My surfing today took me to digitalballparks.com, a great photo site run by a Staten Island couple. They've travelled to dozens of major and minor league parks, and their photo galleries are crisp and comprehensive. They have a gallery of Wahconah Park in Pittsfield, MA, which got me to thinking. There are so many minor leage parks within an hour or two of here (Lowell, Pawtucket, Portland, some in Connecticut). I've got to start going! Since I could only manage tickets to Fenway for one game this year, I really need to get on this. Plus, unlike the Red Sox, maybe some of the kids can score a run.

"Darius Songaila leaves Wake Forest as arguably its best big man since Tim Duncan...Songaila is great with his back to the basket and has the ability to put the ball on the floor and is a good pull-up shooter...He's solid, fundamentally sound, and has shown the ability to put the ball in the basket...Commits an enormous amount of turnovers for a big man."

Like Peter Marshall said on the old Hollywood Squares when someone blatantly screwed up a chance to block...."This may work out".

In Which A Dangerous Precedent Is Set

I didn't watch the game tonight (you know...it's Draft Night). And the Red Sox won. Uh oh...it could be a looong summer if tonight's trend holds up.

Hilary at work has rekindled my interest in my baseball card collection, long sitting boxed and waiting in various closets here and at Mom and Dad's house. So I spent a good part of an off-day plowing through and seeing what I've got. So if any of y'all have extras from the early 80's, I can give you a wishlist. If you don't, you can still partake in the wisdom of a BunkoSquad classic, "All I Need To Know About Life, I Learned From Old Baseball Cards". (Note: I am not a designer.)

Dan Gets Slammed

I've never been a big fan of Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy, who's always seemed a little too smug and self-important to really address the needs of Boston sports fans. So I was happy to see Bruce Allen's New England Sports Media Watch, which took out an axe and just savaged Shaughnessy, calling him on his inconsistencies, using his own words to expose what a miserable writer he is. A very fine effort.

The Horse Latitudes

The Horse Latitudes are an area around the 30th parallel that's brutal for passing ships. There's no wind to speak of, it's hot and still, and awfully tough to sail through. They were so named because Spanish sailors used to throw their horses overboard in an attempt to conserve food and water, and provide themselves a brief moment's entertainment.

Which brings us to the 2002 Red Sox.

There's a Horse Latitude stretch in every season. Sometimes it lasts a few games, sometimes (see 2001) it starts in mid-June and goes till next year's Spring Training. It's not just a losing streak; it's a losing streak combined with poor play, dismal clutch hitting, and agonizing pitching. To the point where you almost don't want to watch the games out of frustration and preserving your own sanity. And boy, are we there now. No one's hitting reliably, Manny's back after an inauspicious rehab stint (and, in typical Red Sox fashion, they stick him in left field rather than give him a game or 2 at DH to get his major-league rhythm back), and the pitching (particularly the bullpen) isn't exactly making us brim with confidence.

Of course, Pedro pitches tomorrow. So we may catch a wind and start sailing again soon.

The NBA Draft

Tomorrow is the NBA Draft, or "Night of A Thousand Bad Suits", as it's informally known. The Celtics don't have a first-round pick, so I'll get my entertainment from Charles Barkley, trade rumors, and anticipating Bill Simmons' annual Draft column, easily the sportswriting highlight of any summer.

The top pick, owned by Houston, is expected to be Chinese big guy Yao Ming. We'll soon find out if Yao Ming is Chinese for "Shawn Bradley", as has been suggested. I honestly don't know much about the rest of the projected top picks, so I'll just scoop Hubie Brown and John Thompson and project that many of them have tremendous upsides.

Sunday Column Roundup

Bernie Miklasz and Michael Holley mourn Darryl Kile...The Globe Magazine investigates why baseball doesn't matter to a lot of people anymore...Peter May is glad the Celtics don't have a draft pick...Tony Massarotti talks about Red Sox All-Star prospects...Lupica frets about the Knicks...Miami sportswriter Dan LeBatard says that Florida wouldn't have understood Luis Castillo's streak even if he had broken the record...Joel Sherman says the Met Yard Sale begins soon...Phil Mushnick hates everything.

