ESPN Widget Headlines Compelling, Current [Part III]

I'm going to keep doing this until ESPN realizes that the point of a widget is to bring forward breaking stories that people may have not heard about yet. You know, something like this. Or this. Or this. At least there isn't any mention of this dumbassery.

We Will, We Will, Sign You [Clap] Sign You [Clap]

Yesterday on the Max Kellerman Show on 1050 ESPN Radio, they had callers propose an chant for Knicks fans to serenade LeBron James with at the Garden. They settled on the above one, based on Queen's famous arena song.

The night after Kobe dumped 61 (with no rebounds and 3 assists) on the Knicks at the Garden, LeBron topped it by scoring 52 with 11 dishes and 10 boards, the most points in a triple-double since the merger.

Doris, Part III [Non-Sports]

[Here are parts I and II, in case you missed them]

Thanks to everyone who participated in the Delusional Doris Sign Sweepstakes earlier today! Mostly due to the length of the entries, there was no winner from the comment section. However, I did draw some inspiration from them and made two additions to our sign.

The top line now reads: "Did you write that letter w/your teeth?" (h/t: FY contributor Matt)

And the last two sentences read: "The difference is that when you did it, we laughed it off, and when we did, you called the cops. (and the new one) I bet they had a nice laugh when you hung up.
<3 115 xoxo"

I go to put it up, and to my horror, her door is open.


She wasn't outside, but just when you thought this woman couldn't be any creepier, she props her door open with a garbage can lid and a splintering 2x4. I don't know how that doorway connects to her apartment, but I can only assume the staircase is lined with with old newspapers, bird feathers she has collected from the roof, pre-1963 Playbills, and dead cats.

It's really awkward to ZipTie the signs on her side, from ours. I have to lean over the planter (which is right next to the railing) and around the chimney with both hands free to connect the tie. It makes it a whole lot more difficult when you have to keep an eye on that open door to make sure your crazy neighbor doesn't come flying out on her broomstick, causing you to lose your footing and fall 6 floors to your death.

If you look closely, you can see the two ties from the last sign, cinched much tighter than when I put them up. I can only assume that she had never seen a ZipTie before, and tried to remove them by yanking on the long end, only antagonizing her further.

This has been fun, but I really didn't think last night's post was going to be the 5th most popular post in the (somewhat brief) history of this blog. I'm not sure what that says about our sports commentary or more importantly, you sick puppies, but thanks for stopping by.

Whether she responds to this sign or not, rest assured there will be another Doris post at some point.

Happy Trails, Chase Wright

On the infamous night that Chase Wright gave up four consecutive home runs at Fenway Park, I was out with a couple of friends at Blondie's on 79th St. It was the same night when the Celtics gawt totally fackin' warked by David Staahrn in the 2007 NBA Draft Lottery and were given a pick three spots above where they were supposed to be.

The Yankees carried a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the third inning. Wright retired Kevin "Fack" Youkilis and David Ortiz on fly balls, when Manny Ramirez stepped to the plate.

Manny smashes one into the Green Monster.

Whatever, it's one run.

Next up, J.D. Drew. He drills it into the Red Sox bullpen in right.

It's okay, we still have the lead.

Then Mike Lowell lofts one over the Green Monster.

Okay, fuck. But it's still tied.

Finally, Jason Varitek pulls one into left field, it's high...

/Smashes face into plate of wings.

Wright finished the inning by retiring Willy Mo Pena, but was replaced by Colter Bean in the top of the 4th. The Yanks actually rebounded to take the lead in the 6th inning, but Scott Proctor gave up three runs in the 7th that sealed the deal.


In a span of 13 pitches, Wright became only the second pitcher in MLB history to give up four round trippers in a row, while simultaneously washing his Yankee career down the drain. Wright is at the level where guys are just looking to get another shot at the bigs. When your second to last outing included giving up a historically incredible offensive feat to your arch rivals, it's hard to get that stink off of you. He had posted a 2.85ERA last year, primarily in Double-A, but wasn't called up when the rosters expanded.

Today the Yanks traded him to the Brewers for Eric Fryer. After a lackluster Rookie Ball showing, Fryer busted out last year for Single-A West Virginia batting .335/.407/.506 in 104 games, while playing LF, 1B and even catcher (39 games).

Chase, I'm guessing the NL Central is going to be a lot more kind to you than the AL East was. You're left handed and only entering your age 26 season, so your best days are probably ahead.

