Man, nine visitors already today? I guess I need to get on these earlier.
Yes, I know I talked about wanting to post about media. But, I’m not going to today. There are hundreds of articles that talk about baseball’s TV deal(s) and its merit. It’s important, but not necessarily dear to me. Baseball gaming is something that is much closer to my heart, so that’s what we’re going to talk about today. Baseball video games are awesome. I was first introduced by Little League Baseball on the NES, which is still a favorite that I’m hoping comes back on Virtual Console. Things have progressed through there, but you could always bet there were going to be a few different baseball options on whatever console I was playing at the time. Plus, I was one of the few to own Sammy Sosa Softball Slam. Way better game than it had any right to be. I digress. In any case, baseball games have gotten better more realistic* and complex, and it’s great. The GM/Franchise modes are amazing. But I find is awfully sad that they seem to have completely taken the place of baseball board and card games. *I am a big fan of MLB Power Pros, which the graphics are not realistic. But the ballparks are done awfully well while keeping the style, and the game play is way, way beyond what you would expect at first glance. Sadly, 2008 seems to be the last version. As I've mentioned here and linked to, my brother has been playing a full APBA season for a really long time. All 30 teams, 162 games. He started pretty much when he got the full card set, which are the 1999 rosters, so, yeah. It actually might have been more like 2002, because he picked up a sort-of pocket schedule that had every team’s schedule at the hardware store, so that’s the schedule he’s using. In any case, he’s been at it for a long time and only about 55 games in for each team. It’s a pretty big undertaking, and I’m proud of him for doing it and sticking with it. *While this is the same game, it’s a newer edition. His looks like this. APBA, though, is not the king of baseball board games, though. That would be Strat-O-Matic. This game is the one that inspires nostalgic columns and ruminations by sportswriters and athletes. As described in the linked articles, Bob Costas and Jon Miller to this day talk about a “historic” Strat-O-Matic game involving Gary Geiger. Those articles are full of those stories by big baseball names. How this game went unnoticed in the Parrish household is a mystery. I guess that’s just not the board game KB Toys had in stock, and thus fate was sealed.* Strat-O-Matic probably has the better back-story, too. I would highly recommend all three of those articles, by the way. *In the interest of full-disclosure, Andrew also bought APBA Hockey and Football. I don’t remember too many football games, but he did play quite a bit of hockey, but was never really satisfied with it. That prompted him to cross lines (gasp!) and get Strat-O-Matic Hockey, which he has been thrilled with, and I enjoyed it quite a bit, too. Maybe I just haven’t lived in the right area or hung with the right crowds, but it sure seems like there should be a much more widespread play of these games. Strat-O-Matic and APBA apparently do well enough to stay in business, but when’s the last time you saw a commercial for either? Or saw either in a store? And I’ve certainly never seen any of the expansions in a store. I know the (board) gaming community and jock culture don’t often overlap, but it sure seems to be that there’s a lot of room for growth in this area. People have tried to grow this market. The game that springs to mind for me is MLB Showdown.* It ended up being short-lived, but I remember the commercials for it when it came out. Maybe my interest was already piqued because of Andrew’s APBA habit, but I latched on right away and decided I had to try this game. Andrew and I played a ton of those games, along with a distant cousin who lived down the street.** It was a simple to understand game, games went quickly, and it went well playing solitaire, too. As with most things, it was more enjoyable against other people, preferably friends. *After doing some research, apparently it wasn’t actually ESPN backed, but they definitely ran a ton of commercials for it, and as a kid I got a strong enough impression that I thought it was an ESPN product until now. **One thing about growing up in a small town, it seems like everybody is a distant cousin, or some sort of relation. That’s why I made sure to marry a girl whose family is all out-of-town. It didn’t last, though. The game was over by 2005, just five years after it started. I think I was kind of stung but its failure because it was the baseball game I would have made. One twenty-sided die, two rolls per at bat. And that was basically the game. One roll to see if it was pitcher’s advantage (which is typically was) or hitter’s advantage (which if you had Craig Paquette,* never seemed to mean a home run, even though he had a range of 16-20). There were some other intricacies that you could ignore. There were strategy cards, things like rattling the pitcher or guaranteeing a stolen base. You could test outfielders’ arms and stuff. But, again, not necessary. So, complication wasn’t an issue. *I think he had a relative working on the game. So why did it fail? I don’t remember it being particularly expensive, and Wikipedia tells me extra cards were $3 a pop, which sounds right. I know between the three of us, we built up teams in a hurry. Is it just impossible to get kids to play games that aren’t electronic any more? Not flashy enough? Too boring? I don’t know. I know I shouldn’t use my childhood as a norm, because I’m the nerd that read our entire history textbook to study (though I just enjoyed reading it) and aced the test and ruined the curve in middle school. But, I know the three of us had an absolute blast playing this game, just as others have had blasts playing APBA and Strat-O-Matic through the years. If we don’t know why it failed, it’s hard to say what to do to encourage growth. I would say marketing, but Showdown had marketing, as noted before. My theory is you have to get the game actually in kids’ hands. It’s like the demo games you see at Best Buy and that sort of thing. I don’t know where you would really demo a board game or how. Have an employee at the store ready to play with all comers? Kind of like samples at a supermarket? That might work if you had the right employee. Playing with a stranger isn’t typically as good as playing with a friend, but