First spring training game for the hometown team tomorrow, folks. They match up with the Minnesota Twins, the cross-Fort Myers annual rivals (in March). The Sox will see Minneapolis' Favorite Sons six times before they make a break for New England, and while much is sure to happen in these meetings, there is one thing that is absolutely certain: Doug Mientkiewicz will not be on either side.
Now, I don't consider myself one to normally cry over spilled milk. And truly, Mientkiewicz is nothing more than that in the grand scheme of all things baseball-related. But in what was an otherwise perfect off-season for fans (save for Pedro's tired routine), Dougie provided me with all the bulletin board material I needed. Now I kind of know how Rodney Harrison felt when Freddie Mitchell mounted his needless and ill-advised verbal attack. Do you guys know of the Dougie soundbite of which I speak? Let me catch you up to speed.
Upon arrival at Mets camp, this doozie spewed from the lips of our former late-inning defensive replacement. I'll let you guess what the statement pertains to: "It wasn't what everybody made it out to be. The Twins-White Sox is just the same to me."
Ummm ... in my good ear?
I'll be the first to admit that yes, our region has undergone quite the makeover brought on by the radical transition from inferiority complex to some warped version of a superiority complex. Seriously, I don't know what to do with myself besides gloat and bask in our greatness.
But the reason the statement "Sox-Yankees is the best rivalry in the history of sports" holds so much water is because even those on the outside have deemed it so. We know it's the best, and we expect it to be recognized as such.
Sox-Yankees is our fan Super Bowl, and we got to witness it 26 times last season. So why do I care so much about how a jettisoned backup who was only here for three months - with only a .215 average and a World Series ball to show for it - feels about one matchup?
(By the way, he was 0-1 in the seven-game League Championship Series. Now I know for a fact that this rivalry wasn't the same as Twins-Pale Hose ... because he actually played in those middle-market, no-one-cares games ... idiot.)
To just think of the fact that this fraud could have possibly been inhabiting first base this year is enough to make me nauseous. True, we wouldn't have won the WORLD SERIES without good first base defense. But last I checked, David McCarty was a defensive wiz, and ... oh ... would you look at that, he batted .258 last season. No, he's not Gehrig, or even Kevin Maas for that matter, but he's better than Dougie. And McCarty went to Stanford, so I think he would have at least the half of a brain it would take to acknowledge that our rivalry is a Secretariat-like runaway over the field.
Oh man, it gets me more heated just writing it. I hate the Yankees with every fiber of my being. What could Minnesotans hate about Chicagoans (and only South Side Chicagoans at that)? The only rivalry I have deciphered is a competition for who can have more empty blue seats at their games.
I can only rest on the hope, for his own personal sanity, that Mientkiewicz is simply, unbelievably, uncontrollably bitter that Millar got chosen to stay in town over himself. Dougie's thinking "I was an Olympic hero! He's going on friggin' Queer Eye! He's never hit a ball to right field, and I'm pretty sure he's still bending over to pick up a grounder he muffed on July 14th!"
Then again, maybe I'm the insane one. Since I heard that quote from him, I've been scurrying up to people like a rabid dog with green eyes, grabbing their shirts violently as I spit out "You hear what Mientfrtwixcsds said?" My roommate went shopping for a cage for me earlier this week.
But there's more. It recently came out that he griped about the amount of time he saw upon his arrival in Boston. Yes, Doug, you could have stayed in Minnesota and collected all those at-bats that made your team cringe. And you would have been knocked out in the first round, as your former mates were. No parade through the Mall of America, sorry man. You got stuck with a stupid ole 2.5 million person-deep parade, a ring, and your name in every paper in the country. But I guess winning isn't everything.
I should have known not to trust anyone who has one of those goatees they just grow on the chin, sans mustache. Those are creepy, like people are hiding some secret under that one little spot on their face. I just hope Matt Clement shaved his. By the way, if you have one, feel free to e-mail me and defend it or just rip into me. I'd love to hear the rationale.
OK, so we've established that Johnny Damon called his team idiots, but apparently Mientkiewicz truly is one. He belongs in a small market. I can't wait to see him play every day for the Mets, hit maybe .230, and get booed out of town. He and Pedro belong together. It didn't have to be this way, Doug.
Hey, we need something to complain about, ya know?