I ain't mad at cha, homey.

Baseball Is Your Pal, Football Is Your Gal

Early in the history of this blog, we established a tradition based on a quote from the 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, Benjamin Disraeli, who once said, "It is easier to be critical than right." It's relatively easy to eviscerate some one's stupid ideas. It's much more difficult to come up with original thoughts of your own.

Unlike Richard Justice stupidly contended, Baseball isn't better than football, nor is the inverse true. They are about as far apart as two sports can be, besides maybe golf and rugby. Just based on the duration of the season, I would consider myself more of a baseball fan right now, but I've been a die hard Giants fan since I was five or six years old.

One of my earliest memories is of the drive back upstate with my father from Giants Stadium after the GMen beat the Lions to improve to 11-0 back in 1990. My dad would rattle off uniform numbers, and I would respond with the corresponding player. "27 - Rodney Hampton, 85 - Stephen Baker "The Touchdown Maker", 56 - Lawrence Taylor, 70 - Leonard Marshall, 58 - Carl Banks, 11 - Phil Sims, 55 - Gary Reasons, 30 - Dave Meggett, 82 - Mark Ingram, 89 - Mark Bavaro, 76 - Jumbo Elliot". I probably watched Giants Among Men, and True Blue 50 times each.

We had a Super Bowl party that year and I can still remember Scott Norwood's kick sailing wide right and getting lost in the celebration in our family room. Conversely, when the Yanks won in 1996, my dad was away in Taiwan for business and I watched Charlie Hayes catch that pop-up by myself.

George Carlin of course has the seminal work in contrasting the two sports, and Joe Posnanski recently drilled further down into the differences in language between them, but I have a take that I haven't heard anywhere else.

It took me about a week after the Giants lost this year to realize it, but to me, baseball is like a good friend and football is like a girlfriend. After they were ousted I wore my blue and red Giants winter hat for three straight days and listened to Ben Folds on the walk to work. It was odd and pathetic sort of melancholy, almost like I got dumped.

Football is emotional, passionate and physical. Although baseball has the go-to sexual metaphor (rounding the bases), to me, "driving down the field","crossing the goal line", "settling for a field goal" or "having to punt" make more sense.

Brandon Jacobs running over LaRon Landry in the first quarter of Week 1 against the Redskins gave me a far greater sense of satisfaction than A-Rod hitting a home run against the Orioles in the second inning of a game in April ever could. Likewise, intimacy with a significant other can grant you satisfaction in a way a friend just can't. In football, the highs are higher and the lows are lower.

You hang out with baseball all summer long. On any given night, you can take it or leave it because you know it's going to be around the next day. Blow off football and you've gotta wait an entire week for the next game.

You don't put that much stock into every single baseball game. You don't analyze everything your friend says either, unlike how your lady picks apart the nuance in every word you use. The Yanks could roll into Kansas City next May, line up CC Sabathia against Brain Bannister and lose and still take the series. If your football team lays an egg against a team they should beat, it is literally 10 times more significant to their record.

Looking back at my Giants vs. Yankees posts, the former tend to be more fiery, and my "Fuck" To Other Word Ratio (FTOWR) is quite high. My stuff about the Yankees is more statistically grounded, objective and decidedly lacking in vitriol. Although, if Robinson Cano had done what Plaxico Burress did and Joba Chamberlain said what Brandon Jacobs said, that might not be the case.

And no, that's not my girlfriend. I would never date a girl with a tramp stamp! (It's this comely lass)

Number of Days Until Spring Training: Roger Maris (#9)

It wasn't supposed to be Roger Maris. He didn't come up through the Yankees system, as he was acquired in the trade that sent Don Larsen to the Kansas City A's in 1959. He didn't get along with the New York media, and was considered surly.

Even though Maris won the AL MVP in his first year with the Yankees, they were still considered Mickey Mantle's team in 1961. Maris was an outsider and not considered a True Yankee(TM). In a perfect world, Mantle would have been the one to break Babe Ruth's single season home run record. Fate did not agree and Mantle suffered a leg infection late in the season that hindered him from topping the mark. He ended up with 54HR.

Before the 1961 season, the AL expanded from eight to ten teams, adding the Los Angeles Angels and the Washington Senators by way of an expansion draft. Both teams selected Yankees with their first picks; the Angels took Eli Grba and the Senators claimed Bobby Shantz. The Yanks also lost Duke Maas, Dale Long, Bob Cerv, Ken Hunt, Bud Zipfel. The expansion draft weakened the overall talent pool in the league fairly significantly, but despite the pillaging, the Yankees were among the teams least affected.

