Everyone Has An Opinion About A-Rod & Dallas Braden

Good morning, Fackers. You'd think that a game with a triple play would be the enduring topic of conversation stemming from the game yesterday afternoon, but alas it is not.

By now you've probably seen or read about what happened between Alex Rodriguez and Dallas Braden just before Robinson Cano grounded into an inning ending double play in the top of the 6th inning yesterday, but if not, here is Chad Jennings' breakdown (with audio) and the most complete video explanation I could find:

Let's see what people are saying about it:

A-Rod:

I thought it was pretty funny, actually.

Braden:

The guy was tasting himself too long to apologize.

Michael Duca (author of a book on baseball's unwritten rules):

It was very common (to observe the rule) in the '40s, '50s and '60s. Bob Gibson was very well versed in protecting what he called his office. He told people to say the ... out of my office. Had that been Gibson on the mound, A-Rod would have picked himself off the grass to get back to first. He would have decked him. No question about it.

#2: Alex Rodriguez is one of two types of player: A guy who’s profoundly ignorant of much of the Code, or a guy who actively disdains it.

Bill James:

I've never heard of such a rule. To be honest, people are always coming up with unwritten rules that you're not supposed to do something that they don't happen to like, but usually, it's some old manager who is upset about a kid bunting to break up a no-hitter or something. THAT'S annoying, but when it's a fairly anonymous player springing an unwritten rule on a 34-year-old Hall of Famer who has been on the All-Star team since Dallas Braden was in the 6th grade. . .well, what can you say?

Craig Calcaterra:

I've never heard of the unwritten rule about not walking on the mound, but I want to think less of A-Rod for it all the same if that makes any sense. Mostly I just want someone to recut the video of Braden jawing at Rodriguez with the audio from the "get off my f------ obstacle" scene from "Full Metal Jacket" because that would be cool.

Rob Neyer:

No, the Yankees won't be intimidated by Dallas Braden or anyone else. They're too good, too experienced, too confident. But Braden wasn't yelling at the Yankees. Not really. He was yelling at himself, and at his teammates. Players have won MVP Awards for such things.

Kevin Kaduk:

On one hand, it's nice for A's fans to see that one of their young guns won't cede any ground or be intimidated by one of the best players on the defending world champs. I'm also always up for any time a baseball player breaks cliche-mode and goes off the script.

But on the other, there's something to be said for knowing your spot in the game and earning enough capital to call out a perennial All-Star over something so petty.

Keith Hernandez:

“I don’t know if there is an unwritten rule, but I would never do that.”

SoSHially Unacceptable (commenter at BBTF):

Not having heard of this rule either, I called my buddy who pitched a couple years in the minors. I asked him what he would have done in this situation, and he basically said he would have reacted the same way as Braden. And, he added, he wouldn't have thought any player in the majors would even consider running across the mound, knowing how pitchers would react.

And for what it's worth, he's a big Yankee fan.

Dan Reiner from Bronx Baseball Daily:

Now, being a pitcher myself, I’d understand if Braden got slightly upset. But for him to scream at Alex and proceed to throw a Carlos Zambrano-like tantrum in the dugout is a little much in my opinion.

Lisa from Subway Squawkers:

Dude's played in a grand total of 65 MLB games, and all of a sudden, he's the enforcer of all the unwritten rules of baseball? Please.

Denton from Surviving Grady:

Add it to the list of lowlights for A-Rod. He will never get it. The two teams don't face each other again until July, but pitchers seem to remember these things.

In regards to the last one, Braden is 6' 1", 190 and throws 85 MPH. It would likely not be in his best interest to retaliate.

I think this boils down to two points. A-Rod probably shouldn't have run over the mound. It probably takes less effort just to jog around it. There is a disembodied voice in the clip above (Barry Larkin?) that suggests there's some sort of gamesmanship involved on A-Rod's behalf, but I tend to doubt that. I think it was just a thoughtless mistake. If he was trying to intimidate him, I doubt he would have just played dumb afterwards. The dismissive hand waive in the clip above says it all.

The other half is that Braden threw a complete temper tantrum over this, kicking stuff on the way back to the dugout after already having said his piece at A-Rod. We get it buddy, you feel disrespected. But it was CC Sabathia's mound for the other halves of the innings too. It's a purely symbolic thing and it's your problem if you let yourself get all worked up about it.

If that was A-Rod's goal, he certainly succeeded, but the end result was Cano's double play ball, so it backfired in the grand scheme of things. Let's just hope this is a dead issue. I don't want there to be an injuries or suspensions that result from this the next time the teams meet in July.

The Most Undah-rated Linkaround Evah!

Here are a few things to check out before you really begin hoarding your company's bandwidth and submarining its productivity:

Alex Speir of WEEI wants to know why the rest of the country doesn't appreciate Kevin Youkilis for the haaahd-working, ovah-achieving supahstah he is. WHEN WILL YOU FACKS EVAH GIVE YOUK THE CREDIT HE IS DUE??!

If you are planning on buying Yankee tickets when they go on sale at noon today, be sure to check out the Ticketmaster tips from Ross at NYY Stadium Insider.

Nate Silver's projections say that Jeter will hit .286 this year and Allen Barra of the Village Voice infers that the Yanks are doomed if he's right... CRUCIFY THEM BOTH!

Speaking of the Captain, it appeared that he might have tweaked his throwing hand on a diving stop last night night, but according to him, it's fine and he'll play today against the Tigers at 1:05.

Joel Sherman says that it's "almost certain" that the Yankees will trade either Sergio Mitre or Chad Gaudin before the season begins. Gaudin seems to have more value as a swingman but also has a higher salary. Just depends on who they select as a trading partner, I suppose.

Patrick Sullivan over at The Baseball Analysts continues their Stakeholders series with five questions for Bronx Banter's Cliff Corcoran about the Yankees.

Greg Fertel from Pending Pinstripes did the math on the concept of bullpen chaining I brought up in my post about the 5th starer. Click through to see how much sending Joba to AAA would cost the MLB club.

Mike Vaccaro of the Post talked to Mark Teixeira about the pressures of playing in New York. It's the typical "playing in New York is so much more difficult and important that playing anywhere else" piece, but I still enjoyed this line:

Nobody ever wonders if a linebacker "has the makeup to make it in New Orleans." No one ever ponders if a power forward can become "a Portland guy." Or if a goalie has what it takes to make it in Buffalo.

