Although Seattle's mayor suffered some kind of synaptic Y2K problem and attempted to force us all to begin the year like DotComGuy, I can proudly say that my hangover is just now dissipating, and my New Year's resolution is to get out a whole lot more, e-mailing the aforementioned DCG and letting him know just what a hoot it is to have a life.

And no, our site outages are not caused by Y2K -- essentially, everything's being moved to new hardware, in a new place, and the transfer was not going smoothly. I may have to roll up my sleeves and hook up the damn servers myself.

Moving to baseball, without a whole lot of new rumblings over the holidays (Albert Belle must have been reciting the positive affirmation, "I don't slug carolers," this year), it seems that they just can't get John Rocker out of their heads. In fact, just in case they do, I'm sure Sports Illustrated will be rushing out their special John Rocker editorial issue any time now.

The fact is, he screwed up. He made himself look bad, he made his team look bad, and in this day of people believing in their heart of hearts that ballplayers are overpaid jerks anyway -- utter fallacy, and proven to be wrong, but never mind that -- he made his sport look bad.

But is he really the Grand Wizard wanna-be that people want to believe he is?

I don't know.

Neither do they.

Neither do you.

The only people who can give us a clue as to whether Rocker's ravings were willfully racist and bigoted, or just the product of a prodding SI reporter combined with one too many bowls of Ultra Glucose Puffs for breakfast, are those who know him and deal with him personally on a daily basis.

So far, no friends, family or teammates have offered an expose of how Rocker has slighted an African-American bat boy, or how he has screamed at a couple speaking Mandarin in public, or anything to offer any real-life evidence of how Rocker's actions prove that his statements are from the heart. SI could help by publishing an unedited transcript of the interview. However, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for one.

Therefore, we must proceed as if Rocker was simply a very, very stupid young man who got carried away with until his motivation is proven to be otherwise.

Unfortunately, there are many who wish upon Rocker all manner of injury, from firing and banishment from his chosen profession to physical harm. If you want to talk "hate speech," that's where it's at. It saddens me that Henry Aaron is one of those calling for Rocker's head on a platter, when Aaron himself should know what it's like to receive death threats and hateful personal insults on a daily basis. It's Aaron who should be talking to Rocker personally, helping the kid to learn from his wealth of experience.

My feeling is that Rocker had intended to generate what professional wrestlers call "heel heat," with the intention of having New Yorkers hate him because of his expressed dislike for all their city stands for. Done intelligently, this can be a good thing (as our own Derek Zumsteg explained back in 1998), but Rocker got it all wrong.

Add to that the fact that Sports Illustrated hails from NYC. Adding their editorial staff to the roster of those not liking Rocker much goes far to explain why we get all the bile, with absolutely zero questioning along the lines of "why are you saying these things?" The intent was not to probe into Rocker's psyche, but to keep it superficial. Mind you, this is not surprising coming from a magazine that spends the entire year working up to their swimsuit issue.

Item: Rumors of first a three-way trade, then a four-way trade (or was it vice-versa?) involving everyone's favorite trade bait, Ken Griffey Jr., rocketed through the 'net over the holiday. Problem was, the rumors were started by Seattle baseball writers, rendering them almost as useless as if they'd come from Peter Gammons.

We who get to read the daily columns by the local Seattle beat writers (somehow that term makes them sound like aspiring Jack Kerouacs, which is dead wrong, although heavy drinking would explain a lot) understand that each day brings a new deal that the M's would most certainly want to make. Sometimes they get it right, but that's usually only when the deal is a bad one, i.e., re-signing Dan Wilson.

And those of you pouting (or happy) because "now that the Reds know they're the only team on Griffey's list, they can get him for nothing," remember: If the Reds offer "nothing," they'll have to wait for Junior to become a free agent, and don't think he will take any less than market value. Either way, the Reds will have to give to get, either in a trade or a salary dump, no matter when they get Griffey.

So enjoy, Reds fans...

Item: Peter Gammons discovers OPS! In his latest ESPN column, The Man Who Loves Clubhouse Leaders explains that there's this newfangled stat we can use to see how good a hitter really is. You'd think he never reads the daily Rob Neyer columns on his own site! (Actually, I'm positive he doesn't, but you know...)