Baseball: The Last Week of the Regular Season
Okay. Given the design of this site, one might well think that I like baseball a bit. Yet I have not blogged a single post on any topic related to America's other pastime (is there any doubt what our primary pastime is?). There's a mere week left in the regular season, and the team that I followed for most of my adult life, the San Diego Padres, is battling for a playoff spot against their nemesis to the north, the evil Hollywood (nee Brooklyn and erstwhile Los Angeles) Dodgers. As of the time I'm writing this, my beloved Padres are maintaining a game and a half lead on the Dodgers. The Dodgers have the best offense in the National League, and the Padres have the best pitching. We have all-time saves leader, Trevor Hoffman; Woody Williams; Dodger castoff, Mike Piazza; Jake Peavy; and one of my favorite players, Mike Cameron. They have Greg Maddux, Derek Lowe, Brad Penny, and Nomar Garciaparra. Based purely on the cast of characters, I'd have to give the advantage to the Pads. However, baseball has defied my sense of justice more than once. I try to accept its judgments with humility—as long as inherently evil teams like the Yankees and the Braves aren't the beneficiaries. More of that in another post. Suffice it to say that the post-Ruppert Murdoch Dodgers have shaken off the shackles of unmitigated evil.
If it were two and a half game lead with only a week to go, I'd feel a bit more comfortable, but with ninth inning heroics like Nomar's walk-off grand slam today (not to mention the infamy of the four consecutive home runs on four consecutive pitches in the bottom of the ninth of Monday's game), it's clear that evil won't go quietly into that dark night.
Of course there are more important things than baseball, some of which I've written about. Don't ever forget that innocent people are dying because of the actions of a government that purports to speak for each and every one of us (it does not speak for me). However, even the most terrifying narrative needs some comic relief. The poetry of baseball provides that for me. It's this kind of dogfight that makes for storied rivalries. This is the ideal way to head into October.
Here's how a perfect week in baseball would shape up for me:
Padres: NL West title
Phillies: NL Wild Card (can you say Ryan Howard?)
Dodgers: Eating Tommy Burgers in Santa Monica on October 1