The New Red Sox

It used to be that you could count on the Red Sox to lose in the most spectacular way. As they said in Fever Pitch: "They don't just lose. They raise it to an art form."

All those infamous years that any real Sox fan has memorized. '46 and '75, '67 and '86... they made everyone think they were really going to win, and then they would lose in the worst and most unexpected way.

This year, we lost a different way. We lost in a way that we should have lost, when any other team would be expected to lose. The Red Sox, on the other hand, were pretty much expected to bounce back, but only because they were the Red Sox. So it came as a complete shock when they didn't.

Actually, now that I think about it... it's the same thing that happened last year. The Sox were down 3-1 in the ALCS, came all the way back to force a game 7, and then, just when everybody was sure they would pull it off (as they had, miraculously, in the 1999 & 2003 ALDS, and the 2004 & 2007 ALCS), they blew it.

I won't even try to place all of the blame on Papelbon. They played 3 games, not one, and they lost each and every one of them, with or without Papelbon.

Oh, Please, Gods of Baseball, please don't let it be an L.A. Subway Series. I don't think I could bear it, if the season came down to la-la land.

Red Sox baseball 2009 is over. Here come six months of baseball hibernation. I hate this part.

And when Joe Castiglione read those famous words of A. Bartlett Giamatti's at the end of the broadcast, that's when I fell apart.

"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone. You count on it, rely on it to buffer the passage of time, to keep the memory of sunshine and high skies alive, and then just when the days are all twilight, when you need it most, it stops..."

"What's not been a factor has been the Red Sox offense so far."

When they said that, in the bottom of the 8th, I was really hoping it would come back to bite them. But unfortunately, the comment remained terribly true.

But there was a bit more vintage Boston. You know, the tantalizing loss. Mike being the tying run at the plate and dashing all of our hopes just as they were starting to gain strength. It's coming back.

Now I want some 1999 vintage Boston, as in Boston losing Games 1 and 2 to Cleveland and then coming back to win 3 and advance. Or even 2003 Boston.

Plus, it's all in the patterns, and this one's worked out great:
2004: we beat the Angels in 3.
2007: we beat the Angels in 4.

So obviously it's gotta take all 5 games in 2009!

Postscript: Yet another complaint about Angels fans - today I saw one wearing what had to be an Angels golfing hat. With a diamond pattern.
And we complain about pink-hat fans? Evidently, it can be much worse.

A Whole Lotta Ugly

What an ugly game.

I think the best word to describe Game 1 of the Sox-Angels ALDS is FAIL.

Above all, this game was a prime example of the Umpire Fail. The umpiring was a joke, reminiscent of the 1999 ALCS. What baseball fan, who saw those plays, could actually believe that C.B. Bucknor missed the call?

Not the people who know that he's a horrible umpire. Major League players voted him the worst umpire in 2003. He was awarded the title again in 2006. Wikipedia isn't letting "new or unregistered users" work on his wikipedia page... because of vandalism.

After today's game, I can't blame anyone who would try it. (Whether editing wikipedia is a form of vandalism is another issue for a different blog...)

Then there's the Broadcasting Fail. Considering that this was TBS, it could have been much, much worse. But, after acknowledging that two LA baserunners were out by a long shot, though Bucknor called them safe, they had the nerve to say that "Red Sox defense has been good, but they have three errors."

Without any mention to questionable calls. Come on! Why point that out, if you know that two of those errors should go to Bucknor for Ugly Umpiring?

And, last but not least - rather, worst of all - the Red Sox Fail.

Because we can complain about the horrible calls all we want, but none of them prevented our scoring runs. That was all Boston.

Pitching was fine - Jon Lester allowed a few too many walks for comfort, and obviously Torii Hunter's home run was the key to the game, but he did very well. (Especially considering the two 4-out innings he had to play...) 3 runs should not be enough to beat the Red Sox.

But it was. With only four hits, and these scattered across the innings, the offense was practically nonexistent. No one even made it passed second!

Papi struck out three times! He, along with Jacoby and Youk, went 0 for 4!

This is not the Red Sox I know and love.

Luckily, Beckett is pitching tomorrow. Here's hoping he can get something going, and inspire some offense from his teammates.

