Yet Another OOTP6 Dynasty, Year 2: One Flew Over the Pale Hose

[cknox0723]

This post will be short because this forum is all about the dynasties, and rightfully so, but if you're reading this thread for the first time (or nine hundredth), you're probably wondering how the hell it got so big, and where the hell I went, and how the hell I ended up back here.

I don't remember how this thread got so big.

Once upon a time four years ago (four years ago!) I booted up OOTP6 for maybe the 20th time with the intention of finding something to distract from what was at the time a life that badly needed distractions. I started sharing on this forum because I had used to do that with Baseball Mogul, when I was a pimply kid of maybe 14 or 15, and we had just miraculously survived the Y2K scare a year before. I share in words rather than numbers because that's who I am. Numbers tell you a little bit, but my head doesn't work in numbers. I can add them pretty quickly though.

I've been through a lot in the last four years, even in the last two years, so my writing style should be quite different. I hope it's still worth reading. It's obviously A LOT of reading if it's something I stick to, so fasten your seatbelt if you dare...

And I do plan on sticking to it for now. I got great joy out of writing so much about this fake baseball team, and I'm at a point in my life where I need to find some joy in my spare time. I don't have much money or a great job, I'm still pieceing together a lot of the non material things in my life. To be frank in between the time I started this thread to today, I developed a lot of very unhealthy behaviors and coping skills. It's just now that I'm learning some healthy wins. The reason I mention this is for YOU - obviously behind all these words there is a person typing. If YOU (whoever you are reading this) ever feel like you don't have a person in the world who gives a ****, please send me a PM. Take some faith that I have been to that dark place, in so many ways. And every day I make some little effort so I don't go back to this place...today, it is resurrecting the Pale Hose. That's worthy of celebration...I have a lot of words to type about this ragtag bunch.

And that's all you get about me. Now about the team that, for a while anyway, made a lot of people in this forum get really familiar with the bold function...

[cknox0723]

I started this dynasty a long, long time ago with the intention of distracting myself, and I did that in the way I had always known to distract myself -- take something ****ed up and fix it. If you're looking for my psychological motive behind it all, call it a metaphor for how I always felt about myself and my life. Point is, I'm no White Sox fan, I can't regale you with tales of how the players on this team compare to vague images from my childhood of Ozzie Guillen dancing across a staticky television. I did have one of those staticky TV's when I was growing up, but I'm a Yankees fan from New Jersey whose favorite player growing up was The Pride of Evansville.

I'd still call myself a baseball nut today, even though my attention's strayed to other things the past few years, but I can't figure out whether I love or hate the Yankees nowadays. I cheer when they score and curse when Alex Cintron beats them in the 11th, but I look at their placement in the standings with a bit of satisfaction. It's like it's the birthright of all Yankee fans for the team to finish first, or at least win 90 and the wild card. BORING! There's your first bolding in a while.

It's a lot more fun as a fan to see a team go worst to first, or make a run to the Series after fifteen losing seasons or something like that. A run like that offers us as fans a chance at redemption, a chance at hope. Those things are simply a symbol of the things we hope for and pray for for ourselves. I'm someone who has found himself hoping for those things when they seemed completely impossible, so for me a chance at redemption and hope has always been a bit personal, because I NEEDED those things for myself.

I suppose that was really the motivation behind what was presumably the turning point of this franchise, and you can find the particulars of that under the link "THE trade" in my signature at the bottom of this post.

The short form (ha ha) backstory to that point is this: when looking to find some way to entertain myself four years ago using this game, I took someone's MLB roster set and simulated until I found the most dire franchise I could imagine. That turned out to be the White Sox, who were suitably horrible enough that they lovingly and fittingly became referred to as the Pale Hose. The first year of my managing the team was 2005 in the game, the team was awful at the big league level to the tune of finishing in last place of a poor division, and really had no good young players to boot. I did my best in the amateur draft, tried to patch things up with trades and the occasional free agent here and there, but none of these guys were anyone you'd have the fond, hazy memory from childhood about. Actually I regarded most of them as players who'd fit well on the '97 Twins, one of the most nondescript teams of recent memory.

