Damon doesn't throw well, his swings sometimes look awkward, and fly balls can be a bit of an adventure, but Damon is the kind of player the Yankees have to keep.

Hideki Matsui gets swan-song treatment from Mike Vaccaro under the headline "Godspeed, Godzilla." Vaccaro gives Matsui's career five graphs, and for a player who never mastered English--and who reporters have a hard time relating to--one has to wonder if that's as much he'll ever get. Vaccaro trots out his career numbers, but says the most impressive thing was "the humanity he brought to the role."

Alex Rodriguez steals quite a few stories after he broke a Series slump with the go-ahead RBI in the ninth. My favorite is the one David Wells pens for the Post. This morning's offering is about Kate Hudson, who Wells credits with A-Rod's success this postseason. It's not a novel claim at this point, but Wells brings some inside information.

She is the perfect complement to him. I know her a little bit and have talked to her quite a few times. She's just a really down-to-earth chick. She'll go to baseball games and have fun. She's just supportive of him, and that empowers him with an "I don't give a damn" attitude.

It wasn't an entirely glorious day for New York sports, though. Both the Jets and the Giants lost. The day-after stories are mostly summing up, so we'll have to wait until tomorrow for the real finger-pointing to start. But they're already tending in Rex Ryan's direction now that the 4-0 start is a distant memory. Gary Myers calls him green in the Daily News. And everyone seems to like this typically gracious post-game quote from Ryan about the 30-25 loss to the division rival Dolphins: "Sometimes, things just don't make sense."

But that was the peak. The Manny Ramirez–David Ortiz combo? Ramirez was already serving a drug-test-related suspension, and the news that Ortiz was implicated was just like the news that Ramirez was implicated, only a little fatter and slower.

The idea of the list is much more exciting than the list itself. Everything you didn’t know you knew about performance-enhancing drugs, all in one place. Just let the list out, and let the public stand face to face with the truth about drugs and baseball.

“Name them all and get it over and let baseball go on,” Hank Aaron said. Put the names out, Mark Teixeira said. Put the names out, Johnny Damon said.

Damon’s name is on one list already. The Yankees outfielder is No. 3 on a list of 103 baseball players that you can turn up if you Google “baseball steroids list”—or that you can find even more quickly by Googling “fake steroids list.”

People who post the Internet list like to make a point of saying they don’t really believe what’s on it. There are plenty of forensic criticisms of the list—too many Red Sox (it’s a Yankees fan’s hoax!), too few no-name players, suspicious formatting—but the main objection to the list is a matter of attitude. The steroids scandal is about the feeling of being duped, or worse, letting oneself be duped. So now the desire is to be in the know but also to be knowing, to be wised up.

That said, you wouldn’t care to bet that any particular player on the fake list is not also on the real list. Plenty of the names have already gone into the history books for being otherwise implicated for performance-enhancing drugs—Rafael Palmeiro, Gary Sheffield, Barry Bonds, Benito Santiago—and even more are the sort of names that history has a hard time paying attention to. Wasn’t that journeyman utility infielder already caught for something? What about that slow-footed corner outfielder? Or that other slow-footed corner outfielder? It’s like trying to keep track of who used to play for the Rangers and who used to play for the Astros. Six years is a long time in baseball.

So the Internet list hovers on the edge of public view, not quite fit for discussion. Information does not exactly want to be free, at least not in this case. Information would rather be certified by someone who knows what he or she is doing: The New York Times and Sports Illustrated, the old media of record, slowly digging out the names on the real list, one or two at a time, like scrupulous archaeologists clearing a site with brushes. Look, here we have … what appears to be … yes, here is Sammy Sosa. Definitely Sammy Sosa. Sammy Sosa, “according to lawyers with knowledge of the drug-testing results,” was on the list of players who failed drug tests.

Thanks, lawyers. Come on. You gave up the guy shaped like the Thing, the guy who hit 243 home runs in four years. That’s like shooting a farm-raised pig on a captive hunt. Put the names out!

Or better yet, don’t. The ethical problems are bad enough: Sammy Sosa may be a fraud and a hypocrite, but his drug test was supposed to be anonymous. Turning a private screening program into a public blacklist is a much more serious breach of trust than trashing the home-run record book ever was—even if the list were to tell us what we want to know.