The Angels deserve to lose if only for introducing that horrid eye- and earsore, the thunderstick. Call me a baseball snob if you want to, but those things are ugly. They deserve to be banished to the NBA. (I'm ashamed to read that they first broke onto the U.S. scene in my hometown of Portland, Oregon, but that was at a soccer game so I don't really care.) Dear Korea, next time you want to export some fan fun, please send us the singing!

Go Sox!

The Tiebreaker

And so it begins: the Phillies have just beat the Rockies and the 2009 playoffs are officially under way.

Yippee! October is here!

I woke up this morning and hurried to check the score of the Twins-Tigers tiebreaker (when I went to bed, it was 4-3 in the 8th inning). It looks like I missed an amazing game. I only hope it's an indication of the weeks to come!

It all seems a little unfair, though. Neither the Twins nor the Tigers were the clear winner after an entire season of 162 games, so how could it all be decided in one little game! (Okay, it could have been littler, seeing as it went into extras...)

And, one little close game. A difference of only one run to determine the division champion, and teeter-tottering scores through all 12 innings.

It doesn't seem like a fair way to choose a winner. I always think of as an even-handed game, with its best-out-of-five/seven-game-series. But, then, no one said it was fair - and as a Sox fan, I've seen plenty to prove it.

And, after all, whichever team won, the team from the Central Division would still be the worst of the four AL playoff contenders, and have a lower winning percentage than the Texas Rangers, who didn't qualify.

Anyway, I'm glad the Twins won. It may be hypocritical, as a Red Sox fan, but I like the whole culture around midwest baseball. The honest way they work, the middle-class type of team. The Red Sox are, unfortunately, like the Yankees - up in their own little penthouse, in one corner of the country, the two of them hitching free agent prices higher through their competitive offers. The Twins are the way baseball probably should be. Less flashy, but still amazing, exciting, and always managing to thrill you.

Okay, I guess the Tigers are that way, too. But the Twins have Orlando Cabrera, and ya gotta like Orlando Cabrera. Especially the way he picked up the pieces for us when the Red Sox management surprisingly and cruelly disposed of Nomar in 2004.

Also, I've been to the Twindome, and I loved the atmosphere. (Now there's an ironic sentence.) The people don't have to be diehards, and still it seemed like a place where everyone not only knew the game, but truly enjoyed it. Not like the games at Seattle, where families come for seven innings and a souvenir picture of the kids with their hot dogs, and where the attendance rises and falls with the winning percentage. Coming from a city that seems to take baseball for granted, it was nice to find a place where people valued it.

So, basically, I'm rooting for the Twins in the ALDS because I had a good experience at their ballpark.

And because I have two teams. You know the ones. The Red Sox, and whoever's playing the Yankees.

September 23rd is a special day in my life.

In our lives, actually. Because it is the day that all three of us first (and last, in all cases but one) went to Fenway Park. It is the day that we fell in love with the Boston Red Sox. The day that we became diehard baseball fans.

So, today marks the 10-year anniversary of our family's being fans of the Boston Red Sox.

It's been a wild ride, as it has for anyone who's followed the Sox these years. From that 1999 postseason that first reeled us in, to the ever-painful 2003, to the elation of 2004, and the repeat in 2007 (which happened came at 6 am on a Tuesday morning for me), we've loved it.

And it keeps getting better. Even though a core part of being a Red Sox fan went away when they won, we wouldn't give that up for anything. Now we can take more pleasure in the little things - beating the Yankees, for example. Or having a couple of Oregonians, Washingtonians, and even a British Columbian on the squad. We still get those amazing come-from-behind victories and still expect to be figuring in the playoffs - but we'd stick with them till the end, even if we weren't.

It's changed us, too. The most obvious example, in my case, is that I speak Spanish mainly because I'm a Red Sox fan - if I had never gone to that game, I never would have worshiped Pedro Martinez, and then, I never would have lived in the Dominican Republic.

