Jay Mariotti

NEW YORK -- It felt like a recruiting trip, the one he never had when he bypassed college for the NBA. Only this process involved the world's most glamorous arena, a 10-story Nike billboard out on Seventh Avenue and a hip-hop mogul like no other, ready to tell LeBron James that New York is a "concrete jungle where dreams are made of ... there's nothing you can't do.'' Every time James plays Madison Square Garden, with rapper homeboy Jay-Z sitting in the front row with other celebrities, the scene transcends sports and becomes an entertainment blowout.

NEW YORK -- He has found peace to purge his demons, love when all he had was Madonna and madams and, most importantly, truth when his past was so fake and sleazy. No matter what we once thought of Alex Rodriguez, it's difficult to hold a grudge when he has achieved joy and reward the right way. In fact, allow me to propose the ultimate happy ending, something unimaginable only a few months ago but perhaps attainable if he continues to be a model citizen, a fine teammate, a grounded human being and the greatest ballplayer alive.

That would be a place in Cooperstown, home of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

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NEW YORK -- There is something arrogantly American about it, I know. The $210-million Yankees have won a World Series amid a destructive recession, doing it for Boss George Steinbrenner in the first season of their $1.5-billion edifice of excess, where a $275-million lightning rod just happened to overcome a steroids crisis and finally deliver the postseason we've long demanded. None of those elements are universally endearing to the masses, yet all converged on a festive, rocking November night when Championship No. 27 wasn't welcomed by the pinstripe haters as much as force-fed into them like skunk oil.

Look, President Obama might say, "This is corporate America at its bloated, ignorant worst. The White Sox have a better business plan."

"We're supposed to win," said Yankees manager, Joe Girardi. "We know that every day we come to work."

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PHILADELPHIA -- This is where they booed Santa Claus but gave a standing ovation to a dog killer named Michael Vick. This is where they taunted Mike Schmidt, maybe the best third baseman ever. This is where Donovan McNabb is viewed as an emotional dishrag, where MIchael Irvin was cheered when he lay motionless on the field, where I saw a woman in an UTLEY jersey tell a guy to "stop being a (p----)," where men are men unless someone wonders otherwise, which means your life is screwed.

It is in this Yuengling-and-cheesesteak culture that Cole Hamels, a California pretty boy not blessed with the Bruno/Rocco/Angelo first name like many Philly tough guys, decided to commit parochial suicide. Shelled again in Game 3 of the World Series, he emotionally unraveled afterward, suggesting very strongly that he wanted his season to end right then and there. In any town, such an acknowledgment would be viewed as a breach of cowardice. In Philly, where the home team trailed only 2-1 at the time, Hamels is being called a sulker, quitter, crybaby, wimp and (p----) of the worst ilk.

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PHILADELPHIA -- They have nothing in common but history. Chase Utley is a southern California dude with gel in his hair who speaks in cliches and has all the pizzazz of a resin bag. Reggie Jackson was the portrait of flamboyance, the straw that stirred the drink, the problem child who jarred the equilibrium. But today, they are joined in baseball lore by the five home runs each hit in a single World Series, with Utley's latest two shots propelling the Phillies to an 8-6 victory in Game 5 and renewed life for a repeat title.

"It's pretty cool. It's pretty surreal," Utley said with typical nonchalance. "I'm glad we got the win. It was a do-or-die game."

GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Shame on them for booing him, mocking him, staging funerals for him, wearing flip-flops and eating waffle fries to ridicule him. The hostility toward Brett Favre was an embarrassment to a community that never looked smaller, an affront to the idea that the publicly owned Packers and their fans form a unique family bond amid the greed and sleaze of 21st-century sports. If the Cheeseheads truly had perspective, they would have stood and applauded the man whose swaggering presence defined a franchise and state for 16 years, and then they'd have rooted like hell for their boys to beat the old dude and the despised Minnesota Vikings.

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PHILADELPHIA -- This is why sports has instant replay, Bud Selig: to get the call right, to make sure history isn't tainted by blown decisions, to remove the human element when the human being is conspicuously wrong. I'm not sure the Yankees would have won Game 3 of the World Series if Major League Baseball didn't review home-run calls.

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NEW YORK -- He didn't want to relinquish the ball, not with the fans ready to bombard him, not when they were preparing a final triumphant round of "Who's Your Daddy!" chants. But it was time for Pedro Martinez to depart nonetheless, perhaps forever from a stage that is 110 streets north of midtown Manhattan but always has felt like pure Broadway every time he has performed there.

Thursday night at Yankee Stadium was no exception. Nicked by the home team for three runs in six-plus innings, on a night when the Phillies had few answers for the vicious breaking stuff of A.J. Burnett and a two-inning dose of Mariano Rivera, Martinez handed the ball to manager Charlie Manuel, absorbed the rude serenade as he left the mound, pointed to his father in the sky and then, as he neared the visitors' dugout, broke into a grin that had to make you laugh even if you were a Philadelphia fan sensing defeat.

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NEW YORK -- Ever seen a crowd in this city so quiet, so wet, so stupefied? This was to have been the beginning of another pinstripe coronation, the first in a series of Win One For The Boss vignettes in the House That Ruthlessness Built. Instead, all the puffy hubris was silenced on a rainy, windy Wednesday night by Cliff Lee, who began the year in woeful Cleveland and may end it in a pitching pantheon.

It wouldn't be wise to dismiss the Phillies as unworthy of these Yankees and this World Series backdrop. With Lee outdueling his best pal in baseball, CC Sabathia, consider Game 1 a firm reminder that the Phillies are the defending champions and not the least bit intimidated by the mammoth city to the north, a Taj Mahal ballpark in the Bronx and the massive payroll and talent of the Yankees. We winced when Jimmy Rollins, the mouthy leadoff man, boosted Jay Leno's sickly ratings when he went on the show and forecast another Philadelphia championship. "Of course, we're going to win," he chirped. "If we're nice, we'll let it go six, but I'm thinking five -- close it out at home."

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CLEVELAND -- He always has a rapper's catchphrase for everything and everyone, primarily himself. And while Shaquille O'Neal really should adopt The Big Hypothermia -- an ode to a bone-chilled, unemployment-scarred town that couldn't be farther from Hollywood if it were on Uranus -- it's typical that he would produce a more creative, applicable nickname.

"I'm the Big Witness Protection Program," he said, playing off the Nike ad extravaganza for LeBron James. "I've come here to protect the King."

Works for me. Given their collective magnitude in pop culture, it's hard to fathom that Shaq, maybe the greatest entertainer ever known to sports, has arrived in middle-market Ohio to join hands with James, who soon will push aside old man Tiger Woods as the most prominent athlete in the land, if not the world. But this is the unusual bond that happens when the Cavaliers feel extreme urgency to win an NBA championship for James, so he doesn't flee next summer for New York -- and the Phoenix Suns only feel urgency to watch their bottom line. Shaq is shipped to Cleveland for a few pierogies, and, suddenly, a beleaguered town that hasn't won a major sports title since 1964 becomes pro basketball's epicenter.