Sweeney's All-Star Picks

I won’t do too much of an introduction here. So, uh, here is what the MLB All-Star rosters would look like if I had the power to pick every player. I did follow the rules – every team has a representative. I started by making the teams. Once I had the full roster filled, I went though and satisfied that requirement. A couple of more deserving player had to be left off. I’ll tell you who those were after the rosters (Teaser!).

American League
Starters
P – Zack Greinke
C – Joe Mauer
1B – Justin Morneau
2B – Aaron Hill
3B – Evan Longoria
SS – Derek Jeter
LF – Jason Bay
CF - Torii Hunter
RF - Ben Zobrist

Pitchers
RHP - Andrew Bailey
LHP - Mark Buehrle
LHP - Brian Fuentes
RHP - Roy Halladay
RHP - Felix Hernandez
RHP - Edwin Jackson
RHP - Kevin Millwood
RHP - Joe Nathan
RHP - Jonathan Papelbon
RHP - Mariano Rivera
RHP - Justin Verlander
RHP - Jered Weaver

Reserves
C - Victor Martinez
1B - Kevin Youkilis
1B – Mark Teixeira
1B – Miguel Cabrera
2B - Ian Kinsler
3B - Brandon Inge
SS - Jason Bartlett
OF – Ichiro Suzuki
OF - Johnny Damon
OF - Jermaine Dye
OF – Adam Lind
OF – Adam Jones

So what if I have four first basemen. I could have added another. Russell Branyan is having a bananas year. Also, I came so close to putting Alfredo Aceves in there. I love that guy.

Last Men Out
Robinson Cano – He was my personal last man in... which meant he had to make room for the Baltimore representative, Adam Jones.
Joakim Soria - There is not one player on Oakland that remotely deserves to be in an All-Star Game. I guess Andrew Bailey is the best choice. I guess. Sorry, Joakim.

National League
Starters
P – Danny Haren
C – Brian McCann
1B – Albert Pujols
2B – Chase Utley
3B – Mark Reynolds
SS – Hanley Ramirez
LF – Ryan Braun
CF – Carlos Beltran
RF - Adam Dunn

Pitchers
RHP - Heath Bell
RHP - Jonathan Broxton
RHP - Matt Cain
RHP - Jonny Cueto
RHP - Ryan Franklin
RHP - Trevor Hoffman
LHP - Josh Johnson
LHP - Ted Lilly
RHP - Tim Lincecum
RHP - Frankie Rodriguez
LHP - Johan Santana
RHP - Javier Vazquez

Reserves
C – Russell Martin
1B – Prince Fielder
1B – Adrian Gonzalez
2B – Orlando Hudson
2B – Freddy Sanchez
3B – David Wright
3B – Pedro Sandoval
SS – Miguel Tejada
OF – Brad Hawpe
OF – Raul Ibanez
OF – Justin Upton
OF – Hunter Pence

I want to note: I picked Danny Haren as the NL Cy Young. ... He’s having an incredible year. And, Pedro Sandoval? Hey, I’m as surprised as you are. ... It is not Javy Vazquez’s fault that he has a losing record.

Last Men Out
I managed to get somebody from every team my first time through. Boo-yah.

So there are my picks. I hope yous read this and start on your own. I look forward to making fun of you, making hypocritical arguments, and, ultimately, changing my picks.

Complete Sidebar: There is some kind of team on the other side of the park. They're doing the Remember the Titans chant ("Everywhere we go..."). So I ask you, name three more overrated movies than Remember the Titans. It's tough. Then again, I think all sports movies are stupid.

FJMing The NY Times

It's 9 to 2 Indians in the second inning. I'm not thrilled (but it doesn't dampen my happiness from the Bulls' Game 1 win. WOOO!! Wait!!).

(Aside: This just came to me. One of the best things to watch during the NBA Playoffs is Kirk Hinrich. Watch him whenever he's on the offensive end with John Salmons and/or Ben Gordon. They both refuse to give him the ball. It's delightful. After a few years of being The Guy for the Bulls, Hinrich has turned into a pretty solid complimentary outside shooter. He gets open behind the arc and knocks down shots at about 40%. However, when either of the two aforementioned me-first scorers is on the floor, Hinirich jumps up and down in the corner calling for the ball.

Hinrich hit one three today. Here's how that play went down. Gordon gets the ball on the right wing with about about 20 seconds on the shot clock. Hinrich is in the right corner. He drives right, Hinrich's defender crashes in to help, Hinrich calls for the ball, Gordon continues trying to drive finally proceeds to throw an ugly cross court pass to Salmons--12ish seconds. Salmons stutters inside the arc, loses his dribble, fights to put up a shot, but eventually decides to pass back out to Derrick Rose at the top of the key. Rose, far and away the best player on the team (36-11-4 this afternoon), quickly touch-passes it back to Gordon with the assumption (I assume) that Gordon, with about five seconds on the clock would touch it over to the still open Hinrich in the corner. He, again, drives right. Nothing there. After he picks up his dribble, he considers forcing a shot to the point of actually jumping with his side to the basket. He pumps in air, relents, and gives it up to Hinrich. He knocks down the three. Buzzer. Hinrich is noticably upset he didn't get the ball 20 seconds earlier. Good possession!)

In the time it took me to write that, the second inning ended. It's 14 to 2. The ball really, really, really carries to right. Awesome. All of this may render what I'm about to do totally meaningless. Anyway, during the Yankees/Indians Friday afternoon game, I sent message to Phlip in regard to the Yankees home-opener loss. It read, "I don't want to read the New York Times article about the new stadium "missing the mystique of the old one." That article, of course, already existed. The author, William C. Rhoden, probably had been waiting all winter to break it out. Here it is in annotated, nitpicky, Fire Joe Morgan form.

