Congratulations to the mighty Texas Rangers who won the pennant tonight. They beat my beloved Tampa Bay Rays last week, just as they did last year, but this year they did it without Cliff Lee, and, somehow, they look even better.
Filed under: Current Events, Sports on October 16th, 2011 | No Comments »
My beloved Tampa Bay Rays’ season ended moments ago. I wish I could say I am not disappointed. I am. Not only because they squandered the amazing late-season rally that ended in triumph last Wednesday night, but because of how unimpressive they looked in their three losses against the Texas Rangers. The pitching for which the Rays are so famous wasn’t as advertised. True, Moore pitched phenomenally on Friday, but Price was disappointing, Shields didn’t live up to his recent amazing standard, and the young Hellickson surrendered devastating home runs. But even worse, the Rays batters looked downright feeble. Evan Longoria, who won the now-legendary Game 162, went 0-4 today, striking out twice. Upton, who, I will admit has been playing much better this season than last, struck out thrice. Damon, in spite of his amazing hustle, couldn’t come through, either. Sean Rodriguez played his heart out, but that wasn’t enough when the rest of the team was so unproductive. Mostly, I was disappointed with the way my guys just stood there as good pitches went right past them. I understand you have to wait for your pitch, but that looked bad sometimes.
Last year Cliff Lee shut us down. This year the Rays shut themselves down.
Still, I give Texas credit where credit is due. Their bats are dangerous, and their pitching is effective. If Detroit cannot dispatch the Hated Yankees, the Rangers are my team.
Meanwhile, I won’t be all gloom and doom. I am still proud of my guys. They gave me what I always have said I wanted: a winning season. Contrary to what many predicted at the conclusion of last season, the Rays still made the playoffs, and did it without Crawford, Soriano, Benoit, Garza, and others. They demonstrated an astonishing ability to replace big names with nobodies who play hard for much, much less money. Johnny Damon plays with an energy and attitude I love to watch. And this kid Moore who won big last Friday is extremely promising.
Joe Maddon is a remarkable manager. He did what few expected he could do, by taking a team with few recognizable stars, and finishing second in baseball’s toughest division, knocking out a team everyone assumed would win the World Series this year. But I am sorry he couldn’t capitalize on the big opportunity his team had in the post-season. If the Rays could have won the pennant, he’d be a shoo-in for manager of the year. As it is, I fear the Rays’ second-October-in-a-row loss will come to be seen as inevitable, as though the team didn’t belong in the first place. It’s bad enough that the Rays don’t get the respect they deserve considering their do-more-with-less situation – I don’t want to hear people say, “that’s what we expected”. The talking heads on ESPN, MLB-TV, and elsewhere, in a fawning love for New York and Boston that borders on obsequiousness, display demonstrable lack of enthusiasm for the Rays. It would have been nice to rub it in their faces.
So, farewell 2011 baseball. I will eagerly await your 2012 return.
Filed under: Current Events, Musings, Sports on October 4th, 2011 | No Comments »
I am not the only one who thinks that yesterday may have been the best day for baseball in a long, long time. Over at ESPN.com, Buster Olney points out that
The Yankees hadn’t lost a 7-0 lead in the eighth inning or later since 1953, and that’s what happened. The Red Sox were undefeated this year when holding leads after the eighth inning, yet they lost. There were four games involving the wild-card races Wednesday, and in three of those, a team came to within one out of victory, and lost. At 11:40 p.m., the Atlanta Braves matched the greatest September collapse in history, and 25 minutes later, the Red Sox set a new standard for September collapses. And Evan Longoria’s game-winning homer was merely the second in history that propelled a team into the playoffs, on the last day of the season; the other belongs to Bobby Thomson.
Olney adds that someday, “somebody will write a book on baseball’s greatest day ever”.
[Addendum: Dave Sheinin at the Washington Post writes, ""What that was, quite simply, was the best day of regular season baseball the game has ever seen".]
Meanwhile, MLB.com has a convenient timeline in text and video format, chronicling what went down last night. A Hollywood screenwriter could not have invented a more dramatic scenario.
And, best of all, at SI.com, Tom Verducci begins his column with this:
They will go down as the most thrilling 129 minutes in baseball history. Never before and likely never again — if we even dare to assume anything else can be likely ever again — will baseball captivate and exhilarate on so many fronts in so small a window the way it did September 28, 2011.
