Even snitches deserve love

February 29, 2008

I know this isn't hip or popular to say, but I love a good snitch. Let's hear it for the rats among us. Every now and then, there's just no doing without a good, old-fashioned bigmouth, even the ones who don't get religion till the feds are banging on their door.

Recent columns

• Tattletales deserve love, too

  February 28, 2008

  I know this isn't hip or popular to say, but I love a good snitch. Let's hear it for the rats among us. Every now and then, there's just no doing without a good, old-fashioned bigmouth, even the ones who don't get religion till the feds are banging on their door.

• With Woods, it's easy to root for perfection

  February 27, 2008

  You should want Tiger Woods to go unbeaten this year. It wouldn't be boring. It wouldn't be redundant. It would be the best thing that could happen to sports after all the scandals and strip-club shootouts and Congressional hearings and dog abuse stories that sports have force fed us recently. Perfection would mean Woods would not only eclipse the titans in his sport, legends like Hogan and Nicklaus and Snead. He'd also outdo Joe Louis and Michael Jordan, Muhammad Ali and anyone else you could name as the most dominant athlete in sports. Ever.

• With Woods, it's easy to root for perfection

  February 26, 2008

  You should want Tiger Woods to go unbeaten this year. It wouldn't be boring. It wouldn't be redundant. It would be the best thing that could happen to sports after all the scandals and strip-club shootouts and Congressional hearings and dog abuse stories that sports have force fed us recently. Perfection would mean Woods would not only eclipse the titans in his sport, legends like Hogan and Nicklaus and Snead. He'd also outdo Joe Louis and Michael Jordan, Muhammad Ali and anyone else you could name as the most dominant athlete in sports. Ever.

• Passing on Santana could mash Cash

  February 20, 2008

  Brian Cashman should have traded for Johan Santana isn't a thought you expect to have rattling around your brain as Yankees old guard Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera sat side by side Monday, looking like the franchise's Mount Rushmore while Andy Pettitte spilled his guts about why he used HGH. Not a Met was in sight, but the thought was there just the same: Cashman is going to regret not trading for Santana.

• Passing on Santana could mash Cash

  February 19, 2008

  Brian Cashman should have traded for Johan Santana isn't a thought you expect to have rattling around your brain as Yankees old guard Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera sat side by side Monday, looking like the franchise's Mount Rushmore while Andy Pettitte spilled his guts about why he used HGH. Not a Met was in sight, but the thought was there just the same: Cashman is going to regret not trading for Santana.

• Enough of steroids: Let's get back to sports

  February 15, 2008

  I woke up, rubbed my eyes, dragged my scandal-weary bones out to get a newspaper and checked everything three times, just to be sure: No more congressional hearings on Roger Clemens vs. Brian McNamee? Check. The Knicks are as lousy as ever heading into this weekend's All-Star break? Check.

• Clemens dug a hole and Pettitte can't help him

  February 13, 2008

  If the leaks about Andy Pettitte's deposition are correct, Roger Clemens will sit in a congressional hearing room today on Capitol Hill and continue a crash to Earth of his own making. The narrative about whether Clemens cheated to become the greatest pitcher of his generation will sharpen into more detail. And Clemens' crossover from icon to con man could be near complete.

• Either Roger or McNamee is kidding himself

  February 8, 2008

  Personal trainer Brian McNamee's new assertion that he gave federal authorities some seven-year-old bloody syringes and steroid-laced vials that he says proves Roger Clemens is a performance-enhancing-drug user did more than rachet up the intrigue about who's the spectacular liar in this case just days before both men are scheduled to appear at a congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday.

• Giants made themselves into champs

  February 5, 2008

  That the Giants' hotel was still standing yesterday morning after a raucous postgame celebration that stretched on until 4 a.m. ranked as only the second-biggest upset they pulled off as a team in the previous 24 hours.

• SUPER BOWL XLII: Tom, we can't all be perfect

  February 4, 2008

  GLENDALE, Ariz.

