Author: YankTank

Kris Pollina lives and works in New York City as an advertising copywriter. She lives and dies by NY sports and is the first to admit she can be wildly irrational in defense of her teams. She spends too much time thinking of fantasy team names, too little time reading injury reports. She doesn't understand people who keep score at baseball games. She has more interest in the Kreb Cycle than she does in the NBA, tennis, golf, or anything that is limited to running around a track. She doesn't mind the NFL overtime rules, thinks hockey is wildly underrated, and hates the expression "step up to the plate." Most importantaly, she doesn't believe in wearing baseball hats with football logos on them. Football players wear helmets.

New York Mets

The Scorch Has Been Passed to a New Generation

Post author By YankTank
Post date October 4, 2007
9 Comments on The Scorch Has Been Passed to a New Generation

“How did you go bankrupt?”
“Two ways: gradually, and then suddenly.”
-Ernest Hemmingway, The Sun Also Rises

Thank you, Queens.

Thank you for doing the impossible.

Thank you for flooding the headlines and monopolizing the morning news.

Thank you for securing your own special spot in history and diluting ours.

Thank for liberating us from the stigma that has been emblazoned on our psyches since October 21, 2004.

And mostly, thank you for finally disencumbering us from the toxic ownership of “the biggest collapse in Major League Baseball history.”

Tags baseball, collapse, MLB, ny mets, ny yankees, playoffs

General Sports

A Friendly Game of Fantasy

"Baseball is almost the only orderly thing in a very unorderly world." -Bob Veeck, past MLB franchise owner

"I’ve come to the conclusion that the two most important things in life are good friends and a good bullpen." -Bob Lemon, HOF-er

No one needs two catchers on his fantasy team. And no one’s going to win his league if his entire team targets one type of stat, whether it’s ERA, SLG, BA… 22 players with identical strengths will never give you the versatility and power to dominate a team of carefully selected position players that all satisfy unique roles. So, if we religiously apply this seemingly common knowledge to our fantasy teams, why can’t we apply these principles when coordinating other areas of life? Like…our friends.

Tags baseball, fantasy, MLB

MLB General

The MLB Japanglicize Movement

Post author By YankTank
Post date May 5, 2007
2 Comments on The MLB Japanglicize Movement

Japanglicize v. (Juh-PANG-gluh-sahyz): to merge Japanese culture with that of English culture, ultimately enhancing both

I associate pasta with Sunday Night Football, hotdogs with baseball, Chinese food with rainy weather, and sushi with work. Those little white rice rolls, seaweed soup, and the green paste that masquerades as guacamole, conjure images of the suit-wearing, Blackberry-toting echelon of corporate America. Whenever a coworker suggests expensing lunch, I beg for Chipotle. But somehow I always get overruled and end up with an $8.95 lunch special on my desk (a "Bento Box," as it’s called), and a growling stomach for the rest of the day.

Tags baseball, japan, sushi

Boston Red Sox

Boston: Bean- Beer- and a Buffalo

Post author By YankTank
Post date April 26, 2007
10 Comments on Boston: Bean- Beer- and a Buffalo

“I have just returned from Boston. It’s the only thing to do if you find yourself up there.”
-Fred Allen, (1894-1957) comedian

I don’t eat New England clam chowder or Boston éclairs. I don’t wear the color red at all during baseball season. I weasel out of business trips that involve a Massachusetts destination. The city of Boston, to me, is no different than mint chocolate chip ice cream, margaritas, or “The Lord of the Rings.” I don’t care how universally popular they are: I’ve tried ’em, and I hate ’em.

Tags Boston Red Sox, fenway, ny yankees, road trips

New York Yankees

The Baseball Hangover

The only good thing to come out of the movie “Meet Joe Black” was a scene portraying a quick one-two punch of cars slamming into Brad Pitt. Right in succession. The only good thing to come out of this weekend was that I now have a reason to gratuitously reference this scene. That’s just the kind of few days it’s been.

Tags ny yankees

MLB General

"The Prom Queen isn’t even that pretty": Tiara Envy in the MLB

Post author By YankTank
Post date September 14, 2006
8 Comments on "The Prom Queen isn’t even that pretty": Tiara Envy in the MLB

Chicks can typically be generalized into a few different categories: unassailably good-looking, ugly, average, and–by far, the worst–girls who were told, at one point in their lives, that they were hot. They’re the real problematic species: the girl who, in her sophomore year of college, went to a frat house and some drunk dude who’s indiscriminately screaming the lyrics to an O.A.R. song and wearing a “Cherry is my favorite flavor” t-shirt, came up to her and slurred, “Damn, you have a body like karate!”

MLB General

Trading Up is Hard to Do

My last boyfriend didn’t know what a bunt was. He thought it was some kind of pastry sold at Yankee Stadium. I would dangle baseball-relationship metaphors above his head, and he would just roll his eyes and return his attention back to playing Halo 2. Which is probably why warning him the trade deadline was coming up on his heels didn’t sound any foreboding bells. So when the logistics of dating a man who defined a grand slam as “a homerun, sort of, but better?” became more frustrating than watching A-Rod bat, I readjusted my Fantasy Team, moving my now ex from my starting rotation to waiver wires.

General Sports

A Real American Classic: A Father’s Day Tribute

Post author By YankTank
Post date June 16, 2005
6 Comments on A Real American Classic: A Father’s Day Tribute

“Never go down looking.”

I only applied to one school, only wrote one college essay, waxed philosophical on only one “best advice I ever received” topic. I’m 24-years old, and now I look upon most baseball metaphors with a disdain usually reserved for ESPN writers. But I still hold my father’s sound wisdom, his insistence that I never let a fastball go by without swinging, as one of the finest gems of wisdom anyone has ever instilled into me.

New York Yankees

MAY DAY

Post author By YankTank
Post date May 8, 2005
1 Comment on MAY DAY

The Yankees are a mess.

This news, of course, is about as breaking as Britney’s bun in the oven. But what IS stop-the-presses noteworthy is that the fans- who have thusfar been desperately clinging to a battle cry of “The season’s young!”- are beginning to slowly and listlessly accept this immobilizing truth. That our team, our revered immortal pinstripes, the apple of the eye of the Big Apple, the essence of my being and the blood running through my veins…is a mess.

General Sports

Steroids vs. Gambling: The Deadlier Sin

Post author By YankTank
Post date April 29, 2005
4 Comments on Steroids vs. Gambling: The Deadlier Sin

“In gambling, the many must lose so that the few may win.” -George Bernard Shaw

I once asked a tech support guy in the Apple Store what the over/under line was on how long it would take to fix my ibook charger, and if I could arrange a payment plan based on the money line. There’s more money on my Foxwoods Casino card than there is in my checking account. And I may or may not have put point spreads on Connect Four games. (It can be done.)