By the middle of the seventh inning Thursday, the Yankees’ highly anticipated home opener had officially been declared a disaster. The Yankees opened a new season and christened a new stadium in the eerie shadow of the old.

The new stadium is a bit bigger and sits directly between the old stadium and the sun. Okay. I don't know if any of that's true. But! What exactly makes this particular shadow "eerie"? Aren't all shadows kinda eerie?

The home team trailed, 10-1, after a nine-run seventh by the Cleveland Indians on the way to a 10-2 loss. And Yankees players were showered with boos in the new $1.6 billion stadium.

The boos were mainly directed at Damaso Marte. He has not been good in pinstripes.

For most major league baseball teams, the home opener is the essence of the clean slate, the fresh start. For the Yankees, the idea of starting with a clean slate is daunting, like climbing Mount Everest. After they were pasted Thursday, the incline became a lot steeper.

This was much more than a simple home opener: This was the opening of a lavish new Yankee Stadium, built by a franchise with baseball’s highest payroll, despite the economic collapse around it — a franchise accustomed to winning championships, although it hasn’t won a World Series title since 2000. Old Yankee Stadium represented one of the greatest, or at least one of the most storied, home-field advantages in North American sports. Visiting players routinely gushed about walking into the Stadium and soaking in its history.

This sounds a lot like "gushing" for the new stadium too.

"I'd be lying if I said it isn't special" and "It's got to be the biggest visiting clubhouse you'll ever see." - Eric Wedge

"This is top of the line. This is just like being on the home side. It's got everything you need." - Ben Francisco

With a simple move across the street, that part of the Yankees’ legacy is gone and the franchise, payroll aside, is now on a level playing field with the competition.

Talent aside as well, apparently. Rhoden goes on and brings up various historical moments, outside of baseball, that happened in Yankee Stadium: "Win one for the Gippper" speech, a Joe Louis fight, The Greatest Game Ever Played (Colts def. Giants). Basically, his thesis is: Without The Stadiums history, the Yankees are fucked.

Manager Joe Girardi said that Thursday’s game was “hard to watch,” but he added that the Yankees’ fate and the legacy of the new Stadium wouldn’t be decided on the first day.

Exactly! Your column is worthless!

True enough, though Thursday’s rout, three days after the rout against Tampa Bay, raises questions about how long it will take these Yankees to fill a new stadium with the sort of championship moments that made the old Stadium so special.

Soon?

Well, no, it couldn't be soon. It took 80 years the first time around.

Longer? Never?

I guess we'll have to wait 80 years.

Before Jeter’s first plate appearance Thursday, a bat was placed across home plate. The bat, we were told, was used by Babe Ruth on opening day 1923, for the opening of the old Yankee Stadium. Ruth homered that day and the Yankees swept the opening four-game series against the Red Sox, then cruised to the pennant and the World Series title.

On Thursday, Jeter flied out and the Yankees were pummeled.

Those two events were directly related, you see. Noteworthy Note: Jeter never flied out in the Old Yankee Stadium.

Mystiques are created by championships and championship moments: title fights, football classics and World Series victories. The old mystique is gone. You can argue that the mystique began to fade seasons ago.

You could make that argument. The Yankees have had mediocre pitching staffs over the last several years. It's a good argument. You are not making that argument, though. Your argument is that the mystique is missing.

What will that legacy be? Who will be the first group to win a championship in the new Yankee Stadium?

How the Yankees transfer that mystique from the old building, now gray and dark and awaiting its demise, to the new is Girardi’s challenge.

THAT is Girardi's challenge. It has nothing to do with, I don't know, baseball.

The questions may not be answered for years.

The architects and the Yankee organization did a great job of moving as much memory as they could into the new Stadium.

Sadly for these Yankees, some spirits just don’t travel that well.

The Yankees ended up losing 22-4. I have totally changed my mind in regard to the everything in this post. Steinbrenner should call John and see if he can do anything about this stubborn ghost moving problem.

I'm not very good at this. Good night.

First Post

Well, here it is.

MY FIRST POST!

Aren't you excited? No? Oh. Umm. Yea. Well, this is awkward....

I thought I would post on a slightly historic day. Today is the day when...JOHN MADDEN RETIRES! Nothing else of importance is happening today so I figured I would comment on this. This is both the happiest and saddest day of my life. I am happy because now we won't have cmments along the lines of, "To win you gotta score more points than the other team," "A smart coach would call this play," and, how could we forget,"Brett Favre, Brett Favre BRETT FAVRE!"

However, this day would have been so much better if only another certain broadcaster (let's call him Joe) would retire. I won't name names because, as Sweeney mentions, we won't be able to bash like the masters. But, both you and I know who I'm talking about and would agree you would trade Joe for Madden any day. In fact, I'm sure Madden would do better in baseball than Joe does, even though Madden doesn't know anything about baseball since Brett Favre doesn't play.

Seriously, though. BASEBALL! Opening day for the new Yankee Stadium. Ehh, just another loss for the Indians. Nothing special there. We get the fact the Yankees have a huge stadium with loads of money. Who cares? Me. I want a huge stadium with loads of money. It's not fair. I wish I could be Hank for a day, just to have the power. And I would have Cashman trade everyone to the Indians. Bwahahaha.

OK. Now that I lost all of our readers, I shall end this post, just as Lee hits Teixeira with a fastball. Life is good.