This Is Why We're Here

People often send me hate mail, saying I’m biased in my observations about Mike Lupica, and that I’m just a subjective Yankees fan.

As we all know, Lupica would never go out of his way to make a Yankee player look bad, just for the sake of being an asshole, right?

Well then, what the FUCK would they say about Lupica’s retarded comparison this week, only 24 games into the season?

Here's a fun fact of the baseball season:

By “fun”, Lupica actually means “useless”.

Even though he still isn't close to getting his batting average over the Mendoza Line of .200,

Here comes the cherry-picked stat that some non-Yankee player has over a Yankee player…

David Ortiz has more RBI so far than A-Rod.

Jesus Christ, Lupica! It’s not even an individual stat, it’s more like a team stat!

We know you like to crap all over Arod, but you gotta come up with something better than this!

The last time I checked, batters can’t control how many guys he has in scoring position when they come to the plate. In this case, there certainly have been fewer chances for Arod.

Take a look at this stat, you dopey midget…

Red Sox team OBP = .361 (1st in AL)
Yankees team OBP = .331 (9th in AL)

Of course Ortiz is gonna have more RBI with a lineup that is FIRST IN THE AL IN OBP!

So instead of being a subjective jackass fuck like Lupica, let’s take a look at the rest of the story…
Superman Ortiz - 24 games, 96 ABs
Crappy ARod - 22 games, 86 ABs

Ok, so right off the bat, we can see Ortiz clearly has the advantage, with 2 more games and 10 more ABs under his belt. Would Arod have 10 more RBI if he had the same amount of ABs? With the way the Yankees offense has been sputtering, not likely.

Let’s see what both players have done without the help of their lineups…

Superman Ortiz
Hits 17
Doubles 2
HRs 4
BA .177
OBP .288
SLG .323
OPS+ 62

Crappy ARod
Hits 26
Doubles 7
HRs 4
BA .302
OBP .348
SLG .523
OPS+ 134

Holy shit! Other than home runs, Arod owns Ortiz in every offensive category! How the fuck did that happen? More than double the OPS+!?!?

And Lupica went out of his way to make that worthless comparison? To try and make Arod look inferior to Ortiz by posting RBI stats?

Gee Mike, thanks for your expert analysis!

Next week's brilliant comparison by Lupica - "David Ortiz has less errors so far than ARod."

Not Like It's Hank's Team or Anything...

Since everybody loves a little roleplay, I'm going to pretend to be Mike Lupica deciding what to write about. Here we go.

Hmm… what should I write about? Well, lets see. What are the other people writing about. They're writing stories, stories about people, stories about people in sports! Some of them are writing about the Mets slow start and how their ancient players are falling apart and declining. That's no fun, and I mean… everybody's writing about that. The Rangers just advanced in the playoffs, but I'm not a big hockey guy (unless they win the Cup, then I'm Hockey Fan #1.) I know. I'll write about something that NOBODY ELSE IN TOWN is writing about!! Because I'm the Premier Sports Journalist in New York City! I'll write about Hank Steinbrenner!!!

I like to imagine that Mike Lupica is just oblivious to the fact that 10 other people at his own paper are covering the same story, except that they're smart enough not to pass judgment, because they realize that they're not experts. Mike, on the other hand, is an expert. A fucking dynamic expert who's never wrong. Except for when he gives his opinion on something, then he's pretty much wrong 100%.

It's not just Joba, either. Hank knows so much pitching now that he wants Mike Mussina to pitch more like Jamie Moyer. Why? Because he saw Moyer on television Saturday, that's why! Tim Wakefield hung in there and won for the Red Sox on Sunday. If Hank had caught that one on the dish, he might have been yelling for Mussina to start throwing knuckleballs.

Hahaha… fuckin' Hank! Hank's just watching that shit on TV! Good thing Hank didn't see Wakefield, or he might have gotten a hard-on! It's a good thing that Hank didn't watch Ace of Cakes on the Food Network… or he might want Mike Mussina to bake him a cake that looks like a 1957 Chevy Malibu!!!

People are overreacting about Mussina. If you subtract 3 at-bats by Manny Ramirez, Mussina's having a great year, and if the Yankees were hitting better, Mussina's probably 3-1 instead of 1-3. As a fan with a brain in my head, I understand this. However, as an OWNER who's paying this guy TWELVE MILLION DOLLARS, I'd probably be pretty pissed off. And if I was also the son of George Steinbrenner, I'd probably let you know that I'm pissed off by spouting some irrational shit.

Except… wait a minute. You mean that since Mussina's fastball is topping out in the mid-80's, Hank thinks he should slow down his breaking pitches? So that he can pitch effectively, sort of the way Moyer does with an 80 MPH fastball? Holy fuck! This just might work!!!! Well, fuck Hank for having a good idea about his $12 Million Dollar Pitcher anyway!

He doesn't sound like the owner of the Yankees, he sounds like a guy at the end of the bar sometimes. This time he was running his mouth on Joba the way Joba's fastball occasionally runs in on right-handed batters, saying that only "idiots" can't see he belongs in the starting rotation with 100-mph stuff, that if he were the big boss last summer he never would have let the Yankees - read: Brian Cashman - send Joba to the bullpen in the first place. Sounding like a caller to the radio now, another who has decided that Joba is the second coming of Bob Feller.

Where have you been Mike Lupica? The owner of the Yankees has ALWAYS sounded like a guy at the end of the bar! He's torn into his own players far worse than anything Hank's ever did. If you don't believe me, ask Hideki Irabu. I hear he's a server at Denny's now. Or better yet, ask Ed Whitson. The guy is a Steinbrenner, a real Steinbrenner! He's going to say irrational shit when he gets angry.