Prospect maven John Sickels interviewed Yankees Senior Vice President Mark Newman. Topics include Slade Heathcott, Andrew Brackman, Jesus Montero, Pat Venditte, and Jeremy Bleich (pronounced "Bleish").

Geoff Baker did an interesting video interview with Bill James which included some reader/viewer questions. As always, James gives frank and interesting answers but this time you have visual confirmation that he is not a robot.

DRay's Bay wonders if the number of batters hit by pitches is in decline.

Is the hype around Aroldis Chapman enhanced by the fact he comes from the magical and mysterious island of Cuba? Tim Marchman believes so. Marchman also believes that it's ridiculous for baseball to be drug testing it's managers. We may or may not have some more thoughts on the Ron Washington Saga in the near future.

Jeff Zimmerman at Beyond the Box Score used spray charts as a way of examining wrist injuries. If nothing else, it's a nice reminder of how much David Ortiz sucked at the beginning of last year.

We'll be back with more in a little bit.

1 Day Until Spring Training: Billy Martin

There are 741 billion different ways to arrange a 25 man roster into a 9 slot line-up. Once you select the 9 best players that number drops to 362,880. Surprisingly, at least according to countless computer simulations, the way a manager chooses to arrange those 9 players from there doesn't have that much of an impact on the amount of runs the line up produces.

There are only so many ways a manager can impact the outcome of a game. Most of the decisions a manager has to make, like removing a starting pitcher, pinch hitting, or intentionally walking a hitter are technically possible at all times. However, no reasonable observer would advocate going to the bullpen in the first inning unless there was an injury or a complete melt down by the pitcher. No one would suggest intentionally walking a batter to lead off the 7th in a tie game. Like batting order, once you narrow the moves a manager can make down to a fairly reasonable set of options, the decision amongst them isn't statistically likely to make much of a difference.

So how is it that Billy Martin is universally remembered as "a genius who could turn almost any kind of team into a winner"? How could he have been so influential when even the best decisions could only have a limited impact on the field?

Martin spent 11 seasons as a player in the major leagues, six and a half with the Yankees. A second baseman by trade, Billy put in some time at third and short, allowing Casey Stengel some of the flexibility that he so cherished. In his playing days, Martin was scrappy and gritty and all of those terms that people use to describe players that appeared to be trying hard but weren't particularly good. He could play defense but couldn't really hit for average. Or power. Or get on-base. Or steal bases once he got on. But Stengel was Martin's most fervent advocate, so the Yanks kept him around.

During his time with the Bombers, he was part of four World Series winning teams (1951, 1952, 1953 & 1956). It was more a matter of great timing than his production. He played alongside Mickey Mantle, Phil Rizzuto, Yogi Berra, Gil McDougald, Moose Skowron, and Elston Howard and behind Whitey Ford, Allie Reynolds, Vic Raschi and Eddie Lopat.

In 1953 - one of his finer seasons with the Yanks - he was the only person on the team to appear in more than 60 games and have an OPS+ of less than 100. However, over the 28 World Series games in which he appeared, he hit .333, well above his career mark of .257.

It might have been this success in the World Series that endeared him to superstar teammates Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford. The trio were legendary for their after hours gallivanting throughout New York City and on the road. The fact that he involved Mantle and Ford in his partying was what got him traded in the middle of the 1957 season following the legendary brawl at the Copacabana.

Yankees General Manager George Weiss viewed Martin as a bad influence on the team's stars and dealt him to the Kansas City Athletics in a seven player deal shortly after the fight. After the '57 season, he was traded from KC to Detroit, then to Cleveland, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and Minnesota, never spending more than a season with any organization as a player. He did stay with Minnesota after his hung up his cleats, however.

After Billy retired, he worked as a scout in the Twins' organization for three years, then was asked to serve as third base coach under his former manager, Sam Mele. Martin enjoyed his time as a scout and had no real aspirations to ascend the coaching ladder but agreed to come on board because he respected Mele. During that time, he mentored a left handed Rod Carew and was one of the few voices that insisted Carew was ready for the Major Leagues in 1967 when he took home Rookie of the Year honors.

It was during the 1967 that Sam Mele was fired by the Twins. The club had got off to a sluggish 25-25 start and rumors abounded that Martin would be Mele's successor. However, Billy had yet to actually manage a team and Twins' owner Calvin Griffith chose veteran skipper Cal Ermer instead. The following May, Martin took over as manager for Minnesota's AAA affiliate in Denver, an assignment he was afraid would be his "one way ticket to oblivion". In hindsight, it was just the opposite.

In his first season as manager of the Denver Bears, Martin took over a team that started 7-22 and led them to a winning season. Graig Nettles was one of the players on the Bears that year and although he didn't much care for Martin at first, he eventually came around:

When I saw the results, I stopped hating Billy Martin and began to see him for what he was: an extraordinary leader.

The two would later win a World Series together with the Yankees.

Twins ownership eventually saw Martin for what he was as well. After one more year in Denver, Martin was promoted to Major League Skipper, replacing Ermer. In his first season at the helm, he guided the team to 97 wins and a Division Championship. Griffith was no doubt impressed with the 14 win improvement from the previous year, but fired Martin in part because he beat up pitcher Dave Boswell and left him unconscious in an alleyway behind a bar called A.C. Lindell's in Detroit.

Martin had always been combative. He grew up in one the poorer areas near Berkley, California - East Bay City and was surrounded by gangs and street violence for much of his early life. His mother sent his philandering father packing before he was even born. Martin didn't lay eyes on him until he was 15, at which point Billy told him he never wanted to see him again.

Despite Martin's violent episode with the Twins, he landed another managerial gig in Detroit just a year later (where the fight with Boswell occurred, of all places). In his first season in Motown, the Tigers won 91 games, an 11 game increase from the year before, but finished second to Baltimore in the AL East. The following year they won only 86 games but edged the Red Sox by one game to win the division and went on to lose to the A's in the ALCS.

Martin was fired 134 games into the '73 season, this time for ordering his pitchers to retaliate for the spitballs Gaylord Perry was throwing on August 30th.

Despite his building reputation as a loose cannon, he landed on his feet in Texas before the season was over. In 1974, Martin presided over a 23 game advance, taking a Rangers team that had won just 57 games the year before up to 84 victories and a second place finish in the AL West. Martin was fired once again by Texas in 1975, after the team started to fade midway through the season. Within a week, he was hired by the Yankees and finished out the last 56 games of the season with them.

