Let’s hug it out, A-Rod

There’s a story in Variety that Alex Rodriguez has dumped Scott Boras and hired a Hollywood dude as his agent. The story is not entirely true, I’ve been told. Boras remains Alex’s baseball agent. This latest move is for other ventures.

But Boras used to handle everything for Alex. The winter of discontent continues for him.

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Brian Roberts has come out and apologized for using steroids once. Amazing how many of these guys used PEDs just once or twice, isn’t it?

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It always seems to work out for Joe Torre. The Dodgers have signed Andruw Jones and the best Japanese pitcher on the market, Hiroki Kuroda. The Dodgers were 82-80 last season and eight games out of first in the NL West. Adding Torre, a cleanup hitter and a good starter puts them right back in contention.

Yanks-Dodgers World Series. How great would that be?

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Loyal reader Nick from San Francisco traveled to Taiwan and sent a link to his Flickr photo album from the trip.

The photos show how incredibly popular Chien-Ming Wang is in Taiwan. Thanks for sharing the photos, Nick.

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All is quiet on the Johan Santana front says the Boston Globe.

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I picked up my niece at school yesterday. Leah is 7 and in second grade. As the kids streamed out the door at 3:15 I noticed that one thing hasn’t changed: the boys still jump in snow as soon as possible.

But what struck me is that every single kid had a backpack. I may be dating myself here, but I didn’t have a backpack until college. What could a 7-year-old need to carry around? One kid had a bag on wheels like he was a lawyer.

So I checked. There were 4 books, her journal, extra mittens, a water bottle (we didn’t have those either when I was a kid), a Webkinz, tissues, her lunch bag, a folder of homework and assorted Hannah Montana pins.

I asked Leah if she really needed a backpack. She looked at me like I was insane. “I had one in kindergarten Uncle Pete,” she said with disdain for my idiocy. “You have to have one.”

Yeah, I’m old. Damn it.

News source：http://yankees.lhblogs.com/2007/12/18/lets-hug-it-out-a-rod/