• MVP Eli outduels Golden Boy Brady

  February 4, 2008

  Patriots quarterback Tom Brady was hammering his feet up and down, anxiously slapping the ball against his left hand, hurriedly scanning the field to find someone open, but the Giants' pass rush just kept coming toward him like a lava flow, incinerating everything in its path.

• Amazing Eli outduels Golden Boy Brady

  February 3, 2008

  Patriots quarterback Tom Brady was hammering his feet up and down, anxiously slapping the ball against his left hand, hurriedly scanning the field to find someone open, but the Giants' pass rush just kept coming toward him like a lava flow, incinerating everything in its path.

• Spygate rewind yields minor nuggets

  February 2, 2008

  NFL commissioner Roger Goodell didn't look like a man who had awoken yesterday to the news that "Spygate Lives!" - sort of.

• Chiefs' Turley a lifeline for retired NFL players

  February 1, 2008

  PHOENIX

• Strahan enjoys 2nd Super Bowl

  January 31, 2008

  If someone could guarantee him this kind of payoff every year, Giants defensive end Michael Strahan would have an easier time deciding "should I stay or should I go?" He's been so animated and happy during the run-up to Super Bowl XLII, it's easy to wonder why he ever thought of retiring as he sat out training camp last summer.

• Patriots linebackers aged to perfection

  January 30, 2008

  They are not your typical snowbirds who come to Arizona for the warmth and the sun. Just the Super Bowl. Junior Seau turned 39 days ago, which makes him a certifiable antique among NFL linebackers. New England inside linebacker Tedy Bruschi is a stroke survivor in his 12th NFL season, and he's hinting at retirement after Sunday's game. Next to them, 11-year veteran Mike Vrabel can actually brag about being young despite the flecks of gray in his brushcut hair and beard.

• Giants, Pats don't come clean about dirty players

  January 29, 2008

  They forearm each other in the throat, land a punch in the gut now and then, run full speed at each other, collide, fall down. Then get up and do it again. The job description is high-stakes tackle football - for pay. So don't blame them for throwing up their hands and laughing like choir boys in the past week every time someone says there are dirty players among them.

• Giants coach Coughlin made change for better

  January 25, 2008

  He wasn't always guaranteed to be back. The fact that Tom Coughlin was standing at the news conference podium yesterday, still working as coach of the Super Bowl-bound Giants, traces to a sit-down meeting he had a year ago this month with co-owners John Mara and Steve Tisch.

• Boston must be stopped

  January 23, 2008

  Well, there they go again in Boston. How do I say this nicely? What a bunch of freaking nut jobs. Try the decaf tea, will you? Even if they are three hours away from New York City, you could hear all their shrieking yesterday from here: What if Tom Brady can't play against the Giants in the Super Bowl? What if the Patriots end up 18 and Oh No? First there was the Bloody Sock. And now this: The Boot.

• Pats still undefeated, but look mortal

  January 21, 2008

  The New England Patriots moved into their fourth Super Bowl in seven years yesterday and their record is still perfect at 18-0. But they aren't the invincible bogeymen of the NFL anymore. Maybe the Pats can use these next two weeks to recapture their infallible selves. But right now, they're not the same juggernaut that steamrollered opponents most of the season or found wideout Randy Moss streaking into the open no matter how many guys were covering him or who was blitzing Tom Brady.

• Which version of Favre will show up?

  January 20, 2008

  He is one-half of today's quarterback showdown - the record-setting, Hall of Fame-bound half - yet a question that's always shadowed Green Bay's Brett Favre has hardly been mentioned at all this week. Nearly everyone is wondering if the Giants are going to get the Good Eli or the Bad Eli in the NFC Championship Game at Lambeau Field, yet few people are harping on which Favre the Packers will get.

• Lambeau? Brrrring it on

  January 16, 2008

  Worried about Eli Manning's ability to play effectively in the cold during the NFC Championship Game on Sunday against the Green Bay Packers? Admitting it is your first mistake.

• Patriots' Brady isn't perfect, but very close

  January 14, 2008

  FOXBOROUGH, Mass.

• Brady plays for Patriots because of Dick Rehbein

  January 13, 2008

  FOXBOROUGH, Mass.

