Maybe I Don't Understand Major League Baseball Rules (And Maybe I Don't Care)

What, exactly, was Yankees manager Joe Girardi complaining about on Tuesday night after my sad-sack Red Sox scraped out a win against their vastly superior (this season to date) AL East rivals?

Something about Manny Delcarmen taking too much time to warm up in preparation to relieve one of the Red Sox's five godawful (this season to date) starting pitchers? Something about one of those pitchers, Josh Beckett, not actually being injured?

Cheese and rice, Joe: Your team's about a billion games up on the Red Sox. If you're going to protest something, protest the fact that the Yankees are currently trailing a team whose fans will remain nonexistent until it faces yours in the division series. (And then they'll be all like, "Hey, our city has a baseball team! I love that dude from 'Desperate Housewives'!")

Celtics Defeat Yankees, 92-1

As any deluded sports fan knows, the best (irrational) way to cope with one season's team's failure is to carry over the resultant disappointment to the next season's team in the (meaningless) hope that the latter will, in victory, take the sting out of the former's most recent defeat.

When such a victory occurs on the same night as a decisive thumping of your former season's team's archrival...well, that's just Phantastic.

Idiot

Following the (suckass) Generally-Pacific Coast Angels of But Also Maybe Portugal?'s improbable victory over the (suckass) New York Yankees (actually of New York, unlike the NFL's Giants) in Game 5 of the ALCS on Thursday, the Yankees' ballerina-armed centerfielder Johnny Damon--the Judas who conveniently ended his tenure with the Boston Red Sox by grounding into an out that ended the Red Sox's postseason in 2005--was knuckleheaded enough to make the following statement:

"It gives them a couple more days of hope, and hopefully that hope ends on Saturday because anything can happen, especially with as tough of conditions as we’re going to be playing in... They still have to beat us two times at our place, and hopefully that’s going to be tough to do.”

Anything can happen? No shit, Professor Recall.

God, I hate both of these teams so much.

GO--uh...THE RETROACTIVE CANCELLATION OF THE 2009 MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL SEASON?

(Yeah, that works.)

Oh, NOW They 'Bumble'...

Shut up, baseball. I hate you.

Red Sox Celebrate Metroville's 400th Post by Peeing All Over New Yankee Stadium

There will be many games played between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox at the ill-advised sinkhole that is the Yankees' new stadium between now and the time that the Yankees go bankrupt, but there will only be one first game to take place there between the two arch rivals...and--on Monday (Tuesday local time)--the Red Sox won it.

That's on the books forever and ever, Yankee fans. Nana-nana boo-boo.

Who Told Selena Roberts I Have a Birthday Coming Up?

Beginning with his shift from would-be Yankees' savior to be playoff poison, I figured that, following the divorce, the Madonna mess and--of course--the steroid scandal, my Alex Rodriguez schadenfreude had reached its apex with the mirror-mirror smoochy-face gay porn photo spread. Little could I have imagined that the gift that is A-Rod's freefall had more to give.

It comes in the form of further revelations from Selena Roberts' upcoming biography of the manchild, A-Rod: The Many Lives of Alex Rodriguez.

Not only did Roberts break the story that A-Rod tested positive for steroids in 2003 (when he was playing for the Texas Rangers), her book reportedly includes evidence that Rodriguez--despite orange-faced promises to the contrary--continued to use illegal performance-enhancing substances when he was a member of the New York Yankees. Part of this evidence--the best part, far and away--is that A-Rod's Yankees teammates called him "Bitch Tits" because of his "round pectorals, a condition called gynecomastia that can be caused by anabolic steroids".

My cup runneth over.

Rodriguez also, according to Roberts' book, has a gambling problem, is a bad tipper at Hooters and (speaking of tipping) is a fan of signaling opposing batters to let them know what pitch is coming with the expectation that his cheating will be reciprocated.

The latter practice is called "pitch tipping", which is similar to the nickname that will--god willing--haunt Alex Rodriguez for the rest of his life.

Then again...I don't want to be greedy.

[NY Daily News]

Sweep the Dregs

While it's too late to provide unique insight on the Red Sox' 3-game sweep of the Yankees over the weekend--including Jacoby Ellsbury's ridiculous steal of home (y'know, the base to where the pitcher is throwing the ball in the first place!)--I figured I'd squeeze in my obligatory mention of it before the Red Sox begin their series against Cleveland, who has a better of beating Boston than the Yankees do, because the New York Yankees are a terrible baseball team.

Grow Up, CBS SportsLine.

Seriously. Grow up.