And come on Lupica… Bob Feller?! Bob Feller was 266-162 with a 3.25 ERA (ERA+ 122) in 18 seasons. He walked 1764 and struck out 2581 in 3827 innings. You should know… that here in Yankeeland, we have much higher expectations than that for Joba Chamberlain.

I think I speak for everyone when I say that if Joba Chamberlain doesn't win at least 700 games in his career, and strike out at least 10,000 hitters, and if he ever allows more than 1 run in a season, we're going to be very disappointed. And Hank will probably try to kill him.

It is not merely a bush-league, no-class thing to do, at any point in the season.

An owner with a $200 Million Dollar payroll (I know this because Mike told me once or twice…) should have NO SAY in how his team is run. You're absolutely correct! The General Manager having to answer to the Owner is fucking BUSH LEAGUE!!!!

All that is supposed to matter is that Hank, and an awful lot of Yankee fans, want him to be New York's Josh Beckett eventually and want that process to start yesterday.

Mike, Mike, Mike… how many times do I have to explain this. Josh Beckett is just not a good enough pitcher. In parts of 8 years, Beckett is 79-53 with a 3.76 ERA (ERA+ 116.) That's pretty good for a mortal man like Josh Beckett, but we're talking about JOBA CHAMBERLAIN!!! Do you know why they call him Joba? No? Well neither do I! But they call him Joba!! Have you ever met a guy named Joba before? Of course you haven't! Because it's not a real name. It's the kind of name that a God makes up for himself when he comes down from the Heavens in the body of a pitcher who intends to utterly dominate baseball.

I think I speak for all Yankee fans when I say that anything short of Sandy Koufax's seasons from 1963-1966 would be a major let-down. Joba is just going to have those crazy 26+ win, 1.70 ERA, 382 strikeouts in 335 innings, 0.855 WHIP years. Over and over and over again. Until he's like 50.

And if he doesn't, Hank is going to beat Brian Cashman to death with a baltine hammer for making him a relief pitcher.

It has been mentioned here, and more than once, that if Hank Steinbrenner, who loves being the big boss of the Yankees the way America loves "American Idol," really thought Santana was the one who was going to move the Yankees past the Red Sox and put them back on top, then he should have done something about it when Santana was still available.

People like that American Idol show!? Are you kidding me?! Everybody I talk to thinks it's balls. And another thing, aren't we eventually going to run out of PILLS to give to Paula Abdul? I don't mean "we", like you and me. I mean "we", like the fucking country. That girl is WHACKED OUT ON PILLS!!! Ha ha ha ha!!!

The reason the Yankees didn't trade for Johan Santana is because the Twins asked for Melky Cabrera, Phil Hughes, Ian Kennedy, Joe DiMaggio's monument, Paul O'Neill's first born son and Theo Ratiliff's expiring contract! Then they gave him away to the Mets for a 4th outfielder, 7 pounds of raw hamburger meat and a sleeve of Titleist golf balls. And Mike Lupica agreed that the Yankees were smart to refuse the trade. Probably because he was having wet dreams about Santana in Queens.

So in summary, the owner has opinions about the players he's paying. America loves American Idol. Mike Mussina probably can't bake a cake that looks like a '57 Chevy. And Joba Chamberlain is the ghost of Sandy Koufax. Everybody thank Mike Lupica for enlightening us to these lovely, and pertinent facts.

Shooting from (about a foot and a half Behind) the Hip.. (you know, the Bum!)

In what must be considered the shock of the year, it was announced this week that Isiah Thomas will no longer be coaching the New York Knicks. I just don't understand why people refuse to see all the good that Isiah has done for the Knicks, the City of New York, and quite frankly, the Planet Earth! Did you know that every time the Knicks lose a game by 20 or more, a rare species of endangered Wildlife sees a large boost in population? Just last week, Isiah's bad coaching might have ensured that your grandchildren will be able to see Elephants at the Zoo in 20 years!!

Okay, I'm kidding. Isiah sucked balls and everybody knew he was on the way out. And to celebrate, Mike Lupica sets his focus on none other than Anucha Browne Sanders! Does anybody know who she is? I've barely ever heard her name mentioned… wait… yes I have!! Months ago! When she mattered! Lupica returns to a story that's been thoroughly covered and was put to bed by EVERYBODY ELSE when it was no longer important (because she got a huge payout and justice was aptly served.)

I'm not going to tear into specific aspects of what was said, because it's all tired and hacky at this point. Instead, I'd like to point out one glaring issue: Mike Lupica's Unabashed Hypocrisy!! Yes, that gets bold, and underscoring!!

Lupica is completely outraged that Isiah allegedly sexually harassed Browne Sanders. He's flabbergasted at the nerve it would take for a black man to call a black woman a "Black Bitch." Now if Isiah were white… and he had called Browne Sanders something classier, like saying… a Nappy-Headed Ho. And he had done it in a more private way, like say… via a syndicated radio show that was broadcasted to millions of people… then it'd be okay.

I'm going to tackle this next part Lupica style. With sentence fragments. Mean ones. Ones that get the job done.

Mike Lupica defended his butt-buddy Don Imus for months. Defended him when nobody else was dumb enough to. Defended his racist, sexually-themed comments. Comments that not only defamed an innocent team of college girls, but also an entire race. Defended Imus. And in doing so, spat in the face of common sense and journalistic responsibility.

But when it's Isiah, behind closed doors with nobody to correlate the story in any way, Lupica insists on being the first and last guy in town to take shots at the situation. Dare I say a bit of good old fashioned racism is at work here?

***

Did you see that shit? Three stars means that I'm going to move on to the next stuff. I just stole a Lupica literary tool! I'm on Fiyyyyyyyah!! Like Mariahhhhh!!! I'm slightly ashamed of myself for saying that.