Let me take a moment to remember some of the Red Sox-y things we've done:

-Gone to Fenway Park.
-Seen the Yankees play the Red Sox at Fenway Park. (This only applies to Fran, sadly)
-Built a Johnny Damon snowman (before he went to the dark side)
-Gone to Jacoby Ellsbury's 2007 Welcome Home Parade
-Seen the Red Sox in Oakland - multiple times
-Seen the Red Sox in Seattle - many, many times
-Seen the Red Sox lose in 19 innings
-Gone to see "Fever Pitch" with the whole street, all fellow Sox fans, dressed to the nines in Sox gear and cheering
-Gotten autographs from Jason Varitek, Johnny Damon (before he was evil), Pedro Martinez, John Valentin, and several others
-Cried all night and skipped school the next day when the Sox lost in 2003
-Seen Johnny Pesky speak at Portland's PGE Park
-Watched or listened to Red Sox games at any and all times of day
-Moved to the Dominican Republic in search of the baseball life (this one only applies to me)
-And much more...

So I couldn't let the day pass without taking the time to reflect on the Red Sox and the past ten years.

Now that I have, I think I'll go curl up and watch "Fever Pitch", and relive that amazing year.

Hometown Hero

Today, during the first game of the Red Sox's double header against the Rays, the broadcasters were talking about the emails they had received at Soxbooth. People from South Dakota and Wyoming invited them out to visit. They had heard from The Dakotas, Utah, Tacoma... even Portland, Oregon! "Of course," they added, "the fans in Portland are mighty proud of Jacoby Ellsbury."

True story! We ARE proud of our Jacoby! Of course, he isn't really a Portlander, seeing as he grew up in the town of Madras. But Oregon is small enough - and has produced so few Major Leaguers - that any connection with the state will do.

And Jacoby is Oregonian in a big way: Oregon-born, Oregon-raised - even Oregon-educated, as he stayed in-state for college (OSU). He's probably even more Oregonian than I am.

Oh, yes, we love him. Some members of my family - namely, the other "contributors" to this blog - went to Jacoby's welcome home parade in Madras in 2007.

Francesca took this picture. She was actually that close to Jacoby.

Apparently it really was a hometown affair; F and G say they felt a little out of place, like intruders. But what an experience.

Anyway, I thought it was time for a tribute to the guy who means so much to Massachusetts and Oregon - and all of Red Sox Nation. After all, he just had a birthday on Friday - he's 26 now.

So, Jacoby, this one's for you. Hope you have many, many more years of excellent baseball in your future.

And I hope they're in Boston.

Baseball on the Radio

Tonight, I'm listening to the Sox game. (As opposed to watching it.)

I used to listen to games all the time. That was mainly out of necessity: In Portland, before mlb.tv, there was only Gameday Audio and the occasional national broadcast. Other than that, if you were out of area, the Red Sox were not available on television. You could only listen to it over the radio.

In 2000, I spent summer afternoons, from 4 until dinnertime, upstairs in the stuffy study with a scorecard or my journal, listening to the Red Sox. Okay, not every afternoon, but a huge amount of them. It's a very pleasant memory. Sleepy warmth and good baseball - I especially remember a come-from-behind win on a double off the Monster by Nomar against the Texas Rangers. It was a sweet summer, except for all of the drama with Carl Everett and Pedro getting punched by Gerald Williams of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and barely missing a no-hitter against them.

Lately, though, I've been watching a lot more games. It gets cheaper every year on mlb.com, and it's nice to know what players look like, to see how they run, how they catch, what their wind-up or batting stance looks like. I heard about Jacoby Ellsbury scoring from 2nd on a wild pitch, but didn't see it - didn't see him play - until months after it had happened. Since then, I've preferred watching to listening.

But there are other benefits to listening to the games. For one thing, I like the announcers better. For another thing, you learn more. The announcers talk more - there's more color commentary and therefore more background information. And I like the commercials, because they're local - to Boston. It makes me feel closer.

Coincidentally, I was surfing the web today, looking for updates about the Portland Beavers, and found this Dwight Jaynes post about building a casino by the Rose Quarter. At first I shuddered. Can you think how horrific that would be? Whenever there's a concert at the RQ the traffic is insane. Imagine having concerts at the RQ AND a casino? And those horrible lights? And the very idea... I kind of agreed with Gov. Kulongoski when he refused to let a casino in Portland to fund MLB, even though I really wanted an MLB team. He was right: baseball and gambling don't mix, as Shoeless Joe and Pete Rose know too well. It was... in bad taste.

