TheDevilAndGodAreRagingInsideMe

Farnsworth's gotta go. I can't say it enough.

Or, Roger Clemens and Freddy:

I don't remember, seemed like they were just phased in. I do remember, however, the WCW Cruiserweight Championship magically became the WWF Cruiserweight Championship and the WWF Lightheavyweight Championship being dropped without a "unification" match. Speaking of unifications, why in 2002 did all the midcard belts start being merged into eachother? IC swallowed the Hardcore, then the European, until it was merged with the World Heavyweight.

What I was getting at was the chain reaction that was set off when they lost the 2001 World Series. I never even put a lot of thought into the Ortiz thing until I wrote it, nor do I fault them for passing on him. But they did end up trading Johnson away the next year in the Javy Vazquez trade, and Giambi had a complete breakdown in 2004 where he only played about 80 games and John Olerud was claimed off the scrap heap for first, and not trusting Giambi for '05, they brought back Tino Martinez, the same guy they had cast off in 2002 in favor of Giambi.

Mo takes 3rd place on the saves list, passing John Franco with 425.

Welcome to the club. It's the last birthday you have to look forward to. I'll be 22 in the fall.

I was at Modell's today and Pavano merch is moving as slow one would expect. I can't even vote for these awards thus far though because I haven't been paying attention outside of the Yankees.

Yankees: Don't sign Giambi in 2002. This opens the door for them to sign David Ortiz in 2003 and keep him from Boston. Big Stein wanted Ortiz, but Cash-man firmly said no, since the team already had Giambi and Nick Johnson. Without Ortiz, Boston may not even be able to come back after being dead in the water in August to win the Wild Card and set up the 2003 ALCS. Also, keep Marcus Thames and/or Juan Rivera to play the OF instead of trading him for Ruben Seirra and getting Raul Mondesi to play right. Keeping one or both of these two homegrown outfielders probably puts Hideki Matsui somewhere else in 2003 as well, although they really wanted to get a grip on the Japanese market so that signing may have happened anyway. Rivera comes in to pitch in extra innings in Game 4 of the 2003 World Series, instead of bringing in Jeff Weaver who hadn't pitched since September and gave up the game winning home run to Alex Gonzalez. Yankees go up in the Series 3-1, but if you stay the course and Wells still blows up in Game 5 and Beckett pitches his shutout in Game 6, we have a Game 7 with retiring hero Clemens' last hurrah against Brad Penny. Signing Vlad Guerrero instead of Gary Sheffield in 2004, which in the process chased Andy Pettitte away to Houston (who convinces Rog to come along for the ride; Brian Cashman suggested he file for free agency in case he wanted to make a comeback) for three years. The Yankees win the 2004 World Series, and the Stros don't make it in 2005 without Pettitte and Clemens. Perhaps the pitching holds up in 2005 and the Yanks at least make it past LA of A in the first round and meet the red-hot White Sox in the ALCS. Without David Ortiz, Boston doesn't make it in 2003 and the unspeakable debacle of 2004 doesn't happen. Then for 2005 they get off their laurels and get Carlos Beltran, which sets them up for the forseeable future and doesn't bring in a breaking down Johnny Damon either. Also for 2007, hang on to Carlos Pena to solve the first base black hole (no Mientkiewicz/Phelps/Phillips mess...interesting how in 2003 they didn't want to have a roster with 3 1Bman, but in 2007 they saw it as a neccessity), who was in the system last year. And to bring it full circle, he was also involved in the 3-way trade in 2002 that sent Lilly for Weaver.

And A-Rod heads to the 15 day DL with a hamstring, after colliding with Justin Morneau at first.

Last year I think I played through 8 full seasons or so of dynasty with Rutgers. I won 2 National Titles and 4 Heismans. Can't wait for 08, though it seems its coming out real early.

Would anyone mind giving a quick rundown of the show?

He murdered the shit out of it. Even the ump was in awe.

Last summer I went to a SmackDown Taping/Live Raw show at the Meadowlands. Fans chanted all throughout the SD! taping "We want Raw."

I've always hated main event interviews.

I'm not a real man, I'm a bed wetting momma's boy.

Love the boring chant. Dark matches with no-names always get it.

The Saturday game is the only time in July I will have to watch the Yankees on either Fox or ESPN.

Scott Proctor burned all of his gear in a bonfire on the field after Saturday's loss to Oakland.

Sugar Shane Helms (WCW)/Hurricane?

And he came back about two weeks later with the Taped Ribs™.

Top to bottom I thought Judgment Day has been the best PPV of the summer so far, but J-Day/ONS/Vengeance have been the first time in 5 years that I've watched three back to back pay-per-views. I stopped watching week-to-week, hardcore before Unforgiven in 2002. (The night HHH was awarded the WHC, matter of fact) The ones I've seen since then have been Survivor Series 2002, Judgment Day 2003, Vengeance 2003, SummerSlam 2003, WrestleMania XX, No Way Out 2005, Judgment Day 2005, and SummerSlam 2005.

But did anyone really see it? I mean, ECW is on late, and I think that the 7 year old Cena marks would be in bed by the time it comes on. It's like a tree falling in a forrest - if nobody hears it, does it make a noise? Well, if Cena "puts somebody over" but it's on ECW, does it really count?

I think that main event was the direct result of "oh shit, we have a PPV coming up and we need somebody to feed to Cena." Now that the PPV's are back to being all-branded, they need to clip them back to 12 per year, or reduce the price when there are two in one month. They had J-Day, then two weeks later was ONS:ER , and within the same month/3 weeks later, you had Vengeance:NoC. All for $39.95, with nothing really of note or overly memorable for your dollar.

Well, he does have that nifty high-angle DDT, as well as that grab the guy from behind by the throat and reverse sit out powerbomb sort of thingy.

Yeah, F him and stuff.