A co-worker's friend just called and said they ran into Lew Ford and his wife at a hot dog stand at the Fair.

Was anyone hurt?

HAH! I kill me!!

Ohhh PRIZES!!!!
Last chance for food on a stick that counts =)

Much love
Wonder Woman

No. :-P

They congratulated him on the team's success and Lew said he hopes their momentum can carry them far into the postseason.

The interesting thing is that the article makes virtually no mention of the White Sox past the introduction. I like that.

So, heraldguy, when did you start channeling Alf?

Which channel can I find this, "Rome is Burning" show? I did a search for it on my DirecTV and counldn't find it.

Adidasman:
I never stopped channeling ALF.

Dear Mr. Shelley,

That would be ESPN.

Sincerely,
Batgirl

To: Adidasman
Re: White Sox barely mentioned by SI

EXACTLY.

Just turned it on to espn to see the coming up torii Hunter tease.

Oh, Torii. Hyenas? I love you, man.

Ohh. What a great article! The Twins are finally getting the respect they deserve.

I saw Torii on Espn, which was very exciting! But I didn't see Juan or Joe on afterwards, were they not on or did I just completely miss them?

Rome is Burning was great, but I couldn't find The Hotlist.

Did anyone else watch Around the Horn today? They talked about the AL MVP and only mentioned Mauer once and didn't mention Morneau at all! And that sent me on an hour of talking about how much I hate Derek Jeter and Jermaine Dye, which I liked doing, but my family's kind of ignoring me now....

The Hot List is on ESPN News. *nods*

What I meant to say is it's on there....and sadly, a lot of cable providers don't carry it. I know I never got it until we got DirecTV.

Even though I'm a huge die-hard Sox fan (that would be the White Sox) from *before all the bandwaggoners* I love your website and I'm completely nuts over Justin Morneau (I voted "Dreamy") :-) If we're going to have a wildcard race instead of just beating everyone else in the division like last year, I'm glad it's with you guys !

I believe that an MVP is someone who carries their team into the playoffs. Jeter, while he is having one of his best years, does not carry the Yankee lineup. He's got Damon in front of him getting on base(rbi) and Giambi behind him driving him in for all those runs. It would be a shame if Jeter won the MVP. Meanwhile, Ryan Howard single handedly carries the Phillies and he is the main reason they are in the WC race. Same goes for Morneau. Although the Twins have a lot of players who are doing great and having career years, Morneau and Mauer are the only ones with MVP type numbers.
NL MVP - Howard
AL MVP - Morneau
but you know everyone just wants to kiss Jeter's ass and it's almost inevitable that he will likely get the stupid award.

Ahem. But as far as MVP goes, The correct answer is Jermaine Dye. Various cuts at stats for the 3 most commonly named and the local duo below.

Raw stats:
Dye - 1.040 OPS / 39HR / 106RBI / 85R
Papi - 1.033 OPS / 47HR / 121RBI / 99R
Mauer - .940 OPS / 10HR / 73RBI / 67R
Morneau - .956 OPS / 32HR / 110RBI / 74R
Jeter - .893 OPS / 12HR / 81RBI / 92R / 26SB

Give Mauer & Jeter some credit for doing it at a less offensive-driven position.

As for "clutchness", stats with RISP:
Dye: 1.195OPS / 14HR / 74RBI
Mauer: 1.094OPS / 2HR / 61RBI
Jeter: 1.063OPS / 4HR / 67RBI
Papi: .970OPS / 10HR / 71RBI
Morneau: .967OPS / 8HR / 75RBI

"Down the stretch", AKA post-ASB:
Papi: 1.108OPS / 16HR / 34RBI
Dye: 1.034OPS / 14HR / 38RBI
Morneau: .987OPS / 9HR / 37RBI
Jeter: .900OPS / 7HR / 29RBI
Mauer: .858OPS / 3HR / 28RBI

Papi gets downgraded because of the DH factor, Boston's fade, and the fact that he's missing significant time down the stretch (and may sit out a while more depending on the heart issue). Dye is clearly having the best offensive season of the remaining group, with the only possible question being Jeter because of the value of his production at SS.

Jermaine's also carrying the White Sox offense at a time when Jim Thome's been in & out of the lineup and they've needed to score runs to support shoddy pitching. And he plays RF as well as any of these guys play their respective positions. So those factors even out across him & the JM-boys, leaving his statistical advantage as the differentiator.

I have to say Clem puts forth excellent numbers.

I will say that until recently I thought that Ortiz had the MVP locked up, but the team began faltering when Ramirez missed time and teams were able to deal with Ortiz pretty easily, pitching around him in situations that he could hurt them while pitching to him when he couldn't. That speaks more to the value of Ramirez than anyone else, and he would be my MVP vote if Ortiz wasn't so good -- Manny's numbers suffer because of all the times he bats with empty bases...

Then, of course, my focus turned to Jeter and I have to say that there is a rather compelling argument for him as MVP. Individual career year aside, he is the player that carries the Yankees (along with Rivera, but Rivera is situational). Take last night for example. Down 2-0, two on, Jeter at the plate -- no doubt he's coming through with a base hit to tie the game, and he doubles down the left field line. He absolutely carries the Yanks, and even with their scary lineup, if Jeter misses extensive time, kiss the Yanks goodbye. One final note on Jeter - while the Yanks have gained something like 17 games on the Red Sox since July 4, that has as much to do with the Red Sox playing like ass, as it has to do with the Yanks' (and Jeter's) success. I do think undue consideration will be given to Jeter's MVP candidacy because of the Yanks' turnaround and utter thumping of the Sox in the standings over the last 6 weeks.

That being said, my vote (if I had one) would likely go to Jermaine Dye. You'd think Podsednik as table setter, Thome and Konerko to clean the table hurt Dye's numbers (see, e.g., Manny Ramirez above). But at last glance, Dye comes in at .327/39/106 (no really, that's accurate). Thome goes down and the Sox have not suffered a dramatic decline because of Dye. I honestly cannot believe how incredible Dye has been this year, and truly believe he is the Most Valuable Player in the AL this year (and I cannot believe I think that, much less put it in print).

Special note about Morneau. Notwithstanding the above commentary, JustIn is having a wonderful season, and might be my #2 vote for MVP (over Jeter). As I recall, Morneau took a few weeks to get things going, and once he did (now .317/32/110 - when did THAT happen?) so went the Twins. My issues with Morneau over Dye (and to some extent, Jeter) is that the Twins also picked it up by turning around their pitching staff. El Presidente, the Franchise, even BRadke pitched lights out for 2 straight months. And it seems now that if the pitching wavers, the Twins might lose a game here and there. In contrast, Dye has put up his numbers in the wake of a pitching staff that has something like a 6.0ERA and don't get me started about the Yanks' pitching. That is my pause about Morneau. There is, however, something to be said for someone who has knocked in 15% of his team's runs scored, and 25% of his team's home runs, in helping to lead his team to a Wild Card spot (let's hope). It'll take another month, but it's possible that Morneau can leapfrog to the #1 spot.

So there you have it, praise for some Red Sox, White Sox and Twins players from a YankeeFan, who thinks Jeter should be given MVP candidate consideration, but come in third (or second). Ok, who needs a defibrillator?

YankeeFan