maybe if he had that sort of outgoing personality, a bit of a child-at-heart, and encouraged parents to play with their kid at the store and acted more like a guide to the game. There’s also the issue of where you sell it. Sporting goods? Dick’s sells baseball cards, maybe that would be the outlet there. There are some specialty gaming stores; it might be a good fit there. Maybe kind of a meeting point for kids to take something they already like and get introduced to other gaming. I don’t know. I wouldn’t mind if somebody wanted to pay me to try to figure it out, though. I just really seems like there’s some fertile ground here, now it’s just figuring out how to plow it. I think I'm going to do the media post tomorrow. That seems a good way to wrap up the week. As for today, I don't have a ton, because it's hockey playoffs, so that's commanding my attention at the moment. I fell asleep during the second period, but apparently I didn't miss much. Chicago looked thoroughly overmatched in the first period, basically hanging Corey Crawford out to dry twice. He's already a rookie that started the year as the backup. Being named the playoff starter is enough pressure for anybody, especially with how he came to get the job. He doesn't need the help of defensive breakdowns. The Blackhawks were looking better before I fell asleep, but apparently Robert Luongo was just too much. It's about time. I kept hearing about how great he minds the net, but I'd never really seen it because it kept melting down against the Blackhawks. Maybe now I'll understand what the great northwest sees in him. By the way, I have no problem rooting for Vancouver, I would love to see Canada bring home the Cup.
The other game I watched a decent amount of was Capitals-Rangers. I'm a little torn over who to root for here, but watching the game, I found myself pulling for the Caps. I'm not the biggest Ovi fan. I don't dislike him, necessarily, but I appreciate players like Crosby and Toews more. But, you have to admit, Ovi plays hard, and he's not afraid to get physical like a lot of other "faces" are, both in hockey and in other sports. You have to respect that, and I would like to see him go deep in the playoffs. Maybe even (to quote that great bastion of culture, Major League) "win the whole fucking thing."* Anyway, the Caps were the better team, but it's impossible to say enough about Henrik Lundqvist. He's got a chance to be Halak 2.0, except with a better projection for the future. *I don't think I ever promised this would stay PG, but I'm not sure that's pushed it up to R yet, either. By the way, you should rewatch Major League again. It's not as good as Bull Durham, but there is room in everyone's heart for both. In other news, Wabash completed it's sweep of DePauw yesterday, powering to a 12-5 win in Crawfordsville. This makes a nice pair with their 7-5 victory in Greencastle earlier in the year, and goes very well with the 57-40 basketball win at DePauw, and (most importantly) the 47-0* nothing victory in the Monon Bell football game at Wabash. I don't know the last time either side swept the "money sports,"** but I'm not sure I could be more thrilled about it. Welcome to the conference, DePauw. *Did I mention Wabash was the heavy underdog in this game? I mean, heavy underdog. **Well, you know, as "money" as sports gets at the Division III level. I need to start making a list, I've got a few kind of big topics I want to tackle in the near future. I'll give a little insight here so you can be looking for these posts. There's the media post I plan on doing tomorrow. I also plan on doing a post talking about baseball games in other media (video and board games, mostly). I would like to say I'm going to do that one next Friday, but I might not sit on that one that long. It's a really interesting topic to me, maybe something of a pet project. If you take a look at the "Sites I Like" page, you'll probably see why. Oh, and pictures. I guess that was the title of this post, wasn't it? Wabash wraps up their home schedule this week, so this is pretty much my last chance to get a picture of the stadium in use, which I would very much like for the top of the page. Keep your fingers crossed that I'm able to make it happen. Just because I really don't have a lot to say today, which in the past means I might have schedule slip. Not here, though. Not yet.
The Cubs got blown out of the water, as is going to happen to any team from time to time, even against the Astros. The Reds keep on rolling. I did hear Jonny Gomes on the radio last night, and he seemed pretty happy with the team. Hard not to be when you start 8-3. If this were football, we'd be looking at them as Super Bowl favorites. He did say "You know" about eighty times through the interview, though. That got old quick. NHL playoffs start tonight. I'm going to try to watch the Blackhawks, but they don't start until late because they're out in Vancouver. That's by Seattle, if you're very geography-challenged. And if you don't know where Seattle is, I hope you weren't born in this country. Or you're 8 or something. If you are reading this blog as an 8-year-old, that's pretty good. Congrats to you! But learn where Seattle is. I'm also awfully sore today. I covered six miles yesterday, running a mile and a half of it. That's because A) I'm trying to get in shape for my wedding August and B) I'm not going to embarrass myself again running a 5K in June. I suppose you can throw in C) there's a disc tournament in October I'm supposed to play in and I want to be in shape for that. But that's pretty minor to B, and really minor to A. A really ought to be worth at least two letters, maybe three, if we're doing this by importance. So, ABC) wedding, D) 5K, E) Disc tournament. There we go. I also need to take a new picture for the top of the blog. The under construction theme was cool for a while, but I think this site is pretty well constructed now. So, it's time to get a shot of the finished stadium, maybe while a game is in session. I'll see if I can swing that Saturday or something. Anyway, more tomorrow. Maybe I won't be feeling so tired and sore, so I can get into my mega media post. Or maybe I'll save that for a big Friday blow out. We'll back to the regularly scheduled baseball talk tomorrow. But, with this being the eve of the hockey playoffs, I decided to write about hockey today. Actually, that had nothing to do with it. I just looked at attendance numbers and I felt moved yesterday. Let's see if that translates into today.