You knew there were going to be a lot of nights like Friday night for Yankee fans this season, especially the ones who wanted Brian Cashman to do whatever was necessary to get Johan Santana out of Minnesota.

"Not someone I'd pay $150 million for on a bet." Why the quote? To again, remind you that this was Mike Lupica's stance on Johan Santana mere days before the Mets handed him a $151 million dollar contract. Pick a side of the fence Mike. Seriously.

Derek Jeter said Kyle Farnsworth buzzing Manny the other night didn't count, because Manny didn't get hit. And I just want to see how amusing the Yankees think it is the next time somebody throws 100 behind the captain's ear.

Here's some news for you. The next time someone throws 100 behind the captain's ear, they'll be wearing a Red Sox uniform. They’ve been throwing at Yankee hitters without retaliation for the last 12 years. With this painstaking thing called "research", I've learned that last season, the Red Sox hit 9 Yankee batters in their 18 games. Further research reveals that Derek Jeter has been hit 16 times in his career by Red Sox pitching. Manny Ramirez, on the other hand, has been hit 7 times by Yankee pitching. Shut the fuck up about this Mike. It's a non-story.

Good news at the Stadium! The last one Manny hit off Mussina just landed underneath the Avis sign in left.

Haha yeah! Manny really killed that one! It just landed!! Haha!! Boy oh boy!! Manny crushed that ball!! I'm surprised that after he dug in and hammered the hell out of one like that, and then stood there to admire it like Manny always does, that nobody threw one at him… oh shit… my bad.

Blowing A Load On Beckett

So the Yankees and Red Sox went at it again last night, and in typical April fashion, the Red Sox came out on top, and by the way Lupica writes about it, MLB should just cancel the rest of the season, because the Red Sox have an ace.

An ace with an ERA over 5, but still, it's Josh Beckett!

Get your barf bags ready, because there is NO CHANCE we'll get through this article without hearing about Game 6 of the 2003 World Series.

When the Yankees beat the Red Sox, Lupica cries about how long it took. When the Red Sox win, it's about heroes.

This was all hardball between the Red Sox and Yankees last night

Hardball!? You mean it wasn’t the Stanley Cup finals?

He (Josh Beckett) was the real story of this game

Manny Ramirez had 2 HRs and 3 RBI, and Ace Beckett gave up 3 runs.

Sorry nerd, Beckett was NOT the real story.

This is the kind of pitcher the Mets hope Johan Santana can be.

A $151 million dollar pitcher with a 5.12 ERA? That's what the Mets hope Johan Santana can be?

The Yankees got him for three runs in the fifth Thursday night.

In two starts against the Yankees this season, Beckett has a 3.68 ERA. Pretty good.

But does he deserve yet another article about how great of an ace he is? Well, he is a Red Sox pitcher, and this is Lupica we're talking about here.

Got nothing after that.

Uh oh, beware the Lupica Poetry!

When Lupica has to resort to his tired sentence fragments for dramatic effect, you know you are going to have to flush twice, because you are looking at a huge pile of shit.

This was the kind of game that big pitchers are supposed to win for their teams.

Yes, this was a HUGE season-altering game for everyone involved.

In April.

The real heat last night came from Beckett.

Three earned runs, eight innings.

This was so much like the game he threw at the Yankees last Sept. 15 at Fenway Park, a Saturday afternoon game, national television.

Uh oh, get ready for that 2003 World Series reference!

And (he) was everything he is supposed to be, everything he was in Game6 of the 2003 World Series against the Yankees at Yankee Stadium

Dingdingding winner!!!!

Was the ace everybody wants, the one who stands there and says he is going to throw it about 95 miles per hour for the next three hours or so, dig in, see if you can hit it.

Lupica Poetry. Can anyone explain it?

Other than...it's stupid?

That is the kind of ace Beckett was last season in Boston.

Yay! Let’s hear it for 2007!

You know who else wishes it was 2007?

David Ortiz.

He had a bad inning last night, gave up those three to the Yankees with two outs in the bottom of the fifth, giving up a double to Johnny Damon and then a single to Derek Jeter, followed by a double to right from Bobby Abreu that brought the Yankees back from 7-0 to 7-3. The rest of the time he was the pitcher the Stadium and the Yankees know and expected him to be

I get it now. When the player you are yanking it to has a bad inning, you just gloss over it, and talk about all the good stuff he did.

Lupica - "You know what Beckett's ERA is in ALL of his shut out innings? Zero!!! Not ONE RUN was giving up in his shut out innings...in his CAREER!!!"

*defiant smirk on his undersized face*

Of course the theatrics last night belonged to Manny.

I see. Beckett gave up three runs, but because of a World Series game five years ago, he is the "real story", a "big game pitcher", an "ace".

Manny's two home runs and game-deciding three RBI?

Oh, that stuff is just silly theatrics.

Finally Farnsworth threw one behind his head. Trying to throw one 100, his manager said. Sure he was. Manny is on the kind of tear that few hitters have ever had over time against the Yankees and they got tired of it and Farnsworth buzzed him.

Holy shit! You mean Farnsworth wasn’t really trying to throw 100 MPH!? I think you are on to something Mike! Girardi must have been covering for one of his players, and you exposed him for the fraud he is! That is some serious crack reporting right there! Thank you for opening my eyes to the truth!!!

The Yankees have a lot. Just nobody like Beckett.

The Yankees could have given up on their young pitchers and $151 million to have Johan Santana, and you would have written an article about every earned run he gave up. You diss the Yankees when they spend for free agents, and when they don’t.

