Oblivious and self-righteous Cardinals fans vs. desperate-to-play-the-victim Red Sox fans: WHO YA GOT?

If you happen to cross paths with any media members who write about either of these teams anytime in the next few months, kick them in the crotch for me.  I'm not 100% sure which side is worse, although I am leaning strongly towards the Cardinals.  At least loudmouth moron Red Sox fans are pretty honest about themselves: they're loudmouths, they're morons, and they're OK with that.  Their other most annoying flaw is their obsession with climbing up on their crosses and portraying themselves as victims (as seen most recently in the way many of them donned tinfoil hats and briefly insisted that the NFL changed the "pushing your teammates into the line of scrimmage" rules specifically to screw them, or more generally in every tweet Simmons has ever tweeted after a Boston team loses).  And that flaw is insufferable.  HOLY SHIT, THE WORLD IS NOT AGAINST YOU, AND IT SURE AS SHIT HASN'T BEEN PARTICULARLY CRUEL TO YOU IN THE REALM OF SPORTS FANDOM FOR THE PAST 15 YEARS.  But mostly, Boston fans just love their teams, and think their teams are better than your teams, and FACK YOU if you disagree.  I have a modicum of respect for that.  Cardinals fans?  Oh boy, here's where it gets much, much uglier.

The whole "Best Fans In Baseball" thing has been a vomit-inducing and out of control myth for a long time now, perpetuated by mouth-breathing commentators (both national and regional) who bring it up EVERY FUCKING TIME you're watching/listening to a game that's taking place in Saint Louis.  The Bob Costases of the world trip over themselves to point out the fact that the fans clapped for their starting pitcher who came out of the game mid-inning after a good start, or cheered tepidly for a nice catch made by an opposing player in the bottom of the 2nd, before the game gets tense.  Essentially every example some retard might try to give of Cardinals fans being the best around can be put into one of two categories: 1) something that all fans of all teams everywhere do (classic example: cheering for former players who come back as members of other teams) or 2) things that are not true (classic example: being super "classy"--counterpoint, see the Twitter feed linked above, or the way they handled the Pujols departure).

But the real cherry on top of the shit sundae is how oblivious they are.  Most Red Sox fans, if asked to evaluate whether Red Sox fans are obnoxious, will at least consider the possibility.  Most Cardinals fans, if asked to evaluate whether Cardinals fans are obnoxious, will act like they are being asked to evaluate whether the earth is flat.  If you didn't hate Will Leitch before (and Jesus, how could you not?  Will Leitch is a huge piece of shit), you will after this.

All right, we need to get something straight, and we need to get something straight fast. I have never, ever, ever ever ever ever ever, heard a Cardinals fan refer to him or herself as "one of the best fans in baseball." I'm sure it has happened. I've just never seen it. And I hang out with a lot of Cardinals fans.

1) It happens every 15 seconds or so on that Twitter feed I've been linking 

2) As I already said, it happens every. Single. Time you listen to or watch a game that's taking place in Saint Louis, so it doesn't really matter whether they gave themselves this moniker (which I'm sure they did); it's being crammed down our throats anyways, so who gives a shit where it came from

3) It's very unlikely Leitch has any friends, so his story is dubious to begin with

This notion, that Cardinals fans are always walking around patting themselves on the back, telling everyone they run into, "Hey, did you know that I'm part of the best fans in baseball? Well, I am," appears to have secured its place in the public consciousness. 

It's laughable that a person who is smart enough to operate a computer would not understand how this works.  It's like he's never heard of the concept of smugness.

It's ridiculous. Humans don't talk like that, particularly ones as earnest and cheerfully dopey as Cardinals fans. 

He's like a lawyer, using legalese and hyper-literal interpretation of terms to try to confuse the argument.  CARDINALS FANS DO NOT SAY THIS EXACT SET OF WORDS VERY OFTEN; THEREFORE, THEY ARE DEFINITELY NOT SELF-RIGHTEOUS PRICKS ABOUT THEIR BASEBALL TEAM.

The only people I've ever heard anyone refer to Cardinals fans as the best fans in baseball are:

Opposing fans or media members saying so derisively;

Opposing media members saying so derisively?  Which planet are you on?  I suppose Cubs broadcasters/reporters might do that.  Media members for the other 28 teams in the league most assuredly do not.

