Let's hope the Tigers do the rest of the nation a favor and knock the "best team money can buy", out of the playoffs. Otherwise we may have another "Who Cares World Series". Remember the Mets- Yank this series of several years ago that produced the lowest ratings in World Series history? Go Tigers!
One who thinks the Big Apple is a piece of shit.
Thanks for the feedback! 
this is a good elog. nice work.
torre made 2 huge mistakes:
1) benching sheffield
2) leaving chien ming wang in ny for a not gonna happen game 5
as for the mistake of building a frankenteam -- i blame steinbrenner for that
go back and look at the 98 roster and yes the 96 roster too ... real teams, real results
brw, just out of curiousity i'm listening to sterling and waldman on 880. sterling seems to understand that the yankees may lose the game.
yankees in 13 or I will send you 13 dollars
i know it gets you mad when people like me who don't have a "real" team to root for jump on the "hate the yankees" bandwagon, but this is the most detestable team of all time. in any sport. period. it really makes me so happy that (these days) they lose so predictably. why hate them?
1)who do you root for on this team? sheffield? giambi? arod? johnson? wright? mussina? even jeter strikes me as a big turd. there are very few guys you can like on this team.
2)compounding the fact is that most of these guys are hired guns. sure, that is true of a lot of players in a lot of sports but the yankees are in a class of their own.
3)steinbrenner. has there ever been an owner you can hate more?
4)aside from guys like you hans-guys that know something about baseball, that die for their team, etc- most yankee fans are the worst, most spoiled fans in the world. they are touchy, classless, ill-behaved, fair weather fools. you make fun of red sox fans, but they seem to me to care more about their team and to know more about the sport. sure, they can act like drunken fools, but so can yankee fans.
we were fans of the early 90's knicks. i often wonder if i really *could* have liked that team if i was from somewhere other than NY. but at least that team was composed of a bunch of underdogs. i also can understand rooting for the yankees of 1995-1999. not because they won, but because they seemed like a team. but you damn well know that it is damn hard for you to root for these guys. it would be so much easier to just ignore the yankees until the team returns to being a team. at least that way you can enjoy the moments when they win.
I don't really buy the whole Frankenteam thing.
dude
c'mon
and your joking about good chemistry too. that was funny. i suppose it is good chemistry when a loser like giambi who never won anything rags on a player in public for being choker...
you're
oh, and i forgot to mention michael kay...
that was a nice moment - jeter's at bat in the 8th - there's a ballplayer who needs a team around him not a bunch of highly paid journeymen.
You have a well written thought out blog. I know I ripped on your Yanks, but I am in podunkville, Midwest (St. Louis) and just get real tired of all the national media attention being paid to NY when there are a lot of other good teams playing baseball. I have been watching this game and post-season play for 45 years and it's like there are 30 teams in MLB. Not just the three east of the Hudson River.
Hang in there better days are ahead. Keep in mind the Yanks have won 26 World Series. That's 17 more than the next closest team, the Saint Louis Cardinals. Keep writing and don't let the bast**ds get you down. You're doing a great job!
Herb in Saint Louis
whatever. i never said that anything i said was "scientific." that's the whole point-my OPINION is that this "team" is a joke. i simply cannot understand why you try to stand up for them. you totally miss the point:
1)people hate teams that have an unfair advantage. the gap between the red sox payroll and the yankees payroll is the entire payroll of the tigers team.
2)that money is being expendend on dirtbags. sheffield and giambi should not even be allowed to play. they are among the few confirmed steroid users in MLB. arod, mussina, johnson, wright, brown...i can go on and on. most of the guys you have named that you like are holdovers from the team that is understandably likeable (bernie, rivera, jeter, posada). my statement concerning jeter refers to the numerous reports that he is a cold, calculating grudge holder. he clearly has spent the last 3 post seasons blaiming his teammates for losing. i know-not scientific.
oh, and its interesting based on your comments of the past how you like damon now. hmmm...
3)as for fans, i lived in boston for 10 years, and new york for 18. why would you think i dont know a lot of sox and yankee fans? that is retarded. i have been to many more sox games than you have. and i certainly have heard your unflattering characterization of them numerous times, including as written on this site. how many game have you gone to at fenway? give me a break.
4)your look back at all of the past yankees is unconvincing-i doubt that you really buy what you have written (for example-do you really think abreu is is the same league with o'neill when it comes to wanting to win? come on).
5)sure, duke, detroit, etc all bad. but the point is that detroit was a team mostly built from the draft (thomas, rodman, dumars, etc). these are not teams that every year sign 3 old all-star dudes. that is what is so lame about them. don't give me that "every team is signing hired guns" crap-look at the team that just beat your mercinaries. you just admitted that you can only name 7 of them. that is because they are not famed hired guns.