So spare me the dramatic sentence fragment ending to your article.

Speed Up Reality For Reality TV!

You would think, after reading the latest literary bowel movement from Lupica, that he hates baseball. Today's article is all about how the games in the Yankee-Red Sox rivalry take too long and are too annoying.

The biggest rivalry in sports, and Shithead wants them to speed it up and get it overwith.

I think Lupica was just pissed because the game cut into his American Idol/Biggest Loser/Rock of Love II time.

God forbid the little troll pulls himself away from his reality TV fetish and actually watches/reports on/enjoys sports.

The Yankees and Red Sox played another four-hour game last night at the Stadium, the kind of four-hour, nine-inning game they have played against each other in each of the last two seasons, the kind of game that tries to turn what we still call the best rivalry in sports into something, even on a night when both teams came from behind, into something that makes a tractor pull seem like high drama.

Because baseball fans hate to see lots of baseball and runs and lead changes - what a bore!

How ironic that Mike complains about the length of the game in a sentence longer than the 5th fucking inning.

And made you wonder more than once what if Isiah Thomas might get fired before this one ended.

Wow, I'm so used to seeing swipes at the Yankees in Lupicas' articles about the Knicks…now he's bashing Isiah in Yankee articles?

Isiah, you are done.

And, no, I wasn’t thinking about Isiah during the Yankee game - I was wondering if you were gonna write a stupid fucking article about the Yankee-Red Sox rivalry.

Thanks for not letting me down.

Four hours and eight minutes this time.

Jesus Christ, almost a HUNDRED words into the article and you are still talking about the length of the game!?

Put down the stopwatch asshole!

Yankees 15, Red Sox 9. Some seasons they play 19 games against each other. This year it is only 18. No worries. They'll find a way to make up the extra time easy.

Just like you find ways to fill in your article with worthless crap, like reporting on the length of game?

It started Wednesday night in the fifth inning, an epic fifth inning, one that lasted nearly an hour in real time, 53 minutes to be exact.

What did I say about that stopwatch, bitch!?

And "nearly an hour in real time"? What the fuck other kind of time would we be talking about? Bullet time? Uranus time? Hammer time?

The Red Sox came into the top of the fifth down 7-3 to Chien Ming-Wang, who wasn't all that far away from no-hitting the Red Sox last Friday night in Fenway. Then the Red Sox started banging Wang around, five straight hits to start the inning…

Singles, Mike. Five singles. You make it sound like Wang was the second coming of Mel Rojas.

Sometimes the games between these two teams don't just make you wonder about how the Democratic debate is going in Philadelphia, they seem longer than the whole Democratic campaign.

That is so ironic, because Mister Six and I were just discussing this last night…

FaFa - Wow, this is a long game!

Mister Six - Do you know what this game makes me wonder?

FaFa - How the Democratic debate is going in Philadelphia?

Mister Six - Actually, I was wondering if this game is longer than the whole Democratic campaign!

(Cue the crickets)

So it was Wednesday night. Because the Yankees came right back in their half of the fifth against Julian Tavarez.

Ok, that was the beginning of a paragraph. Does it even make sense?

No.

Julio Lugo tried to throw one in the general direction of one of Chuck Knoblauch's old throws…

Here's an idea - try writing a positive article about the Yankees without simultaneously shitting on the Yankees.

Seriously. Surprise us one year.

…the Yankees needed a Triple-A catcher and Chad Moeller, who really can catch and throw and handle pitchers and always could, needed a job. Now here he was in the middle of Red Sox vs. Yankees last night. The biggest year he ever had in the majors was with Milwaukee in 2004, when he got to the plate 317 times and played 101 games and hit just .208. He has never hit much.

His biggest year in the majors was when he hit .208, and then you go on to say he has never hit much?

Great analysis Mike!

The Yankees hit the ball all over the Stadium, hit the way they're going to have to hit this season with this pitching staff…

That's right Mike. Keep punching the Yankees in the balls.

I know it's hard for you to separate criticism from praise when it comes to reporting on the Yankees.

As always, they take wins any way they get them against the Red Sox. No matter how long they take.

Hopefully today's game will take less time, so it won’t cut into your busy schedule of not watching sports events.

More Lip Shit

I missed this gem…

Patriots owner Robert Kraft apologized the other day for the "fallout" of SpyGate at those owners meetings.

Not SpyGate itself.

You know what I call that in sports?

I call that a Giambi apology.

The "infamous" Giambi apology happened on February 11, 2005. It happened over three years ago. In that span of time, Lupica has written about it over and over and over. Three. Fucking. Years. Ago. Here's a stupid question. What did Guillermo Mota say in his apology speech? What did the Mets, as an organization say in their apology for employing Kirk Randomski? What about Keith Hernandez, Wally Backman, Doc Gooden, Daryl Strawberry and the rest of the cokehead 1986 Mets? What did they apologize for? Oh… that's right. None of them apologized for shit! Giambi got up in front of people and admitted his wrongdoing. The fact that he neglected to say the word "steroids" out of fear of losing his $21,000,000-a-season contract is understandable and forgivable. After all, Lupica doesn't admit to being a hacky, shitty sports journalist… because if he did, the Daily News might fire him. And then he'd have to go back to sucking dick for a living. You know, that's how he paid his tuition to the Bristol Clown College (AKA ESPN University).

And another thing, have you ever wondered why Mike Lupica is so obsessed with HGH? The answer is simple! (http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1516352) HGH can be used to cure DWARFISM!! These bastard cheating baseball players are using up all the HGH! There isn't any left for the people who really need it! The HGH that Jason Giambi injected to hit home runs could have helped THOUSANDS of Little People (See: Members of the Lupica Clan) to grow up into full-sized people!