Players on the field describing the experience of playing in St. Louis.

Every player on every team describes his team's fans as the best in baseball.

The last 24 hours have unleashed a torrent of disdain for the Cardinals and their fans, most notably from Drew Magary at Deadspin, 

Read that if you haven't, it's great.

who does this sort of thing better than anyone on earth. (Drew's Why Your Team Sucks series is a brilliant experiment in discovering which teams' fanbases are the most sensitive about their public image. The Cardinals rank undeniably high on that last; Drew says he received more "Hate Tweets" 

Also great, read that as well.

in response to that column than any other he's ever written. He got so many that I, who am briefly mentioned in the column, got some too, caught in the Hate Tweet crossfire.) All this disdain comes with the territory: When you win as many games as the Cardinals have, 

Ah, the last refuge of the asshole fan who wants to defend the assholism displayed by him and his kind: Y'ALL JUST JEALOUS!!!!!! 

and have broken the hearts of so many teams in the postseason over the last few years, as the Cardinals have, people are going to get sick of you and thus angry at you. Over the last eight years, the Cardinals have ended the postseason dreams of the Mets, Tigers, Phillies, Brewers, Rangers, Nationals and Pirates. That's a lot of fanbases spitting in your general direction.

Hey, idiot: people aren't sick of the Cardinals because they win so much.  They're sick of the Cardinals because they have won so much that it has turned their fans into a bunch of huge fuckheads.  Is anyone, outside of fans of these teams' rivals, sick of the Spurs or the Ravens the way lots of people are sick of the Cardinals?  What's the difference?  Oh yeah, there aren't that many Spurs fans, and Ravens fans aren't as insufferable as Cardinals fans.

So Cardinals fans don't think they're the best fanbase in baseball, or at least not any more than every fan thinks they're part of the best fanbase in baseball. 

/game show buzzer

But I feel obliged, as someone for whom his Cardinals fandom is central to my life, a critical aspect of my entire existence, 

You're a gigantic fucking loser and I hope you never reproduce.

to stick up for us. If you were to try to figure out the best fanbase in baseball, you could make a case for several teams. The Yankees. The Cubs. The Phillies. The Dodgers. The Giants. The Red Sox. The Tigers. And, yeah, the Cardinals.

That's just a list of the oldest and most popular teams in the league.  There's nothing notable about any of those fan bases other than the fact that there are a lot of people among each, for historical, geographical and/or bandwagony reasons.

Because Cardinals fans could probably use an antidote to all the bile yesterday, and because Game One of the NLCS kicks off at Busch Stadium tonight, this is how one might make that case.

Holy shit.  "Clearly, us Cardinals fans don't think we're special.  Now here are ten reasons why we're special."

10 Reasons Why Cardinals Fans Might Be The Best Fanbase In Baseball

Let's test my theory from above.  I'll be shocked if there are any of these that can't go into one of my two previously stated buckets: 1) not special or 2) not true.

1) They really do cheer opposing players when they make a great play. This actually happens. You'll even see it in the NLCS. If Hanley Ramirez makes a diving stop to throw a Cardinal out, or Clayton Kershaw loses a no-hitter in the eighth inning, Cardinals fans will give them standing ovations. Now, you can mock that if you want. You can call that "fake classiness." But you cannot deny that it happens, all the time.

This is in both buckets.  First, obviously, every fanbase will cheer the opposing team's accomplishments under certain circumstances, like the no-hitter example used above.  Second, no, Cardinals fans will not do this during the playoffs.  You know how I know?  Barry Zito pitched masterfully in this game last October, and was removed mid-inning, giving those classy fans a great chance to class it up and show how classy they are by applauding his performance.  Hell, it wasn't even a backbreaker from the Cards as far as the series was going--after this game, they still held a 3 games to 2 advantage.  Did Zito get applause?  Hmmmm.  (That smattering of cheers you hear is from Giants fans behind the SF dugout.)

2) They love their players even when they leave. When Dodgers centerfielder Skip Schumaker or infielder Nick Punto are announced any time in this series, they will receive huge ovations as well, probably even if they get a base hit. Both were pivotal parts of the 2011 World Series team, and the Cardinals fans will never forget it. Eventually this is even going to happen to Albert Pujols.