6)"johnson, arod and sheffield" did not figure into this team? silly-thye make more than several teams.
7)don't give me that crap that i only bust on the yankees when their season ends. it is just that that is when it hurts the most.
i have been drinking?very "scientific." i suspect i hurt your feelings because i insulted your team. grow up.
Hey Herb,
Thanks for the kind words. Go Cards (although I hate LaRussa)!
ok you win. they are the most detestable team to me in my history.
i am not going to retread over the few silly comments made in your reply; some of them make no sense.
and yes, you are right, i watch every jets game, even when they are 4-12. so what? so i am an immature sports fan too. if, somehow, the cap was abolished in the nfl, and the jets signed every top player out there, i probably would still root for them, but not as hard. if they signed TO-type players i would care less. the loss to pittsburgh in 2004 would have hurt less, etc. im sure success and the fact that the yankees are a mercinary team makes yankee fans not care as much. that is why i was not surprised when i overheard you say, during the 2005 season, that you were not watching the yankees. when they got their act together and won the division you had coincidentally started to pay attention. not that i blame you, but it is just hard to care about a team like that, even if it is historically your team. given this, i am surprised this loss hurts so much to you.
1) but it doesn't seem like a square peg in a round hole situation
hans bungle arod is a short stop. and sheffield is an outfielder. is it any wonder they fuck up in the infield when the pressure's on? in the history of free agent baseball i don't think there's been a squarer peg than arod to yankees. if you can't see that, no problem. but that's the way it is.
2) it was the top of the eight and jeter was battling with bonderman with i think damon on base. bonderman made him look bad in two previous at bats. they were down 8-1. jeter was desperately trying to get a hit and i said to lara, "look at that guy, there's no quit in him." in between pitches jeter is yelling at himself, "COME ON, COME ON." the announcers picked up on a few moments later. guys like him come along once every ten years and you should be damn glad he's a yankee.
i have mixed feelings about sympathizing with your pain because i know you're a thinking fan and a solid person and i count myself lucky to know you. and i know that postseason baseball is an emotional roller coaster that ends in heartbreak for 7 out of 8 teams. that said, i know you can't even acknowledge the hideousness of the jeffrey maier incident because as it happened it made your team come out on top. when the yankees have a series stolen from them like that, then you have a right to be bitter. but if they just get plain old beat, well --- that's just one good night's sleep away from history.
one other smallish observation: somehow, rainouts seem to derail the yankee postseasons. it surely happened in 2004. and i think it just happened again this year.
i'm back...
daily news sez torre is out and sweet lou is in.
here's the truth -- in my personal hierarchy of crushing defeats, this one ranks very low on the list. i am indeed over it. we got our asses kicked and I'm fine with that five hours later. Yes we're mercenaries blah blah blah. No tears were shed. I had separated myself by like the 5th inning. My only thing is -- and I direct this to Kissel only -- you know a guy is down, why do you come with the douchey, and unoriginal, criticism? I just don't get it. It's weird. I wasn't on a rooftop beating my chest about the Mighty Yankee Machine. I was writing what I thought was a humble, lighthearted, and potentially entertaining blogpost about the last game of the year.
I don't actually think it's mean-spirited of you, just kind of clueless and inappropriate and I'd like to think I wouldn't do it to you. And I probably wouldn't have responded if I wasn't a little pissed off about the loss, you're right about that.
PB, good point about the square peg and round hole thing...but remember that Sheff started the season in RF and people had to shuffle around due to injury. Arod, well...he's a bum, but nobody was complaining about his defense last year.
Whatever. I love the internet.
plus who is jeffrey maier?
I've been drinking. Please send me 8 bucks.
This is the most entertaining read on the internet since the Foley IMs.
Kissel, what are you wearing?
P.S. I think the Yankees need to buy up the Tigers' bullpen.
Hans: I liked your point-counter point with Kissel. I especially liked how you bared your soul. For me, the best part was when you admitted:
"I like Wang."
Go with it, brother. Don't feel bad.
i apologize for being mean-spirited and clueless and unoriginal.
no, I said it wasn't mean-spirited.
but it was, a bit. it was not as bas as the time a called you up on your cell phone after they lost to the sox in 04, but it was mean.
i thought irabu was a fat p*ssy toad. you suggest he's a fat drunk. which is it?
d lee says the yankees are looking into buying a do-over.
and i think isaiah thomas is going to trade for a-rod. (can't remember who said that, it was funny.)