Amazingly, in his first full year in the Bronx, Martin again steered a team to a double digit rise in wins, from 84 to 97. The Yankees won the AL East that season and advanced to the World Series but were swept by the Reds.

During the subsequent offseason, despite the fact the team just won their first pennant in 12 years, George Steinbrenner, fresh off his suspension for illegal campaign contributions, started making moves. Chief among those was the acquisition of Reggie Jackson. Martin wasn't in favor of acquiring the Orioles' slugger. With the team in need of shortstop, Martin instead lobbied for signing the Orioles' Bobby Grich, one of the best second basemen in the game, who had experience at shortstop as well. Per usual, Steinbrenner got his way. Reggie came to the Bronx, the Yankees used their other free agent spot to sign pitcher Don Gullett, and Grich went to the Angels. Jackson made Oscar Gamble expendable, and he was flipped to the White Sox for shortstop Bucky Dent.

Martin wasn't fond of Jackson, and when Reggie's infamous "straw that stirs the drink" story published in Sport Magazine in May, it only increased divisions in an already fractured clubhouse. Tensions came to a head during the '77 season when Billy pulled Jackson from a nationally televised game at Fenway Park on June 18th for failing to hustle out a fly ball in right field in the bottom of the 6th. When Reggie got back to the dugout, tempers flared and they both had to be restrained. Despite the drama swirling around in the clubhouse (the Bronx Zoo), the Yankees won 100 games that year, topped the Royals in the ALCS, and beat the Dodgers in 6 games in the World Series. It was the only World Series victory of Martin's managing career.

The madness didn't subside in 1978. Midway through the season Jackson ignored signs from Martin and bunted when it wasn't called for. This sent Martin over the edge. He told the press later that day about Jackson and Steinbrenner, respectively, "The two of them deserve each other - one's a born liar, the other's convicted."

It would prove to be his undoing as Yankee Manager (for the time being) and he resigned a few days later. Less than a week after resigning, Martin was the final player introduced at Old Timers Day. There, it was announced that Martin would return as manager for the 1980 season, with his replacement, Bob Lemon, moving to the front office. Steinbrenner couldn't wait that long, firing Lemon less than halfway through the 1979 season, with Martin taking over for the final 95 games. The team had a winning record under his guidance, but finished 4th. That tenure ended after Martin bloodied a marshmallow salesman by the name of Joseph Cooper in a barroom fight in a Minnesota hotel.

But back to the original question. What made Billy Martin so good as a manager?

He once explained:

Out of 25 guys, there should be fifteen who would run through a wall for you, two or three who don't like you at all, five who are indifferent and maybe three undecided. My job is to keep the last two groups from going the wrong way.

He also employed daring tactics that may not have agreed with conventional wisdom, but seemed to work out for him. One of the things he taught Rod Carew was how to steal home, and as a result 7 of Carew's 20 stolen bases in 1969 were of home plate.

He also used some odd tactics, like asking pitchers to hit and play other defensive positions. He had pitcher Fergie Jenkins DH in the 6th inning in a game in 1974, breaking up a no-hitter with a single to center, and later tried the same tactic with pitcher Rick Rhoden in 1988. He had Ron Guidry in center field and Don Mattingly at second when the Pine Tar Game was resumed in 1983. He had lefty swinging Mike Pagliarulo bat right handed in 1985. He literally drew the Yankees line-up out of a hat on April 21st, 1977 against the Blue Jays, a game which they won 8-6. In Oakland from 1980-1982 he employed "Billy Ball" - a combination of hit and runs, squeeze plays and stolen bases - despite the fact that his teams lead the AL in HRs.

Could his strategies alone possibly be the only reason that every team he managed got significantly better as soom as he got there? Some of those things, like DH'ing Rhoden or Jenkins, while creative, couldn't have possibly created a positive win expectancy. But sometimes you can make a low percentage play and have it still work out. He seemed to go all-in with a straight draw and hit it on the turn more than his fair share of times.

It's probably difficult to accept for the most statistically-inclined, but the historical consensus is that Martin's true genius was in his personality. He was intense, cantankerous and blunt but also had an incredibly thorough knowledge of the game. Mike Pagliarulo said:

He was the kind of guy who wasn’t afraid to tell you what he thought of you. If I got one hit in a game and hit a couple other balls well, but they were caught, what he’d say to me was, “You dumb-ass dago, you can’t get more than one hit.” Billy was very honest.

But then added:

Billy could see the field so completely; he knew what everybody was doing.

Martin also had a penchant for riding his players, especially pitchers. He once sat down and explained his managing philosophy to Leonard Koppett:

A lot of the time, you have to make a player do something he doesn't want to do, for the good of the team, or to push him harder that he thinks he should be pushed. You can't do it if the player thinks "Why should I listen to him? He's not the boss. He may be gone next year. I'll do it my way" When that attitude takes hold, teams don't win.

Managing is teaching, first of all. That's even more important than winning itself. When you get a player whose potenital you can see, and show him things that can make him better, and show him the things that can make him win, and then you can see him later realizing those things - it's like a graduation. It makes you feel satisfied even if he's no longer your player.

For a team to win, a manager has to find ways to motivate different individuals. He has to judge correctly each man's abilities and weaknesses, and find the right ways and the right times to use them.

But the enjoyment comes from the things I put in.... The victory at the end is only proof that you succeded, and nobody can take that away from you once you've won. But the fun and the rewards are in what you do getting there.

This also lends some insight as to why Martin never lasted as manager for more than three full, consecutive seasons with any team. After managing near his hometown in Oakland from 1980-82, twice winning Manager of the Year and making the playoffs in '81, he returned to the Yankees in 1983 and won 91 games.

He was fired that offseason and re-hired in 1985 when he won 91 games again, except this time he replaced Yogi Berra after 16 games and accomplished the feat in only 145. That September, Martin got in a fight with Ed Whitson in a hotel bar. Having lost his legendary brawling skills, Billy suffered a broken arm and two fractured ribs in the fight. As they often do of drunken brawls, accounts of the night vary, but the New York Times cited an unnamed source that said an official investigation by the Yankees indicated Martin was the instigator.

The team retired his number and gave him a plaque in Monument Park in 1986. He spent the '86 and '87 doing occasional TV work on WPIX Yankee telecasts.