First of all, 6 > 5 SO CLEVER FUCK YOU ALBERT.  Second of all, you're the dumbest sports fan on earth if you think this makes your fanbase unique.

3) Everyone just wants to be Stan Musial. Want to know where this whole notion of The Cardinal Way -- winning, and doing so with class, dignity and reserve -- came from? 

Nope, because The Cardinal Way doesn't exist!  (Unless getting DUIs, using steroids and doing all kinds of other shitty things that players on all 30 MLB team do are classy, dignified, reserved things to do.)  Thanks for offering though.  Stan Musial was great at baseball and a nice person.  There are lots of ex-players who fit that mold.  I know this is going to sound crazy, but every team has them.

4) The Winter Warm Up. Every year around MLK Day, the Cardinals have a big Winter Warm Up event at a hotel downtown. It's basically just a bunch of Cardinals signing autographs, but Cardinals fans attend this event like a dying man crawling through a desert being offered water. (You can actually buy tickets to this event three months in advance.) 

This person founded a major sports blog.  He also thinks that his team is the only team in the league that does a "FanFest"-style event.  That's incredible.

5) They always, always come out to the games. Busch Stadium is at the center of everything in St. Louis, and is always, always full. Season capacity this year was 94.6 percent, second-highest in baseball. Last year? 91.6 percent, fourth. Every person within 200 miles of Busch Stadium spent the last 48 hours -- since the end of the Pirates game -- desperately scrambling for tickets to the NLCS. (If you can help my dad, who's still searching, out, let me know.)

Someone call the NYT and WaPo and tell them to get a crack team of reporters on this story: team that won World Series in 2011/went to NLCS in 2012 sold lots of tickets in 2012/2013.

6) They travel as well as any fanbase in the country. If you've ever been to watch your team play the Cardinals in your home stadium, you know this. Cardinals fans have a way of turning whole sections of opposing stadiums bright red. It has become a tradition in September, when the Cardinals are often playing teams out of the pennant chase, that opposing stadiums because de facto home games. We sort of just cheerily invade.

They're not traveling.  They're a bunch of transplants who left Saint Louis because it's an awful city in an awful part of the country.  Some of them are bandwagoners with no ties to Saint Louis whatsoever.  They are there cheering for the Cardinals because the Cardinals are good.  If the Astros had 11 championships, there would be Astros fans all over the place too.  I'm doing my best to write this with a calm and reasonable tone, but honestly, I just want to meet Leitch in real life and punch him in the mouth.  "We just sort of cheerily invade!"  DIE.  You're the worst.

Players are family here, and they know it. In 2004, the Cardinals traded for Larry Walker late in the season. As he came to the plate for his first at-bat, he received a standing ovation. He struck out on three pitches. He then received another one. 

NO WAY.  Most fanbases would have booed him out of the stadium after one failed at bat.

There is a reason the Cardinals have been able to cultivate and keep players, have been able to trade for stars and keep them: They know it's different in St. Louis,

It's not.  

and they want to stay. 

Matt Holliday, a star traded for and then resigned, would have left in a heartbeat for another team during the 2009 offseason if anyone else had needed a LF and offered him the money the Cardinals eventually offered.  Fortunately for them, no other big spending team needed a LF that year.  Fortunately for Holliday, the Cardinals eventually caved and gave him a market value (or perhaps larger) deal.  But if not for a very unusual free agent market that year, he would have been gone.  Not even the magical wondrous mystical powers of Saint Louis, a town where fans cheer for new players, could have kept him there.

Scott Rolen, who gleefully re-upped with the Cardinals shortly after they traded for him, said, "Baseball is so special to them that as an organization, you have a lot to live up to. You feel like you owe it to the fans to put your best foot forward. They adopt you as their own. You become part of their lives." Ask any player which stadiums they love playing at: Busch Stadium is always near the top of the list. Ask them which franchise they'd love to play for: The Cardinals are always near the top of the list. The reason is not the facilities: It's the fans. We can all get online and have fights about "real" fans, but the players, they live it, they know. They know what's special about St. Louis.

This whole article seems like it could be trolling, but that last sentence especially.  I'm afraid to criticize it too sharply in case it really is trolling.  Nothing worse than getting a fast one pulled on you by someone as emptyheaded as Leitch.