With the regular season completed, I looked at ESPN's listing of attendance numbers, and generally, things look pretty healthy in the world of NHL. Nineteen teams fill over 90% of their arena, eighteen fill over 95%.* There are only four teams that don't fill at least 80% of their venue. It also just so happens that those four teams are the ones that might be better served by moving. And, as you might be aware, the NHL has a history of moving teams more than anybody, except maybe the NBA. Maybe. *Nashville fills 94%. I think it's out of spite to my statistical analysis. Columbus is 27th on the attendance list (by percentage). Nationwide Arena holds 18,144 people for hockey, the Blue Jackets average 13,250 for games. That comes out to 73.58% by my math (well, Excel's math, actually). Now, one year's attendance numbers can be misleading. People generally aren't going to come out for a bad team the way they will they will a good team. So, let's take a quick look at the good years. Or year. Columbus has made the playoffs once in their ten year history, in 2008-09, where they were swept in the first round by the Red Wings. And that year Columbus averaged 85% of their arena. Not bad, but only good for 24th in the NHL, and not a great crowd for the best year in franchise history. One has to wonder if Ohio is that big of a hockey market. One thing they have going for them is the arena. I've not been there personally, but it draws rave reviews. We'll keep digging here. At 28th, we have the Atlanta Thrashers. They share a building with the Hawks, which means there isn't the same kind of concern about an empty building. They only draw 13,403 per game, good for 72% of the building. They came in the year before Columbus, and have also made one trip to the playoffs in 2006-07. They did win their division to qualify, but were then swept by the Rangers. They drew a tad over 16K fans that year, only good for 21st in the NHL. Their ownership situation is in flux, and I'm not sure this team has ever turned a profit. The NHL has already pulled out of Atlanta once, I would say it's not your traditional hockey market. I would say let's keep digging, but instead, I'm going to say this is a team worth moving. Quebec is hungry for a hockey team again. I would be surprised if they couldn't get a deal for a new arena together to revive the Nordiques. Then we can get these great jerseys back again. Next on the list is the Phoenix Coyotes. This has actually been a pretty good team over the years. But, the ex-ownership has come out to say they've never made money in the desert. They've never drawn particularly well, except for playoff games. And they are currently owned by the NHL who is desperate to keep them in Arizona in an arena that nobody seems to like. There were already rumors about moving this team to Hamilton, Ontario. Which isn't a bad idea, I'm sure Toronto can support another team. But why not move them back to Winnipeg? There is a veritable gnashing of teeth to bring the Jets back. The problem was never fan support. True, Winnipeg (like Quebec City, actually) is not a large market. But, if they can build a better arena to generate more revenue, it should be big enough to keep an NHL team. And anything that lands a team back in Canada can't be bad, right? Last on the list is the New York Islanders. This is sad to me. New York supports hockey, but their support goes to the Rangers and Devils. The Islanders have a proud history, but nothing is going in the present or the near future. The arena is regularly voted worst in the league, and it seems all plans to renovate or build a new one go nowhere. Ownership has been up and down, though the records have been almost without fail down for the last ten years. They barely scraped into the playoffs three times, and one year climbed up to fifth in the conference. It's been the cellar other than that. They have a small arena, Edmonton is the only comparable sized building. The difference being Edmonton still sells out to watch a very down Oilers team. The Islanders do not. I hate to say it, but it seems New York is oversaturated with hockey, and the Islanders are the odd man out. Where to move them? I've already got two teams back in Canada where they belong under my plan. They could move to Hamilton, but then they're still going to be stuck playing second-fiddle to the Maple Leafs. Maybe third if the Sabres get good again. No, I think they need to find a market they can finally call their own. Not an original idea, but Kansas City just built a new arena, and would love to have a team to anchor it. The NBA doesn't seem particularly interested. Why not move the Islanders there? They would probably need to be renamed, and I've never loved the Scouts moniker. But I'm sure the good people of KC can come up with something. That way, they still get a good sized market without another winter sport to interfere, a lot like their cross-state rivals in St. Louis.* And maybe the Islanders can get their games on something other than a college radio station. * The Blues, it should be noted, generally draw well although they haven't spent a lot of time as real contenders. That puts three teams on the move. Leave Columbus for now, see if they can grow that market. Their only saving grace is that arena, though. The other teams either have another tenant or a building nobody is happy with anyway. So, Blue Jackets, be on notice. If another city is hungry for hockey, you're up next (Return of the Whalers, perhaps. Who doesn't love these?). The Panthers aren't far behind either. How much longer before Gary Bettman finally concedes the move south was a bad idea? I think one of these days fairly soon I'm going to write a mega post comparing (and contrasting. Mostly contrasting.) the major sports' TV deals and strategies. I'm back in the saddle again. I think I've already broken a record for number of posts on a blog, and definitely longest I've stuck to a schedule. I've done better sticking to a more grueling schedule somehow. I wonder what that says about me.
