Wednesday, October 20, 2004
There's Nothing Like Playoff Baseball
And I mean nothing. If you haven't enjoyed the Red Sox - Yankee Series (nevermind the NLCS), then you must not be human. If you haven't been watching it, you have Wednesday night to redeem yourself.
I'd be hard-pressed to find a baseball player I respect more than Curt Schilling. Well, an active one - Cal Ripken will always and forever be at the top of the list. But I just knew that if Curt was going to come back in, he was going to win the game. There was really no question. After his disastrous performance in Game 1, you could see him with the tears welling up in his eyes in the dugout, knowing that he not only let his team down, but an entire city. He had signed with the Red Sox to do what no one had been able to do in, I believe, a million years (approximately), which is carry Boston to a championship. He could have taken more money (although he took plenty), and he could have gone to a favorite, but instead chose to go to Boston. Now, he was leaving the Diamondbacks, who really had no hope, but it's not like Boston was a sure bet at all. That tells you what kind of a competitor he is - the hopes of a city were riding on his back.
So, when he didn't get the job done in Game 1, he didn't want to make excuses, even though he had earned the right to with his 21-6 year that got the Sox to the playoffs in the first place. I was pretty confident that if the Sox could get there, he'd find a way to return. I kind of envisioned him starting Game 7, coming out of the bullpen to the strains of "Eye of the Tiger" or something similarly cheesy, maybe like "Wild Thing" in Major League. But this was close enough.
They announced a couple of days ago that he might be able to start Game 6, and I figured that if they were going to get hopes up (maybe to fire their own team up, facing elimination already), he was going to be able to pitch. And he was not the type of guy that would insist on pitching if he knew he was going to hurt the team. No, if he was out there, he was going to pitch a gem. And that's precisely what he did. He didn't even have his best stuff. Rather, he pitches with guts and intelligence - working the corners, changing speeds, giving it his all. He gave them 7 solid innings, and only made one mistake that cost them. I don't think that athletes are really heroes, but he certainly was heroic, and quite the "gamer".
I'm not even a Red Sox fan - I'm an Orioles fan, as I've alluded to before. But I hate the Yankees and all that they stand for - I've alluded to this before as well. The reaction of the fans tonight just reinforced that belief a thousand times over. Yankee fans believe it's their divine birthright to win every single time. You can hear it in their moans when a close pitch (which is almost every pitch, to them) doesn't go their way. You can hear it when they blindly cheer a shallow popup. And you definitely could see it tonight in reaction to a couple controversial calls.
The Bellhorn homerun that hit off of a fan in the first row was definitely a nice form of justice. I'm STILL smarting from the Jeffrey Maier "home run" that Jeter hit in Game 1 of the 1996 ALCS vs. the Orioles. (You remember - punk-ass kid reached over the fence and caught a ball that was going right into Orioles right-fielder Tony Tarasco's mitt; Umpire incorrectly ruled it a home run to tie the game; Yanks win in extra-innings.) At any rate, even though it was the correct call, the Yanks fans booed. And THEN, when the umps got together to overturn the A-Rod call, correctly, I might add, the Yankees "fans" start throwing crap on the field.
Hey, guess what, Yankee fans: You don't win all the time. Particularly when you sign mercenaries like Sheffield, and overpaid, selfish punks like A-Rod, and over-the-hill hotheads like Kevin Brown. Grow up a bit. Maybe they should all read my previous post. I bet 20-30 years ago they were the tee-ball players who only hit homeruns.
I'd be hard-pressed to find a baseball player I respect more than Curt Schilling. Well, an active one - Cal Ripken will always and forever be at the top of the list. But I just knew that if Curt was going to come back in, he was going to win the game. There was really no question. After his disastrous performance in Game 1, you could see him with the tears welling up in his eyes in the dugout, knowing that he not only let his team down, but an entire city. He had signed with the Red Sox to do what no one had been able to do in, I believe, a million years (approximately), which is carry Boston to a championship. He could have taken more money (although he took plenty), and he could have gone to a favorite, but instead chose to go to Boston. Now, he was leaving the Diamondbacks, who really had no hope, but it's not like Boston was a sure bet at all. That tells you what kind of a competitor he is - the hopes of a city were riding on his back.
So, when he didn't get the job done in Game 1, he didn't want to make excuses, even though he had earned the right to with his 21-6 year that got the Sox to the playoffs in the first place. I was pretty confident that if the Sox could get there, he'd find a way to return. I kind of envisioned him starting Game 7, coming out of the bullpen to the strains of "Eye of the Tiger" or something similarly cheesy, maybe like "Wild Thing" in Major League. But this was close enough.
They announced a couple of days ago that he might be able to start Game 6, and I figured that if they were going to get hopes up (maybe to fire their own team up, facing elimination already), he was going to be able to pitch. And he was not the type of guy that would insist on pitching if he knew he was going to hurt the team. No, if he was out there, he was going to pitch a gem. And that's precisely what he did. He didn't even have his best stuff. Rather, he pitches with guts and intelligence - working the corners, changing speeds, giving it his all. He gave them 7 solid innings, and only made one mistake that cost them. I don't think that athletes are really heroes, but he certainly was heroic, and quite the "gamer".
I'm not even a Red Sox fan - I'm an Orioles fan, as I've alluded to before. But I hate the Yankees and all that they stand for - I've alluded to this before as well. The reaction of the fans tonight just reinforced that belief a thousand times over. Yankee fans believe it's their divine birthright to win every single time. You can hear it in their moans when a close pitch (which is almost every pitch, to them) doesn't go their way. You can hear it when they blindly cheer a shallow popup. And you definitely could see it tonight in reaction to a couple controversial calls.
The Bellhorn homerun that hit off of a fan in the first row was definitely a nice form of justice. I'm STILL smarting from the Jeffrey Maier "home run" that Jeter hit in Game 1 of the 1996 ALCS vs. the Orioles. (You remember - punk-ass kid reached over the fence and caught a ball that was going right into Orioles right-fielder Tony Tarasco's mitt; Umpire incorrectly ruled it a home run to tie the game; Yanks win in extra-innings.) At any rate, even though it was the correct call, the Yanks fans booed. And THEN, when the umps got together to overturn the A-Rod call, correctly, I might add, the Yankees "fans" start throwing crap on the field.
Hey, guess what, Yankee fans: You don't win all the time. Particularly when you sign mercenaries like Sheffield, and overpaid, selfish punks like A-Rod, and over-the-hill hotheads like Kevin Brown. Grow up a bit. Maybe they should all read my previous post. I bet 20-30 years ago they were the tee-ball players who only hit homeruns.
Comments:
I was so disgusted by A-Rod last night. I don't care who wins the series, but I watched the game last night to see if the Red Socks could pull off another win. And they did. Dan and I will be watching tonight.
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