The last home game of the season, when everybody sings the National Anthem. It's a tradition: The team doesn't have an anthem singer for the final home game. The whole crowd does it, and it's deeply moving, every year. Here's the last one at the old Busch Stadium.

Who gives a flying fuck?

The fans are the reason the Cardinals can compete. The Cardinals don't have a wealthy owner willing to spend billions on whatever player he wants. 

Come the fuck on.  This article is old, but the ownership structure hasn't changed significantly since it was written.  Bill DeWitt is worth a shitload of money.  That's how he can afford to field a team with the 11th highest payroll in the league in 2013.  Does he spend like George Steinbrenner did near the end of his life?  No.  Is he rich as fuck?  Yes.

They don't have a massive cable contract. 

Their current deal is awful, and doesn't expire until 2017.  At that point, they will get a new deal, and it will be comically huge.  I like how all of this is written like the Cardinals are a non-profit financed by $20 donations from generous fans.

They don't even have that sweetheart of a stadium deal. 

The owners paid for most of the stadium, this is true.  They also got a wide-reaching set of tax breaks that helps offset some of that money that they paid up front.

What they do have is a fanbase that will support them no matter what … and is willing to be patient. The Cardinals have one of the strongest farm systems in baseball, and one of the reasons they do is because they've been allowed to be smart about keeping talent around. There aren't angry calls to trade unknown prospects for veterans at the deadline, moves for the sake of making moves. The Cardinals fans, in a way that's not always healthy, trust their team. There aren't moves made to placate the fanbase because the fanbase is always placated. This is an enormous competitive advantage: The Cardinals front office can make decisions based entirely on whether or not they're good ones, rather than how it will "play" with the fanbase. 

Holy shit, what in the fucking shitfuck are you fucking talking about?  Do you have any idea how anything works?  How have you lived to this age?  Who feeds you and changes your clothes every day?

The greatest example of this, of course, is what happened with Albert Pujols. This was a man who had been compared to The Man, who seemed destined to play his entire career with the Cardinals. But when he wanted more money than was wise for the Cardinals to pay, the team walked away, in large part because it knew the fanbase would understand. And it did! There was little ill will toward the team or toward Pujols. 

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

Ok, I can't even finish.  You get the idea.  Will Leitch is atrocious.  Oh wait, one last thing: remember the first few paragraphs of this article?  All that stuff about how Cardinals fans don't actually think they're the best in baseball?

But this idea that there isn't anything special about Cardinals fans, that this has all just been made up as some sort of self-aggrandizing exercise, is ludicrous. The Cardinals have a loyal, devoted fanbase, and it is one that has had a direct effect in the success of their team. 

DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE

GO RED SOX!

(Snarky response from Jarrett, who is a non-atrocious Cardinals fan, sure to appear in the comments below)

Even when Bill Simmons knows something about a sport, he still knows absolutely nothing about that sport

Bill knows more about pro basketball than he knows about any other sport. Unfortunately, he still knows a hell of a lot more about anecdotal bullshit, embarrassing self-promotion, irrelevant stories about his kids, dumb unsupported theories that change depending on which way the wind is blowing, being angry at teams for not making dumb trades just for the sake of making trades, etc. And so it is that we happen upon his yearly trade deadline column.

In 2007, Kim Kardashian was leaking a sex tape, Charlie Sheen was still married, Barack Obama was thinking about running for president, Nicole Kidman's face could still move,

He knows about pop culture! I should read everything this guy writes, I bet he references movies and shows and stuff that I know about!

people other than porn stars were using MySpace, and I was calling the NBA "The No Balls Association."

Burnsauce, NBA GMs. Burnsauce.

Nobody wanted to trade. General managers would rather stand pat than make a move and get raked over the coals. Self-preservation trumped everything else.

In other words, making good decisions with regards to which players you have on your team trumped everything else. As things have been during every trade deadline ever. And during all twelve months of the year during every year of the NBA's existence.

Looking back, it was a transition year between the good old days (in which a slew of teams were run by people who made you wonder, "Wait, are they drunk?") and today's era of suffocating 24/7 coverage (in which every move is endlessly dissected by fans, bloggers and media members).

Things that were around to enable suffocating 24/7 coverage of every single thing that happens in the world of sports during 2004-2006: TV, mainstream internet sites, blogs, radio. Things that have been around to enable suffocating 24/7 coverage of every single thing that happens in the world of sports since 2008: TV, mainstream internet sites, blogs, radio, and Twitter.

