A post about Derek Jeter…really.

Photo of the Yankee Captain courtesy of Kelly O'Connor and used with permission.

Blogging sometimes has its perks.  I definitely think blogging about the Red Sox seems to come with a few benefits since there gets so much attention paid to not only the team but the fan base as well.

One of these perks is that people like to send me stuff.  Books, tickets, invitations to events…a lot comes in and while I don’t believe in turning down a generous offer, there have been times that I’ve said “no”.  Usually when it involves the New York Yankees.  But for some reason, when I was contacted about having an interest in a book called “DEREK JETER: From the Pages of The New York Times” I didn’t follow my initial instinct and say “thanks but no thanks”.    I said “Sure!  Why not?” and then, honestly, kind of forgot about it.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you are a blogger and someone wants to send you free stuff it’s probably because they want you to talk about said free stuff.  I know this.  Currently, I have plenty of free time so you’d think this wouldn’t be a problem.  There is never an understanding of “We’re sending you this so you’re going to say nice things about it, right?” just a “Hey, a mention on your blog would be appreciated”…which, really, I’m all right with.  While I wouldn’t say they come close to the number of  Red Sox fans who visit, the blog has taken on quite a few Yankees fans as readers so I thought it would be nice if I could write something about Jeter that didn’t begin with “If he pumps  his fist one more time…”

So I agreed to take on the book.  And it showed up one rainy day and, admittedly, the nicest thing I am able to say about it is I would LOVE it if they did a book like this for one of the Red Sox.  It basically has compiled articles and photographs from the New York times all pertaining to Jeter and puts them in a pretty, shiny, coffee table book.  It’s really a thing of beauty to look at.

After flipping through it a couple of times it hit me, though.  What the heck do I do with it now?  If I had a fireplace, the question might have been easily answered (I KID!  Even if it’s about a Yankee I have a problem just throwing away books never mind burning them), so I made a mental list of people I knew who were Yankees fans.  It’s not as short a list as you might think.  Heck, I even have some in my family.  But after giving it a lot of thought, the answer came to me.  There is a man in my parents’ neighborhood who is around my age and, alas, a Yankees fan.  I would hold this against him were he not an extremely nice person who spent the better part of every snowstorm helping my father shovel.  I knew it was possible he wouldn’t want the book but figured it couldn’t hurt to ask.  So I did.

You know how folks say being generous is still being a little selfish because you get the benefit of feeling good about yourself when you’re being generous?  Yeah, that was it.  This guy was so appreciative it was overwhelming and it, admittedly, made me feel good.  And as far as the book?  He loves it.  LOVES it.  Started going through it the moment I gave it to him and didn’t stop for a few days until he was through it all.  It made me feel less wormy about taking the book essentially because it was free when I knew very well it could hold the meaning to life in it and that wouldn’t make it any more appealing to me.

Adam, the fella at Press Box Publicity deserves not only my thanks for sending it along (thanks, Adam!) but a pat on the back for sending it out not knowing if I would spend the space writing nothing but “I hate Derek Jeter…I hate Derek Jeter…I hate Derek Jeter..” he took a chance and I hope he doesn’t mind how I chose to share the book with you all.

Some specs for those who might be interested:

About the Book

DEREK JETER: From the Pages of The New York Times

Introduction by Tyler Kepner
Abrams / March 2011
U.S. $29.95 / Can. $35.95
ISBN 978-0-8109-9656-4
Hardcover with jacket
224 pages / 8 1/4″ x 10 7/8″
100 color photographs

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