A little part of my Yankees fan self just died a bit in posting this. But you know what? It’s the final night of Hanukkah, and who am I to deprive our readers of a hot outfielder, whether he plays for the Boston Red Sox or not? I give you Ryan Kalish.
Thank heavens for the New York Post. Without them, how would he know that Derek Jeter sends his single-serving ladyfriends away with gift baskets?
He used to give out t-shirts. True story.
But hey, trends spread like wildfire in baseball. By now, stars all around the game are in the post-booty gift basket game. Step into my office; I’ll show you the baskets I’ve been able to unearth so far.
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Francona at his last news conference with the Sox: classy to the end.
Like any true Yankee fan, I quietly snickered when the Red Sox essentially pissed away the month of September, playing crummy ball and falling out of playoff contention. It’s nice to have a little ammo for the next time someone makes a snide comment about the Yankees “buying championships”. Yes, because Carl Crawford came so cheap.
Then I read this feature today by Bob Hohler and…honestly, Sox fans, I don’t know why you haven’t taken the pitchforks and torches down Yawkey Way. Lackey, Beckett, Ortiz…I could go down the list of selfish bums but why bother. It will only make you angrier. And far be it for me to comment on selfish ball players (*cough*Rafael Soriano*cough*)
Selfish athletes can be found throughout the league, and baseball history is full of douchebag moves by douchebag owners and managers. This situation is, for the most part, no different. But…this crap about Terry Francona popping pills? REPREHENSIBLE. The man brought your organization two World Championships, slayed a supposed 86-year-old demon, dealt with effing Manny and this is how you thank him for his time in Boston? Dragging Francona’s personal issues out in public when the real problem is that you have $15 million pitchers who don’t have the decency and maturity to put down that bucket of KFC in the locker room and go support their teammates and stand by their manager when he obviously needed them most? Real classy, Henry, Werner and Co. Here’s a tip: when a staff member is dealing with personal issues – say, a crumbling marriage – try support and empathy you a-holes.
Here’s how awful this is to Sox fans: one good friend of mine is shunning the team he has supported his entire life on account of this.
And now that Theo heading to Chicago, this is likely Ben Cherington’s mess to clean up. Thankfully, he has a bright spot in Dustin Pedroia, who still cares…until he has an opportunity to leave town. Could you blame him?
Red Sox fans, you have given me hell over the years, but you don’t deserve this. Watching a team choke in September is bad enough, but that’s baseball. Watching the smearing of a beloved manager’s name is simply disgusting. And for that, I feel terrible for you guys.
Let’s just put aside the fact that I had an actual rooting interest last night — everything that happened in baseball over the last 24 hours makes my brain scream this song:
As someone who has spent the last two weeks watching the Cardinals wait until the last inning to win or lose what seemed like 95% of their games, one of the most surreal things about last night was that St. Louis was the only team that got their game settled right out of the gate, batting around in the first inning and scoring five runs before recording a single out. Which left me free to enjoy the one day MLB.tv subscription I paid 3.99 for Tuesday night as a mostly impartial fan (possibly the best 4 bucks I’ve ever spent, even if I couldn’t get the Rays-Yankees because of blackout restrictions, and had to switch to the Phillies-Braves radio feeds for the latter innings because of too much traffic on the video feed (and my crappy bandwidth). At one point, I had three GTalk conversations going and was on the phone to my parents; 99.5 % of the discussion revolved around baseball (I did manage to discuss Christmas arrangements with my folks. I’m not totally obsessed.)
The Bruins Saturday night in Vancouver. Boston will try to get back into the Stanley Cup Final series tonight with Game 3 at home. (Photo: Getty Images)
Just a quick hit to give you something to read between periods tonight.
Know how I always talk about the East Coast’s love for all things Boston? Here’s an article from the Globe and Mail that backs up my point, but only to a certain extent. See, what I got out of this was a) Bruins fans in the Maritimes consist of old guys who are missing their own teeth and b) the Maritimes consist solely of Nova Scotia…oh, wait, they threw PEI a bone. So this story drove me crazy all day. Yeah, I know it’s customary for Canadians in my part of the country to kvetch about how the rest of Canada views us. When national publications talk East Coast, they’re really just talking about Halifax (so we think). And the national CBC is even worse, as when they talk about the East, it seems to end at the Quebec border. Grrr.
So here’s a footnote to that Globe article. New Brunswick is home to two Bruins greats: Don Sweeney, who spent the better part of 15 seasons with Boston, and Willie O’Ree, who broke the NHL colour barrier. For the record, I know far more Bruins fans out here than actual Canucks fans (apologies to those cheering them on because they’re the last Canadian team standing).
And many of them are women.
Here’s something to make you smile, speaking of Boston: one kid honouring his uncle’s memory with an assist from the Red Sox. I can’t hate on them when they agree to do stuff like this.