Finally today, Happy 16th Birthday to Zach Lupica, the point guard in the family.

Zach Lupica is the first Lupica tall enough to play basketball. He's also the first Lupica tall enough to go on the bumper cars. He might even be the first Lupica tall enough to one day have sex with a full-sized person (if he pays.) For the record, the belief that Lupicas reproduce via sexual intercourse is a common misconception. The truth is closer to this. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloning)

Now if Jason Giambi hadn't used up all the HGH, Zach Lupica could have been the Power Forward of the family!

You know his middle name is Randolph. Zach Randolph Lupica.

ESPN Hack Blows Chance at Comedy, Promotion, Respect, Etc...

Thanks to ESPN Page 2 for making me spit my fucking chicken salad.

• Calculator Day (Yankees, Aug. 30) -- Having trouble keeping track of the Yankees' escalating, late-season payroll as they desperately scramble for a playoff spot? Perhaps this calculator can help.

Oh how I miss those "desperate scrambles" for playoff spots… you know… while we were winning the fucking AL East every fucking year?

1998 - Yankees win AL East by 22 games. (Best record in AL)
1999 - Yankees win AL East by 4 games. (Best record in AL)
2000 - Yankees win AL East by 2 1/2 games.
2001 - Yankees win AL East by 13 1/2 games.
2002 - Yankees win AL East by 10 1/2 games. (Best record in AL)
2003 - Yankees win AL East by 6 games. (Best record in AL)
2004 - Yankees win AL East by 3 games. (Best record in AL)
2005 - Yankees win AL East. (Tied for 2nd best record in AL)
2006 - Yankees win AL East by 10 games. (Best record in AL)
2007 - Yankees win Wild Card by 6 games. (Tied for 2nd best record in AL)

Thank you D.J. Gallo.

I paid six fucking dollars for that sandwich so I could clean it off my keyboard.

Shooting Shit From The Lip

A simple Wikipedia search of Mike Lupica reveals that he was born in 1952 (it doesn't give a specific date), making him approximately 56 years old. Personally, I've always thought of Mike Lupica as a timeless cosmic energy, a force of nature, maybe even a theological figure. Sort of like The Greek God of Dying Brain Cells and Sentence-Fragment Haiku. He mystically appears from thin air and everyone present can immediately feel the intelligence sucked from the room.

In this week's "Talking From The Ass" (or is it "Shooting from the Lip"), Lupica talks candidly about Opening Day at Ebbets Field in 1947, roughly five full years before he was born. He speaks about the Civil Rights impact of Robinson and even manages to toss in some Mets fluff, by pointing out that they were the "first, on board before anybody else", to support the Jackie Robinson Foundation. Mind you, that had nothing to do with the fact that the Mets are trying to pretend that they ARE the Dodgers, because their team started in the 60's and has no real history of it's own. The real point here is… Mike Lupica was not alive yet. He's sitting there and telling you what it was like to be there through it all, and he wasn't there. He's reading the same history that we are. HE'S A FIFTY-SIX YEAR-OLD, FOUR-FOOT NOTHING, WHITE GUY FROM BOSTON, THE MOST RACIST FUCKING CITY ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE COUNTRY…WRITING AT LENGTH ABOUT JACKIE ROBINSON AND CIVIL RIGHTS!!!! Mike Lupica is trying to speak out against "The Man." Apparently someone forgot to tell him that HE IS "THE MAN."

But onto the really fun stuff.

If you believe the Knicks have had as many sellouts as they say they've had this season, you also still believe Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

I could point out the fact that this WMD joke is now roughly 5 years old. I could ask if Bill Maher writes all of Mike Lupica's jokes. I could even try to make the point that NOBODY reads the fucking Sports Section because they want to hear about Politics. Or I could make a list of the 1,738 times that Mike has commented on the "Knick Sellouts" at the Garden. Instead, I think I'll just punch myself in the face and run around my office screaming at the top of my lungs. Be right back.

Good grief, it wasn't the media who sensationalized Andy Pettitte's problems with HGH, No. 46 managed that all by himself. You know when Pettitte became a stand-up guy about HGH, now revered by all? When he got caught. As a matter of fact, Pettitte seems to come clean about drugs every time he's caught, either by Sen. Mitchell or by the I-Team of the Daily News.

I came back from screaming too soon, but I'll tough it out because I love you guys. Lupica has half a point here. It wasn't "the media" who sensationalized Andy Pettitte's problems with HGH. It was Mike Lupica. And only Mike Lupica. That's also why he's the ONLY FUCKING SPORTSWRITER IN NEW YORK WHO'S STILL TALKING ABOUT IT!!! You know who else got caught with drugs? Guillermo Mota. A couple of months before the Mets signed him to a new contract… and BACK LOADED the fucking contract so Mota wouldn't lose as much while serving his 50 game suspension. Pillars of the Baseball Community, those Mets. Jackie Robinson would be proud. Or he'd puke and roll over in his grave. One or the other.

Know who else did drugs?

The 1986 Mets.

All of them. Most of them were snorting coke though, so that doesn't count. Lenny Dykstra did steroids, but it wasn't for performance-enhancement. He just wanted the Roid Rage to help balance out his personality.

Should I mention Todd Hundley, Paul Lo Duca, Scott Schoenweis and Kirk Randomski? Randomski was one of the fucking dealers for chrissake! Nah, lets not.

Joe Torre is probably thinking he doesn't want this year's Dodgers to start out like last year's Yankees.

Or finish like last year's Mets.

Angel Pagan can stay.

Well thanks for your approval Mike. We'll fax it over to Willie Randolph and let him know.