The Cardinals have a problem on their hands. This is not a team that expected to have three (maybe four, we'll see tonight) wins in their first ten games. There's trouble brewing in the bullpen, but I'm not sure you can really blame it all on Ryan Franklin. He has a nasty history of his outfield betraying him. It hasn't really cropped up this year, but I also wonder how Matt Holliday is consistently ranked as a top outfielder by the stats. He just looks so shaky out there and has so many near-errors. He has some pretty big actual-errors, too. Maybe it's because he looks so awkward fielding, and stats don't really take into account how you look, they just care about results. Must be the whole thing about how your eyes can fool you. I didn't get a chance to watch the Cubs much this weekend, and when I did turn them on, they were getting thoroughly thumped by the Brewers. The Brewers, it should be noted, climbed back to .500 this weekend, tied for second in the division. I think you can pretty safely ignore the bad start. This is a very good team, which would make me worried if I were a Reds fan. Or whoever they draw to play as a wild card (as I'm still convinced they will be the NL Wild Card). I don't know if I ever actually gave my predictions for the year in any earlier posts, so I will do so now. In the NL Central, I do think the Reds will carry the day. I thought that from the start, but the way they've opened the season, I believe it even more strongly. The Brewers I think will finish second (obviously) and take the wild card. They've got a ton of offense, and their pitching staff looks to be much, much improved. Plus, they don't have Trevor Hoffman still trying to hang on for that 600th save. That was a huge issue last year. Made me really sad to see him go downhill so fast. Anyway, back to prognostication. My preseason pick for third was the Cardinals, but they've looked pretty bad. I'm going to stick with them, though I'm not nearly as confident about this one.* To finish fourth, I'm going to go out on a limb and say the Pirates make a big jump. They're going to finish a few games under .500, but I get good vibes coming from this team. Clint Hurdle is key here, along with the young guys just being that much more experienced. The Cubs will finish a few games behind the Pirates in another disappointing year. And the Astros behind them in a long, miserable summer in the Texas heat. *I really wanted to slide the Pirates here. Seriously. The NL East I believe will be carried by the Braves. It'll be a tight race, but I think they pull it out. The Phillies will push them after figuring out somebody to pick up to boost their offense. Not sure who that might be at this point, but there's always somebody. The Marlins will finish third in a good, but not particularly memorable season. The Mets will follow them, being pushed hard by the Nationals. I don't think much of either of those teams. The NL West is going to be rough. Both the Giants and Rockies are awfully good, and I think they're going to beat up each other enough to allow the Brewers to slip into the playoffs. It's really hard to choose here, but I'm going to go with the Rockies to pull this one out, followed by the Giants. It's a coin flip, though. Nobody is going to want to face either of them in the playoffs, either. Might make for a great NLCS if they both get into the postseason. Behind them, I would say the Dodgers, who have a lot of talent, but I don't think they're on that elite level. The Padres will follow them, and the Diamondbacks will bring up the rear. I'm afraid Arizona has a long year ahead of them, but there is definitely some talent there for the future. The Padres have pitching again, but I don't know where their runs are going to come from. The AL Central will be won by the Twins again. The White Sox wouldn't surprise me, but I think they'll finish second. The Tigers will also be in the mix, but I have them finishing third. No real reason, just a gut feeling. Those three could finish in any order and I wouldn't be surprised. I think Kansas City will be in fourth in a surprisingly good year (for the Royals, anyway). There is help on the way, and you're going to start seeing some of it making the big squad. The Indians will be last, and I'm afraid that's a lost organization right now. Shin-Soo Choo might be the highlight of that team. I really like Choo, but I don't think you want him to be the best player on your team. Of course, they're off to a 7-2 start, so what do I know? The AL West is going to be another good race, but I think the Rangers end up taking it fairly comfortably. A lot of talent on that team, and they might be my pick to win the AL again. I'll be thinking about it and post it at the end here. But, yeah, I just don't see the Rangers not being the best in the division. Though the A's will push them and finish second. Not quite good enough for a wild card, but it will make it interesting. The Angels I think will finish third in a season a lot like last year. Not bad, but not what we've been accustomed to, either. The Mariners will finish last. Probably better than last year, but (like the Padres) I just don't see where they're ever going to score enough runs. We'll see though. The AL East (which I almost forgot, so it goes here) I was going to give to the Red Sox, mainly going along with the crowd. After that start, I'm going to say Boston finishes second and takes the wild card (though I wouldn't be surprised to see it go to a central team). I hate to say it, but that gives it to the Yankees. That should be a more than potent enough offense to cover their pitching holes. The Orioles I think will finish third. I really like where they're heading. Maybe playoffs next year, but not quite this year. They'll be on the cusp, though. The Blue Jays will finish behind them, in a decent year that will be overshadowed by the more popular teams on the east coast.