Go Boston!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm sooooo glad that Boston beat NY. That's all I have to say.

 

Yep! I'm really happy for those guys. I have never, ever seen so much heart and soul put on the line. EVERYONE contributed, and though David Ortiz deservedly got the MVP, it's hard to forget:

• the excellent defense of Orlando Cabrera and Bill Mueller. Remember that game long ago, er, 2 or 3 nights ago, when Cabrera threw Matsui out at home plate, and did the jump and turn thing to throw a runner out at first? Remember Muellers leg blocking the bag so Bernie couldn't slide safe into third? Fine stuff.
• the pinch-running by Dave Roberts, who tied up both game 4 and 5 in the ninth innings. Without his stolen base in Game 4, he would not have scored on Bill Mueller's single, and the game would not have gone into extra innings, and David Ortiz would not have hit the 2 run homer....you get the idea!
• the seemingly inexhaustable bullpen: Pitcher after pitcher after pitcher, 3 days rest, 2 days rest, no days rest, after a while it seemed they all pitched complete games.
• Wakefield giving up his starting spot to pitch relief in game 3, and then pitching relief in game 4 as well.
• the iron knees of Jason Varitek (and Posada, for that matter) who caught over 800 pitches these last 5 days; normally a catcher catches 400 pitches in a week
• the pure determination, and guts, and ankle of Curt Schilling, who gave new meaning to the name Red Sox.
• the utter resolve of Derek Lowe
• Damon's Grand Salami, and his 2 run Poker into the upper decks, after being virtually silent the whole postseason.
• Mark Bellhorn's 2 ringers (Slam-a-lama, Ding Dong!) I dogged Bellhorn out every night, recalling his cruddy days as a Cub, and wondered how he ended up on the Sox after stinking things up when he went to Colorado, a hitter's park, and batted .236. I apologize, Mark, you got a lot of heart.

They deserve this, and they deserve to win it all. I think St. Louis has worked hard all year, I guess they all work hard, but like I said, I've never seen so much heart, and Boston deserves the trophy for the Big Show.

Go Boston!

 

My friend Tom emailed this to me, written yesterday, about Curt Schilling. I thought it was really cool.


October 20, 2004, 11:20 a.m.
Curt Schilling, Hero
Victory, but a game away.



"Courage" is one of the most overused clichés in all of sports. When Tiger Woods won the Masters in 2001 to become the first golfer to hold all four professional Grand Slam titles at once, commentators across the sport spoke of his remarkable "courage" in staving off the competition. When John Elway led last-minute drives on his way to Super Bowl titles, the guys in the booth described in overblown rhetoric his "courageous" field leadership.


Notwithstanding the hyperbole, sports are usually not about courage. The American men and women on the battlefields of Iraq - that's courage. The special-forces soldiers who crawl through caves in Afghanistan hunting for al Qaeda - that's courage. The police and firemen who ran up the stairs of the Twin Towers while others were running down - that's unspeakable courage. Sports are usually about competition, entertainment, and, for some twisted fans like me, even something approaching a religion. Any accomplishment in sports pale in comparison to the real-life heroism exhibited every day by average Americans doing their jobs, no matter how dangerous the task.

With that said, what Curt Schilling did Tuesday night at Yankee stadium could properly be described as the sort of everyday courage that no one could contest. For those of you who might be living in a cave, Schilling is remarkable pitcher who joined the Boston Red Sox at the beginning of the season with a singular purpose: to help his new team with their first World Series since 1918. He has lived up to the massive expectations, winning a major league leading 21 games in the regular season. But all season he pitched on a damaged ankle, a nagging injury that he aggravated in an early playoff game against the Anaheim Angels.

In game one of the American League Championship Series against the just plain scary New York Yankees, Schilling seemed finally to have been done in by his injured ankle, pitching ineffectively and ultimately losing the game. The bad news continued to pile on after that game. Schilling's medical report was bleak. He had dislocated a tendon in his ankle and would require surgery at the end of the season. And since the Red Sox lost the next two games, going down 3-0 in a seven-game series, that season was likely to end soon.

