Why is it that what we can’t possibly ignore is so often ignored by experts hired by TV networks to tell us what we can’t possibly miss? Shorter version: Why are we so seldom told the truth? 

We hold these truths to be self-evident: 

Under Brian Cashman and Aaron Boone the Yankees remain prepared to do the least they can to succeed. If this is a reflection of Hal Steinbrenner’s ownership, there’s annually accumulating evidence that he doesn’t know a rosin bag from a French horn. 

Stephen A. Smith, ESPN’s designated No. 1, remains a transparent, overly enriched, race-based, self-entitled, accent-chameleon, bad-guess spewer of fabricated facts whose credibility is only imagined by his Disney bosses and hustlers of dubious old car windshield replacement contracts.