* The Rays were already looking bad, and things just got worse with the Manny debacle. I would go into more detail, but I think I'm going to save that for tomorrow. In any case, it's back to the basement for them. Too bad for Evan Longoria, another player I really like. *Which I think is all of them. Except maybe Tampa, going by ticket sales. But I think you would find a lot more Rays fans around the city than Jays fans. I haven't walked the streets in either of those cities (at least not recently, I did go to Toronto once to see the Pope), so I may be surprised. As far as postseason predictions, let me review a bit here. I've got the Reds, Brewers, Braves, and Rockies in the NL. Yankees, Red Sox, Twins, and Rangers in the AL. I don't think TV would like that NL side very much, but screw TV. Ratings are near meaningless today. I would love to watch those teams. I'll write sometime about how MLB screws themselves with how they do TV. Anyway, I would have to say the Rockies come out of that playoff, and after quite a bit of thinking about it, I would go with the Rangers again to come out of the AL. I'm an NL fan, but I would think the Rangers take that one, the first championship for Dallas since the Stars won the Stanely Cup in 1999. What, you thought the Cowboys still won championships? I like this title more than I have any right to, mostly because it reminds me of “How I Spent My Summer Vacation.” A few quick notes before we get into today’s discussion. I know these posts have been pretty stream-of-consciousness. I will try to do better about actually crafting these posts. I took a play writing class in college, which I thoroughly enjoyed and thought I was pretty decent at. The professor (who made some appearances in Raging Bull) made the point that they’re called playwrights, not play writers. You should be crafting the play much like one would craft a ship (shipwright, not ship builders, for those that don’t follow). I like keeping in some stream-of-consciousness, I think it makes for a more interesting and many times more natural read. But there is a limit, which I have probably abused in this blog. Which brings me to my second point. Day one, I had thirty-some unique visitors. Twenty-some on day two. Four yesterday. Four! Now, day two was probably not my best work, but it wasn’t that bad. If you’re one of those four brave souls, you’re very much appreciated. Get some of those other twenty to come back. It’s getting better, I promise. Now, the original purpose here. My first plan to fix baseball. We all know the best baseball is playoff baseball. That’s true of most sports for obvious reasons. Baseball, though, I think has the best playoffs, because the first round doesn’t needlessly drag on, and there are only four teams per league instead of eight like basketball and hockey. Football is slightly better with six per side, but the four team divisions start a whole new problem. So, if things stayed as they are now, three division champs plus one wild card, I would have no complaint. Problem is, of course, baseball knows everybody loves playoff baseball. So, naturally, their response is to give us all more playoff baseball. Everybody wins, right? NO! WE DO NOT! It’s a terrible idea that I hope somebody squashes before we even get to the table for the new CBA. I dislike that idea even more than the 18-game NFL schedule we’ve been hearing about, and I’m not fan of that, either. If a change must be made, we should go back to less playoffs if anything. I’ve done some thinking on that, and depending on the day, I might argue that’s still superior to what we’ve got now. Okay, you say, so what do you propose? I’m so glad you asked. I would love to see each league go back to two divisions. Then we just take the two division winners play a best-of-seven series for the pennant, and another best-of-seven for the World Series, like baseball did until 1994. The next question would be how do you split up the divisions? Baseball has better divisions than football, so that makes this task a little easier. Are the divisions going to be pretty big? Yes. And I don’t think that’s a bad thing. It makes the division crown mean much more, as it’s the only way to the post season. Kind of like conference championships should mean in college sports (and typically do in Division III). The east and west divisions in both leagues would stay put, so then it’s just how to split up the central divisions. The only unfortunate thing here is the dividing line ends up right through Chicago, but we all knew there would be some tough calls heading into this. Here’s what I came up with (in no particular order).
