Don't worry Red Sox fans, I haven't forgotten about you. Congratulations on your recent ascent into the AL East penthouse. So after long last the Sox are sitting pretty in first! Now let's just hope that "pretty" turns into "pretty long". Isn't this a wee bit too early for the Red Sox nation to be worrying about when and how The Curse will rear it's ugly head? I mean you've now got over four months to hold off all challenges. I don't envy Sox fans, especially now that Pedro's on the DL and John Burkett's become the staff ace. As for that aforementioned "curse" here's Yankee fan Brian "No One Wants To Trade With Me" Legere's take on the whole thing…

"What I love about Red Sox fans (especially the few I chat with here) is that they all know that this won't last. They know that a bit of good precedes the eventual season curse. Usually, it is Boston in first for the first month or so (good) and then it starts slowly like a Pedro DL, then a Pedro comment about the Babe's butt and then it just snowballs. This year, the Sox had to first catch up to the Yanks and pass them (the good) and now even though Pedro's DL stint will be short, this starts the gradual process leading up to the full blown curse! I hope it gets to 5 1/2 games ahead because that's when the buzz gets real high and then the Yanks will overspend for like Griffey and 2 closers to set up Rivera and then the Ted Williams cryogenic chamber starts to get a bit sweaty on the outside and then the ghosts come out one by one...Babe, Mickey, Thurman, etc. Sorry, lost myself there and now I have to get back to work…"

Believe me, it's much easier being a Mets fan, just so long as you set the right expectations at the start of the season. For example, we just played the Braves close and actually stole a game; let's get the party started in Flushing! Or as Kevin Kelly so succinctly put it in a response to Brian's diatribe on The Curse:

"Therein lies the difference between Red Sox fans and Mets fans....the Red Sox start off hot, but their fans know they ain't gonna do squat come the end of the year....the Mets, they can lose 28 in a row and their fans are like, we'll turn it around, we'll take the Braves this year, I promise!!!"

But I digress (as much as all things that comes from Kevin Kelly's mouth can be labeled "digressions"), back to the Sox. Nomar Garciaparra's got a 25 game hitting streak working and the last Boston player that hit with this kind of regularity and frequency was none other than Wade Boggs, who attributed his success to pre-game meals made up entirely of chicken. Of course, we all know Nomar's secret is something similar, except for him it's not a pre-game meal of chicken, it's a post-game "spread" of Hamm…

Don't look now folks, but with the Yanks doing their best impression of the Mets and Pedro on the DL, here come the Blue Jays! As of this writing the Jays, despite the reemergence of SARS in Toronto and an outbreak of Mad Cow Disease in Canada, find themselves a mere 4 games out of first in the AL East. Hey, just 4 games? When's the next Yankees series? In fact the Jays are doing so well you almost have to wonder why the cows are so mad? What's got their cowbells in an uproar? They really don't make baseballs out of cowhide anymore, do they?

Has anyone seen a picture of one of the newest Mets, backup catcher and sometimes first baseman Jason Phillips? He's got a goatee and really thick glasses. Which makes him a dead ringer for WWE superstar Bubba Ray Dudley! Devon, get the tables!… So if Miami, Boston College and Syracuse actually move to the ACC as planned, any chance we can merge our league with The Big East? Assuming West Virginia stays in the conference, we could change the name of the league to The Full Mountaineer…

Speaking of West Virginia, I see that Kevin Shanley (who went to college there, and still has most of his teeth I might add, for those of you who aren't up on Full Monty owner trivia) still has Matt & The Hat in first place by a healthy margin and actually has managed to capture all but one-half of one point out of the available points in the pitching categories! Now I think that's got to be a league record, however I'm sure Neil's done something similar back in the days when his draft strategy was much like The Hat's, only it was all hitting and no pitching and not vice-versa. Then again we only had 8 categories in those days and as The Grumpy Old Man would say (no not Dennis. I'm talking about the Dana Carvey character from SNL), "We didn't have no fancy-schmancy stats like runs scored and strikeouts! Back in my day, we only had four categories, including things like broken bats and torn ACL's, and we liked it that way!"…

All this success has got to have the other Kevin real nervous as it's looking more and more like he's going to lose that side bet and have to wear a baseball jersey of The Hat's choosing to next season's draft. We've had plenty of e-mails going back and forth with suggestions so I've been nice enough to incorporate them all into this week's poll, plus I've added a few of my own as well. Be sure to cast your vote this week and perhaps I'll even post a picture of Kev "wearing" the winning jersey with next week's column! Ah, the wonders of digital photography and editing software…

This just in! I'm writing this column during the day at work (Shh! Don't tell my new boss!) and I've got an e-mail thread going on with some fellow owners about my choice of a band for this week's song parody. A certain French owner, who's also a big fan of "Les Chausettes Rouge", has informed me that the J. Geils band used to sing a song called "First I Look At The Purse". Perhaps we'll have to write another Yankees based song parody next week focusing on George Steinbrenner? But The Piano Man, Jim Kalach himself, has also pointed out that J. Geils revived the blues classic "Serves You Right To Suffer" and since J. Geils is a Boston band (with a lead singer from the Bronx by the way)…. Ah, it's so nice how music can bring us all together! Fred, Jim, thanks for the contributions…

Staying with the music scene, how about that American Idol final between Clay "Willie Mays" Aiken and Ruben "Tim" Studdard? I love the apparel Ruben wears with the "205" logo on it. He says it's the area code of his hometown and that the designer is some local guy he's helping to promote. I say FedEx one of those jerseys over to The Commish's Office so we can have Kevin Kelly model it for next draft day. While the area code of Manalapan, New Jersey isn't 205, that number is only about 10 pounds less than The Sniper's current playing weight…

And on that note, I think I'll also "take off" (it's a beauty way to go!) for the week myself. Yes, I do realize that I didn't write anything about Annika Sorenstam in this week's column. You see, I had a big list of topics teed up for this column and unfortunately, (Warning! Bad pun coming! "Danger Will Robinson"!, "beedeeep-beedeep-beedeep!". "Intruder alert, intruder alert, stop the intruder!"), she didn't make the cut… Happy belated Memorial Day to all, including the great BBQ-meister himself, Boog Powell, who played his games in Baltimore's Memorial Stadium, and who's jersey, by the way, would fit quite nicely around a certain league owner who likes to make side bets he can't win… 'til next week…