Slow News Week

Just as I was saying the best thing about Shank's picked up pieces columns was their infrequency, along comes Shank with another one.

Pardon me if I sound like Larry King, but what’s up with this Twitter madness? It strikes me as trendy, immature, and entirely unnecessary. What you had for lunch is of no interest to me. Increasingly, tweeting seems to be getting athletes in trouble.

Remember Rashard Mendenhall on Osama Bin Laden? The Raiders and Steelers on Hines Ward? All those players ripping Jay Cutler after the loss to the Packers? It’s just too easy to rip off an inane message of 140 characters and hit the “send’’ button.

Or rip off (so to speak) an inane message of a thousand or so words, send it to your editor and call it a column. Besides, Shank's already tweeting!

The last part of this column is rich with irony / hypocrisy as it involves Jacoby Ellsbury:

Q and A with agent Scott Boras from the All-Star Game. On the public relations beating the Red Sox’ Jacoby Ellsbury took in Boston last season:

This S.O.B. led the charge against Ellsbury in print and on the radio, and now he has the nerve to present the situation in the passive tense, as though he had nothing to do with it? For a newspaper columnist, he's got balls...

Was Ellsbury hurt by the criticism?

Translation - did I get to him?

Did Boras ever think Ellsbury and the Sox would have to part company after the wasted year of 2010?
...
Any talks regarding a contract extension for Ellsbury:

Translation - did my trashing of your client get to you?

This guy really knows how to hold a grudge, doesn't he? Throw in the shot earlier in the column at the Krafts, and that point's a big 10 - 4.

Blessing In Disguise

There have been no Globe columns from Shank in twelve days, one of the longest streaks on record. By way of comparison, Bob Ryan has at least five columns in the same span.

Given the time of year, maybe Shank's secretly working for a CPA firm, banging out tax returns?

Hello, Dan ... You Must Be Going

The above title is an offshoot of a quote from the mouth of the inimitable Groucho Marx.

Although I never envisioned becoming a part of this site -- aside from entering my comments regarding other postings -- I've changed my mind, essentially because Dan has berated me for "being unfair" to him in my book, It Was Never About the Babe: The Red Sox, Racism, Mismanagement and the Curse of the Bambino.

I find that accusation both amusing and ironic since Dan has acquired the nickname "Shank" through his relentless and seemingly vindictive attacks on others. Perhaps the best example of this is Curt Schilling, whom Shank continues to shamelessly refer to in his columns. Apparently Curt (another abrasive personality who can easily get under one's skin) upset Dan after his trade to Boston in November, 2003, when he refused to cuddle up to the Shankster.

So, even though Dan lauded Schilling's acquisition by the Boston Red Sox, Curt quickly gained Shank's enmity. From that point onward, Schilling became a moving (and, sometimes, a stationary) target of Dan's. Dan has accused Schilling of "channeling" through a psychotic Astros pitcher who physically attacked his general manager, and of taking millions from the Sox last year even though he knew his shoulder was blown out and couldn't pitch.

Despite the fact that the Red Sox braintrust refuted those claims, Shank never saw it fit to correct that particular charge. I'm sorry, but, Dan, that's unfair! In subsequent postings I'd like to endeavor to illustrate how Dan never saw fit to correct the many, many pieces of misinformation in his tome, The Curse of the Bambino, even though it's in it's 21st printing (at last count), and Shank's gotta know that much of his fairy tale is flat out wrong!

I personally have been pilloried by at least one Dan apologist for refuting the so-called "Curse" even though it's been done before by other authors, albeit in much shorter form. Be that as it may, the myth needed to be buried once and for all.

And Dan really ought to send a "thank you" letter to my publisher, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., of New York City, since its editor seriously watered down my chapter on the Boston sports media. Otherwise, Shank might have sent a Holy Cross hitman after me.

Finally (for now), I'm using my real personal information to back up my involvement on this website. For one thing, I think that's only fair and proper. A secondary reason, frankly, is I've got a book to promote. And, just for the record, since Dan loves to slam bloggers and Internet addicts, I'm not some cretin holed up in my basement -- we don't have a basement ... we live outside of Atlanta -- endlessly logged on. Our office is off our living room, and that's where our computer is!