And it won’t. The secret list, the one seized by drug investigators and passed around and leaked, is not the final word on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. It is a list of 104 names of players who were told in 2003 that they would be tested for drugs, and were then associated with a positive drug-test result. As with any drug-testing program, some of those positives were false positives: Major League Baseball has said that only 96 players were ultimately counted as positive, and that the players’ union disputes some of those 96 results.

So after we learn who the 104 guilty players are, it will be time to get the list of the eight guilty-but-not-guilty players, and then the list of however many players’ guilt that is in dispute. Meanwhile, the list will still be missing all the drug-assisted players who got a false negative, or who took a masking agent, or who had moved on to drugs too advanced for the drug tests to catch.

What can the real list tell us that the fake list can’t? Yes, it would be funny if one of the anti-steroids crusaders like Curt Schilling or Jeff Kent showed up on the list. But it wouldn’t be surprising. Jeff Kent hit more home runs after his 35th birthday than he did before his 30th. Maybe he’s a clean guy who happened to hit like a steroids guy. Nobody knows.

One national sportswriter wrote recently that he would give up on baseball if Derek Jeter’s name showed up on the list, because Jeter seems like a guy who would quit the game rather than “cheat to compete.” That’s nice, but Derek Jeter never refused to cross home plate when a known steroid cheater like Alex Rodriguez or Gary Sheffield knocked him in. He’s a team player, and he plays to win.

Every time a drug list comes up—the fake one, the Mitchell Report, the collected works of Jose Canseco—it looks at first glance as if your favorite team is especially implicated. You can find the suspect list online with the names of all Mets-linked players underlined: 30-some out of 103 players. Those dirty Mets! But it’s mostly perception: Ballplayers knock around, and the Mets’ alumni are other teams’ alumni, too. Gary Sheffield is a Met and a Yankee—and a Brewer, Padre, Dodger, Brave, Marlin and Tiger.

Alex Rodriguez and the Yankees have the best record in the American League at the moment. Manny Ramirez and the Dodgers have the best record in the National League. Here comes baseball history, or more of the same baseball history.

The last championship Yankees were a steroids team. The Red Sox who knocked them off were a steroids team. The Baltimore Orioles who sat in fourth place and watched them were a steroids team. Nobody’s roster was hydroponically grown in a clean room. Everybody comes out of the same dirt.

editorial@observer.com

Anyway! The Rocketman story concerns an RAF pilot escaping from a crashing plane using his jetpack; the RAF confirms that the near-fatal crash resulted from engine failure and not enemy fire. In print, the inside pictures are pretty spectacular. As is often the case with the tabloids, when the photography on a story is rough, the top position is given to a beautiful photo treatment, while the bottom of the page is taken up with the less photogenic news story. Important to make sure the text on the bottom story, if it's leading the paper, is very, very big, and very, very black.

This is accomplished with the headine "SWINE DEATH." Subheading: "1st city casualty; 5 schools shuttered." A postage-stamp-sized picture of Mitchell Wiener, the assistant principal who died last night of complications from swine flu, accompanies the story. This is big news: the first death in New York City from America's favorite new pandemic, and, just possibly, a fracas over the city's handling of school closings amid the panic? Not really. Most of the story, rather uncharacteristically respectfully, is given over to news of the five new school closings announced yesterday afternoon and remembrances of a math teacher and school official who was by all accounts popular and dedicated.

Daily News: Another way to deal with a story that doesn't have much strong photography is to fill the whole page with headline. This is a great tactic when the story deserves to really scream. But it looks really screamy when you do that. Which is one of the reasons the front of today's News feels a little odd. It's really long: "SWINE FLU CLAIMS 1st NYC VICTIM" reads the main head, after a superhed lead-in of "11 SCHOOLS SHUTTERED AS ..." The first thought we had when we read that was, "the Post is saying five schools were shuttered; did the News scoop the Post on six schools? They didn't: five schools were closed yesterday afternoon, which added to the six closed late last week brings us to a total of 11. Of course, that means that as Mitchell Wiener was dying of complications from the virus, five schools were shuttered; six were shuttered before Wiener's condition was clearly life-threatening. So this is a little misleading. We also wonder—this isn't a rhetorical question, we really are unsure—whether the News headline would actually mean anything to anyone who hadn't already heard of Wiener's death either by logging on or switching the television on pretty much any time since 7 p.m. last night. Couldn't "SWINE FLU CLAIMS 1st NYC VICTIM" refer equally to a first case of swine flu as a first death from swine flu? Perhaps this seems nitpicky. But it at least serves to demonstrate that the News did not hit the nail on the head.