The National Basketball Association

THOSE BASKETBALL PLAYERS MAKE GREAT BASKETBALL PLAYS ON THE BASKETBALL COURT FOR THEIR BASKETBALL TEAMS IN THE NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION

has changed in a variety of ways this century, but none more than this: February's trade deadline, June's draft and July's free agency frenzy are consumed as voraciously as the playoffs and the Finals.

Brilliant, hard-hitting analysis. People really like sports and pay very close attention to them.

You can't just slip a stupid basketball trade by an entire country anymore. You will be mocked on Twitter, on blogs, on sports radio, on message boards, in columns and articles ... if there was a theme song for this era, it would be Queen's "We Will Rock You," with one letter adjusted.

We will ... we will ... MOCK YOU!
We will ... we will ... MOCK YOU!

Jesus Chirst, is Reilly ghost writing for Simmons now? Who edited that? That's fucking terrible. Thanks Bill, you really brought your point home. Other lines to be used in a Simmons column in the near future:

"Thanks to the towering presence of Carlos Boozer and Joakim Noah, the Bulls have great interior defense... if there was a theme song for those guys, it would be Queen's "We Will Rock You," with one letter adjusted. We will... we will... BLOCK YOU!"

"The owners and players haven't been able to reach a labor agreement... if there was a theme song for this situation, it would be Queen's "We Will Rock You," with one letter adjusted. We will... we will... LOCK YOU (out)!"

Fucking A, man. That's horrific.

So it took a few years to adjust, but now we're here. With a crippling lockout looming, half the league felt obligated to do ... something. You could split the motivations of the 30 franchises into eight groups.

(stupid explanations of these eight groups omitted)

Classic, useless/nonsensical Simmons analysis. "Let me break this down for you by making it more complex than it needs to be so you can tell how much I know about the National Basketball Association. See, there are subtle differences between the ways the Nets and Blazers acted at the deadline.... [something something something Jersey Shore AL-only keeper league email from my dad my kids like to wake up early in the morning and no other kids have ever done this in the history of forever]

I was stunned that my Knicks fan buddies were split over the Carmelo trade. Some loved it, some thought they gave up too much. The dissenters made the same point: "Why give up that much when we could just sign him this summer?"

I'm a pretty intense Nuggets fan. I guarantee you I know more about the Melo trade situation and Melo's game than Simmons does. (Which is kind of like saying I know more about how the world works than a goldfish does, but anyways)

Here's the problem: the Nuggets knew that (A) Carmelo was never signing an extension in New Jersey,

Probably true. He was undoubtedly only interested in going to the Knicks. Which is what makes him in some ways even more obnoxious than LeBron- while LeBron forced teams to audition for him, held the worst-planned TV special of all time, and (probably) quit on his old employer in the middle of his last playoff series there, at least he was open to playing in more than one place when he reached free agency.

and (B) Carmelo wanted a $65 million extension as much as he wanted to play for the Knicks.

Doubtful. Given the way he acted throughout the whole sequence of events, it's very likely he would have taken less money to play for the Knicks. He made it pretty clear that doing so was "a dream come true," a homecoming, the only place he wanted to be, etc.

Their savviest play was to keep him past the deadline and play the odds: something like a 90 percent chance that Carmelo would have grabbed the $65 million and a 10 percent chance that he would have been stupidly stubborn enough to say, "I'm out of here, I don't care if it costs me $20 million, I'm gone."

Hilarious. I really love Bill's handicapping skills. The guy who correctly picks NFL games against the spread about 40% of the time knows that there was a 90% chance that Melo wouldn't bail out on a team he didn't want to play for anymore to go to one that wanted him as much as he wanted it. As if they wouldn't have been able to find a way (endorsements, short term FA deal leading to a bigger extension a year later) to make the money work. How does it feel, T-Wolves fans? How does it feel that Bill isn't your GM yet? Or was it the Bucks? Either way, count your blessings.

Few NBA players would ever do that, and no self-respecting agent would ever allow that. It just wouldn't happen. Their move would be to sign the extension, play hard for the rest of the season, then push for a trade that summer. At that point, Denver could have had 29 teams bidding for him instead of one. Everyone wins.

