Red Sox Fans Can't Handle the Truth; Budd Schulberg, 1914-2009

Another nice game in Toronto, eh? Yanks 8, Jays 4.

Mets bounced back nicely, beating the Cards 9-0 at Pity Field.

Okay, enough of that. The Scum are coming in, for a series that will most likely determine the course of the remainder of the AL East race.

I notice ESPN "SportsGuy" Bill Simmons has barely mentioned David Ortiz getting busted for steroids.

Let me put this in language he might understand. Paraphrased from real-life Yankee Fan -- even if he is also a Laker fan -- Manasquan High School, down the Jersey Shore, Class of 1955... Jack Nicholson. Talking to Glen Ridge High School, Class of 1980, Tom Cruise -- and I don't know any of the teams he roots for.

"Did you rat out David Ortiz for steroids?"

(Not in real life. I wish I had had the chance.)

You want answers?

"I think I'm entitled!"

You want answers?

"I want the truth!"

You can't handle the truth!

Son, we live in a world that has walls. One of them is a big green wall in that dump you call a ballpark. And those walls need to be guarded by men with integrity. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Commissioner Selig? You, Senator Mitchell?

I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Ortiz and curse the Yankees. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: That Ortiz's exposure as a no-good cheating bum, while tragic, exposes you Red Sox fans as equal, probably even greater, frauds. And that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, extols the greatest franchise in the history of sports on this planet.

You don't want the truth! Because, deep down, in places you don't talk about at parties, you see the Yankees hitting baseballs off that wall. You see the Yankees hitting baseballs over that wall.

We use words like "Pride. Tradition. Mystique." We use them as the backbone of a life trying to defend something. You use them as a punchline.

I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the glory of the baseball team I root for, and then questions the manner in which they provide that glory. I would rather you just said, "I'm sorry, we stole the Pennants and World Series of 2004 and 2007," and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest that you pick up a pen, or a computer keyboard, and write a confession.

Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.

"Did you rat out Big Papi?"

Not in real life, you dumb Chowdahead bastard...

"Did you rat out Big Papi?"

You're goddamned right I did!!!!

*

Okay, enough of me playing games. Let's get on with the real games.

As they say in the kinds of rivalries that only Yanks-Sox truly resembles in North American professional sports...

Joe Girardi's Pinstriped Army: WE HATE RED SOX!
Joe Girardi's Pinstriped Army: WE HATE RED SOX!
Joe Girardi's Pinstriped Army: WE HATE RED SOX!
Joe Girardi's Pinstriped Army: WE HATE RED SOX!
Joe Girardi's Pinstriped Army: WE HATE RED SOX!
What do you think of Red Sox? "SHIT!"
What do you think of shit? "RED SOX!"
Thank you! "THAT'S ALL RIGHT!"

*

I mentioned a movie earlier. Speaking of movies and sports, Budd Schulberg died yesterday.

Seymour Wilson Schulberg was born on March 27, 1914 in Manhattan, the son of one film producer, B.P. Schulberg, and the nephew of another, Sam Jaffe. He served in the OSS, the forerunner of the CIA, during World War II, and was assigned to gather evidence of war crimes at the liberated concentration camps. His activities included arresting German filmmaker Leni Reifenstahl, who knew many in the Nazi high command, and having her identify war criminals on film footage captured by Allied troops.

He then went into the family business. His novel What Makes Sammy Run? was adapted into a film, and became one of Hollywood's not-so-pleasant looks at itself. He wrote They Harder They Fall, which exposed the seamy underside of boxing, and became Humphrey Bogart's last film. His 1954 screenplay for On the Waterfront, starring Marlon Brando as a man whose boxing and dockworking careers get curtailed by organized crime, won him an Academy Award. In 1957, he wrote the screenplay for A Face in the Crowd, starring a young Andy Griffith as a country boy who becomes famous on television but lets his fame and his personal life get out of control. (MSNBC host Keith Olbermann has likened Glenn Beck to Griffith's character, Larry "Lonesome" Rhoades.)

Schulberg wrote non-fiction boxing, too, for Sports Illustrated. His overall contributions to the literature of the sport won him elected to the Boxing Hall of Fame.

In 1965, after a devastating riot had ripped apart the fabric of the Watts section of Los Angeles, Schulberg formed the Watts Writers Workshop in an attempt to ease frustrations and bring artistic training to the economically impoverished district.

He married 4 times, and had 4 children, 1 of whom was killed while serving in Vietnam. Budd Schulberg died yesterday at his home in Quogue, on Long Island. He was 95 years old, and, until yesterday, a true living legend.

UPDATE: He was buried at Westhampton Cemetery in Westhampton, Long Island, New York.