Look Upon Your Hero, Yankee Fans

If you're still a fan of Alex Rodriguez after the steroid scandal and his recent Details photoshoot (not to mention his general douchebaggery) and you're not interested in him sexually, you are absolutely lying about one of those two things.

[via Deadspin]

Red Sox Nation Recognizes Rhode Island, [SEE UPDATE] Rights of Senior Citizens

While the New York Yankees have treated this year's free agent pool as their own personal game of Hungry Hungry Hippos--renewing with vigor their franchise mandate to morph into a league of cartoon villains--the Boston Red Sox have adopted a much less flashier approach, making acquisitions of the shruggable, "huh, that's interesting" variety.

This trend shows no sign of abating now that the Red Sox are close to signing Rhode Island native Rocco Baldelli, who has spent his career to date with the Tampa Bay (Artists Formerly Known as Devil) Rays.

As a Red Sox fan who grew up near Rhode Island, I like the Baldelli pickup. As a Red Sox fan who likes Red Sox players that aren't constantly injured, I'm feeling uncertain. As a Red Sox fan who has found an excuse to incorporate the New England-based convenience-store chain Cumberland Farms (Baldelli hails from the town of Cumberland) in a blog post, I'm over the moon.

UPDATE: The Red Sox will also be signing old-timer John Smoltz. Wasn't there already a movie about this?

Christmas Came Early for Satan

...or, more specifically, his favorite baseball team.

One bright spot of Teixeira signing with the New York Yankees, however, is that the Red Sox bandwagon should become a lot roomier.

Darkness Falls Upon the AL East

What the hell, American League East teams that aren't based in the armpit of America's penis? You all just went ahead and let the Tampa Bay Rays--a team that has existed for barely a decade (although that was just long enough for them to change their name from a stupid one that made geographic sense, the "Devil Rays" (and which would have allowed this post to have a better title: "The AL East Stings"), to one that was just stupid)--win the division?

Shame on you, Baltimore Orioles. Out of all the major league teams that represent America's pastime (and who didn't very recently relocate from Canada), your home field is closest to the capital of our nation. There's an American hero whose heart you continue to break...some call him "Iron Man", some call him "Junior"...and you've got a lot of explaining to do to him. I'm talking, of course, about Robert Downey Jr.

Shame on you, Toronto Blue Jays. You're from Canada, so it was inevitable that you would one day be defeated by even the worst teams from America...but couldn't you have at least shown proper respect to your pseudo-country's big brother actual country--the Gilbert Grape to your Arnie Grape, if you will--by finishing dead last in the division instead of second-to-last?

Shame on you, Boston Red Sox. Yeah, you're in the playoffs...but as the wild card. You're the defending World Series champions, for Yaz's sake, and you've conceded your division title to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays of baseball--the Tampa Bay Rays! As both a Red Sox fan and a fan of Major League Baseball as a whole, I find this outcome unacceptable. You have one chance to set things right, Red Sox, and you've got one month in which to do so.

Well, I guess that's everyone.

...Or at least every team who will have a stadium next year that is older than wherever the hell it is that Tampa Bay plays.

Yankees Fans Memorialize Home Stadium by Acknowledging Superiority of Red Sox

Tuesday's Major League Baseball All-Star Game was a monumental event for several reasons. First and foremost, it took place at Yankee Stadium, an adamantine landmark of immeasurable significance that is about to be wiped off the face off the earth so the Steinbrenners (who totally care about baseball history and all that crap) can make a few extra bucks a year from its replacement venue. The last hurrah of the House That Ruth Built was given due respect in the form of the largest collection of Major League Hall-of-Famers ever assembled on one field (a collection that was conspicuously absent of Red Sox hats, even on the head of Wade Boggs--who either forgot what uniform is on his Hall of Fame plaque or is an ass-kissing fraidy cat). As if that weren't enough, the contest itself turned out to be the longest All-Star Game in history, lasting 15 solid innings of terrible baserunning.

During the pregame ceremony, the Yankees-fan-dominated crowd booed their tiny black hearts out at each and every current member of the Boston Red Sox that was announced (and there was a lot of booing to be done, as the Red Sox were represented seven strong, more than any other team in the American League). This was neither significant nor surprising on its own...but it would prove to be integral in relation to the astonishing, most historic moment of the night--if not in the entire chronology of professional sports--which didn't take place until long after the game was underway.

