I need to take a moment to step out of my “unbiased” sports writer’s shoes for a moment so I can make a confession.

I despise the New York Rangers.

If asked to rank the 122 professional sports franchises in the Big Four (MLB, NBA, NFL and NHL), the Rangers are No. 123 on my list. I’ll find a way to rank a minor league baseball team or an NFL Europe squad ahead of them.

So when the universe’s No. 1 Rangers fan comes to me — a diehard New Jersey Devils fan — in a dream, it catches my attention.

His name is Jimmy Aschwanden and last night I dreamt I was hanging out with my good friend. In the ethereal world of my mind, it was his birthday.

Tensions between the New Jersey Devils and New York Rangers will ramp up tonight with the start of the Eastern Conference Finals. And while Rangers' defenseman John Scott, left, and Devils right wing Cam Janssen don't seem to get along, that doesn't mean Devils and Rangers fans can't co-exist. Ed Mulholland-US PRESSWIRE

I hadn’t thought about him during the day, nor had I even stopped to think about hockey before sleepily sidling into bed.

But to dream about someone you’ve spent your adolescence trading (good-natured) hockey smack-talk with on the eve of the Eastern Conference Finals between our two teams is goose-bump inducing.

It was a little over a year ago when I had my last epiphany regarding Jimmy — a body-numbing moment that turned out to be the 10th anniversary of the day the hockey Gods summoned him to heaven.

I’m not exactly sure what form of Leukemia he lost his battle with, but, if there’s any divine irony at play, I’d like to believe it was Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma — if solely for the initials N.H.L.

We grew up playing rollerblade hockey in the cul-de-sacs 20 miles west of New York City in a tiny, unassuming New Jersey-borough along the banks of the Ramapo River, where the concrete sprawl of the Big Apple begins yielding to the picturesque spine of the Appalachian Mountains.

We’d play until our feet hurt like hell, which was usually long after the day had ran out of sunlight.

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“Culling the thoughts that occur when you’re standing around waiting for something to happen”

How do you suppose former University of Arizona Wildcat Richard Jefferson and his teammates feel about the recent photo of Mexican drug cartel kingpin Sergio Villarreal Barragan being arrested on Sept. 10 proudly wearing a San Antonio Spurs T-shirt?

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The NHL preseason is underway and if you’re anything like me you…well, you also probably hadn’t noticed.

It seems like just yesterday the Chicago Blackhawks were hoisting the Stanley Cup, 10 days before the Los Angeles Lakers did an Irish jig on the Boston Celtics’ NBA Finals dreams.

Well, the boys of winter are back — despite the fact that Los Angeles hit  a record high 113 degrees today.

Off-seasons appear to be shrinking in the big-dollar game of sports. How much of a hiatus do we actually get to ease out of our post-title hangovers?

On average? About 100 days.

SEASON FINALE     .     TRAINING CAMP BEGAN     .     DAYS

NHL     June 9     Sept. 17     100

NBA     June 17     Sept. 27     102

MLB     Nov. 4     Feb. 15     103

NFL     Feb. 7     July 23     166*

*Mini camp after 75 days

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David Aardsma recently picked up his 30 save of the season for the Seattle Mariners.

I’ll never forget my first encounter with the closer when he pitched for the Chicago White Sox in 2007.

Aardsma was in the Sox’ spring training office in Tucson and using a copy machine.

All I could think was “what the heck does a baseball player need to make copies of?”

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There are ticking time bombs scattered in the cities harboring many professional sport franchises.

They sit like a singing elephant on a street corner. No one really wants to acknowledge it. And when they do, they often do so in self-deprecating tones.

These bombs — the pent-up frustration of a metropolis’ insufferable championship drought — have been known to flip over a car or two upon detonation.

And yet, they cannot be defused by simply snipping the red wire. Or is it the blue?

The fallout of the 2004 bomb the Red Sox set off in Boston rained fallout of widespread relief, divine thankfulness and a newfound tidal wave of chowdah-accented arrogance.

Bombs such as these lie just beneath the psyche of a city and fester until a guy — a bayou-born-and-bred boy, really — like New Orleans Saints’ cornerback Tracy Porter sneaks up from behind one of these weapons of mass deprivation and uses all 186-pounds of his 5-foot-11-inch frame to smack it with a ball-peen hammer.

And a city explodes.

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