That same season, the schedule was lengthened from 154 to 162 games. Commissioner Ford C. Frick, initially announced that in order to break Babe Ruth's record, it would have to be done in 154 games. He said:

Any player who hit more than sixty home runs during his club’s first 154 games would be recognized as having established a new record. However, if the player does not hit more than sixty until after his club has played 154 games, there would have to be some distinctive mark in the record books to show that Babe Ruth’s record was set under a 154 game schedule and the total of more than sixty was compiled while a 162 game schedule was in effect.

This was met with strong media backlash. The Sporting News placed it at #15 of the most shameful acts in baseball history and columnist Leonard Koppett called the decision "a remarkably foolish thing". The negative reaction was certainly magnified by the fact that this was occurring in the first year of the extended schedule and the first year after the expansion.

The prevailing wisdom at the time said the decision was prompted by Frick's loyalty to Ruth which could be traced back to Frick's days as a newspaper man. Frick had ghostwritten for Ruth in the past, allowing Ruth to "cover" every world series from 1921-1936 and wrote glowing columns about him in the New York Evening Journal.

[Ed. Note: I leaned pretty heavily on an artcile by John Carvalho called "Haunted by the Babe: Frick's Columns About Ruth". The above links don't do it justice, so you can access the PDF here.]

Personally, I can't understand why this was such a big deal. Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs in 154 games. The tag of "single season" is arbitrary. It should have to be broken in the same amount of games. I guess people at the time felt like by keeping two separate sets of records, baseball was divorcing itself from it's storied past.

The alternative they chose, however, diluted the Babe's most prized record, and allowed for it to be broken during a longer season against weaker competition.

Aside from his boorish persona, Maris just wasn't a truly great player (see to the right). He had an extremely sharp career peak, winning back to back AL MVPs with the Yankees, but only made two All-Star games outside of those two seasons. Legendary second baseman Rogers Hornsby said at the time, "It would be a disappointment if Ruth's home run record were bested by a .270 hitter."

Maris had 59 HR after 154 games and hit his 61st on the last day of the season in the home half of the fourth inning against the Red Sox.

Due in no small way to the controversey surrounding his quest for 61, Maris was heckled and even had objects thrown at hit on the field. He said he received hate mail, death threats and claimed his hair fell out "in clumps" as the season progressed.

Despite breaking one of the most hallowed sports records of all time, Maris remained sour about the experience. During an interview at the 1980 All-Star game, he said:

They acted as though I was doing something wrong, poisoning the record books or something. Do you know what I have to show for 61 home runs? Nothing. Exactly nothing.

Maris was a victim of our casting. Despite the fact that sports are unscripted, we still expect the right characters to come out on top. Mickey Mantle was the former farmhand, Yankee legend, the Hall of Famer, the rags to riches story from Oklahoma. He partied with the rat pack, Joe D. and Marylin Monroe, and had the key to the city. Maris was the ostracized Kansas City transplant, but primarily on the strength on his 1961 season, Maris has his spot in Monument Park as well.

[Ed Note: 61* is a pretty good movie despite having Billy Crystal's annoying fingerprints all over it.]

Doris Follow-Up [Non-Sports]

[Here is part I in case you missed it]

It was a beautiful snowy day here in the city, and when I got home, I immediately checked to see if there had been recent activity on the terrace. I didn't see anything at first, then just barely caught a glimpse of the corner of our sign sticking out from the edge of the deck, under about two inches of fresh powder. I walked out, picked it up and saw that it had been ripped in half. Fair enough. But, if the snow melts and the pumpkin is back on our side, we've got problems.

She also tied a plastic bag with a letter inside to the a hook on our chimney. Here it goes.

The Envelope:"To: The guys who are no longer with their parents - or - at the Frat house. But Hey, guess what - In The Real World - with - Surprise of Surprises - OTHER RE(down arrow)AL PEOPLE!!!"

This took me a good 10 minutes to decode. Her lower case "t" looks like an "e" with a line above it which I thought was an accent or a tilde or something. (See the word "at" on the fourth line down, first in from the left). I was thinking to myself, "What the fuck is a froe house"?

Just a tip, when you're literally writing out an attempt at making fun of someone, you don't want to awkwardly try to insert another word into your punchline. You either leave it as is or get a new envelope.

