While You Were Sleeping [From a Thanksgiving Food Induced Coma]

I know that they say that tryptophan doesn't actually make you sleepy, but I know what I felt after eating Thanksgiving dinner and leftovers and more food this weekend (though not cereal). Like the Seinfeld episode, I felt like the combination of turkey, heavy gravy and red wine did me in. So there was some important things in New York sports that I missed. Here's a quick roundup of the top three big things (with three smaller things underneath):

 

Derek Jeter wins a big award and the man who announces his ABs steps down. I put these two together because I think that the legacy that Bob Sheppard will leave behind will be in the introduction to Derek Jeter's at-bats when the "Voice of God" speaks down upon Yankee Stadium. And that will be the only time we'll hear his voice from now on as Sheppard is officially calling it quits according to the New York Post. He won't use the word "retired" writes Neil Best in Newsday, but that's exactly what he now is. Buster Olney writes about how Sheppard used to run out of the stadium after the final out--a story I have heard told by other writers and Yankee personnel. It will never be the same, but I think Paul Olden will do a fine job since he won't try to imitate the voice as the early replacements for Sheppard on the Yankees (and Giants) games tried to do. And how about #2, Derek Jeter? It was rumored all weekend but finally it broke that Jeter was going to be named the Sports Illustrated "Sportsman of the Year" and today it was announced for real. NYP's Joel Sherman would have voted for A-Rod or Mariano Rivera over Jeter and LoHud's Sam Borden points out that Tim Tebow, Roger Federer and Eunice Kennedy Shriver all had valid vases as well (as did Jimmie Johnson), but Big League Stew agrees with me that Jeter is the perfect candidate for this award. Congrats again to the Captain, the first Yankee to ever win Sportsman of the Year.

A crack in Tiger Woods' perfect image. It's not a New York sports story per se, but it was one of the biggest sports news stories from the weekend. So first he was reported in  serious condition after an early Friday crash and the real impact, on finding out he was OK, was how how much a false alarm demonstrated Tiger's impact to the sports world as Jay Mariotti and RealClearSports wrote about. Then questions arose about what the heck happened and Tiger Woods decided to stay quiet and cancel police interviews. A lot of differing opinions arose of what should happen next. Mike Lupica pointed out that the world awaited an explanation, RealClearSports said that Woods shouldn't stay quiet for long, and one Detroit Free Press columnist says that if isn't about golf, the world isn't owed an explanation. The gossip columns loved this from the 911 call on SportsByBrooks, to news about a warrant being sought on TMZ, to the National Enquirer breaking news about the woman Woods is supposedly cheating with and the woman who supposedly exposed them, to Deadspin reporting (and honestly saying that the story is "like Christmas" to them) that Tiger told a friend that his wife had "gone ghetto," and he had to "to run to Zales to get a 'Kobe Special.'" (that last one is my favorite). In the end, Woods released a statement on his website saying that the crash was his fault, RealClearSports talked about how Tigers feeds the media and the public, Darren Rovell points out that Tiger ads are still running, and Sam Borden wrote about how the public lives of public people with the oh-so-true quote of "you don’t only get to be famous on the good days." No one knows that better than A-Rod and now Tiger.

The Giants sucked it up. The Giants once again were BRUTAL (as my co-worker, Paul, likes to say). In the past, when they needed a big play, someone would step up and get it for them. Now? Nothing like that. The offense and defense are unimaginative at best and injuries to guys like Ahmad Bradshaw, Antonio Pierce, Kenny Phillips, and others finally caught up to them. Osi looks like he's running at halfspeed out there which makes the rest of the pass rush looks sluggish, Brandon Jacobs doesn't have complementary backs and looks like he can't run over my grandma out there, and the special teams is an absolute joke. Now Eli may be developing a stress fracture in his foot and the team is rolling downhill. They almost got helped again on Sunday when Atlanta and Philly almost both lost and gave the Giants Wild Card dreams again. Now? The Giants need to go 4-1 the rest of the way to even have a shot including sweeping Philadelphia, Dallas and Washington in the next three weeks. I just don't see that happening.

Three other stories:

• Former Yankees' pitcher Ross Ohlendorf was always one of my favorite prospects and I was sad they traded him away in the Xavier Nady/Damaso Marte deal. He was a Princeton grad who had a good arm and seemed like a steal for the Yankees when they got him as a throw-in when they sent Randy Johnson back to Arizona. Well Ohlendorf will be spending his off-season as an intern for the United States Department of Agriculture. Pretty cool!

• BigLeagueScrew says it best: "Knicks fans have had only one thing to hang their hat on this season: 'Hey, at least they’re not the Nets'" Well the 0-16 Nets fired Lawrence Frank (who incidentally started out his Nets career 13-0) and then went on to lose their 17th straight, tying an NBA record for losses to start a season. Ouch.

• Lastly, there is one more place the Yankees have beaten the Mets once again: Black Friday sales. Despite the Mets releasing "new" jerseys (they're actually old jerseys...sort of) just in time for the holiday season, the World Champion Yankees spanked them on the busiest shopping day of the year. There is no off-season for Yankee dominance over the Mets.
  

A few last notes: A few good notes from The Biz of Baseball if you want to get inside the Winter Meetings, so long to ShysterBall (I will miss you!), and Happy 40th Birthday to the Great Mariano Rivera. Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving weekend as they lamented the fall of media.