He's Baaaaaack

8 innings. 2 hits. No runs. 1 walk. 11 strikeouts. Muy bueno.

That Ain't Baseball

10-5. 20-10. 14-11. Those were the scores of the three Yankees-Rockies games in Denver this week. If this kind of baseball is good for the fans, then I don't want to be a fan. Even factoring in the Coors Field effect, this is ludicrous. Of course, it's highly likely that they used balls that weren't stored in the humidor for this series, figuring that the kind of person who only goes to a Rockies game when the Yankees are in town is the same kind of person who gets off on a football score in a baseball game. The good news is that the Yankees' starters ERAs flew up. And the Red Sox don't have to go there.

Speaking of baseball travesties, I can only watch one pitch at a time of the College World Series, going on this week at Omaha's historic Rosenblatt Stadium. (Yes, I was there; go to sooz's capricious.org and click on "Nebraska 2000" under Photo Collections on the right.) Then I hear the PING! of the aluminum bat and I lunge for the remote control. Aluminum bats make every game like a Coors Field game. And they will until a college pitcher gets his head crushed like a pumpkin on a line drive.

Terrifying Admission. I'm Not A Sports Fan.

At least according to Globe columnist Bob Ryan, whose column today revolves around the theme "If you're not fired up for the World Cup, you're not a sports fan." This is so typical of the Globe Sports section, this attitude of "I have decreed this so, and if you disagree you're slime." Shaughnessy does it to a T. I was actually on the verge of getting interested in the US run for the championship. (Though not to the point of getting up before dawn. It's taxing enough to make it to the end of the Sox-Padres games on the West Coast.) But the sanctimonious "I believe this so it must be" attitude puts me off.

Look, it's great that the US has gotten as far as it has. This is a lot more impressive than the Winter Olympics (which Ryan also says is mandatory for sports fans to care about), where the Americans slip in "sports" that only Americans would have the leisure time and the inclination to become good at. I mean, a gold medal in snowboarding? Please. To get involved now puts me somewhere in a zone that is overlapped by the This Is The Time For Blind Patriotism Zone and the They're Doing Well, So I Care Zone. And neither of those is a place I feel particularly comfortable in.

So I can't muster the enthusiam to throw myself fully into World Cup Fever. And if that means Bob Ryan doesn't think I'm a worthy sports fan, I guess I'll have to live with that.

Sunday Column Roundup

Dan Shaughnessy wonders how anyone could miss Roger Clemens...Gordon Edes talks about the Red Sox' new offensive philosophy, but omits any explanation of what the hell happened to Trot Nixon...Karen Guregian does wonder where the hitting's gone...TJ Simers gives Kobe a long, sensuous backrub...Lupica does the same for Tiger...Jim Donaldson tries to eat some innings drumming up some interest in the plucky US soccer team...Joel Sherman says more playoffs are the answer in baseball...Phil Mushnick hates everything.

Come Flail Away With Me

Now interleague play has shifted to NL parks, and I'm confirmed in one of my deepest beliefs. The DH rule is a good thing.

I know reasonable people can debate this till they're blue in the face, and many people whose opinions I respect loathe the DH, but I cringe at games without it. Making the pitcher bat is like an NFL team forcing the punter to cover wide receivers on third down. It's not their natural position, it's not what they train for, and it gives you, the fan, an awful sinking feeling when there are 2 on, 2 out, and Johnny Pitcher is strolling to the plate.

Pitchers batting is traditional! Yes, so once were the flying wedge, the set shot, and no batting helmets. But times change.

It increases strategy! Why, because you get to see Tony LaRussa deftly switch the pitcher into the 8-spot and put his backup SS into the 9-hole to lead off the next inning? What a chess match. It's a lot more gutsy for a manager to send a position player in to pitch a mop-up inning when it's 17-3.

Pitchers get hits sometimes! Shawn Estes hit a home run today! I'm sure his parents are proud. But to me, the pitcher batting will always be Rich Garces bunting into a 5-4-7-2-3-fan in right field-8-2-autographed by the team-7-8-7-Youppi!-4-3 double play in Montreal last year as he chugged down the line. Too bad it came to a sad end, as El Guapo was swallowed whole by a speeding glacier.