Verducci adds that the Rays’ nine-game climb up the standings is the “greatest comeback” in baseball history. Moreover, he says that Longoria’s twelfth-inning home run is “instantly” among the most famous ever, “right up there” with “Bobby Thomson’s Shot Heard Round The World in 1951. It lacks only the New York amplification of Thomson’s homer. It makes Longoria, already one of the game’s great players, a transcendent cultural player”.
That is a nice thought, and I hope it proves true. Certainly, should the Rays do well against Texas and, somehow, win another pennant, the events of last night will seem almost a legend – the sort of thing the Bob Costases and Ken Burnses of the world will recall ages hence. But even if that does not come to pass, and the Yankees and Red Sox-obsessed sports writers of the future try to push it from their minds, the rest of us will never forget game 162 of the 2011 baseball season, which I will henceforth call BASEBALLMAGEDDON!
[Addendum: The St. Petersburg Times is reporting that Cooperstown has asked Evan Longoria for the bat he used to hit that game-winning home run.]
Filed under: Current Events, Sports on September 29th, 2011 | No Comments »
I am writing this after midnight on Thursday morning, September 29, 2011. I am in shock. My beloved Tampa Bay Rays have just won the 162nd game of their season, coming back from a seven-run deficit against the Hated New York Yankees to win in the bottom of the twelfth at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. With this win, the Rays go to post-season play once again. But this alone isn’t what makes tonight so amazing. Rather, it is the absolutely improbable, some said impossible, come-from-way-behind September the Rays have had, combined with the enormous effort on behalf of the Orioles to defeat the Boston Red Sox tonight in Baltimore.
Everything had to fall into place tonight. The Red Sox had been collapsing all month. The Rays had been improving. The last three games of the season would find the battle for the Wild Card take place between two very different teams, against two very different teams: Boston would get to play against the last-place Orioles; the Rays against the first-place Yankees. Two days ago, when it appeared the season would come down to this do-or-die scenario, I dubbed today “Baseballmageddon”. But I couldn’t have imagined this ending this way. I am not capable of writing articulately right now.
The Rays and Red Sox entered their respective games tonight absolutely tied. If both won, or if both lost, a tie-breaker game would be required tomorrow. If Boston won, the Rays were done, and vice versa. So when the Rays found themselves down tonight 7-0 in the eighth inning tonight, I told my friend Anthony it was over. In fact, I left his house convinced my baseball watching was done until next year. When he texted me ten minutes later to say the Rays had just scored six runs, I thought he was pulling my leg. I turned the game on in the car to hear that Orioles fans in Baltimore were chanting, “Let’s go Rays!” When the Rays tied the game I was stunned. But as the game dragged on and on, and reports from Baltimore looked grim, I began to lose hope. I went to bed, listening on the radio while the Rays batted, then turning it off while the Yankees batted. Then, out of nowhere, the radio announced Baltimore had stunned Boston in the bottom of the ninth at Camden Yards, which meant, at the worst, the Rays would get another shot if the game against New York didn’t work out. Then, as I listened in near panic, Evan Longoria hit the game-winning home run. I jumped from bed, letting out a scream that terrified my beloved wife. I still can hardly believe it. Everything had to work out just so, and it did.
I have watched and listened to baseball my entire life. I can say with certainty, I have never experienced a day of baseball like this. People will talk about this forever.
How will I sleep?
Filed under: Current Events, Sports on September 29th, 2011 | No Comments »
Last year I wrote about a terrifying incident that took place at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Texas. A fan in the upper deck, reaching over a railing to snag a foul ball, fell thirty feet or so and landed in the seats below, seriously injuring himself. It must have been a horrifying experience for everyone present, and television footage showed the players and umpires were quite visibly distressed.
As I wrote at the time, the frantic scramble fans undertake these days for baseballs has reached a dangerous extreme. I felt certain that things would get worse until someone actually died. I am sorry to report that that has now happened.
Last night at Rangers Ballpark (just an unfortunate coincidence; it could have been anywhere), a fan reaching for a ball fell to his death from the bleachers above the bullpen. This story has an extra layer of tragedy, though, since this fan wasn’t reaching for a foul ball or a home run, but for a ball tossed to him by a generous player. That is something that often happens at games, and even I have been the surprised recipient of such free souvenirs (one is pictured here). But even that is a dangerous practice. My heart aches for the poor young son who watched his father’s fall, and for whom the game of baseball will never be the same.
But, please, let this be a wake-up call to professional baseball. The lust for free balls has become deadly. If parks have to install protective barriers above the fences and along railings to keep fans from reaching too far, so be it. But, as I said before, things cannot go on like this; something will happen.
Filed under: Current Events, Sports on July 8th, 2011 | 1 Comment »