Amusing names join the Yankees

A long, long time ago I promised myself I wouldn't make any mention of baseball until August. I guess that makes me a liar. However, I do have an exciting excuse of the legitimate possibility of  a World Series run by the Yankees. Perhaps I'm being overly optimistic in saying that but it's hard to deny that Yanks are looking awfully dangerous right now. As if being the best team in baseball since the All Star break wasn't enough, the Yankees have actually shown a pulse before the trade deadline by picking up two big time players: Xavier Nady and Ivan Rodriguez. So now we have suddenly dominant pitching (including Chien-Ming Wang, our ace, potentially returning in September), a handful of future Hall of Famers (A-Rod, Jeter, Rodriguez, Mo), perfectly reasonable role players (Damon, Abreu, Cano) and Jason Giambi's manly, masculine, macho, virile, robust mustache holding it all together. And let's not forget the endless supply of inspirational material we're bound to be subjected to in the midst of the final playoff push at the stadium.

More important than all of this is how amusing the names of our major trade acquisitions are. Ivan Rodrigez is blessed with "Pudge" as a nickname. If he had that nickname in any other respectable sport, there's no way he would  have gotten to where he is today. Xavier Nady's name begins with an X and that's just plain weird. If this requires any further explanation then this blog might not be for you.

In a totally, unrelated note, I just watched The Root Of All Evil on Comedy Central and blogging was officially declared the root of all evil. Congratulations, you're going to hell.