Know who else should have stayed? Ruben Gotay. The 26-year old second baseman who hit .295/.351/.421 in 190 at bats last year, when the Mets had nobody else to play the spot. Instead, they DFA'd him to hand the job over to Luis Castillo who's season started out like this: .207/.324/.241 and has hit as many homers (four) in his last 1,161 at bats as Gotay had for the Mets in 2006. Did I mention that Castillo walks with a limp? Did I need to?

Did Chien-Ming Wang, like, not get the memo about him not being the Yankee ace anymore?

So now Mike Lupica thinks he runs the Mets AND the Yankees? He sent a memo to Chien-Ming Wang to tell him that he's not the ace any more? Do Hank and Hal know about this? I guess Chien-Ming Wang didn't understand the memo. He doesn't speak so much English. You know, I don't think there was a memo. I think Mike Lupica is imagining this shit. I also think that Chien-Ming Wang's 38 wins in 2006 and 2007 is the most in baseball by any pitcher over that span. More than even… Johan Santana!

In fact, in order to equal Wang's 38 wins in 2006 and 2007… we'd have to take Santana's wins from 2006 and 2007, and add Pedro Martinez's wins from 2007. Then we'd have 19 and 15 from Santana. And a whopping 3 from Pedro. That's 37. So lets add Santana's win from 2008. There, now we have 38.

But what about the 3 wins Wang already has in 2008? Well… I guess to match that we can just take the rest of the Mets Starting Pitchers from 2008. Oliver Perez has 1 win. John Maine has… oops… none. Nelson Figueroa has 1! El Duque? Nope. Jason Vargas? Nope… Ohhhh! Mike Pelfrey has a win! I almost didn't check his stats, seeing as he didn't win his first game last year until like… August.

So there you have it.

41 Yankee Wins
Chien-Ming Wang (2006 - Present) = 41 wins.

41 Met Wins
Johan Santana (2006, 2007) = 35 wins.
Pedro Martinez (2007 - Present) = 3 wins.
Entire Mets Starting Rotation (2008) = 3 wins

Apparently Lupica Spit After He Sucked Calipari...

Because a day later, he's sucking the ballsacks of Bill Self and the National Champion Kansas Jayhawks. Not to brag, but a certain someone told you who was going to win that game. It's like I said, The Curse of Lupica!! The mere glance of Mike Lupica could turn Michael Jordan into Stephon Marbury in a big game. But lets get right to it.

This was only a shot to tie against Memphis … But everybody who saw Chalmers knock this one down knew that Memphis wasn't coming back even if Kansas had.

Which is why they stopped the game right then and there. It was fucking over. Memphis had no chance. Probably because John Calipari was out of witty quotes.

So there, one more time, the first of all the times Mario Chalmers' shot will be replayed from now on in college basketball, there he was, coming from his left, nearly losing control of the ball, but holding on to it, because there are times when the ball doesn't bounce away from you in a moment like this, because it is supposed to be in your hands.

This sentence is the Dirk Diggler of sports journalism. It's long and strong and bound to get the friction on. This sentence runs like a 78 pound Kenyan in the Boston Marathon. If Eliot Spitzer were as long as this sentence, Ashley Alexandra Dupre would have done him for free. In case you missed the point, this is a very long, run-on sentence…and so poetic and beautiful too.

There are times in a boy's life when he becomes a man, and Mario Chalmers was becoming and man and nobody in the world could stop him from reaching this pubescent right of passage. Nobody could take his ball away. Which is why the five Memphis defenders simply walked off the court as he drifted to his left and killed them from beyond the arc. I just threw up a little bit in my mouth.

"Ten seconds to go and we think we're national champions," Memphis coach John Calipari would say. "Then a kid makes a shot and all of a sudden we're not."

Oh, now John's full of witty quotes again! Where was this witty quote when Kansas was coming back from a 9-point deficit and your team needed inspiration!! You were supposed to will them to win with your witty quotes!! And at the most critical time in the game, in the season, you choked like Mike Lupica when his nose hits scrotum in a 69!

Seriously though, feel free to congratulate me on being right about Kansas. Adios.

Lupica Sucks Off Calipari!

John Calipari is sticking it to his doubters. And Mike Lupica is right there with him to tell you all about it. They're holding hands around campus. Mike Lupica is inspiring Calipari to coach his butt off with the tale of a four-foot-nothing sports journalist who rose to power in the big city of New York. Calipari feels so inspired by the story of shortness, that he's going to start Derrick Rose at Center in the big game. Little folks can do anything!

He can talk his way through a Final Four the way only a handful of coaches ever have, the way Jimmy Valvano seemed to talk for a whole weekend in Albuquerque in 1983 before his North Carolina State team won it all.

You heard it here. The reason Valvano coached the biggest upset in college basketball history at N.C. State is because he was a big talker. Nothing to do with the players or his coaching ability. Jimmy V. talked his ass off that week! Thanks a lot, for diminishing the memory of a great, inspiring and now-deceased coach.

John Calipari already had the quote of the tournament before he got to San Antonio, talking about his star guard, Derrick Rose, saying that if Rose was going to do what was best for himself and his family, he would leave school after his freshman year for the pros.

The Apostle Peter had the best quote in the Bible, when he said, "Holy shit! That dude is walking on fucking water! People can't do that!"

He first made a Final Four with UMass 12 years ago when Marcus Camby was his center, took over the Nets and made the playoffs with them, when that was no small thing, and then they ran him out of Jersey a year later when they were 3-15.

He made his first Final Four when he had Marcus Camby, who was later drafted #2 in 1996, and would have gone #1 ahead of Tim Duncan if not for some fluky heart problem. Marcus Camby was an absolute beast in college, probably the best player in the NCAA that year (hence him winning the Naismith and Wooden Awards in 95-96.)