General observations: A thing we rarely do is attempt to break a tie by expanding our scope beyond the two New York City tabloids. But reading this morning's version of the story in The New York Times was instructive about how the tabloids' own reporting ethos is sometimes self-vitiating. From this morning's story by Anemona Hartocollis (with additional reporting by A.G. Sulzberger, among others!):

Health officials said Sunday that the death was not surprising, since even in a normal flu season, thousands of victims die of complications from the disease.

Mr. Wiener had a history of medical problems that may have put him at greater risk, the officials said. His family said that he had suffered from gout but that it was under control with medication. [snip]

His wife, Bonnie, a reading teacher, blamed the city for failing to act sooner to close the school where she and her husband both worked. “I know we have a duty to educate the children of New York,” Ms. Wiener, who is not sick, said on Friday. But, she added, “something just doesn’t fit right.” [snip]

In one shift in the way the city was responding to the disease, hours before Mr. Wiener’s death, the health department issued a statement urging New Yorkers who suffered from underlying health issues like emphysema, diabetes or asthma and who were exposed to the flu to see their doctors to determine whether they should take antiviral drugs as a precaution.

Dr. Frieden said Sunday that city officials did not expect to stop the flu from spreading at this point. But he said that the school closings and the warnings to people with underlying health conditions were an attempt to keep people from getting seriously ill, as Mr. Wiener had.

Why does this dispute matter?

On Friday, Dr. Frieden was named by President Obama to head the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where he will have to make critical decisions about how to deal with the spread of the disease. He starts in June. He has urged the federal government to mount a Manhattan Project-type effort to develop a vaccine.

Over the weekend, the tabloids presented the dispute between Ms. Wiener, arguing that her husband had become sick because of the school's failure to close quickly enough after the swine flu hit, and the city; there isn't much to add to that story since the event of Wiener's death, except that the city's efforts to characterize Mitchell Wiener's death as exceptional due to unspecified underlying medical conditions or unexceptional in that a thousand people die of more typical flu strains each year probably deserves some further investigation. What's more, the city both explicitly linked Wiener's death to underlying conditions and did a bit of quick policy work, issuing a warning to anyone exposed to the virus who has an underlying condition to be tested even if they have no symptoms. Is this a public-relations problem that is translating immediately into policy?

If the situation had been slightly different—let's say, a police officer is involved in the shooting death of a civilian, and the mayor acts prematurely to excuse his administration or city agencies from culpability—the tabloids would typically leave no stone unturned until they could break the tie between the victim's family and the city. Here, the tabloids seem satisfied with a "he-said, she said." They may not have the information they need to dig deeper, but you might expect them to present the matter to the reader at least, and indicate somehow their intention to follow up. We'll see whether it is soon enough.

We tend to think that the News got little advantage from its front-page swine-flu takeover, since the treatment was so much sloppier than the treatment in the Post. So we won't bother too much about what stories actually are on the front page of the Post you've got in your actual, meatspace hands. (We got Rocketman.) No matter what the two other stories on the Post cover are for you, the Post beats the News on the swine flu, and there's nothing else the News can offer.

Winner: New York Post

You'll know that the trial concerns charges that Mr. Marshall, acting as his mother's financial adviser, took advantage of her waning faculties late in life to divert massive amounts of money and property from her immense fortune to benefit himself—and, perhaps more importantly, his wife, Charlene Marshall, who is not charged with a crime but who has all along been promoted as the real villain of the saga. On Thursday morning in the courtroom, Ms. Marshall wept in her seat; it was her anniversary with the accused, her husband, and The New York Times had devoted a cover story to her status as the villain of the story even though she is not charged with a crime; less subtly, the Post made reference to comments attributed by witnesses to the late Brooke Astor that Charlene was a fortune-hunter with the headline "CHOKE ON THIS, CHARLENE," referring to a diamond necklace Ms. De la Renta said she was given expressly so that it would not go to Charlene Marshall after Brooke Astor's death. Today, the Post has something it's willing to blast off the front page: A reporter visited the East 79th Street apartment of Anthony and Charlene Marshall—and was let in. Ms. Marshall reportedly told the reporter that Mr. Marshall wasn't in, only to watch in horror as he appeared in his dressing gown and a dumb smile on his lips, at 2 in the afternoon. She ordered him back to his room, then put back on her own dumb smile, explained to the reporter that they could not talk to the press, and before sending the reporter off remarked on the weather and announced that she had planned a shopping trip for herself that afternoon. In the greater scheme of things, there is not much here. But the notion that Ms. Marshall is calling the shots, and possibly has been for some time, is reinforced here. The front page headline? "DISS ASTOR."

