The NO Network

By Jim Weihofen

I can't help but feeling joy that there is something out there that is angering George Stienbrenner. There is a petition on the web to ban the Yankees from the MLB. With the signature count nearing 4,000, this great day may soon be upon us. Just imagine if Jeter ended up in Tampa Bay, or if A-Rod finally found his way into a Red Sox uniform. Wouldn't it be great if Steinbrenner became only a horse owner (Then buy all the best horses, regardless of age or health, go 6-3 in the Triple Crown hunt, then get banned from horse racing...)

There are more sites devoted to Yankee-hating than any other baseball topic out there (really!), so how is it that Bud Selig hasn't authorized this petition yet? The petition is as follows:

To: MLB Commissioner Bud Selig
Dear Mr. Selig,

We formally request that you commit to a program in Major League Baseball that will ban the New York Yankees from competing in the sport. We are asking that the organization be placed in a lock-down state for at least three years. Why do we ask this? Our reasons are many. One, by continually providing work and exposure to known criminals such as Darryl Strawberry they actively erode the character and integrity of the game. Two, by signing outside contracts for services and endorsements, then funneling that money into player salaries, they make it nearly impossible for so many other teams to compete. Only a very few teams can afford to spend the vast amounts of money the Yankees do each season. They knowingly and wrecklessly drive costs higher each year in several categories, resulting in a severe lack of competition in baseball. Consider these two prime reasons, and then listen to the many other complaints we list. We hope you realize that the New York Yankees are nothing but a disease to Major League Baseball since they continually strive to be bigger than the game itself. The likes of George Steinbrenner must be stopped in their tracks, and a three year suspension by your office would send a clear message. If they can't play nicely, why should they play at all? If you so desire, we would be happy to go along with a longer lock down of 4 or perhaps 5 years. An eternal banishment from the game is not out of the question. Thus, we ask that you examine and consider the many names signed below and then act quickly in tearing down the destructive Yankee machine and restoring all that was once good and decent about baseball back to the game. Thank you.


3879. "Yankees destroy baseball by having the biggest payroll each and every year, and by a substantial margin. Also, the Yankees have an edge in competition because of the use of steroids by at least two of their players."

3853. "the 29 others should have the same chance"

Alright, Mr. Selig, you've solved the first issue that's poisioning baseball (steriods), now fix the other (The Yankees).

Hot Stove Books

By Karlsie

(Sorry for all the delays; however, I just survived a nasty browser crash and only finally got back in... enjoy)

The holidays are here and winter is fast closing in on us. While I am thankful we have 3rd base and we're starting to get pitching covered for the 2006 season, there's still a long stretch between now and spring training in which I have to amuse myself.

So, curl up in a comfy chair near the hot stove or the fire; settle in under a comfy blanket with a mug of spiced cider (with just a dash of the Captain in there to really warm you up) and pick up a good book.

That's right - a good book.

Just because the season is over doesn't mean you need to abandon the field of dreams with the extensive library of good reading out there. Over the next couple of months, I'll share some of my favorite baseball books - old and new - with you. To start, let's go with a book that should be on everyone's shelf: "The Old Ball Game" by Frank DeFord.

If history is merely a paint-by-numbers scenario of facts and figures, DeFord is among the class of artists painting the original canvasses of scenes for us to copy. He is a story teller who can weave color and beauty in even the most mundane situation. (His most recent commentary about intelligent design vs. evolution as exemplified by golf is a classic - if you missed it, check the morning edition website to see if it's up there.)

He weaves the tale of two men: Christie Mathewson and John "Muggsy" McGraw transformed the New York Giants into a force that transformed baseball forever. When Deford weaves the tale, it is more than a study in class contrasts that the two men represented; it is a tale of how two people can connect in a way that can change the world as we know it. You can almost feel yourself in Mr. Peabody's way back machine sitting in the stands watch the handsome Mathewson throw while the Little Napoleon dictated orders from the side.

It takes a real talent to do that.