But remarkably, it didn't. Instead, the Sox won back-to-back heart-stopping extra-inning games in Boston - two of the longest in major-league-playoff history - to force the Series back to New York. Enter Schilling. Pitching on an ankle that had been surgically sutured to stabilize the tendon the day before the game, Schilling was a huge question mark. No one knew whether he could survive an inning, let alone a game. His own catcher, Jason Varitek, said that his main goal for Schilling Tuesday night was that he not hurt himself. Schilling was unable to wear a much ballyhooed hightop shoe specially designed to stabilize his ankle (Reebok's best free advertising in decades) because it interfered with the sutures. As he took the mound, blood oozed through his sock.

What he did last night was a performance for the ages. Facing a Yankee lineup that had scored 19 runs only a couple of days earlier, Schilling utterly shut them down, giving up a lone homerun in seven innings of work, mixing an occasional 94-mph fastball with his always lethal split-fingered pitch. Supported by four two-out runs scored by the Sox early in the game, Schilling pitched Boston to a place no other team in major-league history had been. Winning game six 4-2, the Red Sox became the first team in post-season history to come back from a 3-0 deficit in a seven-game series, forcing a decisive winner-take-all game seven in the Bronx tonight.

Schilling's performance was as masterful as it was gutsy. With the sheath around his tendon frayed away and millions of dollars remaining on his contract, he put everything on the line to win the game. Yankees hitters seemed baffled. And Boston sports fans immediately elevated him in the pantheon of their great sports heroes - Ted Williams, Larry Bird, Bobby Orr, Carl Yastrzemski - all of whom seemed to step up when the game was on the line.

None of this guarantees a win in game 7 for the Red Sox. There is a reason no team has ever come back from a three-games-to-none deficit in baseball. It's damned hard. But what Schilling and his teammates have done was a balm to depressed Red Sox fans everywhere. Another terrific season seemed wasted away only a few short days ago. Yet the dead have risen. The Evil Empire hangs in the balance.

Tonight's game could be, as ESPN's Peter Gammons noted with perhaps a small amount of overstatement in the wee hours of the morning, the most important baseball game in the storied history of the sport. Whatever the result, I'm checking into a mental hospital tomorrow for some much-needed psychological rest.

- Shannen W. Coffin is a former deputy assistant attorney general for the Civil Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

 

SEEEEEEEEEEE what long hair can Do.
The samson's of baseball!!!!!

 

Yay!!!!!!!! The Yankee's lost!!!!!!!!

Ya-frickin- hoo..

 

Whats the difference? I have no Idea, someone splain it to me. Why does everyone hate the yankees? I thought they were one of the teams that wins alot... all i know is my great-grandma was a die-hard fan of theirs until her death at 96... beyond that - no clue. Fill me in?

 

A lot of people don't like NY cause all they do is buy the best players. They pay millions and millions of dollars to be the best team. Other teams find it hard to compete with NY cause they don't have a huge payroll like NY does.

NY BUYS their talent. It's no wonder that they win all the time. I'm so glad that the team with the highest payroll in baseball, who is usually garenteed to win, lost and never made it to the World Series.

 

Well, my answer is a little late, but here's my take.


Ack, it won't post!

 

Okay, let's try this again.

I myself am not a Yankee hater. I love baseball, and the history that the Yankees have contributed for a century makes baseball rich.


With that said, there are many souls out there who hate the fact that since 1995, the Yankees have been in 10 consecutive post-seasons, 7 American League Champion Series, and 6 World Series, of which they have won 4. They then blame it on a money mongering owner who, they say, buys all the best players for millions and millions of dollars, and thereby gets everything he wants, like a spoiled brat.



George Steinbrenner, the owner of the Yankees, loves to win, and has set about to put together the best teams to accomplish that purpose. He is very impatient, and it wouldn't surprise me or many others if Joe Torre, the manager of the Yankees since 95, gets fired, simply because he hasn't brought a World Series Trophy home since 2000.



