We all know about the great athletes in New York sports history – Babe Ruth, Tom Seaver, Lawrence Taylor, Joe Namath, Mark Messier, Walt Frazier – and even the busts – Ed Whitson, Mo Vaughn, Roberto Alomar, Stephon Marbury, Scott Gomez. But what about the slightly-to-highly-above-average athlete? The kind-of-great but not all-timer? They may not have been Hall-of-Famers, but they were All-Stars, fan favorites, cogs on a championship team or maybe even just pretty darn good. They’re the little brother that didn’t hog all the attention. But they’re certainly worth talking about and remembering. So when do they get their due? Well, now they will. Here is a series of the not-quite-legendary in New York sports history.

Al Toon was the antithesis of Chad Ochocinco, Terrell Owens and other receivers cut from the aggrandizing, look-at-me cloth. He proved that all receivers don’t have to be showboating boneheads. Toon wouldn’t even spike the ball after scoring a touchdown. Instead, #88 played eight productive, classy seasons for the New York Jets, ducking the attention that he deserved. Besides …

The dream is over. This year’s version of the J-E-T-S Jets, Jets, Jets certainly doesn’t look like “the same old Jets,” though. They’re more like the 1973 Ya Gotta Believe Mets, arriving out of nowhere to come oh-so-close to a championship. They’re a team we’ll look back on with positive feelings and one worth celebrating. They went further than anyone imagined, and have a future that certainly looks bright, with a successful coach and franchise quarterback in place (though Mark Sanchez now needs surgery on one knee and will be rehabbing the other – maybe he really is the reincarnation of Joe Namath). The whole weekend was pretty much a nightmare for New York sports, though: the Rangers were embarrassed by Montreal on Saturday night, 6-0, the Knicks were humiliated by Dallas, 128-78, the Nets lost to Utah, 116-83, the Islanders lost to New Jersey (ok, one local team won, but one of them had to) and, of course, the Jets were knocked out of playoffs.

Unfortunately, I can think …

I’m not a Jets fan, but Rex Ryan has everyone in this city so inspired and pumped up, even I’d run through a wall for him. In fact, I tried to do just that. Unfortunately, I slipped on a bag of Funyuns and flew through the plate-glass window in my living room. Now I have cuts and bruises all over my face and body, one of my ears was sliced off, my wife is furious at me and it’s really, really cold in our living room. Ryan’s infectious motivating style is being packaged into a new self-help, confidence-building program, with books and DVDS – The Rex Ryan Method: Swaggering, Boasting and Eating Your Way to a Newer, More Confident You. Here are his three top keys to turning yourself into a more successful person:

       1. Declare yourself the favorite in any situation; and then make yourself a nice, big sandwich.

       2. Declare that you will be invited to the White House and meet the President; he will …

Confidence. The Jets have it. In fact, the Jets are so confident after whooping Cincinnati’s butt on Saturday, that Rex Ryan feels his team should not only be the favorite in the Super Bowl but also in the NBA playoffs. The first-year coach has his players believing that they can accomplish anything. He’s dispatched Dustin Keller to solve the Jay Leno/Conan O’Brien conundrum. The offensive line is drafting a health-care bill that will make everyone happy. And Bart Scott will be stepping in to replace Simon Cowell on American Idol. To paraphrase Yogi Berra: Sports are 90% mental, the other half is physical. And the Jets are not having any problems with the mental aspect of the game right now (nor the physical side either). Some feel there may be a little too much braggadocio in Jet land, but so far it’s working. Sitting at the other end of the confidence meter is the Nets. They do nothing but lose, and can’t even sniff a victory. Do …

We’re only one week into 2010 and I’m already dropping the ball on my resolutions. In the past I’ve been more successful, such as the year I resolved to quit smoking cigarettes. I used one of those quit-smoking programs, with the patches and the gum and the whole nine yards. Unfortunately, the side effects included nausea, dizziness, vomiting, disorientation, hallucinations, agitation, hostility, amnesia, blindness, a hacking cough, lung cancer, throat cancer, the sudden loss of one’s extremities, and addiction to cigarettes, chewing tobacco and cigars. Sure, now I can’t see, I’m always falling down, I have no idea who I am, I have a hole in my throat and I’m constantly having hallucinations that Art Howe is standing beside me trying to sell me a time-share, but at least I don’t smoke anymore. This year I decided to stop being so humble, demur and shy and to play up my strengths, which means wearing more tank top shirts to show off my impressive shoulder and back hair and to stop hiding my disgustingly smelly feet, …

The 2009 Giants started the season with Super Bowl expectations and ended it with their head coach saying, “I do think we tried. They all came to the stadium wanting to play.” Tom Coughlin seems to have lost his read on his players if he thinks his team tried. They may have come to the stadium wanting to play but once they stepped on the field, it was a different story. The Giants followed up their humiliating embarrassment of last Sunday with 60 minutes of even more humiliating embarrassment this week, if that’s possible. Maybe they wanted to do it twice in a row, and in different states, to get their point across. I’m just not sure what that point is.
Are there any possible reasons for mailing it in like they did the last two games? Were they just making sure Bill Sheridan gets fired? Maybe Kevin Gilbride, too? Did they catch the rerun of There’s Something About Mary the other night, and because Brett …

“First of all, we played our worst game of the season Sunday as a team,”-Colts President Bill Polian said after the Jets 29-15 victory. The loss marked the first time the Colts have lost in the regular season since Oct. 27, 2008 (NFL record 23 straight wins).