Plus, every time a pitcher gets a hit, sportscasters are required by law to say he "helped his own cause", ignoring the fact that baseball is a team game and a hit benefits everyone.

Look, as far as I'm concerned, you NL types can play whatever game you want. But in interleague games, the AL gets killed by having to take a bat out of their lineup, except when the Devil Rays have to sit Greg Vaughn down. It's not fair and it's cruel to the fans who want to see guys doing what they do best.

The Charmed Life Continues

So the Lakers, the NY Yankees and the Microsoft of the NBA, defied absolutely no odds tonight by burying the Nets and collecting their third trophy in as many years. We've discussed Shaq already, so let's look at the two other members of the Lakers' travelling hit squad that won't be replaced (bye, Mitch Richmond!): Kobe and Phil.

Kobe Bryant carries the world's biggest chip on his shoulder, and I can't figure out why. He acts like being on a championship team is vindication for some past wrong, and I don't get it. This guy has led a super-charmed life. The majority of NBA players come from tough, brutal backgrounds; Kobe was raised in the gentle Italian countryside. Many highly-touted rookies get drafted by the NBA's bottom-feeders; Kobe was drafted by Charlotte, from whom he had already demanded a trade to LA, which he immediately got. Lots of superstars went through growing pains in the league before they reached their peak; Kobe was anointed as the Chosen One, the Next Michael from the start, and has had the commercial exposure and the free-throw-volume to go along with it. He's a great player, no sense denying it. But, Kobe, stop acting like this is something you've struggled all your life for. You're in the right place at the right time.

And speaking of the right place at the right time...Yoda himself, Phil Jackson. The man who managed to take the teams with the greatest players in the league and win with them. What a feat! Now even normally smart people like Dr. Jack are trying to rank Phil with Red Auerbach. I cannot let this go. Red coached the team, built the team via the draft and terrorizing other league GMs, made the travel arrangements, sold popcorn, and controlled the water-pressure in the Garden's visiting locker room. Phil let assistant coach Tex Winter draw up the vaunted triangle offense, found teams with Michael Jordan and Shaquille O'Neal, and rolled the ball out onto the floor.

Phil apologists say that it's harder coaching now because there are more teams. Um...yeah, but a lot of those teams are Cleveland, Denver, Golden State and Atlanta. Nice try. In Red's day, even the bottom-feeders had guys like Lenny Wilkens and Oscar Robertson. They say it's harder coaching now because the playoffs are longer. Of course, it helps that teams like the mid-90s Knicks and current Blazers are there to make sure Phil's teams get a nice rest during the playoffs. They say Phil's gotten three three-peats. Red had six. Let's go through them.

1959-60-61. 1960-61-62. 1961-62-63. 1962-63-64. 1963-64-65. 1964-65-66. Yes, kids, that's 8 titles in a row. Call me in 2007 if Phil's on the verge of tying that.

Whistlin' in the Graveyard

I'm going to resist the temptation to read too much into the Sox' sweep at the hands of the Diamondbacks. Arizona is the defending champ; the Sox were due for a few stinkers; they're playing shorthanded; blah blah blah.

But I can't resist the temptation to babble a bit about the ticking time bomb waiting in the background to blow up this Red Sox season. You know what it is - the sudden iffiness of Pedro Martinez. He had two shaky outings against Detroit and Toronto, then struggled and picked up his first loss of the season Saturday. Is he mortal? You don't want to think about it, but you can't not think about it. Even the normally loquacious and erudite Edward of Bambino's Curse doesn't seem to want to talk about it.

So we'll turn to Globe columnist Bob Ryan, who gets paid to confront stuff like this.

By his lofty standards, Martinez is sharp intermittently, which means he might be completely sharp one game and not the next, or sharp for periods of a game and not so sharp an inning later. Ordinary pitchers are like this all the time. Martinez is new to this. And he doesn't like it.

Neither do we. It's a big adjustment going from immortality to ordinary greatness. When Larry played his last few seasons in near-constant pain, everyone in New England felt his back spasms with him. It was tough watching Michael Jordan struggle with the Wizards this year, and fun watching the formerly-unbeatable Mike Tyson get beaten this weekend. Age catches up with you. So does the strain of Pedro's 180-pound frame throwing blazing heat for years.