• Giants are having fun as they await Cowboys

  January 11, 2008

  Giants linebacker Antonio Pierce was smiling yesterday at the news conference podium even before he took a question. He was amused in advance.

• Jessica Simpson: Giants' secret weapon?

  January 9, 2008

  If you believe the frothing masses in Dallas, pop singer Jessica Simpson has done to Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo what the Giants' defense couldn't do. She's the Kryptonite girlfriend. The Stopper.

• They should interview Pettitte, McNamee instead

  January 4, 2008

  I know 10 million people are expected to watch disgraced pitcher Roger Clemens defend himself on "60 Minutes" Sunday night, but interviewer Mike Wallace is talking to the wrong guy. Clemens, in addition to being Wallace's self-described good friend, doesn't have anything new to tell us about his alleged steroid and HGH use. Clemens' lead attorney, Rusty Hardin, said so himself in an interview this week.

• Strahan believes Giants should not be satisfied

  January 2, 2008

  Forget all that backslapping and talk of confidence boosts or we almost had 'em. Giants defensive end Michael Strahan has been a bit of a crank ever since the New England Patriots escaped with a narrow win at the Meadowlands Saturday night. And given what's at stake this week for the Giants, it's been refreshing to see.

• Jets' Mangini, Tannenbaum are on the clock

  December 31, 2007

  They played another football game at Giants Stadium yesterday, but the atmosphere felt a lot like being in Times Square the morning after New Year's Eve. None of the electricity from Saturday night's scintillating Giants-Patriots game carried over to the Jets' season finale against the equally lousy Chiefs. Yesterday broke bleak and rainy and stayed that way. The parking lot was half-empty, and those who did show seemed to be tailgating on muscle memory alone.

• Moss the real Pats MVP?

  December 28, 2007

  It seems hilarious now, doesn't it, the preseason talk that Randy Moss had lost a step, that a malcontent like Moss might not fit in with New England's speak-no-evil choirboys, that Bill Belichick was ransoming his "core values" by trading for Moss in desperation, just months after the Patriots' 2006 playoff run ended with Tom Brady throwing to bargain-basement receivers such as Jabar Gaffney and Reche Whatshisname.

• Dolan should put Knicks' Isiah out of his misery

  December 21, 2007

  The knowledge that Knicks president and coach Isiah Thomas hits his fourth-year anniversary with the Knicks tomorrow got me wondering again what it will take for Knicks owner James Dolan to fire him. And if not now, with the absurdities growing more original by the day at Madison Square Garden, then when?

• Mitchell Report has plenty to blame for steroids

  December 14, 2007

  With every turn of the page in the Mitchell Report on performance-enhancing drug use that was released yesterday, what had been seen as a baseball-wide scandal at the start of the day narrowed swiftly and sharply, at least for New Yorkers. It became a Yankees and Mets story that will cast aspersions on everything from the Yankees' title runs of the 1990s to the damaged Hall of Fame candidacy of Roger Clemens. A few minutes after 2 p.m, Clemens officially became the white Barry Bonds.

• Mitchell Report has plenty to blame for steroids

  December 14, 2007

  With every turn of the page in the Mitchell Report on performance-enhancing drug use that was released Thursday, what had been seen as a baseball-wide scandal at the start of the day narrowed swiftly and sharply, at least for New Yorkers.

• Time for Selig, Fehr to offer apologies

  December 12, 2007

  No matter what else is embedded in the Mitchell report on performance-enhancing drug use that finally slapped down on Bud Selig's desk yesterday for a 48-hour sneak peek, the 21-month-old investigation better - at minimum - prompt some apologies in high places by the time the public gets its first look at the findings tomorrow.

• Redskins play through pain of fallen teammate

  December 3, 2007

  LANDOVER, Md.

• Beltran' best shot to being key to city

  May 20, 2005

  He will go into this weekend thinking less about what his first Subway Series will be like and more about whether this will be the weekend when something big finally happens for him. Is this the weekend when something inside of him finally ignites, clicks in and breaks out?

