I HATE LEBRON JAMES MORE THAN THE BOSTON RED SOX

LEBRON JAMES. YOU ARE NOW PUBLIC ENEMY NUMBER ONE. BEYOND KEVIN YOUKILUS. BEYOND DUSTIN PEDROIA. BEYOND REGGIE MILLER, TOM BRADY, ALL OF THEM. YOU SUCK.

For you non basketball people, let me put how this feels for a Knicks fan in baseball terms. Joe Mauer is a free agent. He's a hometown boy, strongly considering resigning with the Twinkies. But, the Yankees, Angels, Phillies, Cubs and Marlins are also in the running. So, up and down, up and down. He decides to announce on live television. The day before the announcement, the Yankees are the favorites. All the fans are very excited. Overjoyed persay. People still think that the Twins are in the running. So, the announcement rolls around and BAM! He signs with the Florida Marlins. Why?

Sure, we got Amar'e. But, using the previous scenario, thats like getting Josh Hamilton. Sure, he's good, but he's not Joe Mauer. Amar'e is no Lebron James.

Lebron, we've been through enough. It's been 10 years of misery. We survived Isiah. We survived Renaldo Balkman. We deserved you. Every other team has done well in the last decade. Except us. The Heat won a championship. The Nyets made the finals. Your Cavs made the finals. The Bulls have made the playoffs. Ok. The Clippers haven't been so hot either. But Isiah makes up for that. You made a bad decision.

This whole Heat thing? Not gonna work. As tweeter @YankeeMegInPHL stated ""Bosh, you never pass to me. Wade, make him pass to me!!!! PASS IT TO ME!!!!!" - LeBron" Thats how it's gonna end up. It just can't work. The day the Knicks beat them I will laugh. I will sing. I will cry.

Let me say this. I am a Knicks fan. I am down with the Orange and the Blue. I will not give up. Lebron James 2010: Change We CAN'T Believe In. However, Carmelo Anthony 2011: Change we CAN Believe in.

This is a Yankees blog. So here's a bit of Yankee analysis:

We just threw out Ichiro. Hasn't happened in years. So suck it.

Swisharoo made the All-Star team! YESSIREE! SWISH, if you're reading this, I love you.

Liz and I mailed a bunch of letters looking for signed stuff to raffle off. Letters to Mo, Po, Andy, CC, Gardy, Cervelli, Paul O'Neill, Bernie, Jeter, and Swisho. Who do we get stuff from? BTW: all the money from the raffle goes to the Donna M. Crandall foundation, a great local organization. Wanna donate? Email us @ back2backbelly2belly@gmail.com.

Jeter, A-Rod, Mo, Cano, Pettite and Carsten Charles to the ASG. Biggest Snub: AJ. He's soooooooo good. Nah. For real: Joey Votto. Glad he got in on final vote.

Player of the month (June): Cano. Winner. Great month. Honorable mentions: CC, Tex, A-Rod, Gardy

Goat of the Month (June): AJ. Tankin'. Sinkin' like a rock. Honorable Mention: Dave Eiland

I love Brett Gardiner. He's a class act.

How are we actually in first?

Ok. Here's a scavenger hunt for y'all. Open up your newspaper to the Sports Section. Find the baseball standings. What team is in first place in the American League East? The New York Yankees. While I am truly overjoyed by this, I have to wonder how this happened.

Have you watched this team lately? We've been playing like garbage, similar to how North Korea looked against Portugal. I see two key reasons as to why we are in first:

First off, Andy Pettite and Phil Hughes have been indomitable lions this year. They have a combined 18 wins and 3 losses. Hughes is third in ESPN's Cy Young Tracker (behind Price and Bucholtz). Pettite is 4th. Both these pitchers are rolling. They're the Super Eagles of this squad.

Second, Robbie Cano. Don't Ya Know? Cano is on a tear this season. His BA is about .25 points higher than anybody in the majors. First in the AL in hits, second in the Majors to Martin Prado on Atlanta. He's driving the car known as the Yankee offense right now. He's batting like the Celestial Blue Sky.

See...we really shouldn't be in first place. I'm a huge Yankee fan, but come on:

We have AJ. He's tanking fast. Last six starts? 2-4, 6.55 ERA, a WHIP over 1.5, and not too statistically, he can't get people out on two outs. We've got nothing on the top. Jeter is struggling, Tex started slow, but hopefully will get up soon and A-Rod just isn't crushing it this season. We need these guys to get going soon.

We're not going be in first for long without a third of our line up hitting and a two fifths of our rotation pitching like garbage. Especially since we have the Red Sox Fury and the Bafana of the Rays slowly gaining on us.

World Cup Contest:

I will give a prize to the first person who can name all the World Cup References in this post. In order to win, you must comment the references on this post. There are 5 of them.

Other notes:

Vote Nick Swisher to the All-Star team. He needs all the support he can get. Vote here early and often.

AJ looked like crap yesterday. No two ways of saying it.

GO TEAM USA TOMORROW IN THEIR GAME.

The dreaded injury bug

We caught it my friends. And we just can't catch a break now. At this point, almost every player in our starting 9 (DH, not pitcher) has gone down. With the exception of Derek, Robbie and Gardy, everybody has gone down. The latest to fall is A-Rod, but a much more important loss to the team is Georgie.

Jorge Posada went down on May 17th against the Twinkies. He broke his foot after fouling a ball off of it. He was projected to miss 3-4 weeks.

Posada (Po for short) is the most crucial player the Yankees have on their team. He's the field general for the Yanks. Posada, even though he missed about 15 games this season, is still having a great season by his standards. His OBP is about .22 higher than his career average, and his BA is about the same. His slugging is up big time this year compared to his average (.577 to .482). Its incredible to see such numbers for an older player like Po.