This is from a few days ago, but Star Wars fans will enjoy this tale from our pal Andrew Bucholtz at Sporting Madness.
And now back to some seriousness: keep Nathan Horton in your thoughts, OK? God, I hate seeing anyone being carried off on a stretcher.
See? The Red Sox still remember how to smile. (AP Photo)
It’s the Monday of a four-day work week for me. Don’t those Mondays seem like the very longest of Mondays? Ugh. And for that reason, I wish I had this post up for you sooner. Forgive me. How about I make it up to you with not one, but three Mr. Mondays!
Let’s start with a belated Happy Patriots’ Day to the good residents of my geographical neighbours in Maine, and further on in Massachusetts. The Red Sox celebrated the day by beating up on the Toronto Blue Jays 9-1. It was like the War of 1812 except, um, not really. At all.
But hey, how about Jed Lowrie who had four hits including a two-run homer! I haven’t done the research, but at .516/.545/.774, is it safe to say that Jed is off to his Best Start Ever? It’s just a shame he’s Scutaro’s backup. The win is Boston’s third in a row, so maybe we’re finally seeing the team we were warned about all along.
See who else made our Monday after the jump.
Here's Marquette, whose victory over Syracuse last night made me cry. (Photo: Getty Images)
It’s Monday. How are your brackets looking? Like hell? Thought so.
First of all, a warm welcome to our special guest Ladies… Bracket Brawl participants: Melissa_thistle, Courknee35, Big10Bias and fellow Canuck/friend of the blog Andrew Bucholtz (you will go read his blog The 55-Yard Line now, won’t you?) Our current leader isn’t in our Ladies… group – due to technical difficulties, we had to create another group on ESPN.com so one gal could get her picks in. That gal is Buffalita, leading the pack with 460 points and picking Ohio State to win it all. CuteSports and Raven round out the Top 3 at 440 and 430 points respectively. Any hopes I had of repeating last year’s surprise success have been flushed down the proverbial toilet. I blame Butler.
Best of luck heading into Thursday! Sweet Sixteen will be hopefully be sweet for some of you.
So what else is going on? Continue reading
A few of us could tolerate being here right now for our spring break, even with the overcast Florida skies. (Photo: AP)
We’re taking their annual blogging break to recharge our batteries. But don’t worry, we’ll be back in a week with all the fun that March has to offer: MLB Spring Training, NHL and NBA playoff position jockeying, and of course, March Madness (including our annual Bracket Challenge where I will defend my title as Unexpected Champ. I’m the Canadian. How does that even happen?)
Enjoy the next seven days!
Just try to top the "State Trooper Giambi" look, as sported by Mike Mussina a few years back.
It’s been well-documented that we at Ladies… have a love/hate/complicated relationship with the moustache (and why is it so often associated with the mullet?), but this is clearly a case in which we wholeheartedly support its existence. As you may be aware, we are halfway through Movember, a movement designed to bring awareness to men’s health and specifically prostate cancer.
Community support always makes our hearts melt, so we salute the numerous athletes who have taken up the moustachioed cause. Continue reading
It’s not quite September yet, but plenty of baseball teams have already started calling up fresh faces for their major league debuts — which means even if your team is out of any meaningful chance at the playoffs (or if you’re trying to ignore the fact that your team is giving away the division right after reclaiming first place, sigh) there’s still plenty of good reasons to watch the games. I mined the MLB transaction ledger to find every first-time call-up since July 31. You can thank me later.
Ryan Kalish, LF Boston Red Sox
Yes, the Ladies… have been a bit busy this week. I’m home early for the long weekend so that I can be present while my septic tank gets cleaned out. I can barely watch without stifling a gag, but such is the life of a homeowner in the quasi-sticks. Better than paying property taxes in town, I keep reminding myself.
Yeah, I'm still not speaking to him.
Let’s kick off H&R in fitting style with this latest crap about Brett Favre. It seems that during a pep talk for the Southern Miss Golden Eagles, he stated that if they could make it back to the College World Series, he’d return for one more season in the NFL. Continue reading
*Yeah, yeah, technically, it’s Opening Night. Deal.
I realize that Phil Hughes is not starting tonight's MLB opener at Fenway. Enjoy his stare anyway. (Photo: Nick Laham/Getty Images)
Chris Carpenter can report here anytime. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
In between squeals of delight over Johnny Weir and the Norway curling team’s pants, we happened to notice that SPRING TRAINING IS UNDERWAY!
Happy Friday everyone! I already broke my New Year’s resolution to not curse under my breath every time I read about the Boston Red Sox. This was prompted by the news that Adrian Beltre was officially introduced to the Fenway fold today. He’ll replace Mike Lowell at third base (which is sad, truly. I like Mike Lowell.) I happened to be reading a tweet of Pete Abraham’s over lunch, in which Scott Boras was quoted as saying “I think we’ve built a great stage here and there’s a chance for this rocket to take off.”
