Jay Greenberg takes his 14th annual look at the good, bad and ugly of New York sports:
OVERRATED
1. Joba Chamberlain, Yankees: Three-plus pitches that recommended him for a starting role didn’t help him get the same guy out three times rather than just once. As a rule, most relievers are failed starters.
2. Devin Harris, Nets: Can’t defend the lane. Or 6-52. Fails to make teammates better, only remnants of fan base bitter. Eventually filling his predecessor’s sneaks? You gotta be Kidding.
3. Jason Bay, Mets: Beware of free agents coming off career years. Particularly, a Fenway year. Team says it must get more athletic, then ties itself for five years to a friendly guy in a park unfriendly to his strengths.
UNDERAPPRECIATED
1. Pedro Feliciano, Mets: Practically only car undamaged in last season’s train wreck. Not meant as a left-handed compliment, either. Most critical matchup stat: Ryan Howard’s .182 on-base percentage with one homer in 31 at-bats.
2. Wilson Chandler, Knicks: But hopefully not by LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh or Joe Johnson. Has developed his jumper but, unlike teammates, is not content to settle for it.
3. Jamie Langenbrunner, Devils: America’s right wing, exposed from his undercover day job in Newark. Reliable as apple pie.
TOUGH
1. Johan Santana, Mets: Needed his head examined to keep pitching until late August with a left elbow that required surgery. Then again, why would he trust the team’s shrink more than any other member of the medical staff?
2. Eli Manning, Giants: Deteriorating team put his foot (plantar fasciitis) to the fire. Responded with his best statistical season and still hasn’t missed a game.
3. Jorge Posada, Yankees: Best offensive catcher of last 15 years not named Mike Piazza. Was productive as ever last season, when he turned 38 and still caught 100 games. Just the fifth catcher of that age or older in the last 60 years to do so, according to Bob Waterman at Elias Sports Bureau.
FRIENDLY
1. Jeff Francoeur, Mets: Will swing at anything. Will talk to anybody.
2. CC Sabathia, Yankees: King of cordiality, win, lose and, unlike many starters, all the days in between.
3. Kris Jenkins, Jets: Impossible to move … and to dislike. Plays low to the ground. Gives you his lowdown on life.
EXCITING
1. Alex Rodriguez, Yankees: Madonna to Kate Hudson to Cameron Diaz. And Derek Jeter named his book “The Life You Imagine”? Had a hit or two in the postseason, too.
2. Johan Santana, Mets: Outlook suddenly brightens for the Mets every fifth day, a nice changeup.
3. Hakeem Nicks, Giants: More yards per catch (16.8) in 2009 than Andre Johnson, Randy Moss, Sidney Rice, Santonio Holmes, Chad Ochocinco, Reggie Wayne, Marques Colston and Terrell Owens.
IMMATURE
1. Terrence Williams, Nets: Can’t shoot. Nets had to tell disappointed and disappointing No. 1 pick three times to shoot his messenger — Twitter — after he tweeted his whiny misery. At least kept it to 140 characters, unlike Osi Umenyiora.
2. Oliver Perez, Mets: Didn’t do his conditioning at the World Baseball Classic. Unconditionally frustrating. Loses the plate and pitching coaches lose their jobs.
3. Francisco Rodriguez, Mets: “Tired act” of chest-pounding and heaven-thanking, as described by Brian Bruney, totally exhausted itself in screaming and pointing session at the then-Yankees pitcher during batting practice the following day. Any further pointing should be in mirror.
COCKY
1. Rex Ryan, Jets: Declared the Jets the best show in a town where Giants readership runs 25 percent higher and Yankees recently won 27th world championship. Great braggarts of sports history — Deion Sanders, Ochocinco, Reggie Miller, even Muhammad Ali — should kiss this guy’s rings.
2. Darrelle Revis, Jets: Matter-of-fact way of discussing true matter of fact: When it comes to air traffic, he could shut down LaGuardia.
3. Bart Scott, Jets: Completes the Florham Park Trifecta. Talks more trash than Tony Soprano whenever he was asked his occupation.
HATED
1. Chris Duhon, Knicks: Sincere, backup-level point guard failing as starter, being told about it relentlessly by fans. Painful to watch.
2. Glen Sather, Rangers: Wade Redden plays with the same weariness with which Garden has come to boo him. Deeper resentment is for a GM who did this and other cap-choking contracts and has won two playoff series since he took over in 2000.
3. Luis Castillo, Mets: Lost the weight, bounced back with a .387 on-base percentage and, at least by 2009 Mets standards, was a rock. But fans will never drop it after he dropped it and, of course, it had to be against the Yankees.
LOVED
1. Derek Jeter, Yankees: Bigger all-time hit than even Lou Gehrig. Might be the luckiest man on the face of the earth since 1939.