During his final stint with the Yankees in 1988, Billy was more unorthodox than ever. Dave Righetti was deployed for two and three innings at a time, resulting in five blown saves, four of which came in a row. He used a seven man rotation at one point, and had Rick Rhoden DH despite his ailing back. Billy started out 40-28 and had the team in the thick of the division race. But there was a three game suspension for throwing dirt at an umpire and yet another brawl, this one at a Dallas area strip club. It left Martin with bruises, forty stitches in his up ear, and for the fifth and final time, as the former manager of the New York Yankees. He was replaced by Lou Piniella.

All told, Martin only won two pennants and one World Series. His 1253 wins as a manager is good for 32nd on the all-time list, and his .553 winning percentage and 240 wins over .500 place him at 21st and 20th, respectively. But many see him as one of the greatest managers - at least over the short term - of all time. For what it's worth, if I had to pick a manager to win one game for me, it would be Martin.

In 1989, Billy was brought back to the Yankees as a special consultant. It was rumored he had been asked to manage the team in 1990 and had already assembled a coaching staff to come with him.

On Christmas day, he was riding in his longtime friend William Reedy's pick-up truck and both had been drinking but neither was wearing a seatbelt. They were approaching Billy's house in Fenton, NY, just outside of Binghamton, when the truck skidded off the icy road and down a 300 foot embankment, ending up at the foot of Martin's driveway. Reedy was left in serious condition, but Martin was not so lucky. He was taken to Wilson Memorial Hospital in Johnson City. Attempts at reviving him were unsuccessful. He was 61.

Billy Martin was notoriously hard on his players but he was probably harder on himself. He was a heavy drinker throughout almost all of his adult life. He was a fixture in hotel bars when the Yankees were on the road - as evidenced by his many fights that took place in them - and would often be seated on a barstool soon after he left Yankee Stadium as well. Martin forged a lot of friendships because of his fondness for the drink, but also made a lot of enemies that way too. In the end it was directly responsible for his demise.

"I may not have been the greatest Yankee to put on the uniform,

but I was the proudest"

5 Days Until Spring Training: Joe DiMaggio

The son of Sicilian immigrants, Joe DiMaggio's given name was actually Guiseppe. He grew up in San Francisco where his father made a living as a fisherman, manning a boat that wasn't quite large enough for crabbing but was sufficiently sizable to make a living on during the 1920's in the rich waters of the San Francisco Bay. DiMaggio's father, also named Guiseppe, came from a long line of Sicilian fisherman as did the fathers of most of the boys Joe D. used to play baseball with on North Beach playground.

Naturally, the elder Guiseppe wanted all five of his sons to become fisherman, but he didn't understand that by immigrating to America, he had opened up their options far beyond anything they could have conceived back on Isola delle Femmine. They weren't consigned to the sea like he had been at their age. Only the two oldest DiMaggios became fisherman. The youngest three all went on to play Major League baseball.

Dom and Vince both had pretty decent careers. Each player over a decade and both brothers retired with OPS+ around 110. Not bad, but Joe was clearly head and shoulders above his kin.

Vince was actually the one who got Joe back into baseball after he briefly lost interest in his mid teens. Vince asked his manager with the San Francisco Seals to let his kid brother to fill in at shortstop for three games at the end of the 1932 season while the incumbent Augie Galan was barnstorming in Hawaii. In 1933, Joe officially became part of the team.

During his rookie season, just 18 years old, DiMaggio started the season on the bench. Eventually he took the place of a slumping right fielder and began his inexorable march to superstardom. Starting on May 27th, DiMaggio recorded a hit in 61 straight games, shattering the previous Pacific Coast League record. It was then he truly became hooked on baseball:

Baseball didn't really get into my blood until I knocked off that hitting streak. Getting a daily hit became more important to me than eating, drinking or sleeping. Overnight I became a personality.

DiMaggio had a unique minor league baseball experience. Instead of being drafted by an franchise and assigned to one of their teams thousands of miles from where he grew up, he played all of his minor league ball for his hometown Seals. He later explained:

I had the good luck to spend my entire minor league career in the Pacific Coast League, in which all travel and accommodations were first-class, and with my hometown team, the San Francisco Seals, at that. Playing on my hometown team meant when the club played its home stands I could live with my parents, occupy my own room.

The Yankees originally wanted to purchase DiMaggio at the beginning of the 1935 season but Charley Graham, owner of the Seals, drove a hard bargain. He agreed to give up Joltin' Joe, but only after he completed the '35 season in San Francisco. Additionally, the Yankees had to send three players to the Seals before the '35 season began. This made the Seals a heavy favorite in the PCL that year, and they took full advantage.

DiMaggio hit .398 with 100 extra base hits and 173 RBIs. The Seals captured their first Pacific Coast League title in 4 years and Joe was named League MVP. After the season ended, the Yankees sent $75,000 and completed the deal. DiMaggio made the long trip from California to Spring Training in St. Petersburg with fellow Italians and Bay Area natives Tony Lazzeri and Frank Crosetti, the latter of whom was bought from the Seals in 1931.

DiMaggio's personality didn't seem fit for the Big Apple. The Daily News called him "timid" and referred to his as Dead Pan Joe when he first arrived. Later in his career Hank Greenberg noted that if DiMaggio said "hello" to you, that was a long conversation by his standards. He was hyped endlessly by the New York papers and billed as the "Babe Ruth's successor", but in terms of disposition, he was much more like Lou Gehrig than Ruth.

Joe hit .323/.352/.576 with 29 HRs and 125 RBIs in his first year in the Bronx, made the All-Star team and finished 8th in the MVP vote. Had there been a Rookie of the Year award then, he surely would have won it. His sophomore campaign was even better, with a line of .346/.412/.673 and a whopping 46 home runs despite hitting right handed in Yankee Stadium for half of his games.

Over the course of his career, DiMaggio his 148 homers in the Bronx compared to 213 on the road. Left-center field at Yankee Stadium was 460 feet away during his playing days and straight away center was 490. It was a short 281 feet down the line, but the 45 degrees directly ahead of DiMaggio ranged from 430 feed in left field to 406 in right. It suffices to say that the Yankee Clipper lost a fair amount of home runs to Death Valley.

