Has the newness worn off for you yet? Are you tired of seeing pitchers hit or the DH walk to the plate? Has MLB Interleague Play run its course - or, is baseball now just playing too many games?

I know, attendance for Interleague games remains up versus regular league play, but that might be skewed by real rivalry games, such as: Yankees-Mets; Cubs-White Sox; Angels-Dodgers; Giants-A’s; Indians-Reds; Royals-Cardinals; Marlins-Rays. Plus, any National League team relishes a series with the Yankees or Red Sox - the two biggest road-draws for years.

Call me old-fashioned, but I’d prefer waiting for October to see American League versus the National League.

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While I’m on the subject of Interleague Play, I might as well add my two-cents regarding the DH rule. Having lived in an AL city most of my life, I’ve been watching the DH for so long (it was introduced in 1973) that I no longer have interest in watching pitchers hit. Nor does Hank Steinbrenner, especially after losing pitching ace Chien-Ming Wang to a base-running injury. Two sets of rules in one league are ridiculous. Plus, one would think the MLB Players Association would push for the DH in the National League to extend time-served for some aging players.

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Be sure to vote in this weeks www.HOFN.com Poll regarding Interleague Play. Are you for or against?

Here’s another question for you…other than baseball, is there another sport where the defense has the ball?

When did ABC/ESPN become the PR team for Kobe, Inc?

How tired are you of the references “the best player on the planet,” or those silly comparisons to Jordon? Please. Kobe hasn’t even been the best player on the floor. That distinction belongs to Paul Pierce. Even more sickening…how many times are we to be subject to the piece on Kobe at home portraying the good family man? Are we to dismiss his admitted adulterous sexual encounter in Eagle, Colorado on July 1, 2003? I know that incident is old news and should be put to rest – and it would be, if not for the “family man” campaign imposed by Kobe’s ABC public relations team. He’s trying too hard to convince the pubic he’s something we all know he’s not. Maybe if he bought me a $4M diamond ring, as he did his wife after his Colorado indiscretion, I’d forgive him, too.

It seems apparent that Kobe wants and needs to be liked. With apologies to LeBron James, Kobe is the best player in the league…but, likeable? Magic or Jerry West he’s not. First, he runs Shaq out of town – then he wants out of LA himself. Even Lakers’ fans had enough of Kobe prior to the start of the season. However, it’s amazing what a few W’s can do for fickle fans.

As the Finals heads back to Boston for game six, let’s hope we’ve seen the last of the Kobe campaign and just see a great game.

We’ve all seen and heard enough about the rich Celtics - Lakers traditions. Well, almost. How can this championship round go on without hearing the names Chick Hearn and Johnny Most? It can’t.

Considered the two greatest basketball radio-broadcasters of all-time, Hearn and Most were the voices of these two great franchises - and as much a part of their glorious history as Russell, West, Bird and Magic.

Johnny Most announced Celtics games “high above courtside”� (his traditional opening remark), from 1953 to 1990. Chick Hearn could be heard calling Lakers games from 1965 to 2002, including a consecutive-game streak of 3,338. Between the two, there were 25 championships (16 by Most and 9 by Hearn), and nearly 90-years of radio-broadcasting. Most passed away in 1993. Hearn in 2002.

Hearn was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2003. He was also inducted into the American Sportscasters Hall of Fame in 1995 - and has a star on the famous Hollywood Walk of Fame. Most was inducted into the media-category of the New England Basketball Hall of Fame in 2002, and was awarded the Curt Gowdy Media Award by the Basketball Hall of Fame trustees. That he’s not an actual Hall of Famer is a travesty.

Hearn is credited for numerous basketball sayings - called “Chickisms,”� including “slam dunk,”� “air-ball,”� and “no harm, no foul.”� My personal favorite was “ticky-tack”� foul. Most was best known for his raspy voice and villainizing of Celtics opponents. His famous call: “Havlicek stole the ball”� lives in NBA and Celtics lore.

I grew up listening to Johnny Most - and grew old admiring Chick Hearn. There will never be anyone like them again.

Celtics versus Lakers just isn’t the same without them.

Some of us fiftysomethings remember Bizarro, one of the spinoffs of the Superman comics. In the series, Superboy was hit by some rogue radioactive ray and transported to Htrae – Earth spelled in reverse – a cubically-shaped planet where to do or say anything good or right became a crime.

Sounds like contemporary France to me.

Just today a Paris court convicted animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot of “provoking discrimination and racial hatred.” The 73 year-old former film star and pin-up girl must also pay almost $25,000 in fines and damages. Her two-month prison sentence was suspended.

Her crime?

In a December 2006 letter to now President Nicolas Sarkozy – who at the time served as Interior Minister – Bardot objected to the growing public celebration of the Muslim feast of Aid el-Kebir. A rather bloody sheep slaughter – sans anesthetique– is among the highlights of the fiesta.

In the letter to Sarkozy – which was later reprinted in her animal rights quarterly journal – Bardot wrote that France is “tired of being led by the nose by this population that is destroying us, destroying our country by imposing its acts.”

New French anti-racism laws now prohibit “inciting” hatred based on religion or national origin. The court sided with the radical group MRAP, whose lawsuit claimed Bardot’s words were as “inciting” as they were indeed insightful.

For the time being, at least, we in the United States have a first amendment to the Constitution that guarantees free speech. It is the amendment without which all the others are rendered meaningless.

The world of Bizarro never had one.

France just lost theirs.

Okay. It looks like Hillary is out, so that leaves McCain vs. Obama in the next presidential election. It should be a donnybrook of epic proportions. So much at stake for America, so much at stake for both parties. Plenty of mud to be slung in both directions. But let’s have some fun.

What kind of game plan would the great coaches of our time, Wooden, Auerbach, Lombardi put together in assessing the strengths and weaknesses of their opponents. How would they attack?

The coaches would note that one of the many attributes cited by McCain supporters is his heroic service to the military. A McCain strength magnified by Obama’s lack of military service.

For the Obama team, McCain hasn’t demonstrated nearly the strength that Obama has in communicating his message to people of color or woman. He has also been less than diplomatic at times in contrast to the more urbane Obama.

I’m guessing Coaches Lombardi, Wooden and Auerbach might ask what do we need to neutralize our opponent’s strengths. Well, there is a draft of sorts coming up. The Vice Presidential draft. Each Presidential Candidate gets a first round draft pick.

I could see it now. Red Auerbach stepping up to the Podium and declaring, “with the first round pick of the Vice Presidential draft, Senator Barack Obama selects General Wesley Clark.”

Clark, a retired four-star general was valedictorian of his class at West Point. A former declared candidate for the Democratic nomination, Clark spend 34 years in the Army and the Department of Defense. Clark commanded Operation Allied Force in the Kosovo War during his service as the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe of NATO from 1997 to 2000.

With the Republicans now on the clock, the Obama lack of military experience is the trump card that McCain had been holding is now totally neutralized by this deft move by the Democrats.

Okay, so now what do the great coaches muse? I, I’ve got it. Back to the podium strides Auerbach. “With his first round pick in the Vice Presidential draft, John McCain selects Condoleezza Rice.”

Rice, the 66th United States Secretary of State, is a career diplomat, a good buffer for the emotional McCain, but more importantly let’s just say it…”I see your African-American heritage and raise you a woman.”

It’ll probably never happen…but let’s just say.