Yes, we no longer live with our parents. Is that supposed to be an insult? Nice try, but neither of us ever lived in a frat house. "The Real World", huh? That's pretty rich coming from a fucking agoraphobic. Your "Real World" consists of 800 square feet. And of course, that last "sentence" contains four dashes and zero coherent thoughts.

And now the letter. You'd think by the envelope that it would be in pen in cursive or something. Not so much:

Front Side:

"TO: THE ANGRY GUY AT 115 w.74 - (NOT THE NICE SIDE-KICK)"

You love the dash, don't you Doris? I wonder who she thinks is the "side-kick"... Check out the comments on the last post, Doris, neither of us are nice. We are angry because you smashed our pumpkin on our terrace for no fucking reason.

"I DID NOT TOUCH YOUR BOXES"

Yes. Yes you did. You put some old grayed-out boards on there and moved our "Golf Carts" sign just this past week. You put a strange bamboo arch in there at some point over the summer and planted other odd looking plants without asking us.

There is no other explanation as to how that pumpkin ended up on our side. It did not commit suicide by jumping from the planter. The cat that stops by occasionally didn't roll it over the edge. Several pigeons did not combine forces and drop it there.

Perhaps there were some other hooligans on your roof who did it. But you blamed us for everything that happened on your terrace, period. Not sure if you've peered out through that giant pile of plastic bags you have in your apartment recently, but we aren't your only neighbors.

"WE AWOKE THE OTHER DAY AFTER SUPER BOWL SUNDAY..."

Being that today is Tuesday, I'm guessing you are referring to yesterday?

"...TO FIND A PUMPKIN SMASHED AGAINST OUR BUILDING W/SUCH FORCE IT WAS ALL OVER THE WALLS + ROOF!! WE THOUGHT YOU OR A DRUNKEN FRIEND DID IT SO WE RETURNED THE FAVOR + NOTIFIED THE POLICE + TOOK PIX -->"

/Shakes in shoes.

Not all that scary, considering you just confessed to "RETURN[ing] THE FAVOR" in the same fucking sentence.

We took pictures too, except we didn't show them to the police. We posted them on a semi-vulgarly named sports blog and told a bunch of people on the intertubes about how crazy you are.

Back Side:
"YOU HAVE HAD A PROBLEM STAYING WITHIN YOUR BOUNDS IN THE PAST. -"

Sweet, a stray dash!

What she is referring to here is that fact that our neighbors who have two dachshunds were over here literally two and a half years ago and despite our best efforts the pups occasionally ventured onto her side of the terrace, maybe three times.

"YOU ALSO - OR ONE OF YOU AT LEAST - HAS A REAL ANGER CONTROL/SENSE OF ENTITLEMENT PROBLEM"

Angry because we wrote a sign with the F-word or have you been reading the blog? Entitlement because we don't think people should smash a rotting member of the squash family on our terrace? You want to try that one again?

"YOU ALSO - OR ONE OF YOU AT LEAST - HAS A REAL DRINKING PROBLEM"

There you go.

"- YOU'RE NEVER TOO YOUNG TO BEGIN SHAPING UP AND BEHAVING LIKE A MAN!! (MEN)"

Stray dash, volume 2. Thanks for the advice, Grandma. "NEVER TOO YOUNG". Going all Benjamin Button on us, I see.

"YOUR NEIGHBOR -
@117
DORIS "THE MAD WOMAN"

You said it.

As you may or may not be able to see, there were two different markers and even a pen used in this masterpiece. It contains sixteen dashes.


I just wish it wasn't snowing so I could hang up the new sign...
(sorry for the partial joke recycling)

"Doris -
You never touched our boxes? Who put those old boards across them last week? Fairies? What about the bamboo arch? Pigeons? The pumpkin was sitting in the box on Saturday, and on Sunday, it was smashed on our terrace. Were we supposed to assume the black cat did it? You are the one who used to sweep up every single thing on your shitty tar-pit and fling it all on our side. The difference is that when you did it, we laughed it off, and when we did, you called the cops."

As you can see, there is still enough room for about two lines. In 12 words or less, what should I close with? Leave your best shot in the comments, and your zinger just might meet Doris' crazy eyes tomorrow night.