• Make it not pay to use

  December 8, 2004

  It's a consoling little idea to think that the baseball players' union and baseball commissioner Bud Selig will agree swiftly to a neat and tidy policy that will snare the steroid cheats, and quiet the federal prosecutors and grandstanding lawmakers who are baying at baseball's door and threatening to intervene. It's equally nice to daydream about a time in which Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi and every other alleged steroid user will have to live in a prison of his own shame, even if they're not prosecuted in court.

• Quite a show on back nine

  June 21, 2004

  Phil Mickelson was straining at the seams of his talent and his patience and his nerves, he was pushing, pushing, pushing, trying not to wait till the last minute, trying his damnedest to send a wave of cheers, a heart-sinking roar - something - rolling back up the fairway at Retief Goosen, just to let Goosen know that his final-day lead suddenly wasn't safe at the U.S. Open, and that Mickelson had just done something to threaten him in this taut, two-man fight to the finish.

• Mean course is great theater

  June 20, 2004

  The winds finally were gusting at Shinnecock Hills yesterday and suddenly, the golfers' scores were bobbing up and down like some poor little buoys on whitecapping seas. Jeff Maggert's score sank six shots during yesterday's third round.

• Phil a major domo

  June 19, 2004

  Two months ago he still was dogged by that ear- burning, career-long refrain that he can't win the big one. Then Phil Mickelson won the Masters. Now the crowds swoon for him.

• Enough already! We need old Tiger to be Tiger of old

  June 18, 2004

  Hey! I want the Master of the Golf Universe back. It's hard to see Tiger Woods reduced to this. It really is. I don't mean the sight of Woods landing only five of 14 shots on driving holes in the U.S. Open fairways yesterday or the sight of him muttering, cussing and slapping his thigh in anger during his fitful 2-over-par, opening-round 72. Anyone can have a rough day. What was extraordinary was the spectacle of seeing the once mighty Woods smile (smile?) after his petulant round and say - with a lilt in his voice, no less! - "I played all right."

• Driven Singh not shy about dishing it out

  June 17, 2004

  Given his terrific tournament success, his penchant for blunt talk, his occasional willingness to rattle Tiger Woods' grill more often than anyone else in golf, fear is not a word you'd typically associate with Vijay Singh. Neither is guilt.

• Masters win wipes away pained refrain

  June 16, 2004

  For two months, Phil Mickelson has been basking in the validation his Masters victory gave him. He has lapped up the affectionate applause from fans. He admitted on national television that he went to sleep that giddy night still wearing the green jacket he'd just won. He's no longer the best player never to win a major. He turns 34 today but suddenly he's seen as someone bursting with untold possibilities, a golfer whose ceiling has turned limitless, a remarkable athlete who finally understood the swashbuckling shot isn't necessarily the smartest one.

• Much ado about 'I do'

  June 15, 2004

  Raymond Floyd has been a lot of colorful things during his 40-year golf career - big-time PGA Tour winner and high-stakes hustler, playboy/bar owner and backer of an all-female topless band called the Ladybirds during his hell-raising bachelor days.

• Images of the Heart Are the Best Memorial

  September 11, 2002

  The first few days after it happened, the image that haunted me most wasn't the sight of the Twin Towers tumbling down one by one, horrific as that was as viewed from my Brooklyn apartment window. It wasn't the memory of that muffled boom I had heard before that as I sat on my sofa last Sept. 11, drinking my morning cup of coffee. "What the heck was that?" I asked a friend sitting next to me, not yet knowing a second plane had just hit the World Trade Center. Had I looked over my left shoulder, I would have seen both Twin Towers sheared open and belching smoke.

• One Eye on Field And One on Sky

  September 16, 2001

  THE METS have followed the gruesome stories and mounting toll of Tuesday's plane hijackings and terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon as closely as anyone. But as the Mets drove into the parking lot at Shea Stadium yesterday to get back to work, what confronted them were a host of sobering new reminders.

• Tragedy Hits Close to Home

  September 12, 2001

  Nothing immediately suggested something unspeakable had happened just outside my window, just seven miles away. All I heard was a muted boom. Then the Venetian blinds in my Brooklyn living room shuddered ever so slightly.