I just finished watching game seven of the 2003 ALCS on ESPN classic. I didn't get up thinking, "I know what I'll do with the next three hours of my life. I'll watch a baseball game from two and a half years ago whose outcome I already know," but what are you going to do at 11 o clock in the morning when there's nothing else on tv except for the sportscenter I already saw at 2am. So i sat down to enjoy a little history with my last box of Thin Mints(these things are delicious, and did you know that the Girl Scouts of America make literally billions of dollars a year selling these things? A quick round of applause for the Girl Scouts of Southeast Asia, who I'm sure are busy toiling in sweatshops preparing box after box).
It's funny how great the Redsox Yankees rivalry truly is. I would have to say it is easily the second or third best in sports (sorry guys, but Michigan Ohio State is still number one, and if Army and Navy didn't suck so much, they would be an easy number two). I probably don't need to tell you what happened in the game, but for all of my Amish or Hacidic Jew readers out there: Too Many Pitches for Pedro + "Curse" + The Greatest Franchise in Sports = Another Yankees World Series Appearance and My Brother Crying Himself to Sleep. Poor guy.
The rivalry continues tonight on ESPN, but before you get too excited, let me point out that Chien-Ming Wang is the starting pitcher for the Yankees and the Red Sox have lost seven of their last ten. Oh yeah, and everyone's favorite half-Thai warrior now goes by Johnny from the Bronx. Sound like the rivalry you remember?
In an age where money talks, and with two teams in cities where anything less than an anual trip to the World Series is a disapointment, it shouldn't really be that surprising that only ten of the twenty starters for the two teams played in that ALCS game that now seems like ancient history. Will the game tonight be a great one? Probably not. But it could be. Hell, in a spring where Detroit, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and...yes...even Colorado all have more wins than Joe Torre's boys, anything is possible.
And all I can say is that it better be a DAMN good game, considering it is on television tonight in lieu of the Tigers, the Pistons, and the Redwings (okay, the Pistons are on a payperview channel, and the Redwings are on OLN, but I don't get either of those channels). Normally this wouldn't seem that out of the ordinary...if we were in September or October, but the Pistons are playing in a critical Game four of their playoff series, and the Red Wings are facing elimination in game six. The Tigers aren't doing anything special on this particular evening, but with 16 wins they own the second most in the major leagues.
Nuff said.
Hockey shot themselves in the foot with the cancelation of last season, and even though this year's playoffs have been as good as they have been in a long time, with some great goaltending and enough overtime games to make any fan giddy, it's going to take a little more time before they can earn back the nation's respect. The NBA, on the other hand, is insanely popular and yesterday's Lakers win was maybe the best finish to a basketball game I've seen in my lifetime.
The best finish to a baseball game I've ever seen? Game seven of the 2003 ALCS.
So I'll be trying my best to find one of the five television sets in the county that gets OLN tonight, otherwise It'll be a toss-up between using my pirated account for MLBtv to cheer on my Tigers, or tuning into ESPN (which has come so far in the past five years, now legitimately delivering the best coverage for all four of the major sports) in hopes that tonight's game might deliver a gem.
No Pedro. No Clemens. No Nomar. But hey, it's the Sox and Yankees.
Oh yeah, and just in case you didn't know: Jonny Damon 's new nickname is officially Judas Iscariot.