August Update/Millar Factor

While I had some brief fun with Ortiz last week, including adamantly booing him during his six at-bats I saw while at the Yankees game last Thursday (his first game in the Bronx since the Times article came out), there's so much more to talk about. I, unlike the Boston media, was more interested in how dominating the Bombers were over the four-game series than what Papi had to say in his press conference Saturday.

Let me just say that I am now more than ever looking forward to another sports talk radio station in Boston. If I have to hear another moronic caller on WEEI go on about how Ortiz probably never knowingly took as much as a Red Bull to help him get up to the Majors, I might go crazy. I'm sorry Big O but you are and idiot if you think that Ortiz knew any less about what he was taking than A-Rod, so stop acting like it. You are an embarrassment to sports radio.

The real issue in Boston is that there is no Kevin Millar. That is to say that there is no personality in the clubhouse. Maybe it was just the fact that they were held scoreless for 31 consecutive innings, but the visiting dugout at new Yankee Stadium this weekend looked pretty abysmal compared to years when the Sox even thought they had a chance. That's where the Kevin Millar factor steps in.

In '04, Millar's antics, which I admittedly criticized over and over again, really showed how much his team liked what they were doing. As much as I'm not the ideal employee example at the moment, I think it's safe to say that when you like what you're doing you do your best work. In '07, when the Sox won their second Series of the decade, Manny Ramirez's comic relief role was as big if not bigger than his bat. He was the Millar for the clubhouse that year.

One thing the Yankees have shown us over the past few years is that you can have the best players in the league, but without a Millar, you won't win a ring. Enter Nick Swisher. (This could have gone to A.J. with his shaving cream pies, but he's too much of a stud on the mound.) Swisher was never supposed to be an everyday player, but with his increased playing time as a result of injuries to Gardner and Nady, his personality has had a lot more time to shine. His Swish-hawk, his tweets, and his occasional home runs have given the Yankees the life they've been lacking for too long.

As I was correct about the August Sox slump in my previous post, let's see if I can go 2 for 2 on the Yanks going back where they belong, back to the World Series, and all because of the Kevin Millar factor (and maybe with some help from acquisitions of Sabathia, Burnett, and Texiera).