And to kill any notion that Calipari got a raw deal in New Jersey, here is his full record as an NBA coach.

NJ Nets - 1996-97 - 26 Wins, 56 Losses
NJ Nets - 1997-98 - 43 Wins, 39 Losses, Lost in First Round of Playoffs (0 - 3)
NJ Nets - 1998-99 - 3 Wins, 17 Losses

Nope, not a typo. Lupica didn't check his fucking facts. Or maybe he intentionally made this look less ugly, especially since he didn't mention the 1996-97 season. He wanted it to look like Calipari was a good coach who had a bad quarter-of-a-season and got canned. Probably because it's hard to get approval to verbally suck the dick of a below-average coach. And that "Memphis Dribble-Drive Motion Attack" offense was invented at Pepperdine by a guy named Vance Walberg. Calipari just stole it.

Which brings us to a little-known fact in sports. The "Lupica Curse." No team who's coach or players directly interact with Mike Lupica has ever won a championship. Ever. Mike Lupica is believed to be directly responsible for the following tragic sports events:

1) Luis Gonzalez's broken-bat bloop single in Game 7 of the 2001 World Series.
2) Buckner booting the ball in the 1986 World Series.
3) Barbaro breaking his leg during the 2006 Preakness Stakes.
4) Lou Gehrig's Disease. Yes, the entire disease.

There are others too, however, Mike Lupica was NOT responsible for Yadier Molina's home run in the 2006 NLCS or the Mets historic collapse in September 2007. Those events are simply proof that God is a Yankee fan.

It is with the Lupica Curse in mind that on this Seventh day of April, 2008, I, Mister Six, of sound mind and body, do predict that Kansas will upset John Calipari's Memphis team. Yup, you heard it here first. Kansas is going to win. (Note: I haven't watched any NCAA basketball this year, and I know nothing about either of these teams except the research I did to write this article. I'm just picking against Lupica, because he's wrong about 95% of the time.)

Has Lupica Infected The Entire Daily News Sports Department!?

OK, now I'm SURE Lupica is in charge of the entire sports department over at the Daily News!

At 9PM on Saturday, 4.5.08, after the Yankees lost to the Rays and the Mets lost to the Braves, their fucking bitter division rival Braves, this is what the Daily News front page looked like on their website...



Holy CHRIST! The Yankees losing to the Rays is the THIRD MOST important story today!? And the Mets...the fucking Mets, who get owned on a GAME-BY-GAME BASIS by their rival, get seriously fucking owned by the Braves AGAIN, and the Daily News put the Mets "headline" more than halfway down the page!?

What the fuck do you think is going to happen if the Yankees lose a game to the Red Sox next weekend? There will be a dozen stories about it, including Lupica's usual three articles about how the Yankees suck, their payroll is too high, Red Sox are the new dynasty, etc...

The only way we'll get any reprieve is if Lupica and his little band of writer bitches are too busy having a "post-Yankee-loss-circle-jerk" to write anything nasty about our Yankees.

Fuck The Daily News!

First Posts by Mister Six

I find myself wanting to write in more and more often about this little midget fuck, and I just can't help it. It's not even so much the fact that 99% of his articles are either:

A) The same.
B) Bashing the Yankees for Steroids/Spendings/Age.
C) Neglecting to mention that our cross-town rivals have all the same issues.

I think it's more because he's such an unapologetic HACK of a writer. I mean… what's with the constant string of sentence fragments man? Is that supposed to be fucking poetic? I feel like I'm reading Bill Platschke but doesn't he write on the West Coast? This has led me to an undeniable conclusion. Are you ready for this? Mike Lupica came from Bill Platschke. But not like they're related or anything. More like that Mike Lupica was spewed from Bill Platschke's fat ass after a night of Tequila and Taco Bell binging.

Onto what pisses me off about this article though.

Melky Cabrera had made two spectacular plays in the outfield, top of the fourth against the Blue Jays, the best back-to-back plays any Yankee center fielder could ever make in that outfield, the Grand Concourse of baseball.

Loopy, please… stop it, you're so poetic. I think I'm about to cry. I was wrong. I just had to fart. How old is Mike Lupica? How many Yankee games has he been to since migrating here from Boston? How many Yankee games has this man seen? I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that he's seen about 7. I'm guessing the Bucky Dent game was one of them. How the fuck does this midget Yankee-basher know that DiMaggio or Mantle never made two better plays? This is a veiled fucking slap in the face of Bernie Williams, who won multiple Gold Gloves (not that they mean much, but still). It's a veiled slap at DiMaggio, Mantle, even Mickey Rivers. Melky's plays were great, but don't compare shit from April 1st, 2008 to the WHOLE of Yankee fucking HISTORY. Yankee history isn't made on April 1st Mike, its made in October.

Met history is made in April, unless they’re shitting the bed in September and choking away their playoff spot again.

First Melky had run a mile to his left in right-center and reached his glove across his body and taken at least a double away from Lyle Overbay…

Melky ran a mile and reached with his glove and sweated from his mighty brow and took away a double and Lyle Overbay cried and wailed and walked back to the dugout and sat down and Melky went back to his spot in Centerfield and adjusted his cap!!!! Hey Mike… you can write more than one sentence. Also…at least a double? Have you ever seen Lyle Overbay run? Lyle Overbay is to running, what Eliot Spitzer is to Family Values. Lyle Overbay runs like he just shit himself and he doesn't want to make it stain. Melky robbed a double. Nothing more.

"This place was absolutely awesome tonight," Johnny Damon would say later. "Jazzed," Brian Cashman would say.

