When asked about the possibility that his illness is related to steroid use, yankee slugger and gutless coformist Jason Giambi replied, "This is absolutely not related to steroids at all. That's all I can say about that."

Whoaaaa (former) big guy, is that really your answer? Care to try again? Here's a suggestion: "Steroids? What the hell are you talking about?" Or even, "I've never taken steroids." Or go all the way: "I'm not even gonna answer such a ridiculous question. Next."

The way he answered, he might as well have said, "This is absolutely not related to my steroid use at all."

You know why he couldn't answer the way I thought he should've? Because he's a guilty man. So guilty, he can't even tell a standard press-conference lie.

Note: 'gutless conformist' refers to the fact that when he signed with the yankees, he said, "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em."

Which makes the fact that he still doesn't have a ring that much sweeter.

In bostondirtdogs.com news: My boy over there in reliable-info-5%-of-the-time-land said after a recent Sox loss that "yankee fans, front office types, players, and especially Big Stein are simply laughing their asses off at this laughing-stock of a team right now."

All that talk about how if we concern ourselves with the yankees, we look stupid. And what's he worried about? Scatmuncher and yankee fans laughing at us. I'm only an armchair psychologist (thanks, once again, to Bill Hicks), but isn't worrying about someone laughing at you like the ultimate in insecurity? The whole caring-what-others-think about you thing? And it's "especially" Steinbrenner, to him. Why can't such a die-hard Sox fan admit his perfectly natural and correct hatred of the yanks? Hell, I don't even care if they laugh at us, and nobody hates them more than me. They've been laughing at me, to my face, for over a quarter-century. It's because they're insecure.

Magic number down to 60--good to see the Sox do what they're supposed to do--beat the Devil Rays by 10.