*I don’t know if it’s been officially announced, but it’s at least an open secret that Florida is about to rebrand to Miami when they open their new stadium. **I’m already proposing some radical changes here, so I’ll meet the Angels halfway on this name change thing. The AL was a little easier to make the call, Detroit and Cleveland being a decent ways further east than their other Central Division counterparts. The NL was a little tougher. By geography, the decision was pretty clearly splitting up the Cubs and Milwaukee. I suppose you could make an argument for Houston, but I think they are a much better fit for the west than really any other central teams. So, given that choice, I pretty much had to send Chicago west as to preserve the rivalry with St. Louis. There’s no way baseball could lose that. And to give more games between these new, bigger divisions, I would get rid of interleague play, should be done anyway. It’s cool in New York and Chicago, and maybe San Francisco and LA (though I don’t think there’s the same sort of intercity rivalry there. . .you might even be able to make that argument for NY since the Yankees are clearly the dominant team there). But I think Missouri has gotten over the 1985 World Series by now. And I don’t know how you even really argue for the Rockies and Mariners having a natural interleague rival. Just get rid of it, let’s have real separation between leagues again. While I’m griping like an old man, let’s get rid of the DH, too. And would it kill to have some afternoon World Series games? A few notes first, though. First off, they seemed to have fixed the internet at work, but they blocked MLB.com with it. I'm not very happy about that development. But, I guess I can't complain too hard. I'll just have to start recording Cubs games. At least I won't ruin them for myself now.
Secondly, I didn't watch much last night, so no recap post today. I bought a car instead. Talked the guy down from $3000 to $2500, mostly on account of the odometer being broken. He probably knew this ahead of time, but he played it like it was a surprise. After he accepted that I wasn't lying to him, though, he caved pretty quick. Nothing special, but it'll get me through a year or two until I get something nicer. Might keep it around if it's as good on gas as I'm anticipating. I'll post a picture of it maybe once I get it cleaned up. Next, we do have some sports notes, but not baseball. The only thing I did watch last night was the last half of the Blackhawks and Blues. I've finally turned into an unabashed Blackhawks fan, though the Blues do still hold a place in my heart. I didn't even realize they were playing, I thought it was on Thursday. But, my brother sent me a text telling me the Blackhawks weren't looking too good. When I turned the game on, though, it was tied at two. I guess I missed the controversial goal, and the replays I saw were pretty brief. The game went to overtime before nailing a sweet pass to a breaking Jonathan Toews, who put it away for the 4-3 Chicago win. I'm not 100% sure, but I think that punched their playoff ticket. If they can at least manage to get one of these last two games against Detroit to overtime, it definitely will. On the hardwood, the Pacers did officially punch their ticket to the playoffs. First time in five years. I didn't see any of the game, but they walloped the Wizards from all I read. There are playoff tickets for $20, which I'm sure is up in the nosebleeds, but I've never been to any professional playoff game before, so I'm thinking I might find a way to make it to one of the games. First have to make sure of when and who they're playing. I'm guessing it will be Chicago, so Conseco will probably be pretty Bulls heavy. Still, congrats to the Pacers. I used to be a pretty big NBA fan when I was younger and watched the Pacers a lot. I drifted away through high school and college. Sort of paid attention, but not closely at all. Then after going to a couple Pacers games during my senior year of college, I was back on the bandwagon. I still wouldn't call myself an NBA fan, but I am a Pacers fan. Now, to the baseball part of this post. I didn't watch any yesterday and only half paid attention to the Cubs game, so I can't really tell you anything about that. What I can tell you about is my first trip to a major league game. That's a big moment for any baseball fan, and I'm sure you ask just about anybody about the first game they went to. Or at least the first one they were old enough to remember. Going to other sporting events is cool, too, but there's something about that first baseball game. Something about walking into that stadium for the first time and seeing the field with your own eyes. I think it has to do with the uniqueness of baseball stadiums. That's a post for another day, though. Maybe soon. This post is about my trip to old Busch Stadium. I was pretty young, though I don't remember exactly how old. I'll say about 8 or so. That feels right. This was back in the day when you could walk up on game day and buy decent seats for $12 a pop. I don't know why that memory sticks with me, but it does. We sat in the loge section. I was a Cubs fan, but I've always been able to watch about any baseball game that's on, so I was thrilled. My brother was probably even more thrilled, being a Cards fan. Everybody was pretty bummed about Ozzie Smith being hurt, though. It was towards the end of his career. The Cards played the Mets that day, and it was a back and forth game. I remember it being warm, but not too warm. I've been in some pretty miserably hot days in Busch Stadium, this was not one of them.