There is a big point that the haters are missing. Sure, the yanks spend 600 million every year on aging all stars, but what does it get them? For 6 years now, it gets them a humiliating defeat in the post season. If anything, the Yankees' post season futility, and the success of the small-market (read GOP-loving) teams points out that money does NOT buy championships. Yes, it almost guarantees a spot in the playoffs, but that's about it. Spend as much money as you want, but if you don't develop good young pitching, you don't win. And that has always been the case. Also, other owners are free to spend $200 million on their teams. The other owners are RICH, too. The fact that they do not do so is of no concern to me. I am not a communist.
So what's the moral of the story? Easy: Potvin sucks.
wow, this whole thing is so funny. very IS70.
As a Yankee fan who hardly follows baseball anymore i'd say both Hans & Kissel are exaggerating a bit on some basic points.
PRO-HANS
1) most hated team in history of sports?? this isn't even the most hated team this YEAR (*Knicks)
2) Yankee fans are the worst fans? how about fairweather Met fans, racist Boston fans, or traffic beating Los Angeles fans. Yankee fans may be the most polarizing but that's about as bad as it gets.
PRO-KISSEL
1) the whole Yankees buying the pennant thing is somewhat legit of late and a big reason i lost intrest in my team. I totally dig the way we used to farm our squad: Jeter, Leyritz, Pettite, Rivera, Posada, Bernie, El Duque, Soriano, Wickman. Also, guys like Wells, Sojo, O'Neil, Tino and Girardi seemed like guys who really brought a lot to the table in terms of attitude and doing what it takes to win. I totally can't stand it when we go after guys like Sheff, Mussina, Giambi, RJ, A-Rod, etc. Once in a blue moon okay but it seems now to be a yearly right of passage now that terribly reminds me of an off-shoot of the assembled Jack Clark/Winfield years. which brings me to..
2) intagibles. like my brother, it seems Hans might feel that stuff is some urban legend. i really disagree, in times of conflict those chemistry intangibles are what gets you over the hump and help you over achieve. on the flipside, when you have a lot of high-paid solo acts in the clubhouse you get a lot of finger pointing and/or people who wither under the pressure of bloated expectations.
3) sterioid use also made me lose interest in baseball. fuck those assholes. still, Hans is right in the fact there were plenty who simply never got caught (*hello, Brady Anderson)
just an opinion.
PS: it's fantastic out but it looks like we don't have a game today. this is a craying fucking shame! can we get at least enough people amped enough for an occasional football game. it's too sad to have our wonderful field go unattended on a day like today.
dlee-
i stand by my claims about yankee fans. first of all, saying things like "racist" red sox fans-based on what? sure, there are racist red sox fans, and boston certainly is a city that has some shame to bare vis-a-vis racism, but there are racist yankee fans too. hans goes to one red sox game and talks about the racists. i have been to at least 15 sox games, and at least half of the time with my ass in the cheap seats. my general impression is that there are a lot of hard drinking, working-class fans. not so unusual. not so racist. your (and hans') statements are like me talking about knife throwing, battery throwing, gun shooting yankee fans. that would be a real misrepresentation.
that said, what gets me about yankee fans is they are really touchy. i said it before hans' blow up. i think that his response proves my point. i mean, the yankees win 95 games a year. they make the playoffs every year. they dump on fans of other teams all of the time with glee (especially mets and red sox fans). so take your lumps when you team loses. but instead they whine with a sense of entitlement that is embarassing. other people will hate your team. they will make fun of your team when they lose. that is part of sports. it sure has happened to me in boston as a jets fan during the reign of the pats. what is so unusual about it? why is hans devoting long portions of his blog to my stupid glee at the yankees losing? has he not realized that that is part of being a sports fan, and my posts are not so "mean spirited." mean spirited would be commenting on something that matters in the real world. geez.
where are all of the yankee fans now? i walked around my 'hood when the playoffs had just started. everyone was wearing yankee hats. now-this morning-not one. i am sure that in 1997 it was different. the difference is that people get bored of winning. it is so old. that and the fact that their team is a bunch of unlikables means that no one really cares deep down. during the last softball game of the year, lex asked my brother "why are you still wearing that red sox hat?" that is exactly my point-if you are a fan you still care. if your team is the yankees it is hard for sure. i'm sure that if the sox won all of the time, things would change there too.
by the way i totally agree about intangibles. that, and chemistry. they are, to some degree, real things.
i am actually tired of this and I think your points are mostly dumb.
but I think as a fan of no team you have less right to taunt others when their teams lose (it says so in my official fan handbook). when you have a team, when you devote time and energy and (to some degree) your heart to it, that entitles you to razz your buddies when they come up short. otherwise it's just lame and cowardly.
how about those Mets!
remember when Boston fans thought the should get a make up pick for Len Bias?
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