a better parallel than O'Neill.

I think Cano always acts like he knows what's going to happen on every play.  It's why he almost gets pegged at second base on doubles.  It's why he has never taken an extra base in nine years.  It's why he pauses so long before throwing the ball to first base.   It's why he inexplicably puts the bat on his shoulder when he knows he's going to take a pitch -- as if the physical act of holding a baseball bat upright away from his body is too much of a strain.


We're all wasting our mental energy on this topic, anyway.  Comparing this guy to O'Neill and Jackson, for crying out loud ... O'Neill and Jackson would run through a brick wall to win a baseball game

Run to first base and all then there is no reason for these complaints and apologetic theories

It's only 90 feet.

Took PEDs and is a victim of a witch hunt. Not mutually exclusive.

"A-Rod doesn’t have a whole lot of defenders at this point, and this over-the-top lawsuit isn’t likely to improve his image any. Nor is the suit likely to find much traction, considering the commissioner’s broad power to act in the 'best interests' of the game. Of course, one could also argue that what would truly serve the game’s best interests is a little court-ordered discovery.

It’s tempting to dismiss the suit as a public-relations stunt, A-Rod’s desperate ploy to counter the piles of evidence that baseball has reportedly amassed against him. They can’t win on (the merits), said one blind source quoted by the Daily News, 'so the next move is ‘let’s attack the integrity of the investigation.

It looks to me like this is an investigation whose integrity is worth attacking, or at the very least scrutinizing. More to the point, A-Rod may be guilty of using PEDs, but that doesn’t mean baseball should be free to do whatever sleazy things it wants to prove it. A lot of people will look at this lawsuit and say that it has nothing to do with whether Rodriguez used performance-enhancing drugs. Which is true. In its own, self-serving, A-Rod way, it’s about something much bigger."

Alex Rodriguez sues MLB.

You know what would be hilarious?

If someone could think of a synonym for "witch" or "witch hunt" and then use that as a prefix for "Rod."

Because you can then use that word to refer to Alex Rodriguez and it's funny.

It would a can't-miss, uproarious yet biting response to the news that Alex Rodriguez is suing MLB.

Because it's always funny to attach something to "Rod" and refer to Alex Rodriguez that way.

Mike Lupica?  Are you up to the task?  I anxiously await your next column with cautious optimism.

Mike Lupica attacks real-life straw men.

Humorless and ignorant, Lupica usually attacks non-existent arguments from the opposition. This time, he attacks the weird, possibly fictional pro-ARod protesters. A real-life manifestation of straw men.

Arguing with these people would be a waste of intellectual energy, except Lupica has no intellect in the first place:

"Up until now, you probably thought he was just another rich, self-absorbed athlete trying to hold on to his money and what is left of his prime. But looking at the demonstrators on Park Ave., it turns out you were wrong, we all were. Alex Rodriguez is a victim, and practically a political prisoner. No one saw the obvious similarities between him and Nelson Mandela until now."

No one is really comparing ARod to Nelson Mandela, but you're going after a very easy target. I actually think these protestors were hired or were satirical.


"He is a symbol of oppression, at least according to protesters who appear to have piled out of a Volkswagen like clowns every morning for photo ops before Rodriguez goes upstairs for these hearings on his 211-game suspension."

You're shooting fish in a barrel.


"You really do start to wonder how we did miss the obvious comparisons to Mandela. Or Cesar Chavez. Or, better yet, Che Guevara."

You, Sir, are an ignorant turd.

I really think Lupica googled "freedom fighter" and picked the first three names that appeared.

Not to get all political up in here, but you're linking Nelson Mandela to Che Guevera and you somehow think this comparison is appropriate. If you want to join the adult conversation, read a book or something.


"No justice, no peace for the guy, to go along with a batting average that ended up in the .240 range, and two swings that anybody remembered after Rodriguez rejoined the Yankees."

Right.

When he bats .300, it doesn't matter. When he slumps, it matters.


I'm also quite intrigued by the "two swings" theory. My guess is (1) the Revenge HR in Fenway off Dempster, and (2) the record-breaking grand slam.


I can think of many other memorable ARod swings in 2013, so I'm not sure what Lupica is talking about.


Are "memorable swings" even a thing? Does the lack of memorable swings speak to a player's ineptitude? Or does it speak to an elderly sportswriter's soft brain?


MVP Candidate Mike Trout: name two specific swings since the All Star Break.

Alfonso Soriano: name two specific swings since the Yankees picked him up.

The entire Mets team: I challenge Mike Lupica to name two specific swings from the entire Mets team that occurred in the final seven weeks of the 2013 season.



"He thinks he can lawyer his way out of this, or flack his way out of this, or crisis-manage his way out of this. He is defended by these demonstrators and really is treated like some sort of victim as the meter continues to run on these lawyers and flacks and crisis managers. You start to think that in the end, what he will end up paying these people could have kept the government running this week."

Wow! Effortless transition to current events.


"Alex Rodriguez, bless his heart, has played a lot of parts in his life, and now he plays a new one, at least in his own mind, and the minds of these people on the street who seem to think they’re in some weird reality series:

Freedom fighter.

Maybe he really is Che Guevara in pinstripes. Don’t call him A-Rod, anymore. Go with Che-Rod."

"Che-Rod."

Good one.

I'm sure it's going to catch on like Fox News' "government slimdown" is catching on.

Before you conflate Nelson Mandela and a baseball player to a Marxist guerrilla mass murderer, you should probably check wikipedia.

Ken Davidoff talks to the crazies.

I like the "Randy Levine is the Devil" signs.

Yeah, what's up with your drug testing?

One might accuse Murray Chass of being "pro-ARod," but I think he's basically right on. Read the whole thing if you wish. Here are the highlights:

"A prediction (I am not big on making predictions, but I like this one’s chances of being right):

Frederic Horowitz will join Raymond Goetz, Richard Bloch, George Nicolau and Shyam Das in the ranks of baseball’s impartial arbitrators who have overturned or reduced player suspensions for off-field transgressions.

...

And baseball will have to deal with the fact that Rodriguez never tested positive for banned drugs in the 'multiple years' Selig has cited.

Oh yes, about those tests. Why didn’t Selig’s vaunted, self-proclaimed toughest tests nab Rodriguez? The commissioner, as far as I know, hasn’t answered or explained that matter. I, for one, am intrigued by the question and would be happy to hear an answer. Maybe it will come up in the Horowitz hearing."

I want to rant about the Wild Card's supposed success.

The Pirates earned a four-game intra-divisional regular season edge over the Reds. That can evaporate in one game.

The only city that was energized by the wild card race was Cleveland.

If the goal is to make September more important and compelling, this goal is largely counteracted by the expanded rosters.

The one-game playoffs are exciting only because they are rare and unique. You can't force a Game Seven or a Bucky Dent Game or a Last Day 2011. Nobody cares about the first round and why should they? It's like trying to generate excitement by declaring every day is Christmas.