The Hunt people just had to schedule autumn’s biggest event on Saturday, October 28, which is normally Halloween party weekend this year, didn’t they? If you see masses of people walking around Hoboken in Halloween costumes ten days before the actual holiday, now you know why…
Don’t mess with the Hunt. It’s a social juggernaut that will never be stopped. Rain, shine, mud, earthquakes, locusts, whatever…
Online gambling has been banned within the United States. No more online poker, sports betting or any other form of wagering via the World Wide Web within our borders.
Don’t believe it? Well, about 30 minutes after the ban was signed into law, the stock of the largest online-gambling business, Gibraltar-based PartyGaming, which gets 850 million of its annual revenue from Americans, declined about 60 percent in one day, thereby taking away $5 billion in market value. The stock of a British company, World Gaming PLC, which gets about 95 percent of its revenue from Americans, dropped 88 percent. The industry lost $8 billion in market value due to the new law alone.
And you wondered why your neighborhood bookie is smiling again…
And why those Las Vegas ads are suddenly competing with Geico for Every Other Commercial Spot on TV Award…
This is the good news/bad news life as a Cubs fan:
Good news: You sign the most coveted manager available (Lou Pinella) who is apparently so good that the Yankees considered dumping the untouchable Joe Torre to make room for him. For the Yanks, firing Torre is like kicking Jon Stewart off the Daily Show. The program would go on, yes, and it would still be hilarious, but the core, the anchor (no pun intended) that provided a center of gravity would no longer be there, and it would likely morph into Spin City with Charlie Sheen and without Alex P. Keaton…good, but not great.
Steinbrenner realized that while Torre has failed in some big spots over the past six championship-less years (leaving the elder Weaver in Game 4 of the ’03 World Series, blowing a 3-0 lead against the Sox and starting Kevin Brown in Game 7, resting his starters on the final game of ’05 and handing the Angels home-field in the ALCS, moving A-Rod around the order in ’06 like he was Roberto Kelly, etc.) that Torre is probably the only guy who knows how to handle the New York media (who adores him) and keep all the millionaire egos in check. So he stays and Sweet Lou goes to Wrigley to be their 48th manager…
That’s the good news for Cubbie fans like me…
The bad news? Lou has already indicated that he wants to bring Pay-Rod to the Cubs to pump up the team’s offense. Of course, Lightning Rod is one of the great offensive players to perform against bad teams ever to set foot on the diamond, but unless the Cubs are signing E-Rod to hit 30 homers against the Pirates and Brewers while going 3-for-51 against contenders like the Cardinals, Mets, Padres and Astros, K-Rod is not the guy you sign to break a 98-year drought filled with Billy Goats, black cats and Bartman curses already on your bad karma resume.
The New York sports media are truly walking contradictions. Before the Yankees-Tigers series, and even when the series was tied at 1-1, you couldn’t find one newspaper guy or sports talkee that would give the Tigers a chance. Then after the Yankees were outscored 14-3 in Detroit to lose the series, they all screamed that “we knew all along” that the Yankees didn’t have good starting pitching and need to fix the problem immediately!
So you would think the experts would learn their lesson going into the Mets-Cards NLCS, right? The Mets had already lost Pedro and El Duque went down….that’s half of their projected starting rotation. The Cards, meanwhile, had Carpenter (Cy Young Winner), Suppan (great big-game pitcher), and Jeff Weaver (who, as poor as he has been in his career, still has more postseason experience than Olver Perez (3-13 regular season) and John Maine (rookie). But like their perspective on the Yankees, the New York media raved about the power of the Mets lineup, which always trumps great pitching.
Whoops, it’s the opposite…good pitching beats good hitting almost every time. A good fantasy team doesn’t mean an automatic trip to baseball’s biggest stage. If that were case, we’d be talking Subway Series right now.
There’s a reason he wears #13, you know…
South Park is the greatest show on television. If you don’t believe me, rent the newly-released “The Hits: Volume 1.” Between the Paris Hilton Stupid Spoiled Whore episode and the classic where Cartman’s puppet hand becomes Jennifer Lopez, you will never laugh harder.
Really.
Three members of the Duke Lacrosse team are not guilty of raping anyone, and if negative DNA samples and time stamped dorm cards aren’t enough evidence, the other stripper involved in the non-incident that night telling 60 Minutes that no rape ever occurred should be enough. Here’s hoping that the accused decide to counter-sue everyone involved (including the DA) even if those who pressed charges don’t have a dime to their name…if not for any other reason but for the defamation of character and humiliation the team as a whole had to endure over the past year.
All actions should have consequences. If they don’t, what risk is there in throwing out unfounded accusations if there is the possibility of a multi-million dollar civil payoff at the end of the day?
I guess it isn’t such a disgrace to lose to the Detroit Tigers after all, huh? Unlike the A’s, at least those scrappy Yankees were able to get a game off of them.
But they still don’t deserve home-field for the World Series. If a Wild Card makes the World Series (as it has the past four seasons), then all bets are off for whatever league won the All-Star game and Games 1, 2, 6 and 7 at home that go with it.
The Giants had a killer schedule and survived. To use a Mad Dog line, if after playing the Colts, Eagles, Seahawks, Redskins and Falcons, would you take a 3-2 record at this point in the season?
Thought so…
But the fun doesn’t stop now, as Parcells’ Cowboys are next. Realhoboken.com is throwing a party at Liberty Bar to watch the game if you’d like to join us Monday night as the two best teams in the NFC East meet in Irving. Just be sure to have that “SARS” excuse when calling in sick due to liver poisoning the next day. The drinking game planned is simple: For every cutaway shot of T.O., you drink. Expect to have 45 swigs of (insert drink here) as a result. 
You really have to hand it to some other web rags in town. They dole out great reviews for restaurants that haven’t even opened yet whose name they can’t even get right (it’s called Teak on the Hudson for those playing at home, not Teak Sushi) but attack the best wrap joint in town because they don’t have enough art on the walls and also claim is too expensive.
Who knew that $6.95 for a wrap meant having to declare Chapter 7?
And Monet always builds up an appetite.
Speaking of misleading, for all the whining by New Jersey residents about corrupt politicians, why is Bob Menendez leading (barely) in the polls over someone as upstanding and scandal-free as Tom Kean, Jr? Do we really want another Torricelli or McGreevy being one of our state’s prominent leaders?
If Hoboken Bob wins and ends up resigning over the federal investigation currently being conducted about the questionable ways he goes about being a landlord, we only have ourselves to blame.
I leave you with one important question on the minds of every red-blooded American male:
How can we allow North Korea to pursue nuclear weapons?
No, that wasn’t the question…
Will El Nino make it a warm winter in Hoboken this year?
That’s a vital query, yes, but that’s not it either.
Oh, right…I remember.
Why haven’t I seen Rachel McAdams in any movies in over a year after she did, like, 26 in 2005?
And yet, Jennifer Aniston keeps getting work.
As the great Jeff Garlin would say, “That’s a whole bowl of wrong.”