A small, mean thing to wish for

As the Royal Nation* collectively grinds their teeth in anticipation of Something Bad happening against the New York Yankees (an optimistic take is the Royals getting swept...but just not getting swept that badly), besides the obvious hope that Kansas City comports themselves well out there on the field, I have a little side hope:

Keep Derek Jeter from doing anything important.

I freely admit I hate the Yankees and hate Jeter...but only in the sports sense. In the real-life sense, the Yankees are a fine organization (even if the deck is stacked in their favor every year) and Jeter is a great player (even if his career is magnified tenfold simply because of where he plays).

But I've been following the Jeter saga this season -- at least, if by "following" I mean that I read the headlines, and if there's a Jeter story, I avoid it. When I saw he hit two home runs on Sunday, I cringed, having absolutely no doubt what would happen...it would be a top story, major headline, etc., and of course it was.

Here's the issues: 1) it mattered not one whit whatsoever to the game. The Yankees won by 7 runs, and Jeter hit two solo shots, 2) in that context, since the Yankees would have won anyway, it didn't affect the standings -- and the Yankees weren't even playing the Tampa Rays or the Boston Red Sox to thicken the plot, it was the slumping Texas Rangers.

None of this is to say that a resurgent Jeter wouldn't be a story worth telling. But since every single game of his is overanalyzed, the rest of us that aren't Yankees fans can't even have a trend develop before getting hit with what Jeter did in the last game.

• Did he hit more groundballs? Did he hit flyballs? Were they well-struck?
• Did he look frustrated? Did he look happy? Was he stoic? Did that twitch of his upper lip indicate impatience?
• What does Hal Steinbrenner think? Okay, today is Wednesday, so what did he think on Tuesday? What will he think tomorrow?
• What effect does Jeter's Gatorade drinking habits have on his swing? Is his defense slipping because of the direction he cuts his toenails?

I've just had it up to here, and of course I'm now exacerbating the problem by writing to the 30 or 40 of you that will read this post.

Writing on Jeter isn't a problem...it's expected, especially when ESPN forces all things New York down our throat on a daily basis with the added content from their "city" satellite sites (ESPN New York) that for some reason needs to be featured on their main baseball page.

But please, for the love of Pete, wait until a trend happens before reporting. If Jeter had that great game, then went on to torch the Royals over this 3-game series...okay, you've got a story. Run it.

I must admit, though, for purely selfish reasons, I hope Jeter has an 0-fer series and forces the media (read: ESPN) to stop the presses on all the pre-written Jeter stories they want to run in anticipation of his resurgence. Hopefully the inevitable is delayed for a few more days.

*first and last time I will use any expression referring to a fanbase as something "nation". I hate it, and was just being sarcastic. It's all types of overused -- not sure exactly what team started it, although I suspect it was the Oakland Raiders. Let them keep it. It's their word.