Wait. Why don't we get the joke? Was it a "dis" for Charlene Marshall to order her husband back to his room? That's what the subheading suggests: "Wife sends Brooke's boy to his room." And of course, if you put the two words together, it sounds like "Disaster." What's the disaster? If you've been following this case, the Post reporter's escapade is among the least interesting things to have happened yet. Far more damaging material spews from the witness stand each day than anything in the behavior of these two senior citizens at home on their day off. Some other display copy you can find inside the paper and on nypost.com looked better to us; we can see why "ASTOR & COMMANDER" didn't rate the front (the reference is too obscure and, possibly, highbrow, the movie version of the classic Patrick O'Brian novel notwithstanding); "CHARLENE'S IN CHARGE" is a little long, given the size and weight of the type they would have decided to give the story on the front. But both illustrate that the Post probably had not finished its brainstorming by the time they had to go to press with what they had, and DISS ASTOR is the result. We also are forced to point out that in the little teaser (under the heading "EXCLUSIVE") that accompanies the cover treatment, the late Astor matron's first name is misspelled "Brook," even though it appears correctly spelled in the headline, scant inches away.

There is no question that the diss-astor-ous headline on the Astor story is the lead, even though it's at the bottom of the page. Still, the Post gives significant real estate to Yankee hitter Johnny Damon: "Damon rescues reeling Yankees," reads the bold flesh-colored text (underlined, too, in very British-tabloid style) next to a pretty compelling shot of the ex-Red Sock at the plate. The Post has devoted considerably more real estate to this Yankees comeback story than it has to the losing streak Mr. Damon is credited with helping to end (on the front page, at least; the Sports pages are a different matter). Just saying.

Daily News: In the battle between the two big New York daily tabloids, one oft-cited advantage of the Daily News is their willingness to do "enterprise" journalism: They take themselves off the news treadmill long enough to investigate and report on things that become news because the newspaper covers them, instead of the other way around. This morning's cover story on the News only required them to find some lawsuits against two brain surgeons at North Shore University Hospital, where, last week, the paper reported that two neurosurgeons had gone AWOL while an anesthetized patient awaited them in the operating room. Since then, one of the surgeons has stepped down as chair of his department and pulled from the O.R.; but in that same time the News has stumbled upon four lawsuits against the two neurosurgeons and report that eight more suits are coming. Today's story focuses on one patient, a 4-year-old Washington girl whose parents claim was given an experimental surgery on the basis of a misdiagnosis, the results of which have forced their daughter into more surgeries and procedures, including brain surgery. Of course, we've only got the suit to go on—the hospital offered little concrete response to the charges—and we can't tell how frequently neurosurgeons, given their sensitive practice area, are sued when the results of their treatment are not good (which they must sometimes be). Still, the charges are pretty shocking, and they're bolstered by taped interviews with the neurosurgeon provided to the paper. The wood reads "BRAIN DOCS SCANDAL GROWS," then, in large type: "SURGEONS HURT MY BABY." Pictured is the mother in the case, April Bryant, with her daughter Katie and a teddy bear, photographed in April. "Suit: Doctors botched tot's 'unnecessary' spine surgery."

We're in full-on baseball season, and the News packages the home teams' recent performance neatly with two blue boxes, each with the circular team logo, accompanying the headlines "METS WIN 7TH STRAIGHT" and "JOKE'S ON O'S AS YANKS ROLL."

General observations: Given that there's been no courtroom drama since Thursday in the Astor trial, it seems odd that the bit of made-up news the Post found in the case should dominate Monday's front page. But if the paper is campaigning to get its readers' interest in the case up, they could be setting themselves up for a few nice covers this coming week as testimony resumes. Still, it compounds the central problem, that nothing material has happened in the case in this story, and the headline is a clunker and the paper doesn't seem to have absolute command over the spelling of the name of the main character in the drama. And while we're not sure whether Johnny Damon has really "rescued" the Yankees just yet, it's a nice grabby bit of display aimed at an audience that is probably much more Yankees than Mets to begin with.