But then, while thinking about baseball on the radio, I remembered my favorite commercial: The Foxwood's Casino jingle. "Take a chance, make it happen/roll the dice, fingers snapping/Spin the wheel, round and round we go-o/life is short, life is sweet/grab yourself a front-row seat/and let's meet, and have a ba-all/at the wonder of it all" and then the background people chant, "Meet me at FOXwoods."

Scary, the things we remember, but I loved that jingle, and I was sad when they changed it. I would pick that to sing in a karaoke bar for sure.

And then I realized: there's one casino-baseball connection that isn't so horrible.

Kind of tacky, and really not something you want to associate with baseball.

But I think I'd rather have a casino and baseball than no baseball at all.

Putting the "Home" in "Home Run"

Today was the Minor League All-Star Game Home Run Derby, and boy, what a show.

It was easy to surpass expectations, because ours were relatively low. When the announcer said, "Who doesn't love a long ball?" the three of us looked at each other carefully. Sure, we love a Big Papi Dinger, or a the occasional grand slam that shakes you to your gut. Personally, I was always a big fan of the Brian Daubach come-from-behind shot.

But in general we're not big fans of the home run. They're a little boring. They're exciting, but it's kind of a cheap thrill. A showy, long home run does not seem like good sportsmanship.

The Home Run Derby, however, started with excitement and kept it going all the way through.

It opened with two local high schoolers. The first, Kevin Taylor of Sunset High School, neatly lined eight balls over the right field fence. Eight home runs ended up being the most of any player in the first round. One of these eight was powerful enough to just brush the MAC club balcony and win a free Oregon slider for everyone in the ballpark.

Kinda like that time another Oregonian, Jacoby Ellsbury, won a free taco for every person in the country. (But that's a different story.)

Taylor advanced to the second round, which has to be one of the greatest gifts a guy can get on his 18th birthday, along with Terry Evans (Salt Lake Bees), Portland Beaver Chad Huffman and Shelley Duncan of the Scranton/Wilkes Barre Yankees, who we soon recognized from certain MLB games between the Sox and Yankees.

This led to lots of booing from the stands (okay, granted, there was a little cheering, too).

The man behind me leaned forward and asked, "So, tell me, why does Portland hate that guy so much?"

"Well, because really, most of us are Red Sox fans," I replied, "or, at the very least, Yankee-haters!"

A quick consultation of wikipedia told us of Duncan's writing negative comments about the Red Sox in a 10-year-old Boston fan's notebook, in addition to spiking Tampa Bay's Akinori Iwamura. We booed with increased enthusiasm.

Taylor did not fare so well in the second round and was unable to get a single ball over the fence. Still, his total of eight was third only to Duncan (nine in two rounds), and Huffman (10).

Duncan started the finals and managed only one home run on four outs. His last at-bat sent a long, high ball out onto 18th Ave, just foul. I may be biased but I believe it was a fair call. Some viewers protested, but Duncan really went too far. In a friendly competition, he refused to simply accept probable defeat, instead staying at the plate and trying to convince the officials that the ball was fair, citing the fans who wanted to have seen another home run.

It draws an analogy, in my mind, to the players who do steroids in order to please a brand of baseball, a public, that relies too heavily on showy home runs. Cheating to please the fans doesn't make it any better.

He was an ungracious loser. You see, Yankees fans really think they have class - you can tell by the way the fans refer to the team's clean-cut image with remarks such as "Johnny Damon had to come to New York so he could learn to take a shower". (Easily countered by stories such as the Roger Clemens bat incident, your choice of A-Rod stories, such as swatting the ball out of Bronson Arroyo's arm, rumors of steroid use, and his alleged affair with Madonna, and Duncan's afore-mentioned spiking incident) They don't realize that they are mostly spoiled to the point of taking wins for granted and being terrible sports.

When Huffman stepped up to bat, he received a larger cheer and ovation. He hit one home run, then a second, and won the competition. (He hit a total of five, earning $500 in prize money.)

So: Local Boy Wows Crowd, Hometown Hero is Home Run Champ!