There is more than one way to look at all this though. While the Yanks do have the largest payroll in Major League baseball, there are smaller market teams that have been very successful in baseball. Since 95, Cleveland, Oakland, Seattle, Boston, Minnesota, Houston, Atlanta, San Francisco, and St. Louis have had many successful seasons, and repeated appearances in the postseason. While they have not won the big show, they have been in the thick of the battle.

If the Cubs would like to be in the postseason, why don’t they wisely spend money to do so? If the Texas Rangers would like to be in the postseason, why do they very unwisely give Alex Rodriquez a 10 year, 250 million dollar contract that virtually cripples them, because they can’t afford to get any other good players? If the White Sox want to get to the post season, spend money on players instead of dog stadium renovations that do nothing for the team.

If lots of money equals lots of wins, then the Yankees would take top prizes every year, with the other teams following in approximate order of what they spent.

But the truth is, the Yankees have 4 World Series Trophies, out of 10 years. The Twins got a couple within a couple years, back in the late 80s and early 90s. So did Toronto. I say, if you want to win ball games, put the money where your mouth is, and spend what it takes to put together a successful ball club. Spend wisely, and build a team. Be patient. And don’t discredit folks like George Steinbrenner, who do just that. His teams rock, and other teams stink, and that’s all there is to it.

Some folks base their team loyalty on their location: One lives in St. Louis, so one decides to be a Cardinals fan; One lives in Chicago, so one decides to be a Cubs fan. Others pick teams that have captured their imagination and heart: the Boston Red Sox are a historic team with a great ballpark, so one might want to be a Red Sox fan. Still others just love baseball (I may fit in this category) and have a hard time picking a team to stick with year after year. And, there are the fair weather fans that only show up during playoff time when their particular team is doing good, or they pick teams that win, and drop them like hot potatoes when they start losing. Some folks have simply become individual players’ fans, and followed them as they have been traded from one team to the next.

But I think it’s a small mind that hates a team because they win. I mean, isn’t that what they are supposed to do? I think it’s a small mind that hates a team that spends money to put together a good team, and wins. Why don’t the other teams do that? You can’t tell me that the Chicago Tribune Company can’t come up with enough money to get better players for the Cubs. Wrigley is always full of people, it’s a beautiful park, everyone loves it. Where does all that revenue go that is brought in to Wrigley all summer long? Why don’t they spend it more wisely?

Another consideration is fan support. The Yankees are loved by their fans, and the fans "support" the team. There are supposedly 70,000 seats in Yankee Stadium, and 50,000 people consistently show up for games. When a team is good, fans show up, money is brought in, a better team is built, more fans come, more money is brought in…..you get the point. Ever seen the stands at US Cellular field? Very empty. Seats at Tampa Bay? Very empty. Seats at Montreal? Very empty. Bad ball clubs do not bring in fans. The exception is Wrigley, with it’s cute little Cubs. They have the money, and the fan support, and they still can’t get it done. It’s why I’m not a Cubs fan.

So, to Yankees haters everywhere, go ahead, keep dogging Goliath, but don’t forget that people fear them for a reason: They are a good ball club, and they deserve respect.

 

That was a good post, eclayton. You're like an encyclopedia!

I don't agree with everything you said but I agree with most of it. It should be like the good old days when each team brought up it's own players from their farm teams and the scouts acctually scouted players who would play for a team when they were good enough. Then when they made the team they would stay with a team for years and chemistry would bloom that way. I hate that fact that who ever has the most money is most likely to win all the time. Players get moved around too much also. The players go where the money is and that's not right.

I could go on and on but I don't want to get into a big thing about it. I'm just glad that NY lost.

 

Well, I'm not glad NY lost, I'm glad Boston won, but I digress!

I agree that players move around too much. Back in the olden days, as you said, the players were owned by their teams, and had no say. The owners had too much control. Now it's the opposite. I wish there was someway to strike a balance between the 2.

Now, Minnesota has a fine farm system, and that's the main reason they do so well year in, year out. In fact, David Ortiz was acquired from Minnesota 2 years ago.

