Saturday, September 15, 2007

That's a comeback

I've spent an inordinate amount of time in my life following professional sports, notably the New York Yankees and Dallas Cowboys. These teams were great in the 70s, not so great in the 80s when I was growing up, and both were reborn in the nineties. The current decade has been mixed, but not bad for the Yankees. I love MLB and NFL, though my interest in the NBA and all college sports is minimal at best.

The Yankees and Red Sox played the latest go around today, a nearly five hour marathon in which the Yankees were pretty much getting their ass kicked for seven innings. Then they erupted for six runs in the eighth inning against the Red Sox' two best pitchers in Fenway Park and won the game 8-7, which made this game worth my time investment.

As ridiculous as this sounds to those who don't follow professional sports, when Jim Leyritz hit that three run home run in the 1996 World Series it was also one of the happiest days of my life. That was the last time the Yankees were the underdog. When Alvin Harper caught those long passes for Dallas against San Francisco in the 1993 NFC Championship, that was an equally memorable day. Those catches made up for the pain Joe Montana to Dwight Clark caused me as a ten year old boy. I was devastated when that happened. The only other time I was more devastated by sports was when the Yankees blew a 3-0 lead in 2004 and then George Bush was re-elected a few weeks later. What a dark time that was.


Today's Yankee comeback wasn't on par with those things, but what makes sports so amazing is that they are so unpredictable. Truth is just so much stranger than fiction. I will predict that if the Yankees play the Red Sox in the playoffs again, the Yankees will be kicking their ass and balance in the universe will be restored once again, though I might be jeopardizing that by predicting it.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, take back that prediction, Jeff! Do not tempt the sports Gods, predictions are their worst enemies and they punish us for publishing them on blogs.

Wait a minute...I'm not a Yankees fan, I hate The Evil Empire! Predict away.

Angelo Villagomez said...

...and then they drop the next game 10-1.

:)

Aren't you glad you skipped diving for that?

bigsoxfan said...

Thanks for the post, I've been down and out and haven't kept up on the schedule. The ONLY sports (baseball) shown here are Yankee's games and boston/new york series are the only way for me to see my favorites. So this afternoon, I can catch a game, if I can get my mother in law to stop watching her sumo wrestling for a little while.
On your situation, I noted in my time in Saipan, the PSS was often crying immeninant doom, but the gov't finally showed up. Not that the PSS doesn't need all the help they can get, but even the current admin isn't going to endanger their federal bucks, by closing the doors. So, chin up. The missus and I had an excellent experience with the maternity division of the CHC, if you don't go with Tony S. and/or a private midwife. Congratulations, you have some wonderful years to look forward to.

bigsoxfan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jeff said...

Like Meatloaf sang, 2 out of 3 aint bad.

Jeff said...

Get MLB TV if you have a high speed connection. I have it here and love it. All the games for all the teams save the Saturday day games.

Angelo Villagomez said...

I think it has actually been six out of seven.

Damn it.

I hope the Angels knock you off in the first round.

Jeff said...

Same for Cleveland.

Bruce A. Bateman said...

Yankees Rule!

(I would root for the Confederates, but they have no team).

Jeff said...

How about the Atlanta Braves. Incidentally, greatest NY Post Headline was 1996. The Yankees lost the first two games of the World Series at Yankee Stadium, go down to Atlanta and sweep 3 games. After the third game the headline reads "Yankees Burn Atlanta."

SteeleOnSaipan said...

This is hiliarious:
Barry Bonds said the man who bought his 756th home run ball and announced plans to let the public decide its fate is an "idiot."

Fashion designer Marc Ecko had the winning bid Saturday in the online auction for the ball that Bonds hit last month to break Hank Aaron's record of 755 home runs. The final selling price was $752,467, well above most predictions.

Ecko, 35, has set up a Web site that lets visitors vote on three options for the ball: give it to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, brand it with an asterisk before sending it to Cooperstown or blast it into space on a rocket ship.

The asterisk would suggest that Bonds' record is tainted by alleged steroid use. The Giants slugger has denied knowingly using performance-enhancing drugs.

"All of those options don't weigh anything," Bonds told the San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday night in Phoenix. "In baseball, that number (756) stands."

Bonds said Ecko could have found a better way to spend three-quarters of a million dollars.

"He's stupid. He's an idiot," Bonds said. "He spent $750,000 on the ball and that's what he's doing with it? What he's doing is stupid."

Ecko did not directly respond to Bonds' comments Wednesday, but said in a statement he would make Bonds a custom T-shirt that says, "Marc Ecko paid $752,467 for my ball, and all I got was this 'stupid' T-shirt."'

Ecko plans to announce what he will do with No. 756 after voting ends Sept. 25.

Ben Padnos, the California entrepreneur who submitted the $186,750 winning bid on Bonds' record-tying 755th home run ball, said Tuesday he also plans to have the public vote on what to do with it.

On the Net:

Vote 755, http://www.endthedebate.com

Vote 756, http://www.vote756.com

I logged on and voted to **asterisk** it before sending it to Cooperstown. The integrity of the sport is shot, I haven't cared about the game for years now. But if I did, I'd still bleed Dodger blue.