We started this 2006 season with a four-game sweep by the Boston club, who's the kind of ballclub you'd expect just from hearing the name. After nine more games we were a comical 3 and 13. And here's what might have been the real turning point of the season...

We had a day to regroup ourselves before Cleveland came to town, the same club that had pummeled us in two out of three games a week and a half later, and the same club that had been crowned world champion the season before, in a surprising run. Their ace pitcher Josh Beckett locked us down for six innings, but after just 58 pitches was lifted for a pinch hitter when he was due to bat with one out and one on in the top of the seventh, even though Cleveland was up 3-0 at the point and the dude had only thrown 58 pitches in six innings. The baseball gods rewarded us with four runs off one of their nondescript relievers, but since we were terrible Cleveland came right back with a bunch of hits and tied it in the next half inning. But one of the few guys who could dial it above 88 mph, a right-hander named Kiko Calero, came in and got out of the mess. He'd go another inning, our ace reliever from the previous season named Joe Roa would go two scoreless, and crafty Japanese League veteran Akinori Otsuka would go two more. In the bottom of the 13th, our backup catcher named Miguel Olivo would step to the plate against their seventh pitcher, hard thrower Armando Benitez, who would miss out over the plate with one of his bullets, and Olivo would capitalize and get a nice, long trot around the bases for his efforts, ultimately chucking his helmet away and getting swallowed up in a swarm at home plate, a celebration that always makes me laugh because it's truly an image of like the best moment of your life when you're 7 years old.

Coincidentally or not our cleanup hitter was 3 for 6 in that game. His name is Frank Catalanotto and he'd been acquired scarcely a week earlier from a Los Angeles club that couldn't find a position for him. Says something about our state of affairs that a guy discarded by another team jumped right and became our cleanup hitter...although, if the guy can hit, does it really say anything, or at least anything above a whisper? And (not to jump ahead) this guy could hit.

We'd win 8 of our next 9 to close out April with a decent 12-14 mark. Instead of fading like so many early season surprises, a pitching staff materialized, apropos of absolutely nothing, not past history or some spectacular defense or even dumb luck. Just a bunch of guys pitching vintage Bob Gibson style. The offense still wasn't much, but it didn't need to be. We rode arms attached to guys like Buehrle, Garland, Loaiza, and a 34 year old guy coming off an arm injury named Ryan Franklin, and those arms and a favorable schedule led to an eight-game win streak at the end of May, again pushing us back around .500, within a game of it at 27-28.

June's results were 17 wins in 28 games, mostly by scores of 2-1, 4-2, and 5-3. 8 wins in 10 tries against the dregs of the AL east before the All Star break and suddenly you're not looking up at .500, you're looking down at it, way down. What the hell do you do when you won 69 and 62 games the last two years and you're sitting at 52 and 41 at the All Star break?

If your team's actually good, you sit back and enjoy it. But if you're not supposed to be there, if you're riding 34 and 35 year old arms plus a guy who went 4 and 15 two years before, you do something.

The first something was an All Star centerfielder, Vernon Wells, an above average hitter for both average and power who fell in our laps because his contract was expiring. The second happened a few weeks later, and it was the trade described in the link above. We didn't just get an All Star, we got the league's leader in average who was also a demon on the basepaths, not to mention another reliable and slightly younger arm who was discarded simply because of his salary. Scott Podsednik and Wade Miller would later share the spotlight with the seemingly unimportant third wheel in the trade, veteran utilityman Wil Cordero, but that's one of those fluke things.

All that swag came at a hefty price, though, our top pitching prospect who had shot through the minor leagues less than a year after being drafted, as well as the only young player we had that was even worth a damn. In the end I bit.