But I still think that some choices could be made, and more wisdom could be used to build teams, instead of using the excuse that Money rules. As I said, many teams do quite well inspite of the payroll differences. Check this link out, and see where teams such as Oakland and Minnesota rate. This is from last year, but it stands to reason it's a good general guide.

http://espn.go.com/mlb/news/2003/0721/1583823.html

 

Holy *bleep*! Baseball teams have payrolls higher than I thought they did! That's discusting how hight the payrolls are! The Yankees 180 million dollar payroll is outrageous! It's still over 70 million dollars more than the next highest paid team!

 

i agree eclayton
we do have a good farm team.
i remember a few years ago when the twins were going to contracted we made it to the playoffs.
i also recall the that year the twins had a payrole of 25 million and the yanks were close to 100 million.
i really thing that the twins play with heart it looks like they want to be there.
the yanks seam like they do not care about the game at all,. they have no heart.....

i really hope that santana stays here in minnesota and that the yanks do not get him, but when they can offer 4 time the cash for the same job well that is hard to turn down.....

go boston.

one more thing i hope that texas does not win, because it would all turn into a political thing and take away from the game

 

Sounds more like buisness than sports to me. thats why you hate them, huh?

 

Way to go Red Sox! You deserved ths one.

 

This isn't aimed at you, Wenchie, I just want to answer the business aspect of sports.

Everyone needs to eat, even athletes. They entertain us with near perfection at something that is very hard to do, both physically and mentally. We are entertained by the inside stories, the soap operas, and the rivalries. We are encouraged to do what we do each day with as much diligence and perfection as they do. That is what sports is about, in general, and what baseball is about, most acutely.

So, since movie stars are paid for entertaining us, and rock stars are paid for entertaining us, and newscasters are paid for entertaining us (that's what news is, and we all know it) why does everybody have a hard time with athletes getting paid?

I think there is a general grudge aimed at people who are successful. Starbucks starts in 1971, in 1985 they start making coffee the old Italian way, and people like it, so they buy it, and Starbucks explodes. Now, Starbucks is considered an evil global giant by some folks. "Starbucks typifies the strip-mollification of our culture" says one page of a Google search I just did.

Bill Gates gets it all the time, mostly from people using his product as they type out their disgruntled and unthankful comments.

Somehow the corporation is evil. Things get too big, so they must be boycotted, picketed, or avoided. Don't shop at Walmart, don't eat at McDonalds, don't buy Nike, don't drink Coke, don't support the Yankees. Google is becoming evil, Ebay is evil, everything is evil. Shoot, when I make my millions on my terrific business ideas, I'll be evil too!

So, at what point will the Red Sox become evil, if they keep winning? What will Cubs fans do if the Cubs actually started winning?

Me, I choose to root for teams that play well, work hard, and show alot of heart. I'm a Mariners fan, because my sister got me into baseball by taking me to a Mariners/Yankees game at the Kingdome in 98. I'd love to be a Cubs fan, but I can't handle the mediocrity. I can't be a White Sox fan, because I hate the childish sophmoric fans.

But I can support the wonderful Minnesota Twins, because they are so persistent, the Boston Red Sox, because of their history and heart, the New York Yankees, because of their excellant skills, and wonderful history, and even the Atlanta Braves. because I like John Smoltz.

I love baseball because I can live vicariously through the players, and imagine that I'm the one up there hitting the game winning home run, or the diving catch to rob someone of a hit. I can "manage" the team from the comfort of my own home, and second guess what is going to happen, and try to figure out if I could have made some better decisions. I can enjoy all of this through television (television is evil, too, BTW) and still have the benefits and blessings of a family and friends who I can see on a daily basis, instead of leaving them for months at a time to play baseball. I can even take it one step further by playing fantasy baseball, where I really learn how hard it is to manage. (I do that through the Internet, another evil!)

I get the best of both worlds: Be a little boy again for 3 hours, and then snap back into reality and be a husband, father, and friend, with all the responsibilities that those things require.

 

Well now that is over, it looks like The Sox are playing the Cardinals in the WS.

Being a staunch Cubs fan, i have to go for the Sox. We despise the Cardinals, and have so much in common with the Sox.



cooked

 

I don't think the Cardinals stand a chance against the Red Sox. I just hope the games are close enough for them to put Dave Roberts in.