In addition to all the horrors visited on the United States last week,

When Matt Lawton was traded from the first place Twins to the near last place, "out of the playoff race" Mets, I felt sorry for him. Lawton had played his whole career on really bad, losing Minnesota teams, and then, finally, when his Twins were a winner, in part due to his excellent performance, Minnesota traded him to a bad team.

It looks like I underestimated "the Lawton effect." Since he vacated the Metrodome, the Twins have played 12 games under .500, and are now probably done, being 6 games out of first place with around 13 games to go. But since Matt became a Mett, the the "out of the playoff race" Mets have played 15 games over .500, and are now only 3.5 games behind the Braves and Phillies, neither of whom is playing well.

Maybe the 2002 Royals will acquire Matt just so they can experience "the Lawton effect"? Hey, it worked for the Twins and the Mets.

My favorite is when whiners complain about Rob Neyer's NY media bias, despite the fact that he's a Royals fan who has been living in Seattle.