Keith Olbermann turned his EVISCERATIN' blade on Derek Jeter on Tuesday and made some incisive points: This prolonged farewell tour, which has been as much about selling crap as it has about honoring Jeter, is extremely gross. And the collective insistence on keeping Jeter in the lineup has surely hurt the Yankees this season.
This overarching narrative that Jeter ISN'T THE BEST EVER YEAH I SAID IT is a bit silly, though. Who's Olbermann arguing with? Jorge Posada? Modern-day Yankees fans who, like any generation of diehards, overvalue the great they grew up with? Olbermann goes to great lengths to shoot down a Greatest Ever argument that, as far as I can tell, very few people are making. A noisy minority exaggerate Jeter's legacy, and of course they do. It's his last hurrah and he plays in New York, where everything gets magnified to the point of insufferableness. This is like arguing with people who compliment a guy at his funeral (although, as Olbermann fairly points out, Jeter is not dead, despite what his treatment might suggest.)
That said, Olbermann ends the whole thing with "YEAH JEETS," so we're good.