We'll talk more about that trade more once we get to the present, which in my OOTP file is game seven of the ALCS. How you get from 3-13 in April to game seven in Yankee Stadium, the same stadium of my staticky youth, is nothing I could explain, not in the last one thousand four hundreds and forty six words and not in the next block if I had the length to tap away for that long.

This club matched its early season brilliance with a similarly styled late season tailspin, losing the close ones (three consecutive extra-inning losses in early September for example), losing just a few more than we won in August (12-16) and the same from September 1st on (12-17). I guess it would be fairer to say that Cleveland, the club that had won the World Series the year before but had crashed to .500 with seven straight losses before the All Star break, starting winning the games we had, winning with some of those dominant pitching outings but mostly with an offense that just started beating the **** out of every opposing pitching staff. With a 47-21 record after the All Star break, Cleveland was basically a speeding train that we were trying to stop with...well, a speeding outfielder, and that worked out about as well as you'd imagine. How do you stop a speeding train, anyway?

We did sneak into the playoffs as a wild card, where we faced a team that finished all of one game worse than Cleveland. Why you'd bet on a team that had burned out brightly three months before is anyone's guess. You'd have to be crazy to do something like that.

Crazy...crazy like a fox.

[ifspuds]

Damn, I've missed the Pale Hose. You've got a gift with words, Craig.

[Y0DA55]

Oh Craig, good to see you back. I can't say that I have the time to spend reading the dynasty forum these days, but if there is anything that could drag me back here, it's you.

I'm sending good thoughts in regards to your personal life.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by ifspuds

Damn, I've missed the Pale Hose. You've got a gift with words, Craig.

Originally Posted by Y0DA55

Oh Craig, good to see you back. I can't say that I have the time to spend reading the dynasty forum these days, but if there is anything that could drag me back here, it's you.

I'm sending good thoughts in regards to your personal life.

Thanks guys. It's a great feeling to back here but better still was writing those last few posts. It was like sinking down into your bed or favorite chair after being away for a while. That's exactly what it's like, actually. Maybe I have to get up and go to work, go be with my family, go wherever, but it's somewhere I can come back to...hopefully every day. I don't have a favorite chair, but if I did there were times not so long ago where I wouldn't come back to it for days at a time. Not anymore. I love coming home.

Speaking of coming home, in the baseball sense, here's a little bit about that as it relates to the Pale Hose.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

We did sneak into the playoffs as a wild card, where we faced a team that finished all of one game worse than Cleveland. Why you'd bet on a team that had burned out brightly three months before is anyone's guess. You'd have to be crazy to do something like that.

Crazy...crazy like a fox.

Seattle had won 289 games the last three seasons, losing in the World Series three years ago, the AL Championship round last year, and the first round this past season, falling to the eventual World Series champion all three years. Their 95 wins this season included a remarkable 51 on the road, and this 85 win wild card team that was below .500 on the road wouldn't seem to pose much of a threat, soaking wet in the Seattle rain or otherwise.

I think I fell in love with this team and have written so much about them largely because they were just so laughably bad when I started, then managed to turn a decent showing out of nowhere, and decent turned into more, more turned into a miraculous showing as one of the top four teams in standing in the American League.

I still haven't filled out my six foot frame, so I'm hundred forty pounds soaking wet, and if you could collectively gather this entire Pale Hose squad into one lump of baseball talent, that's about what they would have weighed on October sixth in Seattle.

You're not going to win many fights at 140 pounds soaking wet, take that from someone who's tried it, but if there's one guy I would want to go swinging with as 140 pound baseball team trying to fight to keep their season alive, it would be Mark Buehrle. Well, actually it'd be Bob Gibson, but if I had to pick from the Pale Hose roster, I'd take the guy who pitched 242 innings, went 17 and 8 with a 2.79 ERA, the guy who had won 15 and 16 with two terrible teams the two years previous, the one pitcher who I looked at upon taking the team and said, "He's got to stay." After he'd won 15 in that first awful, laughable year, I was faced with a choice - pay him or let him leave. I stuck with my gut, the very first thing I had thought about him, but it came with a price, an awfully hefty one. $50 million over five years, something that might look brilliant right now when he's 28, but maybe not so brilliant when he's 32, 33, and his left arm's got a thousand more innings on it.