Hmm, “rocket”? Is it safe to use that word in Red Sox Country once again without, you know, getting yelled at?
Anyway, good move for the Red Sox and hopefully we’ll see a rebound in Beltre’s numbers (just not during Yankees/Sox games)
More Hit & Run fun after the jump…
Please accept our apologies for extreme lateness, but we Ladies… have been busy with everything from final exams, to holiday shenanigans (shopping, parental visits, eating our weight in cheese), to dealing with ridiculous snowstorms as they muck up travel plans.
So we hope that this final installment of Hanukkah Hunks makes up for the missed nights.
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This goes against everything I believe in as a Yankees fan. But after researching around my other choices for hot, young, Jewish general managers of baseball teams, he pretty much takes the cake. Night 4 I bring you Theo Epstein.
So, we got that exciting September baseball after all, huh? It’s been a while since I followed a baseball game that didn’t involve the Cardinals during my work day, but I was definitely keeping tabs on the first half of that doubleheader. In between actual work, of course.
In fact, with the Dodgers’ stubborn refusal to clinch their division title and the Braves’ surprising surge against the Rockies, all of a sudden we’re entering the final weekend of the regular season with a few playoff spots not quite settled. Still, let’s take a minute to congratulate those teams who have already clinched their division — because if there’s anything we here at Ladies… like better than pictures of athletes, it’s pictures of athletes celebrating.
For the last few weeks, over at my favorite Cardinals blog, Viva El Birdos, Will Leitch has been tracking the team’s magic number by highlighting a past or current Cardinal player with the corresponding jersey number. Today’s number, for example, is Ozzie Smith.
Earlier in the week, I was hoping I’d get to write a congratulatory post, but then we had to go and lose to the Astros yesterday; the earliest the Cards can clinch the division now is if the Cubs lose to the Giants tonight, but I live on the East Coast and this post is already late as it is. So since I looked at the NL races last week, I thought I’d steal borrow Will’s idea and apply the player number countdown to the AL races.
No, no! He's not going anywhere!
Somewhere, in a vast wilderness where cell phones signals go to die and there is no SportsCenter, Crane is feeling a psychic wave of untold joy and relief. That’s because the trade deadline has passed and Roy Halladay stayed in Toronto. Hey, Riccardi, thanks for playing with the heads of Jays’ fans these last few weeks! There’s a special place in hell for GMs like you – right beside John Ferguson Jr.
It’s been a busy few days. Let’s put all the nonsense of PEDs and Papi behind us and concentrate on the actual game of baseball baseball transactions. If your fave player left on a jet plane today for another team and you don’t know when he’ll be back again (hint: check the team schedule), I’m sorry to hear that. On the other hand, if your team has been injected with newfound playoff hope, congratulations! Hope that works out for you guys! Unless you like the Red Sox, and then…you know how I feel. Continue reading
One sentence. That’s all it took. Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz, the sluggers who propelled the Boston Red Sox to end an 86-year World Series championship drought and to capture another title three years later, were among the roughly 100 Major League Baseball players to test positive for performance-enhancing drugs in 2003, according to lawyers with knowledge of the results.
Who cares about Manny Ramirez? Everybody already knows he’s a cheater and a prima donna manchild who will dog it on his own teammates to get his way. But David Ortiz? Big Papi? Say it ain’t so.
Oh, sure, the evidence was there. Anyone who watched him hit in Minnesota and then watched his complete turnaround as a hitter in Boston had to wonder. Was it enough to point to how much he’d drastically altered his swing once starting for Boston? Was it enough to chuckle when he told us that the only drugs he ever took were beans and rice? Was it worth it to ignore just how massive he was in Boston, how he became the ‘Big’ part of ‘Big Papi’? Could we just pretend all that wasn’t there because he seemed like everything that was right about a player- that he was a guy who’d put the whole city on his back with a twinkle in his eye, a gleaming smile and a swing like thunder? Well, yes. Yes, it was. Papi couldn’t be that kind of guy. He’s Papi, for God’s sake.
Well. We were wrong. And whether you believe his story that he had no idea he’d ever tested positive and doesn’t know how he could (even if you buy his cover that he may have bought some energy products from the Dominican in his youth) have tested positive for anything, or whether you so desperately want to believe this couldn’t be true, it is. Sure, nobody knows what he tested positive for yet. Sure, it was six years ago and there wasn’t a policy and accidents happen (just ask JC Romero) and blah blah blah excuses excuses. You know who else tested positive in 2003? Barry Bonds. Alex Rodriguez. Sammy Sosa. Manny Ramirez. Jason Grimsley. Not exactly innocent company.