[Update 2/5: Part III of this saga has now been written]

Number of Days Until Spring Training: Phil Rizzuto (#10)

10 World Series Titles despite spending three years in the Navy. TEN. Ten. 10. Diez. Dix. Dieci. Scooter played for 13 years and won the World Series in 10 of them. Unfathomable.

This is how his playing career ended.

The end of the line for Rizzuto as a player came on Old-Timers Day at the Stadium Aug. 25, 1956, the same day the Yankees claimed outfielder Enos Slaughter off waivers from the Kansas City Athletics. Rizzuto met with club officials, who were discussing ways to get Slaughter on the 25-man roster that had to be cemented within the week for his eligibility for a possible World Series.

Rizzuto realized that he was the player the Yankees intended to release, which they did. He maintained that Stengel and general manager George Weiss reneged on a promise that if the Yankees made the Series, Rizzuto would be put on the roster as the backup for Gil McDougald, the regular shortstop, but Hunter was kept instead.

The part that doesn't really come across in that piece, is that Stengel kept going through the roster and making Phil suggest people, until he finally settled on himself. He was justifiably fuming mad that the organization would go about letting him go in such an undignified fashion, but never burned that bridge.

Rizzuto went on to spend 40 years in the broadcasting booth endearing himself to Yankees fans with a very unique and quirky style, leaving early to beat the traffic and saying "Holy Cow!". I'm a little to young to remember his broadcasting style, but most older Yanks fans I know say that he came across like your favorite Uncle.

In the weeks after he passed away in 2007, a squirrel made several appearances on the right field foul pole, leading many to make the the connection and call the squirrel Scooter.

If he wasn't universally considered one of the nicest guys in all of baseball, maybe he would have spurned the Yankees after the way they let him go and never came back to the organization. Who knows? It's late, but it's probably good that Phil provides some good karma at the end of an angry Tuesday.

More Disgraceful: Smoking Crack Or Going On Dancing With The Stars?

According to Ralph Vacchiano of the Daily News, Lawrence Taylor, one of the baddest men to ever walk this planet it going to go on Dancing With the Stars.

It was first hinted at on Ashton Kutcher's Twitter feed:

Just met LT, the old school, Lawrence Taylor. Expect to see him in prime time soon. Can’t say where, but he better work on his foot work.

Wow, stealthily cloaked, Mr. Kutcher. You sure you aren't a covert agent for the NSA? He's going to make a guest appearance on The Office, right?

LT, don't take it from me, take it from Jerry Rice.

Was in hotel bar lobby where Jerry Rice was having a few beverages and when he walks by a woman who says “That’s the guy from 'Dancing with the Stars!'"

Just to refresh every one's memory, the man who committed the heinous act below is going to be participating in a ballroom dancing competition in front of a national audience.

[Warning: The video below may be disturbing if you are Joe Theismann's leg]

The Worst Halftime Show Ever

From Deadspin comes footage of by far the worst halftime show ever:

The Oklahoma City Thunder turned that concept on its head when they recently hosted a Houdini-style underwater escape act. Kristen Johnson is a professional escape artist whose specialty is getting out of handcuffs and leg irons while being fully submerged in a tube of water. Since that one trick is more thrilling than anything the Thunder have done on a basketball court this season, they booked her for the January 16th game against Detroit.

Let's just say things didn't go as planned. It took her longer than anticipated to get out of the handcuffs and ended up having a seizure before she was pulled from the tank. Video below.

[Warning: The video gets disturbing around the 3:00 mark]

Diamonds

It's only natural that comparisons between baseball and football start to pop up this time of year. In recent years, Hardball and Pigskin have begun to separate themselves as the two most popular sports in the US, and writers are looking for a way to transition from the Super Bowl into Spring Training. As you may have noticed, all of the contributors on this blog are big fans of both sports.

Via IIATMS, Richard Justice gives 10 "reasons" why baseball is better than football. If they were good, I probably wouldn't have bothered to write this post.

2. Skill level

Hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do in sports. Throwing a baseball from 60 feet, 6 inches is the second-hardest thing. The NFL has some phenomenal athletes. None of them is[sic] as gifted as Albert Pujols, Lance Berkman and Roy Oswalt.

I would say getting past a guy who runs a 4.4 40 yard dash and catching a 45MPH pass in the corner of the endzone while still dragging both of your feet on the ground is probably harder than either of those things. This is just a dumb argument made by average-sized white people to explain to themselves that if they only were born with more skill, they could have cracked the Bigs. And Lance Berkman is a fat shit. If we are talking about being "gifted" Justin Tuck is Christmas and Lance Berkman is Easter.