‘‘There’s very little credit that our football team’s given and that’s unfortunate,’’. ‘‘It bothers me a little bit. You have to earn everything you get in this league. Whether you’re playing against a starter or backup, whatever.- Jets Head coach Rex Ryan

Mike Francesa on his radio show was downplaying the Jets big victory and upset with the Ryan quote.

Francesa said:

“No way the Jets sniff victory if the Colts leave their starters in”

“Peyton Manning would’ve put up 30 pts on that Jets defense in the second half”

“Your defense is pretty good, but your offense is the worst in the league”

While all of these points are valid he is forgetting that the Jets were projected to win 5-7 games this year by most experts. Most people expected the Jets to start …

In the last game the Giants will ever play at Giants Stadium, the 2009 Giants decided to honor the team that ushered in the stadium, the 3-11 1976 Giants, by playing just like them. Actually they played worse. Craig Morton, Walker Gillette and John Mendenhall were nowhere in sight, but somehow their ghosts invaded Giants Stadium (and somehow they have ghosts even though they’re not dead yet), as this year’s edition played like a last place team. The final score was 41-9, but the game really wasn’t that close.

This game is probably beyond analysis, but we’ll try anyway. Tackling? Pathetic. Rushing? Pathetic. Defense? Pathetic. Offense? Pathetic. That pretty much covers it. With the season on the line, the Giants just didn’t show up, and now they’re as dead and buried as Jimmy Hoffa. And they closed out Giants Stadium in humiliating fashion, dishonoring all the teams that played before them. It was a sad and pitiful display of football, with the team showing no heart, …

Christmas is all about comebacks and overcoming adversity against all odds. Ok, it’s really nothing about comebacks and overcoming adversity against all odds but is about love, peace on earth, goodwill toward men, opening presents, then drinking all day long and passing out underneath the tree as an ornament falls and pierces one of your eyeballs, sending you screaming down the street bloody, naked and in horrifying pain. Ah, Christmas. One of the brightest, heartwarming stories of the week, though, is Jonathan Bender’s return to the world of basketball after not playing a game in four years. And on top of it all, he’s been productive. The Knicks, too, are on the comeback trail after starting out at 1-9. Bender’s return after a long absence brings to mind other great comebacks. So, without further ado, here’s a random list of notable returns over the decades (and even centuries).

Gordie Howe retired after the 1971 season, then came back in 1973-’74 to play with his sons, Mark and Marty, lasting …

Last night, the Giants went back in time to the carefree, innocent, halcyon days of weeks one through five, when they romped and had their way with opponents and were looking like the best team in the NFL. Of course, they were playing against some of the worst teams in the NFL. And on Monday Night Football, the Redskins sure looked like one of the league’s dregs, making life easy for Big Blue. But at this time of year, all that matters is a win. But if it’s a 45-12 win, then that’s all the better.
The “good” Giants showed up for this game, and what did they do right vs. the Skins? How about everything. It was domination, annihilation, whatever fun word you want to use. The D pressured the quarterback, rattled the quarterback, sacked the quarterback (five times), injured the quarterback and generally made life miserable for the quarterback. They dominated the line of scrimmage. They played with three subs in the defensive backfield …

On Saturday night I was flipping between another Rangers loss and the Christmas classic It’s a Wonderful Life. Of course you can’t help but wonder, “What if George Bailey’s situation happened to me?” What if I were able to see the consequences of never being born? That thought lasted about a minute and a half, because everybody’s life would surely be better. My wife would have been able to marry a more successful, rich, interesting, well-rounded man instead of someone who has nothing but a monkey shooting a slap shot, a couple of empty beer cans and some old Rusty Staub highlights filling up his head. My daughter would have a normal father, one who doesn’t constantly quiz her on the proper French Canadian–accented way of saying the names Guy Lafleur and Gilbert Perrault. And nobody else’s life would be affected one way or the other.

But on that subject, what if, more importantly, James Dolan had never been born? The Isiah Thomas era would never have happened. …

The expected smashmouth, defensive, low scoring NFC East battle never materialized in the Giants-Eagles game, as it looked more like an old AFL contest. It was George Blanda vs. John Hadl. Well, the Giants defense made it seem that way, because they can’t stop anybody. If the 82-year-old Blanda stepped on the field against them today, he’d pass for 400 yards. Sure, both starting safeties are injured and they have a corner playing safety, but last night’s performance was downright ridiculous.
Does it even matter what the Giants did well – Eli Manning threw for 391 yards and three touchdowns (with no interceptions), Brandon Jacobs was back to being his old physical self, dragging six defenders with him as he gains eight yards, Hakeem Nicks had a great TD reception, Domenik Hixon came up with an impressive TD catch and run, Ahmad Bradshaw had some nice runs and a few good blocks, Steve Smith broke the franchise single-season reception record – because it was …