While this News cover story on the two neurosurgeons is not Pulitzer material by a long stretch, the contrast it creates to the Post caused this reporter, for instance, to repeat the central brand message of the News—serious, investigative journalism beats sensationalistic Fleet Streetism. In this case, they're probably right. We would love the Astor story to be bigger than it is, but wishing doesn't make it so. We hope the Post's campaign to put the trial front-of-mind will make this trial as fascinating to New York's subway tabloid readers as it is to us.

Winner: Daily News.

The problem with the post-season in most sports is that one league or conference is often much stronger than the other league or conference. When this happens, the playoffs become anticlimactic, with the actual championship series or game becoming a foregone conclusion once the stronger conference crowns its champion.

A good example of this came in 2004, when the Red Sox and Yankees slugged it out in seven memorable games in the A.L.C.S. They were clearly the two most talented teams in baseball and massive audiences tuned in for each game, knowing that it was the de facto World Series. Which it was. Everyone remembers (for better or worse) Johnny Damon’s Game 7 grand slam in the Bronx, while the Sox’ 4-0 sweep of the Cardinals is mostly an afterthought. A similar example: Team U.S.A.’s “miracle on ice” upset of the Soviet Union in 1980 is mistakenly remembered by many as that year’s gold medal game. But that’s only what it felt like; the Americans actually had to beat Finland to claim their medal.

Every once in a while, though, the championship game or series that’s supposed to be a cakewalk turns into something entirely different. There’s no better example of this than the 2003 World Series. Just as in ’04, all eyes were on that year’s A.L.C.S., another epic seven-game clash between Boston and New York. The competition was fierce, and the series swung back and forth – Boston took the first game, New York the next two, and then the teams swapped wins all the way through the seventh game, when Aaron Boone’s 11^th inning home run sent the Yankees to the World Series. It looked like a World Series in everything but name. Meanwhile, comparatively few people paid much attention to the Marlins and Cubs in the N.L.C.S., which attracted smaller television audiences and spawned far fewer conversations (except for that Bartman thing). To just about everyone, the World Series was settled the second the Yankees beat Boston; the Marlins were just a pesky formality the Bombers would have to deal with while planning their parade.

And then the Marlins won. In six games.

In case it isn’t obvious where this is going, just consider this year’s presidential race. Since early last year, the general assumption has been that the Democratic primary race would be like the ’04 Red Sox-Yankees series – a star-studded clash that would attract international attentions and serve as the de facto general election. And by the end of the primary season, it still seemed that way. Close to 40 million voters had taken part – a record-shattering figure – while interest in the G.O.P. race had been modest. And every indicator pointed to overwhelming built-in advantages for the Democrats after eight years of G.O.P. White House control.

But it’s starting to look like 2003, and not 2004. John McCain has kept the race close all summer, and the most recent news couldn’t be better for him. Just consider what’s in the headlines today:

* Gallup’s daily tracking poll is dead even, 45-45.

* A new poll conducted by a Democratic firm in Ohio also shows a 45-45 tie.

* FiveThirtyEight.com, which uses some of the most innovative and precise statistical tools to analyze the race, reports that: “although Barack Obama remains a slight favorite in this election, his position is more vulnerable than at any point since the primaries concluded, and he no longer appears to have a built-in strength in the electoral college that we had attributed to him before.”

* McCain also won far better reviews for his performance at Saturday’s Saddelback forum. And while this can be dismissed because of the nature of the audience (conservative) and the topics discussed, the contrast between McCain’s confidence and Obama’s hesitant and tentative performance suggests possible trouble for Obama in this fall’s debates.

It is still (relatively) early, and with his VP selection and convention speech, Obama has an opportunity in the next few weeks to improve his standing. But for now, John McCain feels a lot more like the Florida Marlins than the St. Louis Cardinals. And how about this for an omen: The ’03 Marlins were led by “Trader” Jack McKeon who became the oldest manager ever to win a World Series. He was 72 years old.