You can get yourself in a lot of trouble by saying this too much, especially when you're looking at a fake baseball team, but why worry about five years from now when you're not there? You've got today, and if you want to win today, there's few guys who can shut down one of the best offensive teams in the American League like Buehrle. Like the mythical ace should, in our first playoff game in years he does just that, working out of jams against the core of Seattle's lineup in more than a few frames and shutting the bottom of their order down one-two-three in a triumphant sixth frame, leaving with a two-nothing lead courtesy of a two-run home run by third baseman Eric Munson in the top half of the frame. Seattle wouldn't manage a hit over three frames against relievers Akinori Otsuka and Joe Roa, and just like that we have the first punch on the Mariners, up one-nothing in the series.

Our second punch comes about as quick as it could, in the first inning of the next game. It came not with one huge blow but in the form of one two-out double immediately followed by another, giving us another lead before we'd even given up a run. Backup utility man Wil Cordero would lead off the next inning with a long ball over the left field fence, increasing the edge to a two-nothing advantage that had apparently quickly become comfortable, because #2 starter Esteban Loaiza (13-9, 3.33 a year after losing 16 games) would proceed to pitch perhaps his best six innings of the season. His struggles the year before and throughout his career would come from battling to command his fastball in the strike zone, especially the upper part of it, and when he'd come unglued Loaiza wouldn't dare to try to hit the strike zone with anything with much gusto on it. Call it a defense mechanism, I guess, but one that only the offense would appreciate.

Staked to that early one-zip and then two-zip lead, Loaiza was as glued as a first grader with his hand in a jar of Elmer's, keeping his hard slider down in the zone, which carved up the Mariners but a pair of singles slapped just out of the infield. The slappiness occured in seperate innings, so did no damage on the scoreboard.

The first sign that the baseball gods might be intervening in this one occured in the top of the seventh. Veteran first baseman Frank Thomas, who had been with the club for seventeen years and had hit his five hundredth home run the previous year, came up to bat with one out bearing a season batting line of .163 and clubbed a double that with his numbers could have quite literally been described as the one hit he'd been saving up for months, a year, for that one shot in the postseason that had materialized out of...at this point, it looked like the heavens. Backup catcher Miguel Olivo, the guy who months before had hit that home run in the 13th to finally win a game for that ragtag 3 and 13 bunch, stepped in and hit a ball hard and far into right-center field, maybe about as hard and far as you'd expect a guy who slugged .489 to hit one. Trouble is, those outfields in Seattle are about the biggest in the American League, and right center in particular is partially patrolled by the fastest man in the league, the 93 base thief who could probably just go by the moniker Ichiro and be recognized in somewhere expansive and empty like Siberia. Ichiro materializes out of nowhere, makes an incredible diving catch, and doubles the 300 year old Thomas off of second. Just like that, inning over.

Massive, powerful first baseman Adam Dunn leads off the bottom of the inning with a hard-hit single to right, the first Seattle hit with any gusto on it since the day before, maybe since the regular season since they really hadn't done much besides dinking and dunking against Mark Buehrle. Ichiro steps in and you couldn't write a script like what was to follow, not if you were a Mariners fan that had suffered as much disappointment as a three-year division winner could really give you, not even if you were a disciple of Jonathan Dorf. Esteban Loaiza had gone the first six innings without really a blemish at all, but one base hit and one hanging slider later, the home crowd was insane, bat**** crazy insane, because the cult of Ichiro had taken hold of the game, and seeing as the guy had hit .344 and stolen 93 ****ing bases during the season, it was about to swell up Jim Jones style. I mean, you can just imagine the buzz, 5'5" sportswriters salivating about this little 5'9" guy that didn't really hit home runs but ****ing ran and dove across the outfield and slid into bases and got all dirty and went from run-saving catches in the top of one inning to a game changing home run in the next half -- even though his uniform had grass stains on it! The articles would write themselves, the quotes unable to truly describe the impact this guy had on the game, running and running and running and never getting tired. His team hadn't scored a run all game, hadn't put up anything except zeroes the day previous, but Ichiro had just saved a run in the field and then brought home two with one swing of the bat. If he looked threatening with a big stick in his hands, maybe it would seem less like ten runs, but because he's all dirty, it's like some twisted game of pinball, at least from the other end.

