Youk Of The Nation

I accidentally discovered new mojo. When I smoke two cigarettes at once, three players hit a home run in the same inning for the Red Sox. More to come as the situation and my lung cancer develops.

Derek Jeter is good at baseball He's rich He dates various rich, beautiful women, many who make more money than he does He has beaten the Red Sox plenty of times throughout his career. So why aren't you slavishly defending Jeter whenever someone slanders him on TalkSox? Because he plays on a team you don't like. Hating Tom Brady gives the rest of us a perspective you lack. We can agree that he is a great quarterback without insisting that he's better than Joe Montana, Johnny Unitas, Brett Favre, and Peyton Manning all put together. As for the hatred, I hate Tom Brady for the same reason I hate Derek Jeter, Peyton Manning, Dane Cook, Johnny Depp, Ronald Reagan, and George Lucas. Not because they aren't talented (except for Cook), because in their respective fields, they were/are all extremely talented. I hate them because of the way their most fanatical devotees act. They act like nothing these guys have done has ever been less than 100% perfect. Derek Jeter has been a mediocre defensive player for the better part of the last 6 or 7 years. Tom Brady has the advantage of a combination of excellent supporting players and a period in time where getting anywhere near the quarterback without patting him on the back and handing him a sternly worded letter requesting that he lie down on the ground as if he had been tackled gets you fined eleventy billion dollars. Ditto Peyton, but with less supporting players. Johnny Depp has played basically the same character in ten movies and has a near-diefication status among girls between the ages of their first period and their first divorce. Ronald Reagan is the conservative equivalent of Kennedy, the go-to guy for let's-do-what-he-would-do for the GOP. George Lucas can fart out Jar-Jar Binks and that infuriatingly obnoxious cardboard cutout Hayden Christensen and make 80 billion dollars from it. They are all indisputably talented, but attempting to point out a single flaw in any of their personalities or performances results in not a reasoned rebuttal, but an accusation that we are jealous of their success. THAT is why we hate Tom Brady. Frank Catalanatto was a two-bit player for the Jays and Rangers a few years ago, but every time he played the Sox he turned into Ted friggin Williams. I don't hate him because Frank Catalanatto doesn't have the army of drunken idiots and people who know little-to-nothing beyond "The Patriots/Yankees win more than other teams" constantly ready to eviscerate you for daring to suggest that there might be someone better. PS: I have dated some extremely attractive women in my time. Including very recently. I may not be able to hook up with whoever Jeter gets, but I can do okay. I don't need to hate Jeter or Brady for who they date. I have plenty of other, more legitimate reasons to despise them.

The cool thing is you could replace Brady with Jeter in that sentence, keep Captain Intangibles, and it would be the same thing. And no, only YesZir knows everyone's passwords, which is good because if I had access, jacko would constantly be posting about his fanatical desire to become San Francisco's foremost proctologist and Emmz would spend every waking hour online posting about how phenomenally charming and hilarious I am. Also, CD would probably sign every post with "I don't know. YOTN, what do you think? I need your guidance and I desperately require your intellect to formulate my opinion." Anyways, like I said. It's good that I am not all-powerful.

Fitting, though, since the Patriots are the Yankees of the NFL. You could make an argument for the Cowboys, though.

One of the bright spots of the season. Held his own against Hernandez. Granted, it was a weak offense, but 7 scoreless is more than you can ask for from the number four guy against ANY team. Hope he can keep it up.

I think you might be overreacting a bit. After all, Washington state gave us Starbucks! ... BURN THE MOTHERf***ER DOWN

Make sure you don't mix this up, or your head might get stuck to the pillowcase by morning.

Truth. Truth.

YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH

...he's almost like a real Eagles fan?

I wish lightning would strike Brady twice.

...a700 had goodwill towards him?

I went to work every single day for six months with an ulcer that felt like a lump of molten rock in my stomach, and my job was much more strenuous than sitting or standing around doing nothing more exhausting than walking while in a casino. I think the occasional posing for a photograph and slight wave at the passing patrons was within tolerance of his fragile physical state. He has GI bleeding and esophagitis, not Parkinsons.

...and also, while I'm heaping critical similes on my own favorite team's leader, Roethlisberger holds onto the ball waaaay too long, like he's afraid it's going to wriggle from his grasp and run screaming out of the bathroom back into the bar to it's friends before reporting him to the police.

I'm not denying that Ben Roethlisberger is a misogynist jerk who can't throw a pass the length of his list of restraining orders, but still....the Patriots, man. I don't think I've ever seen so much joy on the internet for a player injury as when Brady went down at the beginning of the season a few years ago. I mean, I wasn't glad he was hurt so much as I was glad that it hurt the Patriots, but there were plenty of people who were glad for both.

Plenty of people don't follow all their area's sports teams. It's common, yes, and you might hear crap about it but I don't think anyone takes issue with it, unless they're dicks. Oh, wait, Patriots fans... Okay, in all seriousness. My teams are the Boston Red Sox, Detroit Red Wings, Pittsburgh Steelers, and the Basketball Sucks and I Hate it (they made the postseason this year, beat the Soccer Sucks and I Hate Its in the finals). I am a Steelers fan because my father's entire family is from the Pittsburgh area and he was always a Steelers fan, so I was one from a very young age. I never got into hockey until I was 16 and my aunt, who has lived in Detroit for almost 20 years, took me to a game while I was visiting and I fell in love with the game, and as a consequence am now a Wings fan. I think it all depends on a combination of location and exposure. If you live in Boston but were raised by die-hard Raiders fans, you might be a Raider fan unless you like to be rebellious and contrary or have a lack of head trauma.

"There haven't been any details released, so I'm forced to assume that every bone in his foot has been reduced to a fine powder. He won't be back before 2015 and if he returns sooner than that he'll never be the same. They have no chance in the division without...oh, a Yankees player? Ace bandage, bed rest, he'll be fine in a week."

"And after that walk-off 2.78 run homer, 5x90 is sure to get a shaving cream pi!"

Don: "And Player/Position 6 now has a 34% chance of singling to right field, approximately forty feet beyond the first base bag at a roughly 70 degree angle." Remy: "Uh, Don, the Master Computer calculates only an 11% chance" Don: "Well, Computer Player/Position 6 has beaten the odds before, I think given it's performance over the last several-" Loud, Mechanical Voice: "ANNOUNCER ERROR. MATHEMATICAL IMPROBABILITY" (Heavy Robotic Footsteps, sound of laser fire)

We should replace all of the umpires, players, managers, coaches, and announcers with computers and then every baseball season would be a statistical masterpiece. An entire season of pure mathematical theory.

You're all heart.

The Pirates may have a genuine shot this year. Last year was iffy, they started off strong but kind of faded when some guys who were playing almost too well reverted to normal. But this season seems different. Burnett seems like a new man. It'll be interesting to see if McDonald, McCutchen, etc. can actually keep Pittsburgh in the middle of things, or at least end the streak of losing seasons.

Are you volunteering?