* The big things that stick out from the game itself was an argument about where a ball on the wall. There used to be (maybe still is, I can't remember now) a yellow line that went around the top of the wall at Busch. A ball hit that line, and it was ruled a home run, even though it didn't clear the fence. Some funky ground rule, I guess, I never quite understood that one. The other thing was Bernard Gilkey (as a Cardinal) hitting a no-doubt home run. My brother (we'll say he was six then) jumped out of his seat far enough that it flipped up, but not so far that he was aiming to land on his feet. So, he landed hard on his behind on the cement, which I'm sure smarted, but not as much as his elbow, which he had smashed on the armrest on the way down. It hurt, but I don't think it dampened his day. The Cards won, but I don't remember the final score. *I would hate to ask my dad how much we spent on soft drinks (mostly lemonade, if I remember right) watching the Cards and Brewers once. The Brewers won that game, which I think was also the first time I'd been to a big league game and the home team lost. I guess I was a bit of a lucky charm or something. That was also the day I realized what a scourge Astroturf was. I was already kind of set against it from watching on TV. You could definitely tell a big difference between Busch and Wrigley. To see it in person, though, it looked awful, the ball didn't have anything like a natural bounce. It sure didn't look comfortable in any respect. FieldTurf is better, but I can tell you first hand it still doesn't hold a candle to natural grass. The only time FieldTurf ought to be used is when you're in a dome, and if you can have open air stadiums in Minnesota and Boston, there's no reason anybody should be playing baseball in a dome. I'm not a huge fan of football in a dome, either, but again, another day. I hope some day Toronto will come to its senses and either take the roof off Rogers Centre or build a new place where they can play on true Canadian soil. I don't know what to do about Tampa. They need a new stadium, but they need to actually draw some fans before that. My idea would be move them out west. If there's going to be a four team division, I would rather see it be an AL East with New York, Boston, Toronto, and Baltimore than an AL West with Texas, California*, Oakland, and Seattle. Move them to, I don't know, Portland or something. The NBA does well there, surely they would embrace a big league team. Probably have to build a stadium, though. Still, you get the idea. *Don't get me started on this "Los Angeles of Anaheim" crap. They had a perfectly good name (and uniform) before. I'll try to get used to the Angels being a red team, but I'm still calling them California, or Anaheim if you really twist my arm. Wow, okay. That's my rambling for today. I was trying to tell a story about my first big league game, and landed on Astroturf and division realignment. I think I've kind of decided on a weekday schedule, probably excluding holidays. But we'll see when one rolls around. See I had this post written out once, but then our flakey internet ate it. So, I turned to Word to type it out a second time. I won’t be fooled again! (Insert The Who here.)
Last night was mostly taken up doing wedding stuff. Namely filling and addressing envelopes. I was on stuffing and licking duty, with the occasional address look-up. But, there was still baseball being played last night, so I was paying some attention. The Cubs are already starting to get me suckered in. I still don’t think this is a playoff year, but they may be better off than I realize. Yes, blowing a four-run lead is never a good thing, that didn’t make me happy. But it was nice to see the team respond and put up a couple more runs, and maybe even better to see Sean Marshall lock it down in the 9th. There’s a very good argument to be made that Sean Marshall has been the most valuable Cubs pitcher the past few years. He’s filled about every role there is to fill, and done it all pretty well. The shame of all this I can’t watch afternoon games as much any more. Watching the Cubbies play those early afternoon games was a staple of my late high school and college career. I could record them and watch them later, I suppose, but MLB really beefed up Gameday on their website, so I know I’d just ruin the games for myself. Better to let the DVR fill up with episodes of “Baggage” instead. The Reds are also looking just dominant. Dispatching Houston 8-2 in a game they may as well called in the 2nd, I’m having a hard time finding the holes on this team. I understand the Astros and Brewers aren’t exactly world-beaters, but they have looked awfully good. J.A. Happ really did not. I haven’t watched him all that much, but he sure was moody last night. Jawing with the umpire, walking off the mound before the umpire made his call, etc. He’s young, and I think Houston will be happy in the long run with (essentially) Happ for Oswalt, but that can’t be his usual attitude. The only hole I can find in Cincinnati is their fan base. Opening Day in Cincy, of course, is still a big deal, even if Selig has robbed us all of one of the best traditions in sports. But Great American Ballpark (which is a very nice stadium, I can tell you first hand) has been half-empty since. They very rarely sold out last year, even as they fought for their first playoff berth (and division crown) since 1995. You are better than that, Cincy. I know it’s cold out and there are quite a few empty seats everywhere in baseball right now. But you can’t have this sort of team and not show up. Not unless you’re in Tampa Bay, and there’s a very real chance they’ll be moving. And you can’t use the excuse that nobody knew how good this team would be. They were this good last year and probably even better this year. In defense of the Reds fans that did show up, it was would be hard to find a more energetic bunch judging by the post game show they would run from the stadium concourse. A very underrated part of watching Reds games, if you ask me. I did catch the very end of the Cardinals and Pirates, but I couldn’t tell you much of what happened there, other than Ryan Franklin didn’t blow the save like he did Opening Day, and that seemed to really impress the broadcaster. I’m just glad to see Steve Pearce sticking in Pittsburgh, even if I will miss seeing him in Indy. The game of the night, which I watched the last few innings of, was the Royals hosting the White Sox. The Royals have very quietly put together a 4-1 start, which would be 5-0 if Alex Gordon’s long fly would have been about a yard to the right. There were a couple of interesting plays; I think both in the 12th inning. First was the Web Gem of the Year (so far) from Alcides Escobar. I could go into detail describing it here (and I did in the first version of this post), but then I remembered that I’m not writing for a newspaper here, so I can just show you. The next play left me very disappointed in Hawk Harrelson. Not exactly a new thing, mind you, but worse than usual.