In the top of the eighth inning, with the score tied 2-2 (the American League's runs having just come in the seventh courtesy of one game-tying swing by Boston's J.D. Drew), the Boston Red Sox' Jonathan Papelbon took the mound. When he surrendered a base hit to Miguel Tejada, I naturally expected cheers to emanate from my television...but the response I heard was, at best, tepid--negative, if anything. After Papelbon had struck out Dan Uggla and was facing Adrian Gonzalez, Tejada made a run for second base. Dioner Navarro's throw from the plate was laughingly off the mark, allowing Tejada to easily advance to third by the time the ball was corralled in right field. I thought for sure that the crowd would react to such an unfortunate turn of events thrust upon their most hated rivals' star closer with a cacophony of gratification...but, this time, they very clearly booed.

I couldn't believe my ears. Yes, the Yankees were represented on the American League team, but the only thing on the line was home field advantage in the World Series--a contest that the New York Yankees hadn't appeared in since 2003, won since the previous century, and were widely agreed upon to not be appearing in for many, many years into the foreseeable future. So what the hell were the Yankees fans upset about?

It wasn't until Gonzalez hit a sacrifice fly that gave the National League a 3-2 lead--an occurrence to which the crowd again responded with boos--that the revelation struck me:

The Yankees fans wanted the American League to win because they wanted the Red Sox to have home field advantage in the World Series.

As a Red Sox fan who came of age during an era when the team was a constant punchline for the New York Yankees, I was moved beyond words by this selfless display of concession by Yankees fans--made, at all times, during the last All-Star Game that will ever be played at the one true Yankee Stadium (a game that the American League eventually won, of course, on the shoulders of MVP J.D. Drew)--and I will never forget it.

A couple of decades from now, when the perennial World Series contender Boston Red Sox' chief rivals are the Tampa Bay Shade or the Los Angeles Red Sox or the Arctic Ocean Zombie Polar Bears, should I find myself in the presence of someone speaking ill of the New York Yankees--a franchise which will have long since folded--I will remind him of the 2008 All-Star Game, and suggest that he be a little bit more respectful.

And if he's a robot and tries to fight me, I will disable him with advanced anti-robot Space Karate.

T-Shirt or Holocaust? It's All the Same to the New York Yankees.

Yankees president Randy Levine recently described a certain individual as "somebody who had really bad motives and was trying to do a really bad thing," creatively adding that the act in question was "a very, very bad act." Can you guess to whom he was referring? I guessed Hitler...but I was wrong.

Levine was actually talking about Gino Castignoli, the dude who had buried a Red Sox t-shirt--which was dug up on Sunday--underneath the new, under-construction Yankee Stadium.

It would appear that not winning one World Series since the previous century, despite having the highest payroll in all of baseball, while your archnemeses have already won two (and counting) can cause a team to lose perspective. Not to mention a lot of baseball games. (Zing!)

Hank Steinbrenner's Attack Hawk a Failure [OR NOT--See Retraction]

[UPDATE (4/10): In Metroville's defense, the Yahoo story--which has been updated since it was linked--originally did not cite the girl's name. I'm too fast in uncovering hot scoops for my own good.]

Some people might accept the possibility that Thursday's hawk-attack on a middle school student touring Fenway Park was nothing more than an unfortunate fluke, but I happen to suspect that the bird was planted by Yankees pseudo-owner and doughy jackass Hank Steinbrenner after it was trained to strike at Red Sox fans, all in an attempt to cut back on attendance at his division rival's park. The reasons behind this theory are as follows:

1. The animal in question was not a Blue Jay, oriole or a devil ray (I'm sorry--just "ray"), thus clearing the remaining AL East teams of suspicion.

2. The hawk singled out an adolescent girl as its intended victim, which indicates that whomever orchestrated the attack is a pussy.

3. The attempt, like all other Yankees endeavors undertaken in this century to date, did not succeed.

Better luck next time, Hank.

UPDATE (4/10) (continued): I should have known that Hank Steinbrenner was too stupid to train a hawk. As seen in the comments below, the eagle-eyed Coggblogger has informed Metroville that the name of the girl attacked was "Alexa Rodriguez". Fly on and fly true, winged defender of Fenway!

Billy Crystal in Exhibition = Alex Rodriguez in Postseason

Which is to say, he failed.

On the bright side, perhaps A-Rod has some ideas as to how to get the City Slickers franchise back on track.

The Honeymoon Is Over

When Roger Clemens--the grizzled veteran, firmly set in his ways--first met Andy Pettitte--the eager, fresh-faced idealist--as playmates on the New York Yankees, most assumed that the passionate winter/late-fall romance that sparked between them would amount to no more than a passing fling. But when Andy coaxed Roger out of (his first or second) retirement to reunite with him on the Houston Astros, the world was given notice that the love between the two men was real (and a particularly brave thing to flaunt in Texas). And when Roger came out of retirement again, willing to completely embarrass himself at Yankee Stadium just so that he could be by the side of his one and only, you'd have been hard pressed to find anyone who didn't believe that the storybook romance of Roger & Andy would end with the pair riding bareback on a single white stallion along a picturesque shoreline, into the sunset and eternity.