3. Diamonds - It's[sic] still one of God's greatest creations. It's perfection on every level. Next time you walk into Minute Maid Park, take a moment to appreciate it. From the perfectly trimmed grass to the raked infield dirt to the chalked lines, it's about the base[sic] place on earth to spend a few hours. No matter how bad a day I've had, stress flows from me when I see a big league diamond.

Actual diamonds may or may not be "God's creation", but a baseball diamond is most certainly man's creation, unless there are some naturally-formed infields along a deserted stretch of the Chilean coastline no one has ever told me about. And you really picked Minute Maid Park, the same place with a fucking ramp in centerfield?

4. Ballparks - Baseball's worst parks are better than football's best. If you've ever spent an evening at Dodger Stadium, you'd understand. It's both tranquil and energizing if one place can be both. If you're really lucky, you'll someday stand on the right-field concourse at AT&T Park and admire the view of the bay, the odor of garlic fries, the majesty of the place.

So the HHH Metrodome or fucking Tropicana Field are better than Gillette Stadium or Qwest Field? Football stadiums sell out almost every game all season long, with crowds of about 70,000 people. I like baseball's venues better too, and hardly ever go to football games, but that is some ham-handed hyperbole. And I'm not quite sure "the odor of garlic fries" at one place really factors into a comparison between roughly 60 stadiums. There are probably NFL stadiums that have pretty good culinary options as well.

And you really put those two back to back? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say you probably could have combined "Ball Park" and "Diamonds" (part of a ballpark) into one point.

7. Cheerleaders - Football has 'em. Baseball doesn't.

Rich... you're making the case for baseball, remember? Are the cheerleaders so offensive that you can't stand the 12 second clips they show of them coming in and out of commercials? And not every football team "has 'em"; the Giants don't. I'll take cheerleaders over fucking Cotton Eyed Joey twelve times out of ten.

Welcome To The Internets, Doris [Non-Sports]

Everyone has had a crazy neighbor. We knew she was a little strange when we first spotted the yellowed newspapers she had stuffed in the top corner of one of her (broken) windows visible from our apartment. Occasionally she would blast classical music out of her AM/FM-Radio/Tape Deck combo right on the window sill, which you could hear even if both of our windows were closed.

When my buddy Sampson and I were looking for a place down here, we wanted outside space. Non-negotiable. It is an incredibly valuable commodity in Manhattan and it allows us to grill year round, which is obviously essential. We pay through the nose for it, but it's honestly worth it, especially during the summer.

When we first moved in, it was July and the terrace was a death trap of silver tar. On the hottest days, you could leave footprints just by walking on it, and the railings oozed black tar that ruined more than a few articles of clothing.

Neither of us had a "job" at that point, so we spent about three days and three trips to the Home Depot in Secaucus transforming a worthless space into the selling point of our apartment.

We didn't go in blind. My Dad used to wake me up at 7:00AM on weekends when I was 8 years old to help him with carpentry projects around our house. Sampson and I both worked for my cousin in Lake George over summer breaks in high school building custom lake houses in Cleverdale.

Sampson came up with the design, and I took care of most of the logistics. We carried every board, nail, bucket of stain, and FastenMaster Screw up six flights of stairs and I don't regret a second of it.

The fact that we had people over somewhat frequently didn't sit well with most of our neighbors. The people who lived here before us were apparently never around, which was a stark contrast to two 22 year olds with no jobs and a propensity for late nights and generous pours of Johnny Walker Red.

Doris' terrace borders on ours, not shown to the left in that picture.

The first run-in we had with her was when she called the fire department on us and had them confiscate our propane tank. Common sense would dictate that like a mother bear and her cub, you don't come between a man and his grill. We still don't know what exactly precipitated this most despicable act, but despite our initial outrage, we never said anything to her or retaliated in any way. We just bought a charcoal grill and used the extra 15 minutes it took to sear a couple of sirloins to drink another beer.

Doris used to just assume that everything that ended up on her terrace was a direct result of us, so she would sweep it up and throw it over on our side. It could have been a dead pigeon and she probably still would have tossed it over. Newsflash: There are numerous explanations for why something ends up on your terrace. We don't just throw shit over there for fun.

She also thought it would be a good idea to create a barrier between our spaces using an upside down ceramic planter, a wicker basket and some lattice, all strung together with twine. One day, I actually saw her during the daylight, and sarcastically complimented her on her work. She went "Oh, I just work with what I have, like Caldas, down in Brazil there". Riiiiiiight.