* Brent Lillibridge (which for some reason I always want to call Ryan Lillibridge) drifted a bit too far off second, and the pitcher got him into a run down. Well, not so much a run down as Lillibridge took a few steps back to second before running like hell to third. The ball was flipped to Mike Aviles who was waiting to make the tag at third, which he did before looking back to first to make sure he didn’t get any ideas. (What? The internet? Oh, right. Click here.) The only problem was the third base umpire didn’t think Aviles made the tag. I think it took a second for all parties to figure out Lillibridge was called safe. Aviles was understandably upset and pleaded his case, as did Ned Yost, but then the second base umpire stepped in and ruled Lillibridge out. Replay clearly showed that was the right call. As did full speed, I thought, but I guess I wasn’t standing at third base. *Maybe one of these days soon I’ll skip my baseball viewing habits and discuss announcers. Hey, I kind of look like Joe Posnanski right now. Nothing against the guy, but I hope the resemblance is only writing deep. Now, typically in a situation like this, you might do some grumbling as a broadcaster, or even as a fan, but you would typically concede the important thing is they got the right call. But not Hawk Harrelson. Even after a few showings of the replay, Hawk kept harping on how the third base umpire wasn’t screened or anything, so why could the second base umpire overrule him? You would think the obvious answer would be “Because the third base umpire got it wrong.” I wish we would see more of this. It was really pretty disgusting and set me even further against the Southsiders. The Royals did pull out the game, by the way. And good for them. One quick note to end this. I probably would have watched more baseball last night, but the Blackhawks were in Montreal fighting for their playoff lives. Montreal is also trying to cement their place in the playoffs. And what a game it was. It definitely felt like a playoff game, looked like a playoff game, and I think the NHL could do a lot worse than Chicago and Montreal in the Stanley Cup Finals. It’s not going to happen, but boy it looked good on every level. The hockey was wide open, slick, energetic and extremely entertaining. Montreal (being the Yankees of hockey) has some of the most into it and knowledgeable fans anywhere. Even the uniforms were great.* The Canadiens held on to win in OT, which was disappointing. But it’s hard to be upset after a game like that. I’m officially pumped for the playoffs. *I kind of like this Posnanski thing. I might do footnotes in the future, though. I don’t want to be too blatant. Anyway, I just wanted to add here that it’s a shame the NHL went to color at home, because the Blackhawks white jersey is so much sharper than the red. Hello there, welcome to my latest attempt at a blog. Hopefully this one sticks. What confidence do I have that I will actually write a new post every day, or at least most days? History says I'm not so great at that schedule thing. But, I do love baseball, and I typically have plenty of free time while I'm at work, so here I am. Plus, baseball just started for real a couple days ago, so this feels like a good time to start.
This post will be pretty short, as I'm going to be spending more time building the site for at least today. As way of a little background (if you crave more, you can go to the "About Me" page), I'll pretty much watch anything that keeps score, though baseball is my favorite. It is a dream of mine to make it to all the big league parks, and I've got an okay start for somebody in their mid-20's. I've been to both Chicago parks, Cincinnati, Baltimore, and both Busch Stadiums. And now that I'm out on my own, making my own money, I can make a little more concentrated effort. Of course, all my money right now is going towards a wedding, but I can't gripe very much about that. Also, as a bit of warning, the hockey playoffs are about to start, which is another favorite of mine, so look out for Blackhawk sightings. The Pacers also look like they're finally breaking through to the playoffs. Probably a brief stay, but you might see some of that discussion thrown in as well. As far as baseball today, I know it's early, but I'm really liking the start that both the Pirates and Orioles are getting off to. I've watched this Pirate core quite a bit when they were in Indy, and I have to say, they've got a solid group there. The question, as it seems to have been for a long time with Pittsburgh, is the pitching. If they can get enough pitching, they can score runs. They're not going to win the division, and I don't even think they're going to finish with a winning record, but I do think they're going to end up a lot closer than most realize. As far as Baltimore, I haven't seen them yet, but looking at that roster, they are also going to be much improved. And I think there's something to having Showalter there. It can't be all coincidence that the Orioles win percentage zoomed as soon as he got there. I feel bad for Trembly, I always liked him, but clearly the O's made the right choice. Now if they would just go back to the cartoon bird of the 70's. . . The Cubs? Well, they've looked about like I expected so far. I really can't stress enough how much I like seeing Kerry Wood and Reed Johnson back in blue. It just feels like all that is right and good in baseball. And seeing K-Wood get out of the bases loaded jam yesterday was also a really nice sight. If Soriano can be the same hitter he was a couple years ago, the Cubs might turn out much better than I thought, but that is a huge if. Looks like another year of watching more Reds games. Speaking of the Reds, what a sweep of the Brew Crew! That was one of the most exciting openers I've ever seen. And I like the Reds a lot. I felt pretty good about picking them to win the division this winter. I feel even better about that pick after Wainwright's blowout and Milwaukee looking totally inept at holding a lead. I don't know if I can count on Milwaukee to keep blowing games, because I think Axeford is a solid closer (though that might have more to do with his being Canadian and awesome 'stache than his actual pitching ability). But, it's not looked good so far. Anyway, back to site building. Hope you keep checking in, and I hope I keep up my end of the deal, too. |
Archives
March 2022
|