Well at least he's consistent. But he's still wrong. Melo had no interest in playing for 29 of the 30 teams in the league. He only wanted to play for one. It's located in the city (and borough) where his boy Amare plays, and where his boy CP3 might play soon, and where his bitch of an F-list celebrity wife wants to live. That was his #1 concern all along. Obviously there was a chance that he'd sign an extension with the Nuggets before the end of the season rather than risk losing money if he wanted to go to the Knicks in the offseason as a UFA. To say it was 90% likely is insanity given how Melo acted towards NY before and since being traded as well. I'd say the percentage of likelihood was a lot closer to 10 than 90. In any case, sure, if the Nuggets were able to ink him to an extension, they probably could have gotten more than the Knicks gave. But not substantially more. And in the meantime, they'd continue to be a 45 win team at its absolute ceiling, employing a bona fide sulkosaurus, heading for a first round playoff exit. Now they're a 45 win team with a much brighter future, much happier players, and much more potential to do damage in the playoffs since they're deeper and have more frontcourt size.

That's what terrified the Knicks: Seven months of foreplay going up in smoke because Denver played those 90 percent odds

No.

and said, "Screw it, let's keep him." So why didn't the Nuggets do that? Because they're being run by a rookie general manager (Masai Ujiri) and a rookie figurehead (Josh Kroenke, the 30-year-old son of owner Stan Kroenke), neither of whom wanted to kick off their Nuggets reign by becoming the two bumbling idiots who rolled the dice on a Carmelo extension, then watched him skip off to New York for nothing.

And watched him quasi-ruin the entire 2010-2011 season instead of just half of it.

Denver needed to save face with a decent deal, which it did: Danilo Gallinari, a future No. 1 pick, a year and a half of Wilson Chandler, a giant trade exception and a severe payroll slash.

Pretty incredible, really. Knowing that Melo would only go to one team, they still got a B/B+ of a deal from that team. Thank you Mikhail Prokhorov.

/homerism

One of the strangest subplots this week: Everyone rushing to pick Carmelo's game apart, especially people who rely on advanced metrics and ended up getting caught up in small-picture stuff.

Also known as people who like to use more information rather than less when evaluating something.

Carmelo has one elite skill (he rebounds extremely well for a small forward)

BWAH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. OH GOD GIVE ME A MINUTE TO CATCH MY BREATH. *pause* BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA. Oh man, you're killing me, Billy. If Carmelo has "elite" rebounding skills for a SF (which he really isn't, he's more of a combo 3/4), I'd hate to see what a guy with "average" rebounding skills plays like. Take it from any Nuggets fan- Melo's rebounding skills are somewhere between "above average" and "pretty good." It's not that he's a bad rebounder, but in Simmons' attempt to compliment Melo he's tossed out some lofty hyperbole. That's good stuff. I have no idea what the advanced metrics have to say about it but I'd be surprised if they didn't back me up.

and one transcendent skill (he's as good as anyone in the league at scoring and/or getting to the line, especially in crunch time).

On a much calmer note, I agree with this assessment.

You can absolutely, positively, unquestionably win a championship if Carmelo Anthony is your creator at the end of a basketball game.

On a basketball court played by basketball players. But here's the thing: as the Nuggets learned between 2004 and 2010, you absolutely, positively, unquestionably cannot win a championship if Carmelo Anthony is your best player. Dude took them to two playoff series wins in seven playoff appearances. Am I saying Melo sucks? Of course not. Without him, the 2004-2010 Nuggets probably only make the playoffs a couple of times (if any). And it's not like they made the conference finals in 2009 in spite of him. He was the best player on that team. But that year, that run- with a bunch of complimentary pieces playing out of their minds (Billups, a healthy Kenyon Martin, Dante fucking Jones of all people, and a healthy Chris Andersen)- was as good as they could do. And that was get within six wins of a championship. So let's not trip over ourselves trying to blow Melo. He's not a guy who's going to take you to a title. Him, plus Amare, plus a healthy CP3? Sure. But that's not what Bill is trying to say. The above sentence should say something like "You can unquestionably win a championship if Melo is your late game scoring threat and you have another superstar and some awesome glue guys positioned around him."

