I think I found my mojo, men. Let's see what sort of shit BM's up to these days:

Several weeks ago, I annoyed some New York Yankees faithful by speculating that Jose Reyes and David Wright of the New York Mets might have the best left side of the infield in baseball in four or five years, taking over that distinction from future Hall of Famers Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez of the Yankees. It might happen much sooner than I thought.

BM is about to present a wealth of weak 2006 data to support his claim, but really, is half a year long enough to support this type of decision? Does anyone really think ARod will slug only .487 the whole year? Does anyone realize Derek Jeter's having a freaking good year, better than Jose Reyes' media-whoring performance? Remember when Jose Lima won 20 games -- yeah, things happen in the short term that end up being laughed at long term.

That being said, it's not that crazy to think the Mets' duo is as valuable as the Yankees', if only because of David Wright. If I had the choice of any of these four players for the next five years, hell, even three years, I'd go with David Wright -- that guy's a stud.

Jeter and Rodriguez — .308 batting average (166-for-539), 27 doubles, 3 triples, 20 home runs, 98 RBI, 259 total bases, 85 walks, 114 strikeouts, 22 stolen bases in 27 attempts, 17 errors.

Reyes and Wright — .318 batting average (196-for-617), 38 doubles, 13 triples, 26 HRs, 100 RBI, 338 total bases, 61 walks, 95 strikeouts, 45 stolen bases in 55 attempts, 16 errors.

Ow, my head hurts. Including all those numbers is retarded, but if you're going to do it, BM, how about a chart? Here's my version, with useful numbers and helpful formatting:

Name VORP VORPr FRAA
Jeter 34.7 .48 -5
ARod 21.3 .29 0
Reyes 31.9 .40 +6
Wright 39.7 .53 -7

VORP = runs above replacement relative to position
VORPr = per game rate
FRAA = fielding runs relative to positional average

It will be an upset if an American golfer wins this week's U.S. Women's Open, but recent history at least gives the U.S. players a chance. Since the start of the 2001 season, foreign players have won 19 of the 22 LPGA majors, including every Kraft Nabisco Championship, McDonald's Championship and British Open. But Americans managed to win three of the five U.S. Opens (Juli Inkster in 2002, Hilary Lunke in 2003 and Meg Mallon in 2004).

If I've learned anything from reading BM over the past two months, it's that foreign golfers (especially Koreans) dominate women's golf. I feel so informed.

Steve Finley and Reggie Sanders recently became the fifth and sixth members of baseball's exclusive 300-300 Club (at least 300 home runs and at least 300 stolen bases for their careers). The feat requires a combination of power, speed and longevity. But it hasn't been an automatic ticket to the Hall of Fame.

Instead of proceeding to lay out the obvious argument why it's not an automatic ticket (SBs mean shit and 300 HRs is a low cutoff point for the Hall), BM waxes nostalgic about two players he watched here in Rochester that he thought would be 300/300 performers. Neither made it.

Add Milwaukee's Carlos Lee to the list of outfielders the Yankees probably could have for pitching prospect Philip Hughes. If I were running a team with the money the Yankees have, I'd trade a young pitcher for a quality hitter for the stretch run without hesitation.

Why are we now adding Lee's name to that list? Because he's been on a tear? Wouldn't his increased performance make it less likely the Yankees could acquire him for their scrub pitching prospect? Perhaps BM meant to write "Add Milwaukee's Carlos Lee to the list of outfielders the Yankees will try to finagle away from another team because even they can recognize that hitting 25 HRs before the All-Star break is a good thing."

Sorry, Swiss soccer fans, but any team that goes 0-for-3 in a penalty shootout to settle a 0-0 draw doesn't deserve to advance in the World Cup or any other cup.

That's what you have to say about the World Cup? Screw that. How about the fact that the Ukraine/Switzerland was an awful game with both teams playing not to lose. How about commentary on the England match? How about an explanation why all the teams seem to be playing similar styles of soccer which comes across as slow, uncreative, and whiney? Or maybe your real idea was stolen by an economics geek: Freakonomics link.