"This" Is Baseball

“It gets old when you battle your butts off and don't get rewarded. We're tired of playing in these classics and losing. It reminds me of the game [seven] in Minnestota -- the Greatest Game Ever Played. But we lost. This was probably the Greatest Division Series Game Ever Played. But we lost. ... ”
— John Smoltz

Is this happening?

I first watched the Vols get crushed by Georgia. That in itself is enough to at least put a damper on an otherwise wonderful fall weekend. Then I watched that night as the Braves went down 2 to 1 in the NLDS.

And now this. A five hundred and fifty-three pitch eighteen-inning five hours and fifty minute marathon. This will go down in history as the longest game ever. This will go down in history as one of only two times in the long and extraordinary career of Roger Clemens in which he appeared as a reliever. This will go down as the best game ever played. This will be the unforgettable game that shows up on Sports Illustrated videos twenty years from now. And this is what I get to listen to for the next five and a half months. This, this, this. This was the time when Atlanta's starter threw a gem, an absolute gem, and his bullpen gave up a six-run lead.

I'm convinced The Babe has moved from Boston to Atlanta, but only comes south when it starts getting cold...say, October?

Sunday - today - was the end of 162 games of hard-fought baseball. Complete devastation. It wouldn't have been so bad if we would have lost by 10 runs. Hell, we did that last year. But the fact we lost after giving up an insurmountable lead after eight - devastation. After the game, which endured for an agonizing six hours, I had to get out of the apartment. A and I decided to drive by the new house to cheer us up. It worked. We drove by, checked out the neighborhood people, which continue to look really nice, and then went to get a feel for things like how close is the nearest grocery store. We did, and found a Kroger pretty close by, along with a branch of the bank we both use. We ended up hitting a major road, went north for about ten minutes, then turned around. On the way back we stopped at what is to be our new local bar, I'm sure. After two beers we headed back to the apartment. We watched Ladder 49. I'm not quite sure what to rate it yet, but I think I'll go for a four.

I absolutely cringe, freeze up, my face feels like someone rubbed icy hot all over it, and I start sweating and getting a nautious feeling in my stomach when I say...." there's always next year."

But there is always next year, and there is always baseball and the Braves and great homers by Andruw. There's always cheap seats and guys like me wearing jerseys in their dens and screaming at the TV. And, there's really crappy weekend-ruining heartbreakers and bottomless bullpen scoring and heroes who always seem to play for the wrong team. There's the torture of watching the cover being knocked off the ball and hitting the fans on the other side of a wall that says 405', with your guy standing in center field watching it helplessly. And then, when it's all over, you realize something wonderful has happened. It's times like 'this' that make baseball such a pure and legend-laden pastime. I reckon it's times like this that made people who don't even like baseball root for the Red Sox last year. It's definitely times like this that (suck it up) make guys like me, with my jersey and my beer and my screaming, confidently say "We'll get 'em next year," time and time again.

My congratulations go to the fourteen-time division champion Atlanta Braves. The most successful modern day major professional sports dynasty in North America. This time the boys of summer did it with a record-setting number of rookies on the club. And you know what this means.....next year it's on!