Some thoughts on the signing of Johnny Damon.

• The Sux signed John Flaherty, so it's only fair we got one of theirs. Hey, we'll take Manny Ramirez off your hands if you want Bubba Crosby.

• Brian Cashman opened a most awkward and corny press conference — even by Yankees standards — by offering Damon's wife, Michelle, 18 roses (to match his jersey number) and kissing her on the cheek. Suave is not a term one would use to describe Cashman, and I was surprised she didn't return the favor by offering a lap dance. If you played word association with 100 people on the street and mentioned Michelle, 99 of 'em would say "stripper."

• YES announcer Michael Kay prefaced the ceremonial dressing of Damon in pinstripes by saying something to the effect of, "If you're a Boston fan, you might want to look away. This is gonna be tough to watch." Hahaha. That's like seeing someone sprawled to the ground following a massive nut shot, then running over to administer an atomic wedgie. If only John Sterling had hosted, the Pomposity Meter would have exploded.

• One of these days we're gonna have to take George Steinbrenner to task for allowing a team from Boston to craft an image as free spirits and New Yorkers as drones, when comparing the character of the two cities is like a paint-by-numbers to a Van Gogh. When's the Guinness Book of World Records gonna recognize Fenway Park's mark for Most Pleated Khakis Worn By an All-White Audience?

• Aren't there enough fans in Red Sux Nation to afford an extra $12 million over four years to make certain the Yankees couldn't pull this doubly-whammy of filling a need and creating one for a rival? Management couldn't figure out how to bleed an extra couple of bucks per fan over four years? Well, enjoy that big bag of Cheetos with all the money you saved.

• Gotta love the Kansas City Star looking back at 10-year-old articles from when Damon was a member of the Royals. That's when you know your team's got nothing going on.

• Bill Simmons' reaction is pretty matter-of-fact: pro athletes care less about supposed apocalyptic rivalries than fans and make decisions based on money. Which is great if your team has the most money. Wish we could say to Sux fans, "We know how you feel," but we can't.

• It did blow, though, when Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens eloped to Houston to be closer their families and Andy's Power for Living books, leaving us to pitch Jon Leiber, Kevin Brown and Javier Vazquez in Games 6 and 7 of the 2004 ALCS. Imagine what a Red Sux fan's mentality would be right now if they hadn't closed the World Series gap to NY 26 - Boston 6 in between Aaron Boone's HR, that February morning when we dropped the A-Rod bomb, the fall from grace of Nomar Garciaparra, Pedro Martinez's burned bridge, Curt Schilling's career-threatening injury, the vanishing of Keith Foulke, us winning the 2005 AL East after their own late-season losses to the Devil Rays, and now stealing away Damon. My guess is they'd be equal parts suicidal and homicidal, instead of just bitter (again) and insufferable.

• There's still 0.01% of me that's wary of Damon being a spy. With Kevin Millar holed up in a camouflaged van wired with surveillance monitors.

• No. 18 isn't going to be a hot-selling jersey in New York. At least not yet. I could count on one hand the number of Randy Johnson jerseys I saw in 2005. But if you're a Yanks fan in Boston, this is the last-minute Christmas gift to end all.

• Damon will be in pinstripes when the Yankees open their new stadium in 2009, but Mariano Rivera, Bernie Williams, Jorge Posada and Joe Torre, almost certainly, will not. How's that for weird?

• I wonder what will be the first five NYC strip clubs Jason Giambi takes Damon to.

• Again, Damon was never really a hated guy in New York, no more than any other Boston player. In order of most-hated Red Sux, on a scale of 1-100, the top villains are: Red Sux Nation (185,000) Schilling (99.9), Jason Varitek (99.8), Trot Nixon (88) and Ramirez (85).

• I thought Frozen Caveman Lawyer was a fictional character until I heard Damon speak. Compared to him, George Bush is a skilled orator. But it's hard to gracefully say this, which would have been an honest answer to any question he fielded: I would rather get paid $52 million to play for the Yankees than get paid $40 million to play for the Red Sux, and whatever effect it's going to have on Boston fans isn't enough to affect that decision. Period.

• Moral of the story: We're the Yankees and you're not.