But Johnny Damon, fresh from visits to his Orlando chiropractor and dentist, was rejuvenated. On the 28th, he signed an $8 million contract to sell his 2,410-square-foot, three-bedroom apartment on the 39th floor of One Beacon Court, the glittery 58th Street condo where Yank slugger Bobby Abreu and Beyoncé have apartments.

According to records just filed with the city, he closed exactly three months later, the day that the Yankees lost the American League East Division for the first time in 10 years. (They got the wild card, which didn’t take them very far.)

His buyer, listed anonymously as a limited liability corporation, took out a $4 million mortgage. Despite Mr. Damon’s $52 million contract, city records show that he took out a mortgage also, for $3 million, when he bought the place last year.

According to a Wall Street Journal article written when the One Beacon apartment went to market this summer, Mr. Damon now has the hassle of hunting for a “house with a pool” in the suburbs. He’s leaving behind a 21-foot-long living room with floor-to-ceiling windows, in between a 27.5-foot gallery and a 14.5-foot dining room, according to the listing with Adam Modlin, president of the Modlin Group. The broker, who also has worked for Alex Rodriguez, would not comment.

Mr. Damon’s kitchen also comes with a little “breakfast area,” maybe stocked with the Wheaties boxes featuring Mr. Damon’s classic Red Sox squad.

The gossip Web site Big Time Listings reported on the sale Tuesday, pointing out that the lawyer for this deal happens to have represented one of Mr. Damon’s neighbors, Francisco D’Agostino.

• The New York Post

Today, the New York Post reports that both the Mets and Yankees are interested in acquiring Philies slugger Bobby Abreu. But would the all-star outfielder move to Manhattan full-time?

Well, in May 2005, The Observer broke the news that Mr. Abreu had purchased a $3.9 million pied-a-terre at One Beacon Court (where Yankee Johny Damon later moved in).

Here's what Mr. Abreu's agent told The Observer at the time:

Hmm...after he stops playing?

- Michael Calderone

As I remember, Johnny Damon was playing for the Oakland A's when the Red Sox took him, by giving him a ton more money, ripping off a small-market club. He came to Boston and put in three great years. He didn't complain, didn't hotdog, just played hard, and broke the curse. When Damon came to the plate last night, he was all class. Tipping his cap to the Red Sox and to Wakefield. And Fenway booed. The Boston fans are almost as bad as the Yankee fans, booing Rivera last year...

But he’s still trying to unload what seems like the ultimate bachelor pad: his duplex penthouse at 114 Liberty Street.

Thrice already he’s cut the price on the 7,000-square-foot apartment, which first entered the market for $11 million in May 2005.

Now the discount’s getting even deeper. The new sticker price: $5.995 million.

“Russell Simmons wants to move the property,” said Lisa Maysonet, a senior vice president at Prudential Douglas Elliman, who is listing the apartment with her colleague, Gary Kabol. “He is willing to take a little less than its market value to sell it more quickly. Someone’s going to get a really good deal.”

Judging from a recent sale in the 11-story building, the reduced asking price appears more market-friendly.

Last month, Goldman Sachs executive Steven Kerr unloaded his 5,369-square-foot spread a couple floors down for $4.335 million.

With the reduction, Mr. Simmons’ apartment would cost only slightly more than the $5 million that Sean (Diddy) Combs agreed to pay for it in 2001, around the time that it was featured on MTV Cribs. (However, the building sustained ample damage on Sept. 11, and Mr. Simmons graciously let Diddy out of the contract).

But if Diddy doesn’t hurry back downtown to scoop it up, Mr. Simmons’ broker just might.

“If I could buy it myself, I would,” said Ms. Maysonet. “In fact, I am going to talk to my husband about it.”

Damon Saves $400 K.

Where will Johnny Damon, the Yankees’ $52 million man, hang his cap after night games up in the Bronx (and out on the town)?

After he was spotted in a number of Yankee-friendly luxury buildings, The Observer reported in February that Mr. Damon’s offer was accepted on a $5.9 million condo at One Beacon Court.

Turns out he got a better deal than that—by almost $400,000. Mr. Damon has closed on the 39th-floor pad for $5.555 million, according to deed-transfer records.

Mr. Damon and his wife, Michelle Mangan, join Phillies right-fielder Bobby Abreu, singer Beyoncé Knowles, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams, and former G.E. chief executive Jack Welch (among the countless heavyweights who reaped fortunes on Wall Street and in the entertainment industry).