Jazzed? That's the whole quote? Wow, they really save all the good quotes for Lupica, don't they? That's what a grade A, terrific sportswriter gets for his story. You're trying to tell me that the ONLY thing of value that Brian Cashman said about last night's game was, "Jazzed?" And you printed it? I'd have pretended he said nothing.

Then Melky, the kid who nearly went to the Twins for Johan Santana, hit a 3-2 pitch down the right-field line in the sixth, a high shot that seemed to go up as high as the lights at the top of the place before landing in the first row of the stands, just inside the right-field foul pole. It is 314 feet out there. Maybe this one went 315. Or 316. Whatever. It was Yankees 2 and Blue Jays 2 on Opening Night.

Cashman never wanted to move Melky. He doesn't believe in mortgaging his entire farm system for one player that he's going to have to pay an astronomical sum of money for, unlike say… Omar Minaya, the GM of the Oldest Team in Baseball.

Also… you know, had that ball gone 317 it would have been worth TWO runs instead of only one. Only Lupica knows this. Whatever. Doesn’t "Whatever" imply that whatever was said before it is unimportant? If it's not important then why did he fucking WRITE it? Why not… *gasp*… delete it! Simple! Because it's all about sentence fragments. Fragments. And. Lots. Of them. It's like. William Shatner. Is writing this. And pretending. To be Captain. Kirk.

Jason Giambi in looking for a bunt, helped keep it that way, making this amazing leap and catch of a line drive hit by Marco Scutaro.

Can't you just FEEL Lupica resisting the urge to add something like, "The kind of amazing leap and catch that a man, a man like Giambi, who's taken so much money, millions upon millions of dollars, hand over fist, and still disgraced his team by taking steroids and cheating like a damned cheating Yankee, ought to make in a big game. The kind he's never made in October for them." Doesn't it sound like something he would say? I think he said it and the editor removed it.

Now it was 9:07 at Yankee Stadium, first night of the last season on this side of the street, and the blue doors opened out in front of the monuments and here came Joba Chamberlain.

There goes Mike again. This is the kind of fucking poetry that can only be written by a certified member of the Keebler Elf crew. It was 9:07 at Yankee Stadium, and it's a good thing that it was 9:07 and not 9:09. Because if it were 9:09 then LaTroy Hawkins would have come into the game instead and fucking blown it. The monuments are coming with them. The blue doors are probably fucking coming with them. They're moving across the street, not to fucking Pango Pango! It's really not that big of a deal.

Jorge Posada was asked if he'd called for a 97-mph fastball.

Posada smiled. "Actually, I asked him to throw a screwball, but he didn't know how. And we haven't worked on the knuckler enough yet. So I just told him to do whatever felt right." Are you fucking retarded?! If Jorge Posada could just ASK pitchers to throw 97-mph fastballs and they do EXACTLY THAT, then he really should start calling for 97-mph fastballs when Mike Mussina's on the fucking hill.

Just like that, the Stadium dialed itself all the way up on Opening Night, jazzed itself up. RBI double from A-Rod in the bottom of the first, a ball that must have sounded like a police siren coming off his bat.

The kind of thing a player with a nickname like A-Rod ought to do at a big moment unless he wants people to call him F-Rod and not in the good way that people use it for Francisco Rodriguez either. In the way that you would call him F-Rod if he was a miserable failure like he is in the entire month of October and probably also in November and December but we'll never know because nobody plays baseball then but A-Rod should have to because he makes so much money. And does steroids. Jose Canseco says so. So it's true. Plus A-Rod clearly knows Giambi. So A-Rod must be using steroids between innings. Especially if he hits a home run off John Maine during the Subway Series this year.

Okay, okay… maybe Lupica didn't write that last paragraph, but admit it. You got like HALF WAY THROUGH IT before you realized it. Didn't you? No? Bullshit, you know you did.


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If I were Lupica, I'd be less concerned with the dates of birth of members of various New York Teams outfields, and a bit more concerned with how the Mets ended up with the outfield they've got.

I vaguely remember talk of a potential deal a couple of years ago that involved one Manny Ramirez possibly coming to the Metsies. Omar wanted to add him. Boston wanted to move him. There was concern over whether he was approaching decline, but the money wasn't an issue for the Mets (and their now-$140M payroll). And as for decline, here are Manny's last 2 years in Boston.

.321/.439/.619, 35 HR, 102 RBI in 130 games.
.296/.388/.493, 20 HR, 88 RBI in 133 games. (And he batted .340 in the post-season with 4 HR and 16 RBI)

So what could have derailed such a monster trade as to send a guy with a career .313/.409/.593 line and 490 homers to Queens?

Yup… you guessed it. Omar Minaya's absolute fucking refusal to trade Lastings Milledge. Giving up Milledge for Manny Ramirez was abso-fucking-loutly out of the question.

Now… if Minaya were getting back something better for Milledge… like say… a 29 year old lefty outfielder with career numbers of .271/.348/.462, 35 career homers and an OPS+ of 113, especially if that guy OPS'd a cool .723 for his career against left-handed pitching… THAT'S a deal old Omar would have to consider.

Two years ago, Milledge for ManRam was out of the question. In 2008, Milledge nets Ryan Church and if you ask me, that's a worse move than Kazmir-for-Zambrano. Nobody will kill you in the media for the "trade you don't make"… and most people forget them. But if the Mets had Manny Ramirez in their lineup, there's NO FUCKING WAY they lose that series to the Cardinals in 2006 and probably go on to win the World Series over a shitty Tiger team that couldn't pitch without pine tar. And there's also NO FUCKING WAY they blow that lead in September 2007.

So what would you rather have? Manny Ramirez and a Ring? Or the young, virile and "Under-30 for 12 more months" Ryan Church? I rest my case.