To give you a taste, of how I was sucked in - let me quote you this sentence from the opening pages: "Mathewson was golden, tall and handsome, kind and educated, our beau ideal, the first all-American boy to emerge from the field of play, while McGraw was hardscrabble shanty Irish, a pugnacious little boss who would become the model for the classic American coach - a male version of the whore with a heart of gold - the tough, flinty so-and-so who was field-smart, a man's man his players came to love despite themselves."

No one writes like that any more - it is an old-school talent that can run a sentence like that and fill the air with poetry, color and music. It is a story teller's sentence - something we're no longer used to in a world of coffee in a cardboard cup, multi-tasking type-A personalities and instant gratification. Reading DeFord makes me a better writer because he reminds me of what sports writing used to be instead of what it's become: glorified tabloidism designed to feed the jackals their morning outrage and water cooler fodder.

Perhaps, one day, I'll be as good as DeFord - one can only hope. In the mean time, if you need to kill some time while holiday shoppers bustle all over the mall, go into your local big box bookstore caf�, get a fancy cuppa joe and curl up in a comfy chair with "The Old Ball Game" and feel yourself transported away from the insipid canned holiday music and panicked shoppers. You won't be sorry.

Goodbye Theo

By Karlsie

Everyone I know asks me the same question: what happened with Theo? They hope I have some inside information that will lead them to sort out just what happened last weekend when it all blew up.

Like everyone else, all I can say is I don't know for sure, but I can guess. My guess is that it is far simpler than most people want it to be. People wants Theo to be the wronged party - the bride left at the altar by an selfishly uncaring groom in the form of Larry Lucchino while all of Red Sox nation sat in the pews - shocked, shedding tears of embarrassment for all involved.

Let me go on the record with these two words: grow up.

Am I going to miss Theo? Of course I am, but any person out there thinking that a 31 year old wonder child is the sole reason behind the Red Sox being the team they were needs to get a grip. How many people factor in Josh Byrnes deciding to get out of the shadow of Fenway to shine in the Arizona desert? Of course, he's probably scared right down to his toenails that he may end up being as bleached as the bones in a Georgia O'Keefe painting, but if he builds a good team around him it won't be a worry.

Then there's that pesky father figure/son relationship between Lucchino and Epstein. That sort of "Dad…. I have my degree, I know what I'm doing really I do…" sort of (unspoken?) feeling children have following in their parents' footsteps when the sign is about to change from "Father" to "Father and Son."

Theo's father is a writer - and a damn good one at that. Good enough to run a prestigious program down the street from Fenway at Boston University. He comes from a long line of writers - including a couple of blacklisted ones who wrote, among other things, "Arsenic and Old Lace." There is a deep passion and love of baseball in that family, something Larry Lucchino understood and allowed Theo to develop under his tutelage through the turbulent adolescent years, through college and beyond.

It's hard to say what Theo might have done had Lucchino, as a father figure, not been there to mentor and guide him. He might have gone on to sit next to Steven King in the stands where they would discuss their latest bestsellers. He might be up to his elbows in healing sick spirits next to his social worker brother. He might have been yet another yuppie wienie with an MBA and a business to destroy.

But he wasn't, he was Theo and we bowed to him like a gift from on high.

For a couple of weeks now I've been saying that I wonder if he needs to step out of the shadow of Fenway and spread his wings. If he needs to pick up his guitar and play for a while or try something different than baseball. Perhaps he's in that petulant child mode of "I'll show you I can do it, really I can," because he just isn't sure if it's him or not and is looking to see if the magic was his or those around him. Maybe it's a little of everything or all of nothing. We won't know until some tell-all biopic comes out.

No matter what he does, I wish him well. I only believe in a handful of villains and Sox management is not in that handful. This is a growing pains incident - one most of us have experienced from one side or another. This is the childish "up yours" as you slam the door on your way out to show your folks that you can do it, you are a grown up and won't they be sorry when you're gone. This is WP Kinsella's every man who went to college 3,000 miles away to get away from his father after reading "Catcher in the Rye" and whose last words to father were to say his hero, Shoeless Joe Jackson, was a cheater because that was the one thing he knew would break his spirit as well as his heart.