If anything, the extra square footage in the Yankee outfield help Joltin' Joe hit for average. With more ground for the outfielders to cover, there were more places for DiMaggio's hits to fall. On May 14th, 1941, he began his legendary 56 game hitting streak which lasted until July 17th in Cleveland. That day, three great defensive plays - two by third baseman Ken Keltner and one by shortstop Lou Boudreau - kept Joltin' Joe hitless. Undeterred, DiMaggio hit safely in 16 straight games immediately, collecting a hit in 72 of 73.

That year, primarily on the strength of his hitting streak (and maybe aided by the fact that he only struck out 13 times in 621 PAs), the Yankee Clipper stole the MVP from Teddy Ballgame, who hit .406 and roundly trounced him in every other significant batting category, save for runs batted in.

From 1936-1942, DiMaggio hit .339/.403/.607 (159 OPS+), averaged 31 home runs and 133 RBIs and won two AL MVPs. He homered more often that he struck out and played excellent defense.

DiMaggio was known for his long strides that allowed him to cover wide swaths of Yankee Stadium's expansive center field. According to Tiger slugger Hank Greenberg, the only way to get a hit against the Yankees was "to hit 'em where Joe wasn't." He developed his nickname "The Yankee Clipper" because as he patrolled center field he looked as smooth and graceful as the popular 19th century clipper sailing ships known for their speed and ability to cut through wavy waters.

After 7 excellent seasons for the Yanks, DiMaggio went to war in 1943. Well, more correctly, the was drafted into the Army Air Force. He traded in his $43,750 salary from the Yanks for a $50/month wage from the Army, but he continued playing baseball. He became a part of the 7th AAF and was stationed in Santa Ana, California. Joe spent most of his time in the service as a physical education instructor and playing baseball on the Santa Ana team. By contrast, Ted Williams was a fighter pilot.

While his time in the Army was a relative walk in the park, his parents were not so lucky. Since they were Italian immigrants, they were classified as "enemy aliens" and forced to carry identification cards on them at all times. They were not allowed to go beyond five miles from their home with out a government-issued permit. DiMaggio's father was banned from fishing in San Francisco Bay, where he had made a living over the previous 30 years.

The Yankee Clipper lost three full seasons to WWII. When he returned to the Yankees, he was 31 years old and it took him a bit to regain him form, hitting only .290 in his first year back. He hit for a lower average and with less power in his final six seasons than he did in his first seven but still managed a 150 OPS+ over that span. He picked up his third and final MVP in 1947, nudging out Ted Williams by one point despite on-base and slugging percentages over 100 points lower than the Splendid Splinter's, not to mention significantly fewer homers, RBIs and runs scored. It probably helped that the Yanks made it to the World Series and the Sox finished 3rd in the AL.

Williams and DiMaggio were almost swapped for each other in 1949. Boston Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey and Yankees GM Larry MacPhail verbally agreed to a trade, however it fell apart when McPhail balked at Yawkey asked for a young catcher by the name of Yogi Berra. It seemed at the time that the two principles of the trade were stuck in the wrong parks - the left handed Williams in Fenway and the righty DiMaggio in Yankee Stadium. However, they made out pretty well despite their inhospitable home parks. Berra, it turns out, would have been a much bigger loss for the Yanks because DiMaggio was done as a player only two seasons later.

Helped greatly by his hitting streak, DiMaggio became a central figure in American pop culture. Although he was an incredibly great player, his fame outpaced his talents. He was referenced in countless songs such as John Fogarty's Center Field, We Didn't Start the Fire by Billy Joel and Mrs. Robinson by Simon and Garfunkel. He was mentioned on I Love Lucy, Seinfeld, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Hemingway even mentioned him in The Old Man and the Sea.

The Yankee Clipper accomplished an awful lot despite playing in only 13 seasons in the Big Leauges. He was a 9-time World Champion, 3-time AL MVP, 2 time batting champion, and a 13-time All-Star (the only player to be selected for the All-Star Game in every season he played). His career line was .325/.398/.579 BA and he tallied 361 HRs, 1537 RBI.

Joltin' Joe was a private man. He never seemed to be interested in the trappings of fame despite being one of the most famous people in the country for much of his life. He married Marilyn Monroe in 1954, of course, but the marriage lasted less than a year, due in part to Joe's jealousy and public nature of her character. They reunited seven years later and Joe asked her to marry him just four days before she died on August 5th, 1962. Joe had roses delivered to her grave three times a week for twenty years after she passed away. He never married again.

DiMaggio lived a full and long life which ended when he was 84 years old. He spend the last 100 days of his life in a hospital battling lung cancer and passed away on March 8th, 1999. The Yankees wore a black #5 patch on their uniforms to commemorate his life that season which culminated with a World Series victory over the Braves.

Mostly due to the length of his career, it took 3 ballots for DiMaggio to enter the Hall of Fame but he gained admittance to Cooperstown in 1955 and lived more than half of his life as a member of the Hall of Fame. He was to Yankees fans what Ruth was before him and Mantle and Jeter have been after: larger than life legends both on and off the field.

6 Days Until Spring Training: Roy White

By the time the Yankees ended an eleven season pennant drought in 1976 the only connections they had to their most recent successes were coaches Yogi Berra and Elston Howard, and digging back even further in their history, manager Billy Martin. But there was one player on the club who had just missed out on the success of the teams of the early sixties.

Roy White was signed as an amateur free agent in the summer of 1961. He made his professional debut the next year, and worked his way through the minor league system over the next three years as the Yankees won their third, fourth, and fifth consecutive pennants. After a breakout season at AA in 1965, the switch hitting second baseman was called up in September as the Yankees wound out their first losing season in forty years.

The rookie made his debut on September 7th, singling as a pinch hitter in the front end of a double header and picking up two more hits as the second baseman in the second game. It would be White's only appearance at second base in '65, and one of only three in his Major League career. The day after White made his debut, another highly touted Yankee rookie made his debut at shortstop. Like White, Bobby Murcer soon would be moved from the middle infield to the outfield. After Murcer's return from military service in 1969, the pair would be two bright spots in a rather dismal period in Yankee history.

White took over as the regular left fielder in '66, patrolling the Yankee outfield with Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris. Despite the lofty company he kept, the 22 year old White proved not quite ready for prime time. He began the '67 season loaned out to the Dodgers' AAA affiliate in Spokane, returned to the Bronx in July, and despite some lackluster numbers he earned himself a job for good.