I'd go as far as saying he is the reason for the Yankees success in the last decade. Posada leads the team in a major intangible: spirit. He's always supporting the team. He's a true team man. He may not be a hall of famer. He'll get his number retired.

I recently read that Posada will be named "Father of the Year" by the Father's Day Council. Good for him. He deserves it. His son has been diagnosed with craniosynostosis, a serious medical condition. Posada does everything in his power to help his son. He's a great person and deserves this award more than anyone.

It's absolutely necessary that Po gets back soon. He may not have the numbers like A-Rod, the paycheck of Tex or the notoriety of Jeter, but he is just as important as these players. So Jorge, if you ever read this, get well soon. I know you're playing, but get to full strength. You're a true leader, on and off the field for this team.

A shoutout to our new favorite Tweeter-@YankeeMegInPHL. She got us 30 followers tonight. It's really appreciated.

Only 100 to go!

Thats right folks. We have a mere 100 games left to this season. Following today's win against the Astros, the Yankees stand at 39-23, an excellent 16 games over .500. So, here is the report card for Yankee Players as of the 38 percent of the season mark. In no particular order

Robbie Cano-A. Cano is on fire this season, and shows no signs of slowing down. He's batting .373 with an OBP of .417. He's slugging .610. He leads the Yanks in OBP (1.027), so he's having a great year. On the fielding front, he hasn't made nearly as many bonehead plays in the field as he has in past years.

Derek Jeter-B. A subpar start for Jeter, but that's ok. He tends to come on later on anyways. I'm not too concerned about Jeter. He's only about .1 points below .300 batting and his OBP is respectable (.343). He looked strong today with 2 home runs against the 'Stros.

Mark Teixeira- D-. Tex has clearly struggled. About a month ago, we blamed it on April. May wasn't much better. Mark is last among the Yankee starters in batting average. However, he's 4th on the squad in RBIs and 3rd in home runs. It's just the lack of singles and doubles thats keeping him down. I foresee a down year for Mark, but he should still improve by the end of the year.

Carsten Charles Sabathia- B-. Sabathia has looked brilliant in his wins this year, especially in his near no hitter against Tampa Bay. However, it's the losses that's dragging Carsten Charles down. 4th among the starters in ERA, Sabathia just isn't shutting down opponants like the way he was last year. Expect a rebound soon from CC.

Andy Pettite- A. A Cy Young-esque year for the Southern Man . He's wheelin' and dealin'. He's leading the Yankees with 8 wins. He leads the starters in ERA (2.46) and BB/9 (2.5). Pettite looks poised to win a Cy Young this season, but in order to do so, he'll have to beat out teammate...

Phil Hughes-A. Cy Young-esque year for the young gun. If Pettite doesn't lead the starters in a category, Hughes does. This is the sort of pitcher the Yankees have been waiting for from Hughes. Have a pair of teammates ever been this dominate? One has to look back to the dreaded 2001 Diamondbacks with Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson.

And last, but not least

Joba Chamberlain-D. Joba has done horrible this season. He is 1-3 on the season (from the bullpen) with an ERA of 4.94. Joba seems to be struggling to get anyone out. As of late, he's brought his grade up from the depths of hell, but he needs to give up less runs. His strikeout number is excellent and his low walks make him seem better. But he needs to turn around quickly in order to be the dominant pitcher he has the potential to be.

Let's go on a badenture through the Blogosphere

As I just said to my Yankee copanaera Liz, let's take a badenture through the world of Sports Blogging. As Ron Burgandy said, "I'm kind of a big deal". Well, not really. I just survived my Junior Year in high school. I'm still convinced that the only way I actually survived Spanish was because my teacher loves the Yankees. On November 5th, he and I had a "fiesta"in class.

I love the Yankees. I'm a man, so I try not to cry. But when we won in November, I cried. Broke down in tears while on the phone with my sister. I was 7 when we won in 2000. Not really a fan, I remember only this from the series. I never thought we would win again, but we did.

The Yankees are my first, my only and my true love. Sure, I like other sports. I'm a Knicks, Giants and Rangers fan. But there's always been something about the Yankees. Maybe it was the first major league home run I saw (John Van Der Wall, by the way) or maybe it was just the first view of the grass at the Stadium. Maybe it was the kid in the net against Chicago. Or maybe it's just hearing John and Suzyn or Michael, Kenny, Al and Flash calling the game. I love the game and I love this team.

I'm a Posada guy. He's a natural, among the best catchers ever. I like Jeter too. He's never said a mean thing about anyone, a real class act. I like Andy. Man, he can pitch. Robbie, Gardy, Swish, Tex, Mo; All great players, love 'em all.

Two players are clearly missing from that list. A-Rod and Joba. They're both completely overrated. I was at the Cleveland game a couple of weeks ago. We had a lead and Joba comes in. I look to my dad and say "10 bucks we're losing after he's done". Guess who walked out of the Stadium with 10 dollars more than he started with? A-Rod is completely annoying. He thinks he's hot stuff. But really, no. He's nothing more than a pretty boy with some decent strength and a weak groin.

I hate the Sox. Pedroia is terrible. He's a niche player who can only play in Fenway. Papelbon is a Mariano wannabe. He'd be lucky to be half the man that Mo is. Beckett requires a shave NOW. He looks like a complete scumbag. Playing for the Evil Empire doesn't help his image either. But the worst player on the Red Sux? David "Big Papi" Ortiz. He's a horrible, horrible player. He's fat, can't field, can't run and can't hit (ever since he quit the 'roids)

So, I look forward to writing sports for all of you. It's a hobby of mine. I hope all y'all enjoy this. I know I will!