We actually have had some decent conversations with her, but her weird side inevitably came out. One night, Sampson passed out on the terrace and woke up to her throwing bird seed on him at 4:00AM.

We eventually built some spruce boxes where her odd "artwork" used to be, and planted some Aborvitaes for noise cancellation and privacy purposes. Doris was thrilled that we did it and we even planted some flowers on her side.

We had a truce for quite some time... until this weekend.

Earlier in the Fall, we nabbed a pumpkin on a golf trip to Jersey. It sat on our picnic table until it collapsed in on itself in late December. We threw it in one of the boxes to compost and it lay decaying peacefully there, ready to fertilize our Myrtle.

On Sunday, we went out to grill some chicken skewers for the Super Bowl and the rotting pumpkin was smashed on our AstroTurf. We had some ladies over at the time, so we laughed it off, and gave them the background on how crazy she was.

That lasted for about .10 of BAC. Around midnight we went back upstairs and took the remnants of the pumpkin and threw it all back on her side.

Why? Cause fuck her, that's why. There was no reason at all for her to take OUR pumpkin from OUR box and throw that shit on OUR terrace.

Well, today, I got home from work and decided to survey the terrace situation. She returned every chunk and every seed of the pumpkin back on our side. HA. Fuuuuuck that.

I had some leftover posterboard from the "Look At It, Dave" experiment, and decided it was a good time to use it. I made the following sign and Zip Tied it to one of the haphazardly arranged Time Warner cables on her side of the terrace, above the pile of pumpkin remains I threw back on her side.

[It reads:]

HEY DORIS!
ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MIND?

I think we already know the answer to that question... There is absolutely no reason for you to throw a composting pumpkin onto our terrace, which explains why we threw it back. You really shouldn't be touching the boxes we built or anything in them. We haven't bothered you for a long time, so...

STAY OUT OF OUR SHIT!

Cordially,
The 115 guys

Number of Days Until Spring Training: Buck Showalter (#11)

Fittingly, Buck Showalter got overshadowed today.

If the Super Bowl wasn't yesterday, this piece would have been written last night, and Buck would have had the 6:00AM slot. His career as Yankee Manager was similarly overshadowed and under appreciated.

Buck was born to be a baseball man. He has a very baseballey-sounding name. When he was growing up in Century, Florida, Little League games were the most popular summertime activity. Every night there was a game, a couple hundred residents would gather under the lights to take in the action. Buck didn't have to travel very far to catch the games, because his backyard butted up against scoreboard of the field. His father was the Principal of the local high school and coach of the baseball team, in case you were wondering where Buck got his stern demeanor.

Unfortunately, Showalter wasn't born to be a baseball player. He spent seven years in the Yankee organization and had relatively good minor league numbers, but never played a game on the big stage because he was blocked by Don Mattingly. William Nathaniel "Buck" Showalter got his nickname for the state of undress he used to walk around the locker room in.

After his playing career, Buck went on to manage in the Yankees system, starting with Oneonta, moving to Fort Lauderdale, and ending up with the Albany Colonie Yankees in 1989, who went (97-46) and won him the Baseball America's Minor League Manager of the Year. He was promoted to the Yankees major league coaching staff in 1990 and replaced Stump Merrill as Manager in 1992.

After going (76-86) in '92, Showalter guided the Yankees to a second place finish in 1993 with 88 wins. When the strike stopped the 1994 season, their winning percentage was even better (.619) and they were on pace to win over 100 games. The Yanks made the playoffs in 1995 for the first time since 1981 by earning a Wild Card berth.

His personal clashes with George Steinbrenner ultimately led to him leaving the team before the 1996 season. After losing to the Mariners in the '95 ALDS Steinbrenner wanted Buck to fire two of his coaches, and when he refused, Buck got the axe himself. After having set the table for St. Joe and the late 90's dominance, he moved on to the expansion Arizona Diamondbacks. He led them to a 100 win season in 1999 and left after 2000, just before the D-Backs unseated the Yanks in the 2001 World Series.

I was at a game earlier this year and they had Buck pull the Metlife countdown lever. There was a smattering of applause, but not real love for him. I was pretty surprised. Yankee fans pride themselves on their appreciation for the team's history, and to some extent, the indifferent reception to Buck's appearance that night makes me question that.