White broke out in '68, batting .267/.350/.414, good for a 136 OPS+ in the year of the pitcher. He finished third in the American League in runs, fourth in times on base, seventh in triples, and tenth in stolen bases. It was the start of a five year stretch for White in which he posted an overall OPS+ of 138, never posting a season lower than 130.

Even as offense improved following the lowering of pitcher's mounds in 1969, power remained suppressed. While White had enough pop to rack up a decent amount of extra base hits, his keen batting eye was his greatest asset. It allowed him to far outpace the league in OBP. Seven times in his career he finished in the top ten in walks, including four of the five years during his peak and league leading 99 free passes in 1972.

After a down year in '73, White rebounded to post three more seasons with an OPS+ over 120. In the Yankees' pennant winning season of '76 White led the AL with 1o4 runs scored. He slipped a bit in the Yankees World Series winning seasons of '77 and '78, but remained a regular in the line up and a contributor offensively. Following a poor 1979, White departed for Japan and spent the final three seasons of his career playing for the Tokyo Giants - the Yankees of Japan.

White returned to the Yankees as a coach in 1983, '84, '86, '04, and '05. He ranks seventh on the team's all-time games played and plate appearance lists, sixth on the walks list, fifth on the stolen base list, and eighth in times on base.

Roy White doesn't rank with the Hall of Famers in Yankee history, but he was a very good player for a long time. His body of work has been underestimated due to his best years coming in an offensively suppressed era and during one of the worst stretches in Yankee history. Yet he was a very good Yankee for fifteen seasons, a quiet and dignified player who was a calming presence on what were often chaotic teams. In his New Historical Baseball Abstract, Bill James ranked White as the 25th best left fielder of all time, ahead of more celebrated contemporaries Don Baylor, Greg Luzinski, George Foster, and even Hall of Famer Jim Rice.

8 Days Until Spring Training: Yogi Berra

Like his good friend Phil Rizzuto, Lawrence Peter Berra had a formative experience as a young man with a respected Major League figure who told him that he would never become a professional baseball player. In 1942, Yogi was 17 years old and playing minor league ball when he was approached by Branch Rickey, then the general manager of the Cardinals. Rickey offered him $250 to sign with the Cards but Berra refused. When he did, Rickey supposedly said, "He'll never make anything more than a Triple A ballplayer at best".

Yogi held out for $500 from the Yankees and was assigned to their club in Newport, Virginia. In some ways, you can understand why Rickey wasn't willing to shell out the extra $250. Berra never looked the part of a baseball player (or athlete of any kind, for that matter). He was 5'8" and a sturdy 190-something pounds in his playing days, but his fire plug build made him perfectly suited for catching. They don't call Berra's kind of built "squat" for nothing.

When Yogi turned 18, the year was 1943 and World War II was kicking into high gear. Instead of waiting to being drafted into the armed services, he set aside his dream to play professional baseball and enlisted in the Navy himself. Unlike many established Major Leaguers who were part of the military, Berra spent his years in active duty and participated in the D-Day invasion as a gunner's mate on a rocket-launching craft. After Normandy, he was stationed in North Africa and Italy but suffered a hand injury and was sent back across the Atlantic.

When he got back to the States, Berra was stationed at the submarine base in Groton, Connecticut. After he was discharged from the Navy, he began playing for the Yankees' affiliate in New London. According to lore, Giants manager Mel Ott saw Yogi play in New London and offered the Yankees $50,000 for him. Yanks GM Andy MacPhail wasn't familiar with Berra but was pretty sure that if Ott wanted him that badly, he was worth hanging onto. The following year, Yogi spent half of the season with the AAA Newark Bears before being called up to the Yankees.

Growing up in St. Louis, the only time Berra had seen Yankee Stadium and said he was rendered speechless because it was so much bigger and grander than Sportsman's Park where he had watched the Cardinals as a boy.

It took Berra two seasons to take the starting catcher's job from Aaron Robinson and once he did, he never looked back. The 1948 season began a stretch of 15 uninterrupted All-Star game appearances which included three MVPs and four more top 5 finishes. Yogi's career also encompassed fourteen World Series appearances and ten championships, both of which are Major League records. In addition to those, he also holds the records for World Series games (75), at-bats (259), hits (71), doubles (10), singles (49), games caught (63), and catcher putouts (457).

Between 1949 and 1955, on a team filled with offensive studs including Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio, it was Berra who batted clean-up and led the Yankees in RBI for seven consecutive seasons. Yogi was famously excellent at hitting poor pitches. Despite swinging at balls in the dirt and those over his small frame, Berra had nearly as many career home runs (358) as strikeouts (414). In 1950, Berra whiffed only twelve times in 656 plate appearances. When asked about swinging at bad pitches, Berra was reported to say, "If I can hit it, it's a good pitch."

As a fielder, Berra second to none. Under the tutelage of Bill Dickey, he blossomed to one of the better defensive catchers in the league. He was spry and cat-like in his crouch, leading Casey Stengel to say "he springs on bunts like it's another dollar". He led all American League catchers eight times in games caught and chances accepted and left the game with the AL records for catcher putouts (8,723) and chances accepted (9,520).

Yogi was also well-renowned for his ability to handle a pitching staff. He handled pitchers differently depending on their disposition, alternatively coaxing or prodding hurlers based on who he felt needed what. Casey Stengel got a lot of credit for how he deployed his pitching staff during the dynasty of the 50's and 60's, but Berra played a large part in that success as well, displaying a knack for what pitches to call and when. He caught both of Allie Reynolds no-hitters in 1951 along with Don Larsen's perfect World Series game in 1956.

Yogi was also remarkably tough and durable. He averaged 118 games behind the plate from 1949-1959 and caught more than 133 games every year from 1950-1956. In June 1962, at the age of 37, Berra caught an entire 22-inning, seven-hour game against the Tigers.

He was a part of the Yankees until 1963 and even in his last season he was productive, punching up a 138 OPS+ in 164 plate appearances. The following year, he served his first stint as Yankee manager. Despite leading the Yanks to 99 wins and a World Series appearance against his hometown St. Louis Cardinals, Berra was fired and replaced with Cards' manager Johnny Keane.

He resurfaced across town with Mets in 1965 as a player-coach. He put in two games behind the plate and two more as a pinch hitter in May, picking up 2 hits in 9 at-bats but soon decided that he was finished as a player. His coaching career, however, would go on. He stayed with the Mets for the next 8 seasons as an assistant manager under at first under Casey Stengel. He eventually took over as manager in 1972 after the sudden death of Gil Hodges. That same year, he was elected to the Hall of Fame along with Sandy Koufax and Early Wynn.

