Girardi is new Yankee manager

Baseball Betting Lines

10/30/2007 - Bronx, NY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Joe Girardi became the manager of the New York Yankees on Tuesday, as the team signed him to a three-year contract.

Reports indicate Girardi will earn more than $2 million per season.

Girardi was one of just three candidates to interview for the post, which opened when Joe Torre turned down a one-year deal for a 13th season at the helm earlier this month.

Former Yankee star Don Mattingly was considered the favorite, but one year as the club's bench coach under Torre after three years as the club's hitting instructor apparently didn't merit enough consideration. Tony Pena, the team's first base coach under Torre the past two seasons and a former manager of the year with Kansas City, was the other candidate interviewed.

Girardi doesn't have much managerial experience, having spent just the 2006 season guiding the Florida Marlins after serving one year as a bench coach for Torre.

Despite a low payroll and roster of young and inexperienced talent, Girardi kept the Marlins in the National League wild card hunt in early September and finished the year with a record of 78-84. He also earned the National League's Manager of the Year award, but reportedly clashed with team management and was fired.

After spending this past season as a broadcaster, Girardi inherits a team that has more than a few questions heading into the offseason on the heels of a third straight first-round playoff loss.

The Yankees will have to make decisions on free agents Jorge Posada, Girardi's successor as Yankee catcher, and Mariano Rivera, the future Hall of Fame closer. Veteran lefty Andy Pettitte, a battery mate of Girardi's in the late 1990s, must also make a decision on whether he wants to return.

Of course, the biggest question concerns who will replace likely MVP Alex Rodriguez at third base. The superstar slugger decided to opt out of his contract and the Yankees have steadfastly stated that they will not pursue the All-Star in free agency.

Girardi, who just turned 43 years old earlier this month, spent 15 seasons as a catcher in the big leagues and won three World Series titles in four years with the Yankees from 1996-99.

The 43-year-old Girardi becomes the 17th Yankees manager to have played for the club and the fourth former Yankees catcher to skipper the team, joining Bill Dickey, Ralph Houk and Yogi Berra. He is the third-youngest manager currently in the majors, behind the Washington Nationals' Manny Acta (38) and the Cleveland Indians' Eric Wedge (39).

The team with the highest payroll in the majors over the last few years hasn't fared well in the playoffs. The Yankees blew a 3-0 lead in the ALCS against Boston in 2004 and were beaten in the 2005 ALDS by Anaheim. Last year, the Yankees were eliminated in four games by Detroit in the first round, and this year lost to Cleveland in the ALDS.

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FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.