Now throw this in: The other players know. They know who's good. They know who's worth a damn. They know who they'd go to war with. So you can't discount (A) how well Carmelo played on the 2008 Olympic team;

Right, he stepped up on that big stage. Makes you wonder why he rarely played like that in Denver. He developed a reputation for coming up big in games on national TV (wish I had the numbers, but I know almost all his averages are up in such games over the course of his career) and in big venues (especially MSG, but also in the United Center and Staples Center as well). There are two possible explanations there: the guy just happens to find a 6th gear in big games, or, the guy only plays at 95% the rest of the time. I know which one of those I think is the case.

(B) how much the other guys respected him; and (C) how the key guys on that team were Kobe, LeBron, Wade and Carmelo. It can't be forgotten. It just can't.

Although it's probably true, I'm pretty sure most fans have forgotten that.

Neither can the fact that he nearly carried a limited Nuggets team to the Finals two years ago.

In his five previous playoff appearances before 2009, the Nuggets won seven total games. Before the 2009 playoffs the Nuggets acquired Chauncey Billups. I'm just saying.

Now throw this in: If there was ever a player who could be ignited by a great basketball city and a consistently fantastic crowd, it's Carmelo Anthony.

See above. That might mean he's a good fit for the Knicks, but it also might mean he's kind of a self-absorbed asshole.

He's been stuck in a relatively icy cruise control for two solid years, playing in a city he didn't totally love, being professional about it,

Questionable.

trying hard every game

WRONG.

WRONG.

WRONG.

... and yet, there was something detached about him.

True, and that something often resulted in him not playing hard for quarters or games at a time. I'm not trying to turn this into an "I hate Melo" post. I'm not like a bitter and scorned Cavaliers fan here. I'm just saying, the guy has some pretty big shortcomings. You can't sweep them under the rug. YOU JUST CAN'T.

No longer. I hate how he weaseled his way to the Knicks and pissed on Denver fans, but that's over. Let's look at this thing objectively: He's going to kill it with the Knicks. I'd bet anything. They haven't had someone like this since Bernard King, which is funny because I always thought Melo was Bernard 2.0.

LOOK HOW RIGHT I WAS ALL THE TIME!

Playing in New York isn't for everyone, but in this case, it will be the best thing that ever happened to Carmelo Anthony.

That's probably true. I'm OK with that statement. He's still a long ways from being as perfect and angelic as you're making him out to be.

I keep hearing that you can't win a title with Melo and Amare. Agreed. But you can win the title with Carmelo, Amare and Chris Paul (or Dwight Howard, or Deron Williams). In the short term, you can make some noise, rock the building and make Knicks fans forget about the 10 excruciating years they just endured. And you can scare the living hell out of the fans from the other Eastern contenders. Believe me, as a Celtics fan, I want no part of the Knicks this spring for one reason: You never want to play a playoff series in which the other team has the best guy. There's a decent chance Carmelo could just go off 1984 Bernard-style in Round 1 or Round 2.

Yeah, after all, he did it a whole one times between 2004 and 2010! He's a volcano, just ready to erupt at a moment's notice every five years or so!

What a lazy argument.

He's referring to people complaining about groups of superstars forcing their way to chosen teams, leaving the rest of the league pretty diluted. (For the record I'm not one of those people, although I kind of see where they're coming from.)

Over the past six decades, the following players pushed their way from a worse situation to a (seemingly) better one either by trade or free agency: Wilt Chamberlain, Oscar Robertson, Shaquille O'Neal, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Moses Malone, Rick Barry, Charles Barkley, Scottie Pippen, Bill Walton, Kevin Garnett, Allen Iverson, Gary Payton, Ray Allen, Jason Kidd, Clyde Drexler ... should I keep going? Now this "phenomenon" is endangering the game???

To a name, those guys pretty much acted on their own. The Miami "Big 3" obviously acted in concert. Amare, Melo, and Paul are in the process of doing so. There's nothing THAT wrong with it... but it's kind of a bitch move. And if the new CBA allows teams more flexibility to accomplish these kinds of moves, you'll probably see groups of 4 or 5 guys working together in the future. I think that's a little bit different than Shaq telling the Magic to trade him.

As Kenny Smith said last night, "If [a small-market team] builds the right pieces around the right guy, he will stay." Period. Duncan stayed in San Antonio because it built the right team around him.

