Rob Neyer calls Carl Pavano and Brian Cashman "heroes"

If I didn't know better, I would think ESPN's Rob Neyer's article entitled "Yankees and Pavano just too many heroes" was a parody. But unfortunately, it appears to be for real. In the piece, Neyer calls Brian Cashman a hero for trying to re-sign Carl Pavano, and Pavano a hero for still playng baseball. Yes, really.

Neyer writes:

If I were 8 years old and my heroes were baseball executives rather than baseball players, I would have a Brian Cashman Fathead on my bedroom wall. Cashman was heroic in defending Pavano during his time with the Yankees, and he's heroic for considering bringing Pavano aboard once again. Many general managers, and perhaps most of them, would not have done either thing.

Oh, please. Neyer still sounds like he's still eight years old here, given how naive he sounds. Put down your pom-poms, Rob.

There's absolutely nothing "heroic" about a GM who so apparently so wants to prove that Pavano wasn't the worst free agent the Yankees ever signed that he's willing to sign him again. That's not heroism; that's literally the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. We saw this last year, when Cashman tried to convince us that bringing back Javier Vazquez and Nick Johnson would be good moves. And how did those work out, exactly? Not so well. Don't see anything the least bit heroic in Cashman not learning from his mistakes.

Neyer continues in this ridiculous vein:

There's something heroic about Pavano, too, isn't there? Pavano was a Yankee for four years, and pitched the grand total of 146 innings. You might have excused him for getting discouraged, even giving up. Maybe he did give up once or twice, and maybe he wasn't as tough as he might have been. Those fans and writers and radio hosts and even teammates probably thought so.

But he didn't give up, ultimately. He finally did get healthy, and just finished pitching 420 innings in two years. In a playoff game against the Yankees in 2009, he pitched seven fine innings and struck out nine Yankees. Can't handle the pressure? Really?

Maybe it's just me, but I define heroes as people who risk their physical well-being for the sake of others. Like firemen who run into burning buildings. Or like my late father, who jumped out of airplanes during World War II (but as my father, fellow World War II veteran Bob Feller, and others of their ilk would say when called a hero, their own definition of heroes were the soldiers who didn't come back, not themselves.) Or the civil rights activists who literally risked their lives so that African-Americans could be treated equally in this country. You can also argue that those who sacrifice monetarily, or in some other way, for others, are heroes.

You can also make the case that a ballplayer who risks his own future health for his team is a hero. Like Derek Jeter bloodying his face flying into the stands. Or Curt Schilling playing on a torn-up ankle with tendons held together by sutures. The key word here is "sacrifice."

See where I'm going here? None of these people really have much in common with Carl Pavano. Cashman -- and for that matter, Neyer -- seem to forget that Pavano so abused his time on the disabled list, with the bruised buttocks, and every other ailment known to man, that he literally spent more time on the DL without surgery than any other player before or since. American Idle was like the little boy who cried wolf; when his doctor said he needed Tommy John surgery, Cashman demanded that Carl get a second, a third, and then a fourth opinion on whether the surgery was necessary before letting him go under the knife.

Unless you think essentially stealing nearly $40 million for the Yankees is the very definition of heroism (and if you're a Yankee-hater, maybe you do!), Carl Pavano is not a hero.

Yeah, Pavano pitched well against the Yankees in the 2009 playoffs (not so well in 2010, something Neyer neglects to mention.) And he's been an Iron Man for the last two years with Cleveland and Minnesota. That's all well and good, and shows that he can still pitch. But it doesn't make him a hero, either.

Neyer concludes his piece by opining:

Two years ago, Carl Pavano was supposedly a shining example of one thing. Today, he's a shining example of another. I was actually sort of hoping that he'd pitch for the Yankees again, just because it would have been a fantastic story. With two heroes.

And Neyer is a "shining example" of a writer with a very warped perception of what truly makes a "hero."

What do you think? Tell us about it!

Joe Torre, Tim McCarver, and Rob Neyer show double standard when it comes to Derek Jeter

I've been saying for years that Joe Torre is a phony, and here's more proof. Torre took time out from his Brett Favre-esque act about whether or not he will be back with the Dodgers next year to comment about Derek Jeter's deking the umpire in Wednesday night's game. Here's what he said:

"Hell, yeah, (Jeter) did the right thing. It's not like running a red light. Stuff you can do out on the field, whether you can get away with it, it's not being immoral. We allow people to steal second base. Anything you can get away with is fine. To me, that's aboveboard. It's not like he's loading his bat."

Funny that the manager who refused to call for a bunt against Curt Schilling in the 2004 ALCS would say such a thing. It's also amusing how hypocritical J-Fraud is on the Jeter issue, given what he said after Alex Rodriguez did the Ha Play:

Even Joe Torre says Alex Rodriguez was out of line....

"He may have been excited about the fact that we were leading the ballgame," Torre said Friday before his team's series opener at Boston. "It was probably inappropriate to do it at the time he did it, but you can't change it, unfortunately."....

"[The Blue Jays] were angry," Torre said. "Oh, there's no question. I can't say I blame them, but what are you going to do about it? What's happened has happened."....

Torre said he spoke with Rodriguez after the game.

"It's probably something he shouldn't have done," Torre said. "I don't sense he's going to do it again."

FOX broadcaster Tim McCarver, who last made the news when he compared the Yankee front office to Nazis and Communists for supposedly airbrushing Torre out of Yankee Stadium, also supported Jeter's fake injury move:

"I can't believe anyone would say that's cheating. Once again, it points out Jeter's wherewithal. What upset some people perhaps is that he was so demonstrative … but to think that quickly is remarkable."

Left unsaid was what McCarver's buddy Bob Gibson, the pitcher McCarver constantly uses as the arbiter of what is correct in baseball, would do if a hitter tried that act on him. Gee, I wonder why.

Of course, when A-Rod did quick thinking of his own against Dallas Braden, McCarver was not amused, and cited Gibson in that scenario  when asked about Braden demanding Rodriguez get off his mound:

“Absolutely — I love that,” McCarver said. “That’s his space. You don’t see any starting pitchers in the batter’s box, do you? You don’t see pitchers go in the batter’s box, dig in, anything like that. So why should hitters be allowed on the mound?”....

“[Pete Rose] tried that once with Gibson in the mid-60s and Gibson threw at him the next time up. Pete spat at him. And the next one was a lot closer. Pete didn’t spit the second time.”

And ESPN.com's Rob Neyer thrice called Chicago White Sox A.J. Pierzynski a cheater for feigning injury to get on base, and suggested that he be suspended from baseball. But when Jeter did the very same thing as A.J., Neyer's opinion was much more muted, and he would not call Jeter a cheater. Read my Faster Times piece on Neyer to see his differing positions in the similar situations.

Since I didn't have any problem with A-Rod's Ha Play, Slap Play, or him walking on Dallas Braden's mound, I didn't have any problem with what Jeter did. But my brother disagrees. He thinks that the reigning SI Sportsman of the Year should be held to a tougher standard:

Jeter is considered so highly that some fans believe that Yankee Stadium should be renamed in his honor. When you are at that level, claiming that a pitcher hit you is a more serious offense than it is for a scrub. What if the pitcher was suspended for throwing at a player that some (Colin Cowherd to name one ESPN personality) consider greater than Babe Ruth?

Anyhow, what do you think? Tell us about it!