2. Mariano Rivera, Yankees: One pitch. One guy, win or lose.
3. Rex Ryan, Jets: Looks like a beached whale, spout still going. Regardless, his players think he walks on water.
UNDERACHIEVERS
1. Eddy Curry, Knicks: Pound for pound, one of the saddest wastes in NBA history. In all those additional ounces, not one of motivation.
2. Vernon Gholston, Jets: Sixth player taken in the draft. Can’t rush, cover, or, through two seasons, get on the field. Makes Dewayne Robertson and Blair Thomas look like franchise changers.
3. Mike Pelfrey, Mets: Sinker that got him drafted ninth overall better describes his mood with men on base. After appearing on the verge in 2008, all he seemed to learn last year was not to trust his stuff.
OVERACHIEVERS
1. Jim Leonhard, Jets: Undrafted, undaunted. At 5-foot-8, 186 pounds, launches himself like a kid having the most fun he can before the adults arrive and send him home.
2. David Lee, Knicks: High school point guard has turned himself into a 20-point, 11-rebound, All-Star NBA center. Only the program indicates he gives an inch, actually as many as four some nights.
3. Matt Moulson, Islanders: Chosen No. 263 in the draft, leads in goals a team that has players selected first (John Tavares), seventh (Kyle Okposo) and ninth (Josh Bailey).
DIFFERENT
1. Brook Lopez, Nets: At 7-foot, just a growing boy. Collects Disney artifacts and comic books while waiting for drowning team to be rescued by Aquaman.
2. Janel McCarville, Liberty: Blood red nails while nailing Jack Nicholson’s Joker grin. Spiked ’do, Daughter of Birdman. Or, maybe Rodman.
3. A.J. Burnett, Yankees: After nine years, team again touched the sky and he supplied the pies. Put a face on the joy of winning.
RESPECTED
1. Thomas Jones, Jets: Has left the weight room only to carry the ball 19.5 times per game over five consecutive 1,000-yard seasons. Leader keeps team conscious while taking shots that should leave him unconscious.
2. Martin Brodeur, Devils: All-timer has all the time in the world for you. Met the most devastating end to a playoff series perhaps ever — tying and winning goals in the final minute of Game 7 — and was waiting to meet the media when the doors opened.
3. David Wright, Mets: Power disappeared, but he didn’t — from the locker room when he was last star standing on ridiculed team.
ARROGANT
1. Jim Dolan, Madison Square Garden: Not only sees no need to ever talk to his customers through the media, but discourages persons running his teams from doing the same. Fiercely loyal to all his bad hires.
2. John Tortorella, Rangers: Loses it with first-row fans, with rookies coming back to the bench after penalties, with beat guys who see innocent humor in longtime pacifists suddenly dropping the gloves. Condescension shows in spotlight’s glare, especially when he glared at the suggestion he got burned using his fourth line against Alexander Ovechkin in a period’s final minute.
3. Osi Umenyiora, Giants: Took his toys and left Bill Sheridan’s meeting and still is essentially threatening not to come back. Thought he was above being benched despite playing below standard.
BRIGHT
1. Jay Feely, Jets: NFL’s leading Republican punted in an emergency, but not from his party’s role as obstructionists on health care reform. “Appear only interested in making the Dems fail,” he tweeted. Always worth a trip across the locker room to caucus with a guy who will cross the aisle.
2. Barry Cofield, Giants: Even at 306 pounds, his words still weigh more than he does. Went to Northwestern. Go-to guy for what’s right and wrong with the Giants.
3. Keyon Dooling, Nets: More likely to watch CNN than ESPN. Wife and mother are published authors.
CLASSY
1. Henrik Lundqvist, Rangers: Stops the puck. Stops to talk. Despite the fact that 80 percent of the questions a goalie gets are about ones that got by him, civility never does.
2. Jerry Manuel, Mets: Picture on the office wall of Georgia shack where he came from. Answers pointed questions without apparent suspicion of where they’re coming from. Reader of Ghandi and Martin Luther King should be writing out life’s lineup card on a mountaintop in Nepal.
3. Damien Woody, Jets: Jets do it on the ground, running behind the salts of the earth. His six kids are an entire offensive line, but quotable guard makes holes in his schedule to help others through his foundation, Woody’s Kids.
PARANOID
1. Jeff Wilpon, Mets: Objection to Carlos Beltran’s surgery was apparent protection in case team wants to void contract. Making this public in light of previous medial fiascoes again proves owner’s kid needs protection from himself.
2. Brandon Jacobs, Giants: A lot of questions he doesn’t like. Couldn’t run over interviewers either in 2009.
3. Braylon Edwards, Jets: Has indicated a belief that he is held to higher standard. After some of the balls he missed, he really should drop that.
Vote here: