Selling out

I could do this too, I suppose. Sell my hopeless attachment to the perpetually hopeless Pittsburgh Pirates on eBay. I bet I could get a buck for it easy.

This is nowhere in the ballpark (pun intended) with what Evan Perlmutter got for his fandom in the New York Knicks. Finally fed up with the Knicks' bottomless ineptitude, he auctioned off his  allegiance on eBay. A guy named James Riedel won it with a $3,450 bid.

And if you're asking here "Why would James Riedel spend $3,450 on something he could do for free, which is root for the Knicks?" you are not alone. The Blob doesn't get this, either. And it for sure doesn't get why you'd spend $3,450 on a Knicks allegiance, of all teams.

The Warriors, sure. The Celtics or Rockets or Thunder, absolutely. Heck, you could even justify bidding on a Pacers allegiance, 'cause they're fun to watch and a bunch of good guys and they're going to be a team to reckon with this season.

Perlmutter, meanwhile, will take his three grand and change and root for the Lakers this year, presumably because that's where LeBron is now and the Lake Show seems ready for a revival of some fashion. This, of course, only identifies him as a bandwagon jumper of the lowest order. And of course few things in the sporting world are more reprehensible than a bandwagon jumper.

You'd never see me abandoning my Pirates for, say, the Cubs, for instance. There's simply too much history there for me, not to say too much Roberto Clemente memorabilia (including a Clemente jersey, natch) scattered around my home. My notoriously vivid imagination conjures gruesome visions of waking up in the dead of some night and seeing Clemente standing over me glowering, having emerged whole and breathing from his picture that hangs in my den.

"Traitor," he would hiss, right before taking a home-run cut at my head.

Shudder.

Anyway ... no, I could never sell out my Pirates for the Cubs or the Indians or the Tigers or, God forbid, the Yankees or the Other Yankees, aka the Red Sox. That will never happen.

Although $3,450 might make me rethink that position.

Kidding, Roberto! Kidding!