* Bits and pieces: World Championship edition

• Dropped by the local Barnes and Noble at lunch today. Almost shocked to see only one “quicky” publication about the Yankees’ latest championship. The New York Post published The Best, a paperback volume. I never liked this type of publication. It seems like a money grab since the stuff for the most part is just culled from the newspaper archives. [Update: USA Today and Sports Illustrated are among a few others that have published similar publications.]
• There have been numerous references to the Yankees in places where you might not expect to see them. The Wall Street Journal posted this article about “Japanese Baseball’s Best Day Ever.” I always get a kick when the sports pages refer to an athlete as “Mr.” So bloody polite. Meanwhile, former George W. Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer contributed this “horns of a dilemma” piece for Sunday’s Week in Review section. (Somewhere in the recesses of my mind I faintly recall an economic indicator that predicts the stock market goes one way if an American League team wins the World Series and the other if its a National League team, but I forget which is which. A little help?)
• In the heat of the celebration on Friday, The Brian Lehrer Show featured this segment on the Yankees and the Series MVP, Hideki Matsui. “The ticker tape parade for the Bronx Bombers is today, and the star of the show is World Series MVP Hideki Matsui, who exemplifies a particular brand of baseball that’s different from the rest of his team. WNYC’s own baseball fanatic (and softball team co-captain) Rex Doane with Andrew Jenks, director and producer of the documentary “The Zen of Bobby V,” talk about the differences between the American and Japanese baseball.”

Tagged as: Hideki Matsui, New York Times, New York Yankees, Wall Street Journal