Because no one reads the newspaper, and SportsCenter's anchors are too perky for this early in the morning, Deadspin combs the best of the broadsheets and the internets to bring you everything you need to know to start your day.
• They were talking on the phone, the two of them, the young man from ESPN and the old man from New York, and they were talking about the man who had just died, Steinbrenner, but you could tell they were really talking about the city, Steinbrenner's city, the old man's city, New York. It was shortly after 7 in the evening, and somewhere the cars were still moaning across the expressways that brought the people from New York, where they earn their living, to the suburbs, where they live, the great city coughing up big hunks of metal. The old man's name was Jimmy Breslin, and he was a fine newspaperman once, and he was on the phone from New York, talking about a dead man whom he wished everyone would stop deifying but really he was talking about a city, his city, and now the young man had said something that Breslin thought very foolish. "There wasn't a lot of hot property in New York City?" Breslin said, incredulous. "Times were down by 1973," the young man replied, and Breslin thought that foolish, too. "Down? You're living in a phony history. This town never has much trouble. It's New. York."
• Go read this sweet reminiscence by a former Yankees bat boy whom George Steinbrenner helped put through college. And while you're at it, take a look at what Joe Posnanski wrote about Steinbrenner in 2008:
Do you want a hero? Do you want a scoundrel? Do you want a tyrant? Do you want a heart of gold? Steinbrenner is what you make him. He is the convicted felon who quietly gave millions to charity, the ruthless boss who made sure his childhood heroes and friends stayed on the payroll, the twice-suspended owner who drove the game into a new era, the sore loser who won a lot, the sore winner who lost plenty, the haunted son who longed for the respect of his father, the attention hound who could not tolerate losing the spotlight, the money-throwing blowhard who saved the New York Yankees and sent them into despair and saved them again (in part by staying out the way), the bully who demanded that his employees answer his every demand and the soft touch who would quietly pick up the phone and help some stranger he read about in the morning paper.
• The one team of really good baseball players beat the other team of really good baseball players for the first time in a lot of years.
• Thierry Henry is bringing that golden hand of his to the MLS.
• Zydrunas Ilgauskas, cocksucker.
• Some bureaucratic red tape is keeping the Iroquois Nationals — a lacrosse team representing the tribe that helped invent the sport — out of the World Lacrosse Championships.
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Good morning. We'll try and find something to write about today.