The Final Score

Good to see Chicago has returned and is embarking on a campaign to bring back Jack in the Boxes to New York.

Godspeed, Norm.

Meanwhile, Anthony just sent me this text message: "I'm at HERSHEY Park tell all my BLOG friends hello and thanks for a great june"

OK, the moles are on opposite cheeks and Richard Thomas' is larger but as soon as I saw Knicks draft pick Danilo Gallinari's picture, all I could think of was John-Boy Walton.

(For Jim and everyone else born too late, the Waltons was TV show in the 1970s.)

The Chicago Tribune reported that a fan was charged with theft related to a fight in the upper deck at U.S. Cellular Field during Saturday's game between the White Sox and Cubs.

Police said that Brian Nolan of suburban Woodridge allegedly picked up some money that fell out of a woman's purse and refused to give it back. That led to several fans punching Nolan.

It is unknown whether the punchers or punchee were Cubs or Sox fans.

In other Cub-Sox news that you may or may not care about, Chicago Bulls No. 1 pick Derrick Rose threw out the first pitch at Friday's Crosstown rivalry game at the Cell and earned some major brownie points with Chisox/Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf by declaring himself a White Sox fan.

Rose, who grew up on Chicago's South Side, also cast his vote for the city's best pizza. "The Home Run Inn," he said, earning himself major brownie points with Chicago Norm.

You know there's something wrong with the world when you pull into a gas station and one of the guys at the Beerz & Gunz mart comes running out and tells you to hold off on filling up until he can raise the prices on the pump.

In case you're wondering, the very same gasoline that we're guzzling on LI costs about 50 cents a gallon less in Texas and Oklahoma and at least a quarter less in Arkansas, North Carolina, Virginia and New Jersey.

Hey, it's great to be back in the Land of $4.32 a Gallon. I can understand why Jim decided to run from Yankee Stadium to Shea between games. Between gas and parking, he probably saved a fortune.

I cannot accept Anthony's challenge to run from the Pizza Hut on Route 110 to the California Pizza Kitchen at the Walt Whitman Mall because the Pizza Hut has been torn down. I will, however, run from the CPK to the mall's Starbucks if I get the right sponsor.

I won't bore you with vacation trip tales, but here's some food for thought:

1. You've got to be crazy to sit out in the sun during a Texas Rangers day game when it's 97 degrees. And when I say you, I mean me.

2. Dear Jack in the Box: Please come back to New York. We miss you.

3. I think that the guys who answer the call buttons at Sonic Drive-Ins are trained to intentionally goof up the order of anyone with New York plates.

4. A list of edible things that woke me up during my visit to Mrs. Norm's family farm in beautiful downtown Middle-of-Nowhere Oklahoma:

A. Roosters who don't understand the "only at daybreak" concept.

B. A choir of insane gobbling turkeys

C. The cow (above).

5. The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council's ballpark hot dog rankings noted in Anthony's earlier entry is just plain loony.

How can anyone in their right mind vote for Wrigley Field hot dogs? Even Cub fans don't like Wrigley Field hot dogs. A lot of them save their hot dog eating for drunken pilgrimages to U.S. Cellular Field. Fenway Franks are kind of raunchy, too. I'm good with Yankee Stadium and Dodger Dogs being high on the list, but the bratwursts in Milwaukee are the best of all. Comments?

I used to think passed ball vs. wild pitch was baseball's eternal debate. Now I know it's "should the Yankees have traded for Johan Santana."

I had this debate again today at Shea in most spirited fashion with Newsday's highly capable baseball columnist, Ken Davidoff.

My position has always been that the Yankees should have traded Phil Hughes, Melky Cabrera and two other prospects for Santana. Quickly, the argument is Hughes -- who I think very highly of -- will, if everything breaks right, one day be as good as Santana is right now. So why not just get Santana?

Ken's argument, as I understand it, is it's stupid to pay $137.5 million to any pitcher, even an elite one. Just grow your own if you can. That's not his only point, but I think it's the main one.

Ken's argument is also butressed by Santana's performance as a Met so far. He's 7-7, he abilis more than Ike, he throws his teammates under the bus, and his stuff is declining. He may one day be a true ace pitcher for the Mets, but in his short time here he hasn't proven to be an ace person with his teammates.

Here's Ken's column from Sunday's paper on Santana.

And here's his Sunday notes column.

And here's his Wednesday Web-only notes column.

Dude's had a mad-busy week.

We both stood our ground. It made for an interesting pre-game, as did Jerry Manuel's comment that the Mets are the No. 2 team in town -- yes, it's true, but does the Mets manager have to say it? -- and the fact that I misplaced my tape recorder for about an hour.

What do you think, Final Score nation? Am I right or is Ken wrong? It's not like there's another choice.

And how about wild pitch vs. passed ball?

A long, long time ago Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig played on Long Island...

For tomorrow's newspaper I wrote a story about an exhibition game Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig played in Lindenhurst on Oct. 18, 1930.

You know how I found about this story?

From you guys.

I was reading the comments on the Yankees blog one day, and some reader complained that he wouldn't read Newsday again until the paper finally did a story on the elderly man named Sydney who worked at the Lindenhurst Village Museum and was at the Babe Ruth-Lou Gehrig game.

When I finally got around to calling the museum, I was told bad news: Sydney died a few months ago. But, they said, his wife is the village historian and might be able to help. She had loads of info of that game, and even introduced me to a 90-year-old lifelong Lindenhurst resident who was at the game. He was 12 at the time and remembers riding his bike to the park, putting a dollar in a man's hat and watching the Babe in action. Pretty cool.

I'll post a link to the story tomorrow...

I don't know if that's true.

But my run interested Mel enough that he had me on his ESPN Radio show this afternoon to talk about it.

Just bizarre.

BTW, who knew Kiper has a radio show and talks about things other than the NFL draft? I didn't.

Okay, I'll stop posting about the run now.

It's jumped the shark.

I feel a lot better than I expected after yesterday's 9.8-mile run from Yankee Stadium to Shea in between games. My legs are stiff. Walking up stairs are a pain. Otherwise I'm fine. Thanks to everyone who followed along with the updates on the blog.

One person emailed me today and suggested I do the run once a year, and see how many readers would come along for the run. I'd be interested to see how many people would be interested...

I'd do it again...

Here's the story I wrote about it for today's paper.

...Chicago Norm jogs from the Pizza Hut to the California Pizza Kitchen on Route 110 in Melville.