“No man for any considerable period can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Why yes, I have heard the sordid details of Steve Phillips’ affair.

Honestly, I feel really bad for his kids, not just because their father has once again been outed as a philanderer, but also because their father is Steve Phillips. That can’t be fun.

Also, I can’t understand why anyone could be surprised to learn that someone so willing to spend time around Steve Phillips would turn out to be criminally insane.

But really, what’s interesting here is one of the details in the young lady’s crazytime letter to Phillips’ poor wife.

It turns out Steve Phillips has “a big birthmark on his crotch right above his penis and another one on his left inner thigh.”

First of all, gross. Second, could this be a clue as to why Steve Phillips hates Carlos Beltran so irrationally and so thoroughly?

Think about it: After “being awesome at baseball,” Carlos Beltran’s most distinguishing characteristic is the massive mole over his right ear. And now we learn that Phillips, too, is riddled with embarrassing birthmarks.

Could it be that Steve Phillips’ is publicly punishing Beltran because he can’t handle his own birthmark-fueled shame? Is Carlos Beltran, in some vague way, like the Hester Prynne to Steve Phillips’ Dimmesdale, forced to carry openly the burden Phillips keeps secret?

And could you imagine a catharsis in which Steve Phillips, finally overcome by guilt, throws open his pants to reveal himself to the world, throwing himself at Beltran’s mercy?

I prefer not to. I’m not insane, and thus am not interested in seeing any more of Steve Phillips than I absolutely must.

CC Sabathia is many things. He is a Cy Young Award winner, the owner of a .261 lifetime batting average, and the active Major Leaguer who appears to have the best shot at winning 300 games.

But perhaps most importantly, he has replaced Wilford Brimley as the human being who most strongly resembles a Walrus:

As you can see, Brimley, in his even older old age (was Wilford Brimley even famous before he turned 60? Has there ever been anyone else who has only been famous as an old person?), has begun to look more like your cranky old neighbor with an awesome mustache and less like a large, flippered marine mammal.

No one can be sure why Brimley has started to look more human than pinnibed. Perhaps he has developed an aversion to bivalves, or perhaps it is just the affect of his body being racked by the ‘beetis.

Sabathia, on the other hand, should continue to feast on (many, many) clams moving forward, just as he does American League hitters.

And though that’s slightly less important than Walrusishness, it’s still pretty awesome.

And what’s especially awesome about the way Sabathia pitches — and perhaps this has something to do with his walrusy qualities — is that he does it in such ridiculous quantities.

Much has been made this postseason about Sabathia’s rough start in last year’s playoffs, and many have attributed that outing to fatigue after a long season of starting on short rest.

But in Sabathia’s three final regular season games — all thrown on three night’s rest and after he had already thrown more than 230 innings in the season — he struck out 21 batters in 21 2/3 innings while walking only four batters and posting a 0.83 ERA.

So I think it’s fair to wonder if CC’s bad outing was only that, a bad outing, and he’s not that affected by pitching on short rest.

Sabathia told reporters before last night’s game that his fastball might not be as sharp. And if we look at his velocity charts from 2008, we can see that there was a dip in his fastball velocity in the final start. But really only in that final start, and it wasn’t the lowest mark of his season.

Maybe that’s notable, and maybe Sabathia really couldn’t keep up throwing on three night’s rest all year long. Or maybe he just hasn’t been conditioned for it, and he actually has the capacity to remain effective for more starts and more innings than anyone in (very) recent vintage.

After all, not too long ago Nolan Ryan — a freak, no doubt, but a human nonetheless — threw at least 280 innings in five out of the six seasons from 1972-1977. In one game, in 1974, he threw a 13-inning complete game in which he struck out 19 batters and walked 10.

In other words, I wonder if certain pitchers have the capacity to pitch a lot more often, and a lot longer, than they are ever allowed in today’s game. Of course, I’ll never find out, because the Yanks would be foolish to risk an investment like the one they’ve made in Sabathia on such an experiment.

So I suppose I’ll just have to take pleasure in how much he looks like a walrus. Coo coo ca choo.

The most interesting thing of the Mariano Rivera spitball controversy? We found out a lot more about how and why spitballs are thrown. I always dreamed of doctoring the ball in Little League, just because I thought it would be funny and figured no one would ever suspect it. But we didn’t have the Internet then and no one would show me how.

I know it’s nothing new, but nothing says “postmodern absurdity” more than when the New York media discusses how an athlete or coach handles the New York media.

Brooklyn Met Fan asks a question I also asked last night: “Izzit just me or has umpiring as a whole gotten significantly worse this season?”

The Jets’ offensive line has been zone blocking more on running plays, which could explain the slow start to their run game.