THE DAILY (not so much) BINGAPANT

More than 250 people and dozens of cameras jammed into the concourse of the Garden's Theatre believed to be the most heavily attended news conference in Knick history.

And Brown promised to make Knick fans proud again.

"I want to see this franchise respected and be a contender every year, having people come to the Garden saying, 'Man, they played the right way,'" Brown said. "Because you're not going to fool them. If you play bad, the fans will understand it. If you show effort, play unselfishly and you show you care, things will happen."

I like this pic not so much for it's artistic presence, but more so for what was captured here. This is a pic of Mo Mo crawling toward the PS2 controller while Unc. Con is left to play with a block and a ball.

Not yet Bambino!!

I dropped off the Bingapant to get groomed this morning and wanted to show you a coupla before pics. Wait until you see him tomorrow. I instructed the grooming artist to give Tino a 'lion cut'. I'm counting the minutes until I get to pick up the little guy (actually Mama is picking him up). As you've read on this blog, it's been a helter swelter summer in Cap City and that long hair is jus too hot for Tino.

Of course, it had to come down to Curt Schilling against Alex Rodriguez. There was no other way the defining moment of the latest Yankees-Red Sox skirmish was going to play out without the Red Sox' new closer battling the Yankee the Bosox love to hate.

From the moment Schilling started getting loose in the bullpen in the eighth, you knew he was going to face A-Rod with the game on the line in the ninth.

And he did. After Gary Sheffield punished a splitter for a leadoff double, Rodriguez crushed a first-pitch splitter for a two-run homer that collided with the back wall of the center-field bleachers to carry the Yankees to a pulsating 8-6 win in front of a sold-out Fenway Park gathering of 35,232.

As A-Rod circled the bases, memories drifted back to last year's ALCS, when Schilling said Rodriguez' chop on Bronson Arroyo in Game 6 was a "bush-league play," a "junior high move" and that A-Rod wasn't a "real Yankee."

Armed with a two-run lead, Mariano Rivera fanned the side in the ninth to post his 21st straight save after opening the season by blowing his first two opportunities against the Red Sox.