(Nestor, you'll have to grit your teeth or look completely the other way at this one.)

For reasons totally beyond my comprehension, the Yankees spring training site is in Tampa, right across the street from Raymond James Stadium, where Bucs work on their WCO on Sundays.  Apparently the City Fathers forgot that the Rays are in town, and Yankees are the arch enemy.  (How would you like having justsc have its spring practice at Spaulding?)  But I digress.

The Yankee presence for some reason requires an extraordinary amount of Yankee news.  Anyway, the fishwrap decided to quote the New York Times magazine, Play, which quoted Hank Steinbrenner, who was taking some shots at the "Red Sox Nation" as a creation of ESPN.  He said to "go anywhere in America and wou won't see Red Sox hats and jackets, you'll see Yankee hats and jackets."  I would suggest to Steinbrenner fils that he should get out of the Bronx a little.  I was in Manhatten last week, and I saw zero Yankee hats or jackets.  But that's not the point.

(Jim Healy tape now -- "Get to the point, will you Jim.")

The Steinbrenner quote ends with this little dandy:  "We're going to put the Yankees back on top and restore the universe to order."

You know, Hank, I seem to have heard that one before.  And it wasn't a quote from a Yankee.  It was from a Bruin, and a full-fledged member of the Bruins Nation.  Hank, show a little class.  Your figure of speech was surely a nice one, and it was nice when Bill Walton said it a few months ago.  All you had to do was to say, "As Bill Walton would say ..." or something like that.
But no.

Which reminds me of Joe Biden, of course.  I just saw him on TV.  He talks just like (and is starting to look just like ) George Carlin.  I'm going to start watching C-Span to see if he does the bit about the difference between baseball and football.  But again I digress.

In any event, Nestor, talk to your close personal friend Hank.  Tell him that we like the obvious reference to UCLA basketball in his language, but he shouldn't just blatantly plagiarize.