The Damons’ new living situation—a sleek, 2,410-square-foot condo—closely resembles the digs from their early days in Boston. Back then, the couple lived on the 34th floor at the Ritz-Carlton, an upscale building that was home to such players as Manny Ramirez, Edgar Renteria and David Ortiz.

After leaving the Ritz-Carlton, the couple seemed to have settled down into a comparatively tranquil suburban setting, purchasing a $4.75 million home in Brookline, near Fenway Park.

These days, Mr. Damon will probably hang around his old ballpark only when the Yankees are on the road. So what are his plans for the Boston home?

In mid-March, the 6,800-square-foot house went on the market for $5.85 million, according to a broker with knowledge of the listing.

Then, a few days after the season opener, Mr. Damon’s house was taken off the market.

Broker Ellie Sonis—who had the listing, according to a source—declined to comment.

Asking Record $28.5 M. Downtown

Besides owning a vast media empire, News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch has been a power player in Manhattan’s high-end real estate world ever since buying the triplex penthouse at 834 Fifth for a record-breaking $44 million. Soon after, Mr. Murdoch put his Soho place on the market and set the record for the most expensive residence listing below 14th Street: $28 million.

Now, that lofty record has been trumped.

Minnesota businessman Edward Bazinet has recently placed his five-story Tribeca penthouse on the market for $28.5 million.

In 2001, Mr. Bazinet purchased the massive apartment at 60 Warren Street for $13.15 million. StarMedia ex-C.E.O. Fernando Espuelas, the seller at the time, had bought it for just $6.1 million in 2000.

The 9,300-square-foot modern structure was built on top of a 19th-century warehouse. Included with the spacious home are four terraces, a full-floor master suite, a stainless-steel-and-glass staircase, and a rooftop home gym.

In late 2005, fashion maven Elie Tahari reportedly paid $25 million for Mr. Murdoch’s lavish Soho spread—which, coincidentally, was also listed at 9,300 square feet. Since that big deal was the highest downtown residential sale, it remains to be seen whether Mr. Bazinet can steal that record away too.

Stephen McRae, of Sotheby’s International Realty, has the listing. He didn’t return calls for comment. Mr. Bazinet could not be reached for comment.

$23 M. in Carnegie Hill

For over half a century, the Spence-Chapin Adoption Service has operated on East 94th Street, anchoring a picturesque block between Fifth and Madison avenues.

But with Manhattan’s townhouse market still going strong, it seemed like the perfect time for the agency to cash out.

After first buying a five-story townhouse at No. 6-8 94th Street in 1955, the agency purchased the townhouse next-door at No. 4 and converted it into a seven-story office annex.

Now, the entire 60-foot building has hit the market for $23 million. Measuring over 24,000 square feet, it could become a palatial single-family home. However, a savvy developer could also seize the building and convert the annex—which requires total renovation—into luxury condos.

Either way, the extra-wide Neo-Classical townhouse offers plenty of provenance for the wealthy buyer. In 1936, architect George Prentiss Butler Jr. altered two townhouses at No. 6 and No. 8 for George W. Perkins, a powerful figure in Republican politics at the time.

Over the past few years, the Carnegie Hill block has been the site of several high-profile deals.

In 1999, investor Bruce Kovner dropped $17.5 million on the International Center of Photography building on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 94th Street. Real-estate developer Aby Rosen purchased a townhouse at No. 3 as an investment. Nicholas Rohatyn bought the 40-foot-wide mansion at No. 10-12 for $7.4 million. And dot-com millionaire Marc Ewing bought the townhouse at No. 13, selling it two years later for $10.8 million.

Most notably, banking magnate Jaqui Safra and his long-time girlfriend, producer Jean Doumanian, sold their mansion at No. 1 (the former home of legendary architect Cass Gilbert) for close to $9 million in 2000. Now, the couple are trying to get $55 million for their mansion at 4 East 75th Street, which will open its doors as the Kips Bay Designer Showhouse later this month.

The Spence-Chapin building is a co-exclusive between George van der Ploeg and Dean Heitler of Prudential Douglas Elliman, and Paul Massey Jr. and Cory Rosenthal of Massey Knakal Realty Services.

Mr. van der Ploeg declined to comment.