There are some hard feelings between me and Billy Crystal (If you don’t find that interesting, I promise there is an interesting point to this post too).
A few months back (right after I started this blog), there was a really big election. You might remember it.
I had tickets (not standby, real tickets) to see the joint Daily Show/ Colbert Report live coverage of said historic election with a few friends. We stood outside in for 5.5 hours to see the funny men mock and call the election. As we prepared to enter the studio, Billy Crystal* and his damn entourage show up and took our seats. If you want the whole rediculous story, check it out here.
Flash forward to today, my friend James (one of the people who waited on that line with me) showed me a segment of the book, The Yankee Years: Joe Torre and Tom Verducci.
In the fourth chapter, Torre discusses the Yankee’s 2000 World Series victory, and how Steinbrenner got less pleasure with each World Series win that his team had. He expected to win. He told Torre after the triumph that the coaches would not receive the bonus that they got after their wins in 1996, 1998, and 1999. Torre put up a fight and sometime later, Steinbrenner backed down and gave the coaches their well-earned bonuses.
Let’s make a longish story short (if you want the whole thing, read the book):
However, Steinbrenner did not give his scouts and development personnel (the silent backbone of the team) their 2000 World Series rings. When they finally received them, the rings were fake! Only a couple of the people got the rings because they made a really big scene.
They still have not been given their rings almost a decade later. When asked about it 2006 Brian Cashman told Newsday that they will not get their rings.
With that in mind, I present you with this passage:
Morale worsened when they were instructed not to bring up the subject of World Series rings at organizational meetings. It worsened still when they heard or saw Steinbrenner cronies such as actor Billy Crystal and singer Ronan Tynan wearing [2000] World Series rings (143).
Billy Crystal is a fun-vampire. As in, he sucks the fun out of the lives of others in order to sustain himself (you know his acting isn’t doing it).
The Yankees scouts and development personnel who were not given their rings call the Yankees’ inability to win another World Series since 2000 “The Curse of the Rings.”
On a brighter note, The Yankee Years: Joe Torre and Tom Verducci is a very interesting and well-written book. I appreciate that it is clearly written by Verducci with Torre’s voice presented in the third-person. It always bugs me when celebrities, athletes, and politicians “write” autobiographies that are clearly ghostwritten.
*My collection of friends and the other people on the line are 99% sure that it was Billy Crystal. If it wasn’t the guy was his clone.
The Geek Whisperer 
I am so dissapointed that Billy Crystal is hosting the Oscars. I took my father to a Yankee game and sat in the owners box along with Billy Crystal. My father was dying from cancer and it was obvious. My father said hello to Crystal and Crystal gave my Dad a “don’t bother me look” While I can understand that famous people don”t want to be interupted in a private setting, you could plainly tell that my father didn’t have long to live. I am of the opinion that Billy Crystal is not a very nice person. In my mind, his actions were reprehensible.