I complained the other day about an obnoxious Yankee supporter at Saturday's Fan Fest. I saw him again today, but this time with his leg in a heavy-duty splint. I wouldn't wish another bodily harm, not even a Yankee fan, but the combination of this sighting with Duncan's embarrassing performance gave me a pleasant thought to last me all evening:

Redemption is Sweet.

Stankee Yankees

It's been a long time since I've experienced much American baseball culture. Although the last time I was here during baseball season was only two years ago, it seems like a mighty long time since I've come into contact with many other baseball fans.

So I still love the sport, and I still keep tabs on my Red Sox, and I still hate the Yankees, and I still get a thrill when I walk into a ballpark or hear the quickened, excited voice of an announcer calling an amazing play.

But I had forgotten how MUCH I hate the Yankees. I even forgot a big part of WHY I hate the Yankees.

There's that annoyingly high payroll, which we Sox fans can't complain about since we're nearly as bad as they are. (Although we still don't get all the big names the way they do, just picking up whoever happens to be hot. The Red Sox are a more crafted team, thought out in terms of chemistry and specific talent and where we can sacrifice offense for a better fielder and vice-versa, while the Yankees just grab whatever name will take the money.)

There's the stupid clean-cut look of the team, and Evil Steinbrenner. There's the obnoxious way they sing Sinatra's "New York, New York" after all the games. There's the fact that the got a new stadium with a non-commercial name, payed for by the city, while the Mets got Citi Field.

But the thing I forgot about was the fans.

I mean, I knew I hated that part, too. But I forgot just how obnoxious they can be.

Yesterday, we got in line to get some autographs at PGE Park, and who should be in line behind my sister and I, but a Yankees fan.

This guy was a real genuine New Yorker, too.

What's the first thing he did?

"Are you real Red Sox fans?" he asked.
"uh, yes", we said, already on our guard.
He immediately asked us if we'd heard of two old Sox players. We hadn't.

The Sox fan in front of us had, though, and told us when they had played (in the 60's). We protested that we were Sox fans before they won. (Even though we weren't there to see '86, we did experience the heartache of the 2003 ALCS and Aaron Boone, and that's really all you can expect of this generation of Sox fans. That moment, and stories of expectation, hope, and heartache gone by.) We also explained that we had lived in Boston, and surprisingly, he did back off a little.

But a little isn't much when you're talking about a Yankee fan.

As my mom pointed out, there's nothing you can do about them. No matter what you say, they'll have a retort. "You won on luck. That doesn't count." "Oh, so 2007 was also just luck?" "Wait till you win four, five years in a row. Then you can talk." Or, "You only won because of Manny, and he was on steroids." You can bring up A-Roid, but it won't make a difference. He'll find something else to throw back at you.

Now I remember why I hate the Yankees.

About 6 or 7 years ago, my siblings and I would give a relentless evil eye to anyone we saw with a Yankees hat. Of course, in Portland, a lot of people wearing Yankee hats are not the kind of people who care all that much, so they must have gotten really startled. I think it's time to brush up that Evil Eye and start using it on the Evil Empire again.

Baseball, Amsterdam Time - Part II

Or, How To Be A Nocturnal Baseball Fan


This entry is a little out of place here, because I published Part I on my other blog last October: dealing with baseball games at inconvenient times. If the game starts at 7.05 PCT, then I can get up at 4:30 a.m. and still catch the last few innings. If it's a day game, I can watch it here at 7 p.m. if it takes place on the West Coast, or 10 if it's on the East Coast - both entirely doable.

If the game starts at 7:05 on the East Coast, though (which happens a lot with the Red Sox), I'm pretty much out of luck - that's 1:05 a.m. over here.

During the playoffs, I'll go to bed at 8 or 9, get up at 1.30, and go back to sleep (hopefully) around 5. That adds up to a decent 6 or 7 hours of sleep.

That's only for the truly hardcore, though, the do-or-die (the playoffs). When I know I can't justify so many hours of baseball (for example, when there's a gauntlet of schoolwork to run over the next three weeks), I go for Time Difference Option #2.

The Sox are playing the Yankees this weekend, and no Sox fan wants to miss that. For Friday's 7.05 game, I set up my laptop next to my bed and watched the first inning (did you see Jacoby score on a passed ball from second base?! That's my boy!) while I wrote in my journal. Around 1.40, I turned out the light, but left the game on, and set my alarm for 3:40. The alarm would wake me up in time for the last inning or two.

