You will not want to miss Monday night’s A Show Of Their Own. We’ll be holding our first ever listener contest! "A Show of Their Own," together with Write-Field.com, will present the winner with a prize package of products from Derek Jeter's Diven line. So, if you want to smell like a winner, tune in LIVE on Monday, May 26th at 9:00pm EST for your chance to win!
The Lady 
Barry Bonds is going down, as fast as a juiced-up water balloon. Alex Rodriguez is going up, as fast as his private jet will allow him to. Two men whose names will be forever linked to home-run chases could not have had days more different from each other yesterday.
Bonds has been the victim of a witch hunt, but I could care less. He brought it on himself. Barry, this is what happens to you when you have the attitude you have. People don't like you and they'll do anything and everything to bring you down. You're a modern day Al Capone. They couldn't get Capone on racketeering but they got him on tax evasion. They couldn't indict you on steroids use but they did indict you on perjury and obstruction. So there.
The best thing Alex Rodriguez did this week was crawl back to the Yankees. The Yankees and their stage are the best place to break the all-time career home run record. Assuming that he'll stay healthy, he'll definitely break it in a Yankee uniform.
In other postseason news:
The Lady
Derek Jeter has never been a very vocal guy. He has always let his bat and glove do the talking. It's not working this year. One could even say it never worked. Over the years there have always been guys in the Yankee Clubhouse who weren't afraid to get in someone's grill and tell them to shape up. These were guys like Paul O'Neill, Tino Martinez, Jim Leyritz and, until his steroids revelations (or, lack therof), Jason Giambi. They did a good job of covering up Jeter's lack of leadership skills and the players responded well. Now there's no one like that in the clubhouse and Derek Jeter has been exposed.
I read an interesting article by Phil Allard on NYYFans.com this morning. Allard's main focus was Joe Torre and Robinson Cano, but he included this very insightful quote:
After all the fallout from Alex Rodriguez's appearance last week on WFAN's "Mike & The Mad Dog," I thought that we'd get a break for at least a couple of weeks from the A-Rod saga. I was wrong. This morning on ESPN Radio's "Mike & Mike In The Morning," Mike Greenberg and Buster Olney (subbing for Mike Golic) descended into yet another debate about it. Greeny is of the opinion, as I am, that A-Rod said nothing wrong during the interview. Buster Olney, on the other hand, thinks (as his baseball-writer colleagues do) that A-Rod issued an ultimatum: If the fans boo him in 2007 he will opt out of his contract.
Until I listened to the interview this past weekend, I had just assumed that A-Rod did nothing wrong. After I'd heard it all, I was convinced of it. The entire "ulimatum" thing is probably less than 10 seconds of the 15 minute interview.
To his credit, A-Rod kept his promise and refused to discuss Derek Jeter during the interview. Did the media acknowledge that? Hardly. The following day, Jeter made his own appearance on the show, and though he'd already said last month that he didn't want to discuss A-Rod again for the rest of the year, he didn't hesitate to answer questions about his former best friend, even throwing in a joke about Paul O'Neill in the process. Did the media acknowledge that Jeter was even interviewed? No.
To listen to both of these interviews, go to WFAN, click on Podcasts, and choose Mike & The Mad Dog on the pull-down menu. I think you'll be surprised at what you hear.
As a blogger, I like to consider myself part of the media. However, when the media ignores what I consider to be a more newsworthy item (Jeter's interview) and continues to verbally stalk baseball's best player, I have second thoughts.
The Lady
Years ago I watched a TV sports report about Alex Rodriguez. I remember seeing Derek Jeter in the piece, making a comment about his then best friend: "I envy his power." Jeter was talking about A-Rod's home-run power, of course. He may envy that, but Jeter has power of his own. I'm not talking about his clutch performance on the field or his leadership as Yankee Captain, although these have contributed to it. I'm talking about the power to prevent being challenged.
Whenever the Jeter & A-Rod Saga rears its ugly head, the members of the media ask the same question, to each other and to themselves:
"Jeter publicly supported both Chuck Knoblauch and Jason Giambi when each was going through his problems and being booed by the fans. Why doesn't he do it for A-Rod?"
We've all read the quotes and seen the clips of Jeter saying that he can't tell the fans what to do in regards to A-Rod. However, we haven't heard this question from the media:
"You did it for Chuck Knoblauch and Jason Giambi. Why is it so different for A-Rod?"
We don't hear the media challenging Jeter by asking this question:
"Shouldn't you be the Captain to all your teammates, not just to the ones you pick and choose?"
Now, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Jeter has been asked these questions and I was just under a rock at the time. However, I don't think so. I hear the media asking these questions out loud on the air and I see them in print. Each time I see/hear them, I ask myself, Did you ask Jeter these questions?
What are they all afraid of? That the Yankees will have them barred from the Yankee Clubhouse? That they'll be fired (if they work for the Yes Network)? Possibly. Just this week Yankee Announcer Michael Kay said on his radio show that Chad Curtis' career with the Yankees ended because he publicly admonished Jeter for not joining a Yankees-Mariners brawl, choosing instead to stand off to the side with A-Rod, where the two of them laughed at the goings-on.
I know that when you've accomplished as much as Derek Jeter has you earn the right not to be challenged by the media. It just bothers me to think that the media might be backing down from challenging him out of fear. If it's true, it's not their fault, I guess. I couldn't blame them for wanting to avoid the unemployment lines. What I can blame them for, though, is even bothering to talk and write about these things at all if they can't follow-up by contacting Jeter. Don't whet my appetite if you can't feed me. It's just not fair.
The Lady
