Have we learned nothing from Jimmy Fallon?

"What are you kids laughing at? If you say 'Jimmy Fallon', I'll know you're lying." So says Homer Simpson.

But, I am referring to the great movie Fever Pitch ("great" being a relative term), starring Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon. Fallon's character is the most extreme obsessive Boston Red Sox fan who falls for the beautiful professional woman and can't seem to reconcile the two. Anyway, in the penultimate scene in the movie, Fallon is dining in a restaurant with his friends and notices that Johnny Damon and two other Red Sox are also dining there. It is immediately following a humiliating loss to the New York Yankees, leaving the Red Sox in a 3 games to 0 hole in a best of 7 series. The die hard fan suddenly realizes that the Red Sox players themselves are not considering their baseball as life and death like their fans do, and he realizes that there is more to life than a baseball obsession.

Fast forward to October 18, 2007 when poor (well, not really) Manny Ramirez is taken out of context for an utterance similar to the message of the famous scene in Fever Pitch. The players are amazing for being able to deal with the stress and disappointment of their profession, by being able to put everything in perspective. Life will go on if we lose. And by taking that easy going approach, it just might give you an advantage over the other team who may be pressing too hard.

Thank you, media, for once again blowing everything out of proportion.


Oh yeah, another thing: Manny may be slow coming out of the batter's box, but his amazing hitting stats speak for themselves. Maybe Manny isn't Charlie Hustle, but look where he ended up.