In 1973, he led the Mets to the World Series and in so doing, became only the second manager to win a pennant in both leagues, following only Joe McCarthy. He had also completed the feat in only 3 seasons as a skipper.

After two more years as manager for the Mets, he rejoined the Yanks as a coach and the team won its first of three consecutive AL titles. This uncanny ability to bring about good luck was not unnoticed. Stengel once said of him, "He'd fall in a sewer and come up with a gold watch." Berra was eventually elevated to Yankee manager before the 1984 season. The team won 87 games but finished a disappointing 3rd place in the AL East.

Berra agreed to stay with the job for 1985 after receiving assurances from George Steinbrenner that he would not be fired. However, the notoriously impatient Boss axed him after a 6-10 start to the season. Instead of notifying Yogi personally, Steinbrenner dispatched GM Clyde King to deliver the news for him. This caused a rift between the two men that would not be mended for almost 15 years. Yogi's replacement? If you guessed Billy Martin, you may or may not be a baseball historian.

On August 22, 1988, Berra and his predecessor Dickey were honored with plaques to be hung in Monument Park at Yankee Stadium. Berra's plaque calls him "A Legendary Yankee" and cites his most frequent quote, "It ain't over till it's over." However, the honor was not enough to cure the relationship between Steinbrenner and Yogi. That would not happen until January of 1999 when Steinbrenner publicly apologized to Berra. According to Steinbrenner at the time, "It's the worst mistake I ever made in baseball." The power broker behind the meeting? Suzyn Waldman.

Armed with only an 8th grade education, an unenviable physique and an uncanny wit, Berra became on of the most famous people in the world. Yogi has been featured in advertisements for Yoohoo, AFLAC, Entenmann's, and Stovetop Stuffing. Although he wasn't especially fond of being called "Yogi Bear", he did have the honor of having a Hanna Barbera cartoon named after him.

Of all the Yankee legends still with us, Yogi is undoubtedly the greatest character. Eighty four years young and still active with the franchise, today's Yankee fans are incredibly lucky to have him around. He currently operates the Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center in Montclair, New Jersey. He spends a lot of time at the facility so if you make a trip out to the Museum, you just might have the privilege of chatting with the man himself.

Counterpoint: Who Cares?

In the six months I've been writing here, rarely have Jay and I disagreed on any major points. We disagreed about a hypothetical recall of Austin Jackson in the wake of a potential Melky Cabrera injury, and we differ as to how the Yankees should approach Hideki Matsui this off-season. But in instances like these, I think we both can understand, if not agree with, the other viewpoint.

Today though, I think we may have an instance of us being distinctly on opposite sides of the coin. This morning, Jay parsed the AL MVP results and had some valid criticisms of the order of finish as well as some of the more obscure individual votes. Moshe Mandel at The Yankee Universe had something similar yesterday, and I've seen traces of the same sentiment elsewhere in the blogosphere. To which I say: who cares?

Perhaps this is hypocritical of me. Just last week I put up a post here essentially criticizing the "stats based community" for not calling out Tyler Kepner, Zack Greinke, and Brian Bannister for their misuse and misunderstanding of advanced metrics in the wake of Greinke's Cy Young Award victory. Though perhaps I didn't make the point as clearly as I wanted, my issue wasn't so much with the misuse and misunderstanding as it was that everyone was so happy that Greinke both won and acknowledged FIP in the process, that they withheld the usual cantankerousness and I'm-smarter-than-you responses that normally follow such a slip up. Now, when the reaction is a bit truer to character, once again it's me who's complaining about the complaining, just as last week I complained about the lack of complaining.

That said, I still think this is really, really unnecessary. Yes, by any worthy metric Derek Jeter was more valuable than Mark Teixeira. Yes, Ben Zobrist probably finished much lower than he deserved. Yes, there were several players who received individual votes that were higher than they deserved or not deserved at all. Yes, I'm surprised/disappointed that Jason Bartlett didn't receive a single vote. Yes, a first place vote for Miguel Cabrera is so patently stupid that it's probably a waste of energy to even explain why.

But still, do we really need to break down all the grave injustices that happened behind Joe Mauer's cavernous margin of victory? Should we even care what happened beyond Mauer taking the hardware? Isn't the whole point to get the winner right, not whoever comes after him? Don't we often preach about sample size, and isn't the point of casting 28 ballots with 10 slots each for a pool of over 400 players that the "most valuable" player will rise to the top? Sure there will be some oddball votes in there, but the right guy won, and he came within one vote and five points of doing so unanimously. Does any of the rest matter?

Please don't take for me anti-statistic. If you read here with any degree of regularity during the season you know that I often sigthed OPS+, wOBA, UZR, WAR, FIP, etc. That isn't the point. The point is how much is enough? We've seen the deservedly-maligned BBWAA get all four major awards "right", and three of the votes weren't particularly close. In doing so they've eschewed traditional biases that would have favored less deserving candidates in years past. Shouldn't this be enough to keep us content for now? Remember, this round of off-season awards represents the Battle of Saratoga, not the Treaty of Paris.

At their core, the MVP, the Cy Young Award, and even the Hall of Fame for that matter are subjective, loosely-defined awards that have little value beyond whatever worth we assign to them. I have a hard time understanding the utter outrage year after year as the awards season comes and goes. While we'd all like to believe that "objective journalists" are the stewards of these institutions, the fact of the matter is we're not talking about Edward R. Murrow or Walter Kronkite here. These are sportswriters. And while many may still exhibit signs of homerism or may be hopelessly clinging to archaic and ineffective means of measuring performance, I still think they're in a much better state today than they were in the days of Grantland Rice, or Ford C. Frick, or Jimmy Cannon. We're not seeing even the likes of Barry Bonds getting jobbed out of a deserved MVP because he's an asshole to the writers. Ask Ted Williams' frozen detached skull what he thinks about that.

So, with a plethora of better methods to assess value at our disposal, why do we even care who wins these things anymore, let alone who finishes second through tenth? If we want to know who is truly valuable, then why not just pull up the WAR leaderboard, or whichever future metric proves to be the most accurate means of assessing performance? Why do we care which pitcher is given an award named after the all-time wins leader, when we know wins are a misleading indicator of true performance, and we know that Cy Young was an inferior pitcher when compared to contemporaries like Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson? Do we even need the BBWAA to give the awards to the "right" players to validate what the metrics have already told us?