I don't remember waking up for the ninth inning, but because of the sound coming and going for commercial breaks, I woke up periodically. I remember seeing the Sox were losing 4-2.

Next thing I know, it's 5:40, and I'm wide awake. I check my phone and see I've already re-set the alarm for the morning. I check the game. It's the top of the 11th inning.

It's like I have a biological Red Sox clock, or something.

Because what happens in the top of the 11th? The Yankees nearly score - but NO CIGAR!

And what happens in the bottom of the 11th?

That would be Kevin Youkilis. Yes, Youkilis happens. He hits a walk-off home run to end the game.

Can I get a boo-yah?
Then I rolled over and fell back asleep. I woke up happy, if not refreshed, because it's not a good way to get a good night's sleep. But it is a decent way to catch the game, if you happen to be an expat baseball fan.

Foreign Fan

I woke up this morning and saw that Team USA lost to Japan last night.

Excellent.

My brother is always annoyed at my choice of team in international sporting tournaments. In the World Cup or the Euro Cup, I never root for the US, and rarely the Czech Republic (our Dad is Czech), usually favoring France or Italy or, in the last few years, the Dutch team. In baseball, the Dominican Republic has always been a very attractive choice for me.

I think he understands the situation a little better now that he's spent a year in Ecuador and supports their soccer/football, but he still doesn't understand why I never root for Team USA.

The answer is relatively simple: they're boring.

Why would I root for US baseball when I already root for an American baseball team 6 months out of the year?

I love my Boston Red Sox, granted, and I love the players. But the style of play just isn't exciting on the international field.

When the World Baseball Classic came around in 2006, I was astounded at the final game. Japan vs. Cuba - a totally different kind of ball game than I was used to seeing. Each team had very distinct strategies, and each played their own special brand of baseball.

Moreover, if the point of the WBC is to spread the game of baseball, it wouldn't do to have the US clobber the little guys all the time. That is not good motivation for the countries with the up-and-coming baseball programs.

So I'm kind of excited that the US didn't make it to the finals, and it will be Japan vs. Korea. Japan actually has a Sox player on their team (Daisuke Matsuzaka), and there weren't any left on Team USA. Japan and Korea have a big rivalry, and the game should be thrilling.

WBC Loyalties

Baseball in Barahona, Dominican Republic

I have been looking forward to the 2009 World Baseball Classic ever since the 2006 one ended. The funny thing is, I never expected that I would see them both from two different participating countries, and neither would be the U.S.

In the first half of 2006, I lived in the Dominican Republic. I watched the games in the living room with my host family, or upstairs on my own; whichever way, the atmosphere was electric. I rooted for the DR, of course. No question. There weren't enough Red Sox players on the US team, and there were several Yankees players that I couldn't stand. I was familiar with many of the famous Dominican players who had never played in the US Major Leagues. It was an easy choice.

This year, I'll be watching from the Netherlands. I think I'll be rooting for them as well.

I don't expect the same charged atmosphere I experienced in the DR, and I certainly don't expect the outcome. The Netherlands won only one game in the 2006 classic; the Dominican Republic made it to the semifinals.

But in 2006, the DR had Big Papi.

In 2009, they have - shudder - A-Rod.

The plot thickens when you realize that these two teams are playing their first game against each other.

I hope it's on TV here. The local time would be 7 pm on a Saturday. Maybe some of my housemates could get sucked into it.

Probably not, though. Not when Nederland is going to get crushed by La Republica Dominicana...

The Offseason

Lately I've been wondering about the prominence of J initials on the 2008 Red Sox team.

Call me a dork, but I love names. I collect names. What I mean by that is, I keep lists of cool names, usually with the pretense of using them some day in a story, but sometimes just because I like the sound or the spelling or whatever.

And lately I can't help wondering at the prominence of J initials on the 2008 Red Sox.

First we have the boys from the Pacific Northwest: Jason, Jon, Jed, and Jacoby (from North to South). These guys have a special place in my heart because of location, and whenever they do good I like to leave messages on facebook about Pacific NW Power and those good old Pacific NW boys. I think from now on I may have to come up with an appropriate and ridiculous nickname for them, for example, The Pac.