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I am still cranky. Blame Rogers Sportsnet for running a Jays promo on Aaron Hill inspired – poorly! – by Dos Equis’s “World’s Most Interesting Man” campaign. Try harder, Sportsnet!
Perhaps you think Lady Bee should try harder, too. Forget it! It’s too darn muggy! Check out the linkups instead: Continue reading
Hey, it’s my nation’s birthday today! We’re …old! Today – if the weather and my second sinus attack in a week clears – I’ll be joining my fellow Canadians enjoying BBQ, drinking beer (not Molson), and rubbing red face paint off my tired children’s cheeks as I grumble to Mr. Bee about how we shouldn’t have stayed out late watching the fireworks when we have to get up for work in the morning.
Some random facts about Canada:
Today we’re showing our True Patriot Love by rolling out our favourite Canucks on the mound and at the plate (or in the case of Russell Martin, behind the plate). So be your most polite, apologetic self, grab a double-double and join us after the jump. Continue reading
I got the idea for this post when I was talking to my friend about the last time the Yankees won the World Series. It’s almost going to be nine years, but nine years isn’t that long. If I ever complained about a nine-year World Series drought to a Cubs fan, I would more than likely get a smack in the face…and it would be completely warranted.
However, when I think back to where I was the 2000, it seems like ages ago. The last time the Yankees won it all I was a freshman in High School. It feels like I graduated from H.S. ages ago; forget about actually being a freshman. The bottom line is we all follow our team with one goal: to see them win it all at the end. Don’t get me wrong, you can still enjoy the season, but you are never fully satisfied unless your team is the last one standing. Unless you root for the Phillies, Red Sox or Cardinals, the last time your team won it all can seem like a lifetime ago.
So let’s take a little trip down memory lane and see what life was like the last time your team were World Champions. Sorry to all Washington, Milwaukee, Houston, San Diego, Colorado, Tampa Bay, Texas, and Seattle fans. You need to have won at least one to qualify.
It’s rivalry week here at Chez Sox. I’ve had the Sox v. Yanks games on, and have been alternately shouting and laughing at my TV. Everything that could possibly be picked up and thrown has been taken away from me, and the husband has been banished to his computer to listen to his big rivalry games, the Phils and the Mets. Suck it, New York, more or less.
I was going to write this big, magnanimous post about rivalries and how they’re good for the sport and good for the fanbase because a rivalry gives even the most casual fan something to talk about. I was going to be the bigger person and say that my mom is right (and not completely insane) when she says that she kind of likes the Yankees, because Sox/Yanks games are just bigger than the other 144 games for those of us who list our home address firmly in Red Sox Nation.
I was going to do all of that bigger person-type stuff, but the idea of saying anything nice about the Yankees fills me with utter, utter revulsion. I don’t have it in me. I can’t do it.
Crane here, filling in for CuteSports. I apologize for the lateness of the hour, but hey, where I am, it’s technically still morning. This is what the Red Sox get for keeping the Blue Jays in third place over the weekend: You get to make fun of them!
Observe David Ortiz, who probably is reminding himself that the world is just illusion, trying to change him:
A.k.a. the “Complete MLB Rundown (To The Exclusion Of Everything Else)” edition. Why? Because I can. Yesterday’s scores presented BBC-style for extra hilarity and confusion.
Good morning. I know in darkness I will find you giving up inside like me.
This Yankee fan will start with the Red Sox, only because showing y’all FOREARMS is more important than my pinstriped pride. You can thank me after the jump. Continue reading
Good morning. Please bear with me as I present you with my ESPN-implosion-inducing All-Star team.
1B (a.k.a Base the First, because I’m feeling medieval tonight): Justin Morneau (MIN). I dislike Mark Teixeira. I dislike Kevin Youkilis. I don’t care about Miguel Cabrera. Justin Morneau is both 1) Canadian, and 2) Totally hot.
Hit the jump for more.
Oh, Jayson. No.
Dear Major League Baseball Players,
We need to talk.
I know we all like to make fun of the old school owners who forbid facial hair, and most of you can probably recite the relevant parts of The Simpsons‘ softball episode by heart. The baseball season is long, and required uniforms can make it hard to find an outlet for personal expressions of style other than your hair. (Or so I’m told by friends who went to Catholic school.)
Still, this beard thing is out of control this season. Minda tried to warn you last year that things were getting a little too scruffy in the chin region, but did you listen?
There’s a magical thing that happens every year after the All-Star break… the Yankees start winning! In an attempt to summon those W’s into our current state of affairs, I thought we’d explore a little all-star action… Ladies style of course!
Earl Weaver would not be happy with our depth at certain positions, but I can’t help that hotties gravitate towards center field and the pitchers’ mound! There has to be some scientific explanation for this phenomenon.
Ladies... 