But then came the Mitchell report--and with it, the ultimate test of the couple's bond. Both implicated as users of illegal performance-enhancing drugs, Roger & Andy needed one another more than ever before as the accusations flew and their individual legacies threatened to crumble around them. It seemed clear that the only way they were going to weather this storm was if they did it together.

Or maybe it only seemed that way to Roger, as Andy has agreed to rat him out in attempt to save his own reputation as an ostensibly honest person.

I guess there's a reason they call it a "storybook" ending...because, apparently, even a love as pure and true as that which existed between Roger & Andy can't last forever in the real world.

Matthew Mitchell Would Like His Fucking Money

When all is said and done, history will likely not regard the first decade of the 21st century as the New York Yankees' glory days. First, there was spending 400 gabillion dollars for the honor of not winning a single World Series, then there was the Mitchell Report, which outed such prominent Yankees as Roger Clemens and Andy Pettite as steroid users (thus tainting the New York teams they played on that did win the occasional postseason series)...and now this:

A fan is suing the Yankees for $221, seeking reimbursement for the money he spent on tickets between 2002 and 2007.

Matthew Mitchell's (no relation to George, I presume) argument is that since the players he watched during the five games in question were using performance-enhancing drugs, it amounts to "consumer fraud" on the part of the organization. Though I certainly want him to win this lawsuit--if for no other reason than it would compound the indignity to the Yankees--I must admit that the team has a pretty easy defense: if Mitchell only spent $221 on five games, given how terrible his seat must have been each time, how could he be sure who the hell he was watching?

(FUN FACT 'A': Freshman year of college, Metroville was in an English Lit class with the guy who played the paperboy in Better Off Dead. You know what he doesn't really like talking about? How he played the paperboy in Better Off Dead.)

(FUN FACT 'B': 200th post! Where are my balloons?)

Andy Pettitte Wants You To Love Him Again

Choosing a tactic opposite that of some Major League Baseball players who were outed as performance-enhancing-drug users in the Mitchell Report released Thursday, a mere two days later, New York Yankees pitcher (and author of a book that encourages kids not to do drugs) Andy Pettitte fessed up to using Human Growth Hormone.

That general admission of fact is where the Integrity & Purity end for Pettitte, however, as trailing it was a freight train of rationalizations: "it happened five years ago", "I only did it twice," "I did it because I was injured", "it wasn't against the rules", "HGH isn't steroids", "I didn't inhale", "Jesus is my co-pilot"...etc.

Maybe some people will buy Pettitte's sob story that "two days of perhaps bad judgment should not ruin a lifetime of hard work and dedication", but I am not among them. The way I see it, Bruce Banner only exposed himself to about two minutes of perhaps gamma radiation...but that doesn't make him any less of the Hulk.

Boys and Girls, Your Baseball Heroes

The Mitchell Report--a.k.a. the Baseball Hall of Fame Bucket List--was announced on Thursday, tarnishing forever the reputation of many current and former Major League players, activating armies of lawyers and public relations personnel, and, most significantly, befouling the innocent souls of confused and weeping children throughout the world.

Confirming rumors that circulated beforehand, New York Yankees Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte are two of the biggest names revealed to be steroids users (the inclusion of Barry Bonds on the list is about as surprising as if he were not voted "World's Most Pleasant Sports Personality")--which is just about all I, as a devout Boston Red Sox fan, could have asked for this Christmas (although that's not to say it wouldn't have been nice to see A-Rod's name, too); another relative bombshell is Miguel Tejada.

Given that George Mitchell sits on the Red Sox' board of directors, many had been curious as to whether that fact would influence his investigate panel's findings. Though it had been rumored that the report would name undead burn victim Julian Tavarez and team captain Jason Varitek (my dismay at the latter possibility was worsened by the fear that I may have unknowingly predicted it [first photo caption]), the only recent Red Sox players on the list are pitchers Brendan Donnelly and Eric Gagne...neither inclusion representing any skin off Sox fans' backs because (1) Gagne is on the Brewers now, (2) he was terrible during his one partial season in Boston, and (3) nobody cares about Brendan Donnelly.

The Red Sox win again!

[To save you the trouble of slogging through the full, 409-page report, Deadspin has helpfully compiled the list of named names.]