I’m in the I-told-you-so mood. And the cranky mood. And the really disgusted mood.
So here’s what’s making me goofy today…
1) The Associated Press wrote a story about Selena Roberts’ book on Alex Rodriguez today. Evidently, A-Rod: The Many Lives of Alex Rodriguez, that made-up piece of garbage by a woman who went to the same journalism school as those famous and successful let’s-make-it-up artists, Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams, has not been a big seller. Evidently, baseball fans don’t cotton to books filled with hundreds of un-named sources.
Now, in case you forgot, Fainaru-Wada and Williams were the dynamic duo wrote the book Game of Shadows using more than 225 un-named sources. That book turned out to be a very successful effort to vilify Barry Bonds, even though most of it was rubbish (one even two or three un-named sources is acceptable, hundreds make a story rubbish).
Roberts, meanwhile, is the woman who jumped to the wrong conclusion and slandered the lacrosse players at Duke University, only to have all of her vitriol turned to urine by a judge who threw the charges against the players out of court. She never apologized, only wallowed in her hubris — and got better journalism jobs.
Seems now that the rip on A-Rod as fallen on few eyes.According to the AP, the book was published in early May by HarperCollins with an announced first printing of 150,000. It has sold just 16,000 copies so far, according to Nielsen BookScan, which tracks about 75 percent of industry sales. The book sold 11,000 in its first week, then quickly faded. The book “A-Rod” fell off The New York Times‘ hardcover list of nonfiction best sellers after three weeks. According to AP, “As of Wednesday afternoon, the book ranked No. 2,904 on Amazon.com, where even James Frey’s discredited memoir A Million Little Pieces — at 1,776 — is outselling it.
Well, give Frey credit, at least he admitted he made it up. Roberts still hasn’t apologized for her destruction of a bunch of college kids and she won’t apologize for this dreadful bit of fiction.
2) Watched the American Hockey League Calder Cup final game between the Manitoba Moose and Hershey Bears on Tuesday night.
In the third period, the Bears dod not complete a single pass. That’s right, not one pass reached its target without bouncing off another player.
How did the Moose lose three games to these guys?
3) My new hero is Judge Redfield T. Baum. He became my hero with just one comment in that Phoenix courtroom on Tuesday. He told the lawyers for commissioner Gary Bettman and the NHL:
“Don’t tell me that you have ‘expressions of interest.’ It’s obvious to me that there is only one bidder, Mr. Balsillie. Expressions of interest are meaningless.”
The Canadian Press was quite impressed as well: “He (Baum) essentially dismissed the NHL’s assertions of four expressions of interest from potential buyers interested in operating the Coyotes in Phoenix — including Toronto Argonauts owners Howard Sokolowski and David Cynamon, and Chicago White Sox and Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf — as little more than hearsay. He added there was only one real offer, that of Balsillie.”
Evidently, Baum has a built-in Bullshit Meter and because he has it, the NHL is in for tough ride.