While doing a little google study of this group, I came across a Joe Posnanski "What's in a name?" column about Lowrie being possibly the most famous Jed. According to Posnanski, the "Northwest is our leading producer of Jeds".

These internet wanderings naturally got me wondering about all of those other Josh's and Jason's and the like.

When I finally went ahead and looked at the roster, I found 10 players on the 25-man roster whose first names begins with a J: Jason Bay, Josh Beckett, J.D. Drew, Jacoby Ellsbury, Jon Lester, Javier Lopez, Jed Lowrie, Justin Masterson, Jonathan Papelbon, and Jason Varitek.

That's a whopping 40% of the roster. I mean, we have lineups where 5 of our batters' first names begin with J. My scorecards, which always feature the first initial, are peppered with them.

Maybe one day soon I'll have time for a statistical comparison of the prominence of certain initials on Major League Baseball teams. I seem to remember an awful lot of Ds, or Gs, or something, on the Angels...

Because you know. Once the season is over, we have to find some way to while away our time while we wait til next year.

Only five and a half months to go...

Foulweather Fans

When I was a young girl, in 1970s Berkeley, the Oakland A's were my team. They were an exciting and entertaining team (perhaps especially to a young fan, learning baseball), with their waxed mustaches and colorful players.

In 1975 they were swept in the ALCS by the Red Sox. I started watching the World Series that year rooting for the Cincinnati Reds. My older brother tried to reason with me. "If the Reds win, that means there are two teams better than the A's. If the Red Sox win, only one team is better." This 12-year-old wasn't interested in logic; revenge was ruling my heart.

But during the series, something changed. I suppose it was hearing the announcers recount the Red Sox hard luck story. Fenway's beauty and the exciting Game 6 surely helped sway me. I was sad when they lost, and not because it meant two teams were better than my A's. But I remained an A's fan.

In 1999 my family was living outside Boston for a year. We'd come from Portland, a city without any major league baseball. My three kids were 6, 10, and 12--and hadn't yet fallen for baseball, which saddened me. I needn't have worried--being in Boston that October took care of turning the kids into fans. For that I will always be glad.

And it gave me something as well. The A's hadn't been my team for a while, really. The Bash Brothers of the late 80's didn't do it for me, and I left the Bay Area around then anyhow. Call me a fair-weather fan, but the A's just didn't keep their hold on me. But being in Boston in 1999 brought back those stories I'd heard during the 1975 series. I was converted.

We weren't lucky enough to be in Fenway for any of the 1999 post-season games, but that didn't matter. We could see the blimps circling Fenway, and the excitement in the air was as palpable as the crisp New England fall. Kids and adults alike were moving through their daytime routines sluggishly, sleep-deprived from watching late games. All conversation began and ended with Sox talk. True, the season didn't end as we'd have liked, but it made us all fans.

The problem now, of course, is that people are starting to accuse the Red Sox of being as bad as the Yankees. A friend messaged me this morning on Facebook: "Sox, sox, sox. It's getting to be a dynasty - at least from a Cubs' fan perspective." I don't think he was being complimentary.

But I ask you. If we stood by the Sox during their heartbreaking collapses (and we weren't fans for long enough to have to go through too many of them), what kind of fans would we be for abandoning them when they're winning? Foulweather fans?

Sleepless in October

I seem to fail to remember what October really means for me. I focus on certain aspects of it, and somehow manage to forget about the rest. I have no trouble remembering celebrating the Red Sox winning the World Series, and I certainly never forget how blessed I am by the Red Sox to walk around with that smug look on my face that says, "86 years of losing no longer means anything, because guess who the only Major League team is who has won twice in the new millenium?"

But every October I rediscover my true life as a Red Sox fan.

When October begins, I usually have the comfort of the Red Sox going to the ALDS. And I usually have the comfort of the Red Sox creaming the Angels (they have a 9-1 record against them in the playoffs since 2004). And then I have the pleasure of going to school knowing I'm a Red Sox fan. The Yankees and Angels fans at my school know they can't say anything to me at this point, because "The Red Sox are turning into the Yankees and they aren't actually a good team, just a rich one!" argument doesn't really work on me.