Hey, he's still 7-1. He's still holding opponents at a .216 batting average. And he's still better that 90% of the pitchers out there. We shouldn't be worried.

But we are.

NBA Finals, Game 2

Sometimes, you just have to throw your hands up and admit it.

There are certain athletes, at certain times, whose very presence means that the game is a foregone conclusion. We saw it here in Boston in the 80s, when good teams like the Hawks and Bucks folded up the tents as soon as Larry Bird walked into the building. We saw it in Cleveland in '99, when Pedro came out of the bullpen and every fan at Jacobs Field was immediately issued a shovel to bury the Indians. We all saw it whenever Michael Jordan took the floor.

I'm here, these guys seem to say. I'm taking over -- you might as well go home. Which brings us to Games 1 and 2 of the NBA Finals.

Shaquille O'Neal has become one of those players. I believe the final plus/minus for LA was +38 with Shaq in the game and -19 with him on the bench. And that sounds about right. Everyone connected with the NBA's been tripping over themselves for years trying to compare Kobe Bryant to Michael Jordan, but Shaq is the only guy who fits the comparison. When Shaq/Michael's on the court, it looks like they're playing a different game than everyone else. With Jordan, it looked like he was playing at full speed and everyone else was running through Jell-O. With Shaq, it looks like he's playing with a Nerf ball. The guy's unreal.

Of course, it helps when the refs refuse to call an offensive foul; I'd be curious to see if they blow the whistle if Shaq were to pick up Kerry Kittles and place him in a seat in the second row. But Jordan got every call under the sun, too, so I guess it's a wash.

One hopes that if someone in Jersey is malicious enough to try to mess up the Lakers with a tainted cheeseburger, they send it to the right room, unlike the moron in Sacramento. I think it's the only way that this becomes a series.

Interleague Play Is Here

Done dispatching the woeful Tigers (3 out of 4), the Red Sox now head home to take on the NL West, starting with the World Champs. Much of the attention is naturally going to be on the Pedro-Schilling matchup Saturday (if anyone has tickets to that game, you should know that tickets won't be honored at the gate, so you might as well send them to me). Some attention will be on World Series hero Luis Gonzalez; I've read it suggested that Fenway fans give Luis a big round of applause for beating the Yankees last fall. I like it.

But I think the best part is that one of baseball's true great guys is coming to Kenmore Square for the first time. AZCentral.com has the following Mark Grace anecdote:

"I'm going to go to the scoreboard and write my name. That's the tradition," Grace told reporters. "I guess Ty Cobb and Ted Williams are up there. I think you can lump me in that group: greatest left-handed hitters ever - Williams, Cobb, Grace. What are you guys laughing at?"

In other interleague intrigue, Roberto Alomar and the Mets go to Cleveland, the Cards and Royals have an '85 World Series rematch, Barry goes to the Bronx, and Houston visits Oakland in a matchup that would be awesome if it featured the rainbow Houston uniforms and green-and-gold A's jerseys of the early '80s.

And let's not forget that riveting Padres-Devil Rays clash. Somewhere up there in the Beyond, Bart Giamatti is kicking things.

The World Cup

I'll admit it up front...I know the World Cup is going on, and I can't dredge up any enthusiasm. I know the US team beat Portugal and I know that every single person on the planet except for us here in the US are going bonkers over the whole thing. The fact is, I don't really care. To me, soccer is like hockey stripped of all the action, excitement, and beer. Tony Pierce has a good entry that pretty much sums up my feelings about the whole thing. So read that.

Two quick notes before I drop the whole thing altogether: in '94 (when, I think, the World Cup was played here), I was walking along Newbury Street in Boston and someone came careening down the street with horns honking and Brazilian flags waving out the window. I later learned that Brazil beat the US team. But the attitude of every pedestrian on the street wasn't shame or anger, it was "what the hell was that?" The US just doesn't care about soccer, no matter how much the professional "soccer's catching on!" crowd tries to ram it down our throats. I think this proves again why it's almost embarassing to be American. Kids in Portugal grow up playing soccer, kicking their little brains out till the cows come home (in Portguese, "até que as vacas vierem para casa"), but once the .005% of American athletes who play soccer get their act together, it's lights out ("luzes fora"), Lisbon!