As Joe at RAB pointed out in the wake of the Cy Young voting, this isn't a culture war anymore. This is the true state of baseball these days, and it's an amalgamation of what were once two distinct schools of thought. As much as some seem to define themselves by it, this is no longer us vs. them, Moneyball vs. old-school, stats vs. scouts, RBI vs. WAR. The game - or more specifically how we look at the game - has changed, is changing, will continue to change, and will do so across the board. It's no longer just Bill James, a few forward thinking executives, a handful of enlightened websites. It's widespread; it's prevalent.

Few if any of GMs are traditional "baseball men"; nearly all have a business background in addition to their baseball experience. Every front office has some sort of statistical analysis taking place. Bill James, Voros McCracken, Tom Tango and others were or are employed by, or are consultants to, Major League clubs. David Cone's routinely referencing Fangraphs on Yankee telecasts. Keith Law, Will Carroll, and other Baseball Prospectus folks were given votes in the post-season awards process. High-profile national sportswriters like Rob Neyer and Joe Posnanski are at the forefront of the "statistical revolution", and if their work wasn't enough to force their colleagues to learn about advanced metrics it was at least enough to create a palpable buzz about the truly worthy candidates.

The times they are a changing folks. And while we might not yet be living in a sabermetric utopia, we've seen great strides made this past week. As we approach Thanksgiving and presumably stop to reflect upon what we are thankful for, shouldn't we at least be satisfied, if not grateful, that the most deserving candidates won both MVPs and both Cy Young Awards rather than griping about the idiot who voted Jason Kubel seventh? I think we should; what about you?

The Jackson Report: Looking To 2010

One thing we didn't focus enough on this year at Fack Youk was the Yankees' minor league system. Thankfully, there are several great resources in the Yankee blogosphere to fill in those blanks. Part of the plan for the off-season is to take a look at some of better prospects the Yankees have waiting in the wings. Today, we'll start with someone we did check on in periodically throughout the season: Austin Jackson.

Jackson is one of the top position player prospects in the Yankee system, and is probably the most Major League ready. Baseball America had him as the Yankees' top prospect entering 2009. The Hardball Times dropped him to ninth following this year, but that's perhaps more a reflection of the depth at the low levels of the Yankee system than it is a knock against AJax.

Jackson spent all of 2009 at Scranton, his first full year at AAA after seeing a single game there in 2007. He followed up on being named the AA Eastern League's Playoff MVP in 2008 by winning the International League's Rookie of the Year award in 2009.

2009 was just Jackson's fourth full season of pro ball. He hit .300/.354/.405 and swiped 24 bags in 28 attempts. The bad news is that Jackson's BB% dropped to a career low 7.4% and his K% jumped to 24.4% after being 21.7% and 22.0% the past two years. His increase in strikeouts did not translate to an increase in power, as Jackson's 2B, HR, SLG, and IsoP were all at three year lows. He also benefited from an unsustainable BABIP of .390

Overall, we should be very excited about Austin Jackson. As a 22 year old, he was quite young for AAA, and he still managed to post impressive numbers. Jackson is considered a "raw" prospect, as he was a major basketball recruit out of high school and didn't devote his full attention to baseball until signing with the Yankees. The gap between each successive level is more cavernous than the one before it, and after handling the low A/high A, and high A/AA transitions with aplomb, Jackson finally met some resistance this year. That might explain the disconcerting changes in his BB and K rates.

As for his BABIP, it certainly is unsustainable. However, Jackson's lack of power (just 4 HRs) and high K% is a recipe for a high BABIP. Add to that his LD% of 21.8%, a career high by a good margin, and his BABIP isn't nearly as flukey as it seems at first glance. Jackson's always fared well on balls in play, with a career BABIP of .361 and never once below .346 in four seasons of professional ball.

Late season indications were that the Yankees intended to leave Jackson in AAA to start 2010, and I think that's the right course of action. Interestingly though, Bill James' 2010 projections have Jackson at .294/.356/.411, better than both Melky Cabrera (.278/.341/.406) and Brett Gardner (.277/.368/.375). I think that's a bit too bullish on Jackson for next year; but then again this is Bill James. For what it's worth Jackson's 2009 numbers project to just a .259/.308/.343 line with just 3 HR, 32 BB and, 131 K according to the minor league equivalency calculator.

Based on his minor league service time, Jackson will need to be added to the 40 man roster this off-season. While I do believe Jackson will see the Bronx at some point in 2010, I don't think he'll break camp with the team. That said, I wouldn't completely rule it out it. There's no telling how the LF/DH situation will play out with Johnny Damon and Hideki Matsui being free agents, and I wouldn't be completely shocked if either Cabrera or Gardner is traded this off-season. Regardless of how it all plays out, I expect to see AJax holding down an everyday spot in the Yankee OF come 2011.

Late Links

Sorry, I'm a little (lot) late with this post. I got a chance to play Albany Country Club this afternoon and bailed on my bloggerly duties. It's a fantastic track, measuring 7054 yards from the tips with a lot of elevation changes, tough tee shots and beautifully undulated greens. We got caught in a bit of a storm but I was able to snap this picture when it cleared up.

Double rainbow, suckas. That means you can take two shots off your score, in which case I kept it under 80. Boom.

On to the links:

Jason is officially live over at ESPN. You can find him in the same place as always, but's he's now ESPN Certified©. Also be sure to check out Jason, Will and Tamar's respective favorite moments from the season.

Is Mariano Rivera's other fastball a one seamer?

Zell's Pinstripe Blog compiled every Yankees Sports Illustrated cover.

Will Leitch on Jeter. He also penned a playoff preview for the Yanks on Deadspin.

Does UZR really fluctuate wildly from year to year?

A-Rod accomplished a 30-100 season in the 10th fewest games played of all-time and the least since 2002.

The Yankees can make life a little more difficult on the Red Sox by not announcing which series they want to take until after tomorrow's play-in game. That way, the Sox won't know what day they are starting in Anaheim until Tuesday night. If the Yanks unexpectedly take the shorter series, the Sox might have to rush out to L.A.

Happy Birthday, Bill James.

If you must subject yourself to the unlimited and unbearable Brett Favrery, at least you'll have this drinking game.

Until tomorrow, y'all...