Duncan stayed in San Antonio because he doesn't give a shit about endorsements or being a "global icon" or whateverthefuck. But most pro athletes do. And some of them, like Melo, also have shrill F-list celebrity wives who can't stomach the thought of living anywhere besides NYC or LA.

Stockton and Malone stayed in Utah because they had each other.

See: Duncan.

Durant will stay in Oklahoma City because of Westbrook and everyone else.

We'll see.

LeBron left Cleveland mainly because it made bad trades and signed the wrong guys.

Most oversimplified and stupid analysis of that situation I've ever read.

And Utah never would have thought it might lose Deron Williams if it hadn't screwed up the roster around him.

That's partially true, which still puts small market teams at a disadvantage. Hey, Knicks: go ahead and make 50 horrendously bad moves over the course of a decade. Eventually, a few superstars will still find their way to you and you'll be relevant again. Hey, Jazz: don't fuck up! Better not make any big mistakes (Kirilenko's contract and Okur's contract are the only two big ones that come to mind) or no more superstars for you! It's not exactly an ideal system.

Besides, why is it such a bad thing to have six or seven loaded teams and six or seven terrible ones? Oh crap, I hate seeing the Finals with all these elite players! Give me a break.

That's what fans want to see! Superteams! Let's contract 22 of them and just leave the Lakers, Celtics, Heat, Knicks, Bulls, Mavericks, ZOMBIE SONICS (best nickname ever; they can stay because of Durant), and Clippers (BILL IS A SEASON TICKET HOLDER DID YOU KNOW THAT?)! Fans in general don't care about parity, and the fans that live outside of NYC, Boston, LA, Dallas, and Chicago certainly don't care about teams in their market playing well!

Biggest douchewad Boston fan analysis ever. WHY WOULD ANYONE EVAH WANNA WATCH SOMETHING OTHAH THAN PATS/JETS, SAWKS/YANKS, OR CELTS/LAKAHS?

I Hate Boston Sports Teams- Sun Continues to Rise in East, Set in West

Remember when Jacoby Ellsbury stole home? I sure do. I'll bet you do too. And if I didn't know any better, I'd have thought from the media's reaction at the time that it was the greatest accomplishment in the history of athletics. Sportswriters gushed and blushed. Some asshole MSM-types (this guy is a blogger, but he's a blogger officially employed by NBC sports, so I'm lumping him in with the MSM) even went so far as to complain that the ESPN crew covering the game detracted from the moment by not calling it as you're "supposed" to call a steal of home, however that is. I wish I were making that up, but that's really what the dude said. ESPN, probably in penance for this alleged sin committed against "Red Sox Nation" and humanity as a whole, stopped all coverage of any other events to show a non-stop looped replay of the steal for 24 hours straight the day after. A Red Sock had stolen home- against the Yankees no less!- and the world would never be the same. We were all forced to revel in the glory of the moment.

Well, Jayson Werth of the Phillies stole home tonight against the Dodgers, arguably in an even cooler fashion. Rather than simply going when a left handed pitcher was about to go into his windup, Werth went immediately after Dodgers' catcher Russell Martin had thrown the ball back to pitcher Rolando Belisario (who, by virtue of being right handed presumably should have been paying attention to Werth's ever-expanding lead on the previous 2 or 3 pitches). Now, it's not like the Phillies get totally ignored by the media. They, along with teams like LAA, CHW, and SFG, are probably in the second tier of media favoritism just behind the ol' BOS/NYY/NYM/CHC/LAD quintumvirate. But the reason for this whiny post is this: considering the fact that he's not Jacoby Ellsbury, do you think anyone in the media is even going to notice what Werth did?

That's rhetorical.

Actually, contrary to what I'm implying, the answer is probably yes. The fact that someone else stole home is an excellent opportunity for said media to take a trip down memory lane and talk about/show highlights of Ellsbury's steal all over again. God bless America.

Oh, by the way, have you heard about this totally underreported tidbit of news? Apparently David Ortiz hasn't hit a home run yet this season. Yeah, surprising, I know. I really had to do a lot of independent research to dig up that fascinating and totally relevant story. After all, he's the only former slugger in MLB history to start a season in his mid 30s with a big slump. Ever. But at least the Celtics are playing well, right? Rajon Rondo: already better than Isiah Thomas, or already WAY better than Isiah Thomas? Discuss.