THE NORTH POLE – In our never-ending quest to get you the hottest breaking sports scoops first, The Matts sent a pair of bald elfin operatives undercover into Santa’s snow-covered compound to get a sneak peek at which athletes and personalities are on the fat man’s respective naughty and nice lists. Unfortunately only one of our moles made it out with the straight dope while the other is now toiling away in St. Nick’s sweatshop cranking out loads of knockoff NY Yankees 2009 World Series Champions gear. The following list is a tribute to his ultimate sacrifice:
NAUGHTY: Roger Clemens. Although Rog has been out of the news of late, he’s a perennial on the negative side of the ledger. What do you expect from a lying sack of s**t who lies and lies and lies until he’s out of fall guys and there’s no one left to lie to?
Believe in Santa Claus and not in this guy.
NICE: Sofia Vergara. Hey, what do you want? Santa’s married but he’s not dead! Our own Cookie also makes it onto the NICE list for reminding Santa of this piece of hotness for those cold winter nights.
Now that’s what we call a stocking stuffer!
NAUGHTY: Charlie Weis. The now former-Notre Dame head coach came in to his job with a lot of hollow promises and left with a chock-full wallet and gut. He also ate all of Santa’s cookies which is a non-negotiable.
Charlie Weis with one of the Notre Dame cheerleaders.
NICE: Charles Woodson. What can you say, Mr. C. is a sucker for anyone who plays a solid cornerback and donates $2 million to a children’s hospital. Nice guy Wisconsin Walt is also a Woodson supporter, which doesn’t hurt.
NAUGHTY: Anna Benson. Some things never change.
Anna Benson stealing Santa’s spotlight with her headlights.
NICE: The New Orleans Saints. While it’s not necessarily nice to make so many teams look so bad, it’s hard not to place the Saints and their long-suffering fans on Kringle’s good side. Between Katrina, the Bobby Hebert era, and wacko owner Tom Benson, it’s about time something nice happened to the Saints… of course all bets are off if and when they face Minnesota.
NAUGHTY OR NICE?: Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren. C’mon guys, fess up already. Santa doesn’t have all day. Was Tiger night putting with some professional party floozie? Did Elin turn into a Lifetime movie and beat Tiger within an inch of his life? It’s only one Christmas you two. Take your medicine and hope to get back in the big guy’s good graces in 2010.
NICE: Officer Bob. Old St. Nick likes to keep his considerable a** covered when it comes to Johnny Law. He’s not looking for any unnecessary sleigh moving violations or parking tickets this year.
STUPID: Fred and Jeff Wilpon. Santa started a whole new list for these two. His feeling is, they are just too dumb to realize that their actions (or lack thereof) are incredibly hurtful to Met fans.
Jeff and Fred on their way to auditions for The Village People.
NAUGHTY: Keith Ballard. The Florida Panthers defenseman gets a Christmas season double-major misconduct for inadvertently (we hope) nearly taking his own goalie’s head off after Atlanta scored on him. Ballard appeared to be trying to break his stick on the goalpost but missed horribly. What made it worse though is that after he connected with Tomas Vokoun’s melon, he didn’t bother to check on his fallen teammate, opting instead to take another crack at breaking his stick. For this, Ballard will be lucky if Santa doesn’t napalm his house.
NICE: Bob Sheppard. The legendary public address voice of both the New York Yankees and the New York Football Giants finally announced his retirement at the age of 99 this past week. Being one of the few class acts associated with the Bombers is enough to get anyone on the NICE list.
This list goes on and on but you have to let Santa keep some secrets. Hope this finds all of you MTMers on the good side of St. Nick (yes, even you Yankee Joe) as you’ve all provided me with some good laughs this year.