And then they go to the ALCS, and manage to play the other best team in the American League, logically. The part that I always force out of my head, however, is how the first 4 games of this series goes. Although I do realize and appreciate how amazing it is for the Red Sox to come back from a 3-0 deficit in 2004 and then a 3-1 deficit in 2007, the beginning of this feat is never quite pleasurable for me. And yet, the Red Sox always manage to get themselves into that 3-1/3-0 hole.

Of course, most Red Sox fans know the effect this has on their school/work life, not to mention their social life. As I stay up later and later to watch the unnecessarily long games the Sox end up losing, I get up earlier and earlier to finish my homework. Yet no matter how early I get up, my grades all drop a few points in October. Some of my teachers award me with pity points for being a Red Sox fan, whereas the rest either mock me or know nothing whatsoever about baseball. My fellow students, however, never let me forget exactly how many times the Red Sox have won this year at Tropicana Field, or the Rays' young and Mohawk-ed lineup.

And so it goes for 4 long and tired days: go to school...come home...do homework...watch the game...do more homework...go to sleep...do more homework...shower and dress...study for my French test on the walk to school...study for my math test in French; sleep with my eyes open during chemistry (sorry Mr. W)...fight off endless comments in the hall...and try to recognize who are the pink hat fans I should ignore (although they're easy to spot: usually they wear the generic Red Sox shirts with no name on the back, and if you were to ask them who pitched the eighth inning of the game last night for the Sox, might reply, "Schilling?"), and who are the real fans I should sympathize with...and then go home and do it all over again.

Then, as I finally turn out the light and try to get at least a few hours of sleep, I realize to myself, "Oh. So this is what it's like being a Red Sox fan in October." Although I am used to it, it always seems to be a new experience for me. And as much as the people around me whine and complain about how easy my life is as a Red Sox fan, I am forced to sometimes disagree. Although it often turns out well for us (I'm not referring to this series just yet, I am much too superstitious for that), we first have to get through the rough spots. I mean, we haven't totally forgotten that 86-year hump just yet.

Don't take this the wrong way though, I'm not complaining. I don't think I would want it any other way. I like my hectic October life as a Red Sox fan, and at least it is not as quite as hectic as some others. For instance, Grace, who lives in the Netherlands, and my friend Joseph, in Germany, are forced with the unpleasant but perfectly logical task of waking up at 2 AM their time for the 8 PM Eastern time games (I thought you guys both deserved an honorable mention for this heroic act).

So even if the Red Sox seem to enjoy teasing us all and making our lives completely sleep deprived and awful for the first few games, Joseph puts it perfectly when he says "The Red Sox appear to have a strange attraction to game sevens." As strange as it may be, I wouldn't be satisfied with anything less. And so my response was simply "They rarely seem to disappoint, though, do they?"

And so far (not counting pre-2004), ain't that the truth?

Totally Banal Sportscasting

I was pretty thrilled about the Sox turning it around and coming back to win Game 5 of the ALCS for a lot of obvious reasons. But I was also pretty happy because it meant the announcers would have to change their repeating loop of commentary on how Papi is 0-for-682 or how the Red Sox have never lost three consecutive games in the playoffs at Fenway Park or how B.J. Upton is so friggin’ great.

Unfortunately, they've just switched tracks and are now playing a different repetitive loop: How Boston came from behind the Yankees 3-0, and last year they came back against the Indians 3-1, and how much Papi has done, and how great Drew was in June… these are repetitions that I very much prefer to the earlier variety, but you’d think they could come up with something a little more insightful.

I used to listen to the postseason games on the radio. I don’t like not being able to see the action – I didn’t see Jacoby Ellsbury run until last winter when I got to see clips of his playoff speed on playoff DVDs and the like. I don’t want to miss any more of that. I like seeing the managers send out signs and watching the movement of the pitches and reading the lips of the players in the clubhouse. But I miss the bias of the broadcasters and the more obscure stats that they share with the fans.

And I was pretty thrown off by one of their closing lines, "Do you believe in miracles... because the Red Sox believe tonight".

Because the Red Sox always believe.