Hopefully, if Theo is really as good as we want to believe he is, in a couple of years he'll be back, more mature and slightly sheepish as he asks if we want to play a catch.

Look folks, the 2004 Sox were a true blessing and gift. The stars converged and the planets aligned to give us a magical ride and it was wonderful. But it has to be more than "we'll always have last year." I don't want the Sox to be like those beer bellied, middle aged guys who keep reliving that championship season they had in their prime, scared to look at the life they have now. The Sox have to be more than a couple of overpaid diva super stars; they have to be a real team on all levels.

So it's time for Boston to say to Theo what our parents said to us (or we have said to our kids): we love you and will do our best to support you, but don't let the door hit you where the good lord split you. Good luck Theo, but it's time for us to stop reliving 2004 and get to the business of 2006.

Why I Like Sox Management

By Karlsie

With everyone dissing Sox management for not resigning Theo, I thought I'd share a story of how the current management far exceeds anything we've ever seen running the show at Fenway. They say you should judge a man not by how he treats his dinner guests but, rather, how he treats the waitstaff. I am here to say that, by that standard, the current Sox management are the type of people I am proud to work with.

Over the course of the season, I have had the pleasure of working with a couple of folks in the front office on a few projects. I have watched some of the folks with fancy titles and on sports writers' speed dial interact with the kids in the office who are just starting out. I have observed how they treat the reception staff and even, in a few cases, how they treat the old retirees who work as game day staff in the trenches. In every insistence, I have watched them treat people with a level of dignity and respect that pleasantly surprised me.

Hell, they've even extended a number of courtesies to a certain writer here at yankeessuck.com, even as they cringe somewhat at the name. ;)

More importantly, I have watched how they treat kids.

My 13 year old son has been through a medical hell that most of us can never imagine. He has a less extreme form of the kidney disease that force Sean Elliott and Alonzo Mourning into the headlines with transplants. While the form my son has should never require dialysis or a transplant, we have had our share of getting to know medical staffs at Children's Hospital and other clinics all too well. In fact, I've learned more about the kidneys and a large number of medications than anyone outside of medicine should ever have to learn.

This year, he took being swept by Chicago hard. I haven't seen him this upset about something in a while. I know it wasn't the loss, but that he was using that to release some of the things that bothered him. So I got in touch with a big-wig at the Sox to ask if there was any way I could sit in the empty park with him for a little bit and let him drink in the memories from the season - where he saw all sorts of wonderful things and had a series of "best nights ever."

This is the sort of thing people who are busy trying to broker deals and spin media can ignore - but he didn't. He handed me to someone who could make that happen. On a beautiful fall day between rainstorms, the three of us - the staffer, my son and I - sat in the green monster seats talking about the season, looking at where Manny, Johnny and Trot had worn spots in the outfield grass on their patrol and talked about our fantasy team that had Konerko on first and Vlad in the outfield if Johnny left.

It was a wonderful afternoon and it did the trick. On the way home, my son opened up about something he didn't know how to deal with regarding boy/girl relationships.

The other day, after four years in remission, my son had a relapse. Something I was told would be so rare, they discharged us from the renal program at Children's. On the way home from the doctor's, where they confirmed this was a relapse and not something minor, my son said, "You know what mom, in spite of this, it's been a great year. I got to go to some games at Fenway with you, I have infield dirt and I got to sit in the monster seats. It's going to be OK."

The old Sox crew would never have allowed me to do something like that … even if they did acknowledge my existence since I don't write for the Globe or Herald on a regular basis. (Although I do have the occasional guest column in the Herald, which owns the chain I write for on a weekly basis.) But these new owners, they understand. A month ago we didn't know we were about to take another ride on the chronic illness roller coaster - but because some good people with big hearts gave us a hand when they did, we're started over that first hill with a laugh instead of a cry.