And secondly, that same professional "soccer's catching on!" crowd will point out until they're hoarse that more kids are playing soccer than ever before, thus proving that soccer's catching on! Well, it doesn't take Pele to figure out how dumb that is. More kids are playing soccer because a) bats and gloves and cleats cost money, b) you can put an unathletic kid on the soccer field and just tell him to run around, instead of playing him the minimum 3 innings, batting him 16th and telling him to try to draw a walk instead of swinging, and sticking him deep in right field where someone will only hit a fly ball once every season. I caught that fly ball, by the way, thank you very much. And c) Kids playing soccer don't get hit in the head with baseballs or savaged with hockey sticks by angry dads.

Plus in real sports, guys playing defense don't have to hold on to their crotches.

Speed of Lightning, Roar of Thunder

The local press seems to think that we'd save everyone a lot of time and trouble if we just went out and shot ourselves. Me, I'm for wasting sportwriters' time. So, I'd like to hang around and give them all a nice big s***burger to eat.

- Lou Brown, Major League

Playing the roles of "why bother" underdogs this week are the New Jersey Nets and the Carolina Hurricanes. Popular wisdom holds that these teams should count themselves lucky to be in the Finals and now step aside and let the big boys take over. The Canes can't stop the travelling-legends team that is the Detroit Red Wings, and the Nets will be lucky to win one game against the unholy alliance of the Lakers, NBC, and the refs (can you see any circumstance whatsoever where Kobe would get a technical foul in the closing minutes of a Game 7? He could break a chair over a ref's head and it would be, at most, a double technical with Vlade Divac).

Maybe the Nets are intimidated by the power of Shaq, the wisdom of Coach Yoda Jackson, or the fearsome spectre of Dyan Cannon in the front row. Maybe the Hurricanes are awed by the fact that Detroit has assembled Chris Chelios, Luc Robitaille, Dominik Hasek, Wayne Gretzky, Bobby Orr, Brett and Bobby Hull, Rogatien Vachon, the Hanson Brothers, and God Himself to skate for the Cup. Maybe in an ordinary year, there would be 8 games total in the two series.

But ask the unstoppable Yankees or the almighty Rams how well being the favorite worked out for them.

In the words of 50 million cliche-spouters...."that's why they play the games."

Wait Till Next Year

Yes, it's taken 36 hours to really come to grips with the fact that the roller-coaster ride is over. The Celtics were a good but flawed team, that played better and longer than anyone could have expected. And in the end, New Jersey exploited their flaws and forced them to play worse basketball than they played all season. My hat is off to them, and I hope the Nets represent the East well in the Finals, where they'll be major underdogs against the Kings, or more likely, an unholy alliance of the Lakers, NBC, and the refs (did you see Kobe elbowing Mike Bibby in the face at the end of Game 6? Did you see the ref looking right at it and not calling anything?)

So now we start thinking about next year. Pierce and Walker will be back for sure; past that, nothing is certain. The Celtics will try to resign Rodney Rogers for some reason; he won't be worth the money that they'll have to pay him. Kenny's locked into a 63-year contract thanks to Pitino, so trading him is out of the question unless they can find some real dumb team to take him on (Hello, Clippers!). As for big acquisitions, there aren't a lot to be made. My Dad suggested the Celtics talk to Miami about Alonzo Mourning; this sent me into immediate chin-scratching mode, but I don't think it will happen because a) the Celtics ownership doesn't seem to be in a take-on-big-contracts mode and b) I can't see Pat Riley trading him. Alonzo has one year left on his contract for $20.6 million, for the record.

The most intriguing roster subplot of the offseason will be Kedrick Brown. The rookie showed promise in very limited P.T. this year. Speculation is that he'll pick up some minutes from Eric Williams in the next season. We'll see; I'd hate to see that the Celtics had 3 first-round picks last year and got nothing for them (Joe Forte played next to nothing and Joe Johnson was traded for Delk and Rogers). GM Chris Wallace has his hands full, that's for sure.