9.17.2007

There's only one September ...

I'm feeling like I've said this before, but how great of a weekend was this for baseball!?!

And I know I've said this before: This is the most exciting baseball season we've seen since at least 1998 ...

Kates and I spent our weekend making the rounds to each of the parents' houses, and the baseball was always on. Going in, we knew this was going to be a make-it-or-break-it weekend...

Friday night was Applebees takeout with Kates' parents. And then the Brewers-Reds game ... When we turned it on, the Brew Crew already was down 5-0 and Ben Sheets had been plucked from the game in favor of Chris Capuano (Chris Capuano!?! ... ugh...). We got to see Prince Fielder tie the franchise home run mark, and Capuano actually pitched better than he had in months, but the comeback fell short ... The Brewers lost. The Cubs had beaten the Cardinals. The Brewers fall 1.5 games back from the Cubs, and the Cardinals -- thankfully -- lose their eighth straight to go six games back ...

I switch channels ...

To the Red Sox-Yanees game. It was 10:30 at night and that game was in the eighth inning. We had just missed a Jason Giambi home run, but with a 7-3 lead the Red Sox appeared to be cruising ...

Right ... Robinson Cano homered for the Yankees. Melky Cabrera walked. Johnny Damon doubled. Derek Jeter singled. Bobby Abreu doubled. And Alex Rodriguez singled to give the Yankees a 8-7 lead ...

Kates was already asleep on my shoulder. And I went lights-out for the ninth, only to make up to the postgame highlights.

That was Friday night.

* * *

On Saturday, it was off to my parents' place ...

For lunch, I brought Culver's; Kates brought Arby's (... hey, we were road trippin' ...). We had some sit-down time with Mom & Pops ... and then it was time for another Cubs-Cardinals game. The first of a doubleheader, actually ...

The Cardinals were looking good ... Then Alfonso Soriano whacked a two-run homer to win it. Alfonso!!

On to the Red Sox-Yankees game ... What started out as a captivating pitcher's dual between Josh Beckett and Chien-Ming Wang turned into a Yankee-drubbing (lovely!) in the blink of an eye ...

We watched until the eighth, and then it was time for Kates and I to hit the road again ... Flipping between the Cubs-Cardinals nightcap and the Brewers-Reds games all the way home ...

I figured the Cardinals couldn't keep losing the way they had been; they took their game. And I figured the Brewers couldn't let themselves slip any further; they took their game too with Prince hitting another home run to become the single-season record holder for the Brewers.

So the Cubs still lead. But the Brewers are just one back. And the Cardinals are all but done at six games back.

* * *

On Sunday, Kates and I threw the Packers-Giants game into the mix as we did some shopping and worked around the house ...

To be honest, I didn't watch the Packers that closely. But they looked good enough to me. And a 35-13 win can't tell me anything less ... I'll take it.

Didn't catch any of the Brewers game. But they won, and I'll take that too.

I did, however, listen to almost all of the Cubs-Reds game. And the Cubs won ...

Driving to the hardware store for some supplies and listening to the jubilee of Pat and Ron celebrating the fact the Cubs were heading back to Wrigley in first place, I couldn't keep the smile from leaking on to my face. It was then then it hit me: Hey, it's either going to be the Cubs or the Brewers winning this thing, this has been one HECK of a pennant race and I'm going to be having a ball no matter which one makes it ...

Of course, I wasn't done yet. The Red Sox and Yankees were on Sunday Night Baseball (lovely!) ...

And it was a classic as usual.

... Curt Schilling against Roger Clemens (no two pitchers had gone against each other with more wins in the history of Fenway Park ...)

... Game is tied 1-1 heading into the eighth. Then Derek "Mr. Clutch" Jeter launches a 3-run homer over the Green Monster to silence the Red Sox nation ...

... Jeter had fouled off pitch after pitch, and Jason Varitek went to the mound after almost every one to talk with Schilling. Jon Miller offered up an interesting stat that put to rest one of the thoughts swirling in my head all weekend long: The average American League game lasts about 2 hours and 53 minutes. The average Red Sox-Yankees game lasts 3 hours and 33 minutes -- because there's so much strategy and thinking that goes into each pitch.

... The Red Sox start mounting a comeback in the bottom of the ninth ... Against Mariano Rivera (... Need I say again how horribly overrated I think Mariano Rivera is!?! Every time a broadcast team starts gushing about him I want to run to throw a baseball at the TV ... He's not invincible people = 2001 World Series.)

... Then Rivera loads of the bases for (insert dramatic music here) David Ortiz. (More dramatic music here.) ... A couple weeks ago, Matty and I were discussing who we thought the three most exciting players were in baseball right now. I answered Vladimir Guerrero, Prince Fielder and David Ortiz. Prince had come through for me this weekend, I hadn't been paying much attention to Vlady, but surely Big Papi was going to come through here, I thought ...

He struck out ... oooooooooooooooh! I sigh with the Red Sox Nation ...

And so ends my latest baseball weekend.

* * *

... So I caught this story on MLB.com today ... and once again, I'm wondering, how much more fun can this get!?

What in the world has happened to the standings everywhere else? Five minutes ago, it seems, it was two Wild Card races and a pair of National League division races. Now every division but the AL West has a race, half of baseball is still alive, it looks like a seventh straight year with a new world champ, tiebreaker-scenario talk will soon be all the rage and someone will be crying more tears of joy than Jamie Pressly.
Uh. Yeah!!

A week ago I figured my ultimate postseason was out of reach. Now, anything could happen ...

If the Red Sox and Yankees meet again, it would be in the AL Championship Series. You know what those are like, and it could happen again. Any wild guess will do. The Cubs and Indians could meet in a battle of the two teams with the longest world championship droughts in the Majors, and the Cubs could win it all for the first time since 1908. The Brewers could win it all for the first time, and so could the Padres or Rockies. It could be another Subway Series, it could be 1986 revisited with Mets-Red Sox, or Grady Little could come back to Fenway with the Dodgers.
I might pee my pants.

That is, if it's a Cubs-Indians world series. Or even a Cubs-Red Sox World Series. Or if the Brewers or Dodgers even make it to the World Series.

The Rivalry never seems to disappoint when it comes to drama. Fans who went to sleep Friday night assuming the Red Sox had won the opener easily awoke on Saturday to hear about an epic Yankee comeback. Saturday was the day Josh Beckett one-upped Chien-Mien Wang, and then Sunday was a fabulous Roger Clemens-Schilling pitching duel (representing the most-ever combined victories by two starters at Fenway) that Jeter broke up. And what an amazing finish, with Big Papi just loaded up for a grand slam walk-off against a closer he had beaten before. This time, Rivera won.
Like I said -- I watched every one. And no, I was not dissappointed.

Last year, the Tigers basically gave away this division at home on the final weekend, their hopes spoiled by Kansas City while Minnesota clinched. Of course, Detroit took advantage of its Wild Card berth instead, making it to the club's first Fall Classic since 1984. Those Tigers seem determined to do things different in 2007, and now it remains to be seen whether their momentum will stretch across an entire fortnight ...

Guess where Cleveland plays on the final weekend of the season? Kansas City. The Royals won at the Jake on Sunday to avoid a three-game sweep, but if the AL Central is still a race on the last weekend, it would be too ironic.

Too ironic.

There's only one October. There's only two weeks left in the regular season.

And I looooooove this commercial ...

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