Wrong, Rick, Wrong!

We loved reading Rick Reilly's stuff when he owned the back page of Sports Illustrated. Witty. Sarcastic. Knowledgeable. Simply put, he got it. Then one day, we heard him on the Jim Rome (radio) Show. We liked his written words a lot better than his spoken ones. On the air, he came off a bit all-knowing, and anyone who disagreed with him simply wasn't smart enough to understand his point.

A few months ago, he jumped ship from SI and landed at...wait for it...ESPN-DOT-COM. (Shocking, we know.) And since then, we've kind of lost track of him. But last night, we were poking around the site and came upon his story about which teams rule their cities.

Our current phrase these days is, "You go with what you know..." And so it was with fascination that we looked at his entries for Philadelphia and Boston.

Of course, he had them all wrong. Not surprising, because it's near impossible to have your pulse on every major city. Except for the fact that Reilly, yet again, made it seem like he knew everything about, well, everything. And with Philly and Boston, at least, he is off. Way off.

Here is his take on Philadelphia: "Used to be Eagles, now it's Phillies. This is partly because of the Phils' young stars and partly because the Iggles owner has handed it to them. Jeffrey Lurie is a Boston guy who's made $800 million so far on his Eagles purchase but not many friends. You always get the feeling that his jet bound for his beloved Beantown is double-parked."

Um. Whatever, Rick.

1. Philly has always been an Eagles Town. Seriously, have you ever heard of fans going to an Eagles game and doing Phillies cheers?!? Of course not. But anytime the Phillies are getting blown out, you can count on some faction of fans breaking out with, "E-A-G-L-E-S!" chants often and loud.

2. True, Philly Peeps don't like Jeff Lurie. But they hated Norman Braman with a passion. Yet, they never let that dissuade them from cheering for the team.

3. No one in Boston ever (ever!) refers to Boston as Beantown!

For Boston, he typed: Red Sox. Once, Boston was a hockey town, and Orr's Bruins ruled. It's never been a Celtics town—despite Russell and Bird—partly because of the finally fading racism. Patriots? Pssshhht. They're not even in Boston. The Red Sox, though, sell out a cramped, rusted ballpark as though there were Hope Diamonds under every seat. Says longtime Boston sports yakker Eddie Andelman: "Who can have a decent conversation about anything else?"

Wow. We're not sure where to even begin.

1. It is a FACT that in the 1980s the Celtics and Larry Bird frigging owned the city! (Frigging owned!) Anyone who says differently, has no idea what they're blabbing about.

2. Now, Boston is a Patriots Town. During the last six days, no one has talked or written about anything other than Tom Brady's season-ending injury. Nothing about JD's bad back. Nothing about Lowell's return. Nothing about Papelbon's recent closing woes. Not a word about catching the Rays for first place. Nope. Nothing. Zilch. It's been All-Brady. All-the-Time.

3. Anyone who cites Eddie (Hi, how-are-ya?) Andelman as a reference for anything sports related is just plain clueless. My Dad told me that about 35 years ago, when there was no such thing as sports talk radio, Andelman had a Sunday night call-in show. If so, that was certainly the last time he was a person of relevance on the Boston Sports Scene. WEEI's rise to dominance coincided with Andelman's departure.

So now you know.