So, looking at things not through Ichiro colored glasses, you've got two choices...drink the kool aid, or head out to the mound with an industrial sized tub of glue.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

His team hadn't scored a run all game, hadn't put up anything except zeroes the day previous, but Ichiro had just saved a run in the field and then brought home two with one swing of the bat. (...) because he's all dirty, it's like some twisted game of pinball, at least from the other end.

I like staring into the abyss, I have to be honest. I guess that quality makes me the potentially perfect manager for a fake baseball team and also explains why this is post nine hundred something in this thread. Having blown a lead for the first time against an obviously better team and having it done in such gut-wrenching fashion, that's baseball's version of staring into the abyss.

Somehow Loaiza doesn't blink much, likely because most of the guys that follow Ichiro in the lineup can't do much but hold his jockstrap, or maybe yell out "You're bad!" in Japanese if they get too jealous of the guy.

My buddy's taken a few Japanese courses and he's going to a Cubs game Tuesday. I asked him if he was going to heckle Fukudome and that's what he told me, about the best he could do is yell out "You're bad!" It's not much of a heckle but maybe it's one of those universal things, we'll see. ¡es malo! Should have yelled that at the hero before he took over the game.

Loaiza manages to get out of the inning without further damage, but our at bats in the eighth are very meek and then our reliever Kiko Calero can't throw the ball anywhere but over the middle of the plate or nowhere near it. After two batters and two singles, we're back looking at the bottomless hole again, a pair of speedy runners on base, at the corners, no one out and contact hitter Luis Castillo at the plate. It's all PJ Bevis can do but to keep the ball within reach of the drawn in infield, maybe, or hope the second baseman pops one up, fouls out or something.

Instead he does something fox-like crazy, pitching out...but it's so crazy that it works, because of course Juan Pierre with 66 stolen bases is going to be running, and of course Miguel Olivo's going to make a perfect throw and not one into centerfield, because sometimes if you just do something different than what you're used to instead of the insane same thing over and over again, you get a different result. I guess in baseball that means pulling a pitcher when it's obvious he's got nothing instead of just saying, "**** it, game's over," or pitching out when you've got that feeling, or pinch-hitting on a hunch, or what have you. Follow your gut too much and you'll end doing plenty of stupid things, too, you've got to use your head a little bit. But sometimes...you just never know.

The Mariners probably would win this game in a simulation nine times out of ten, maybe nine and a half if you add in the factor of a crowd screaming at us how bad we are in eighteen different languages after that seventh inning, maybe nine and three quarters if I would have told you that Ichiro got on base again in the ninth inning.

But this time...Bevis came in with runners at first and third in the eighth, nobody out, and after that caught stealing there was a little hope. After Luis Castillo rapped a ground ball right at drawn in shortstop Jack Wilson, who didn't bobble it or kick it into left but just took a calm peek at third base runner Milton Bradley before firing a strike across the diamond. I think at that point any idiot would have started to believe we might actually get out of this one. There was still a #3 hitter to get out, but what was that compared to the abyss we'd been looking into? Adam Dunn hit a harmless pop up into left-center, and the game was still tied. It'd take a moment to sink in, **** maybe a day or two, but we were out of it.

I guess I could go into the details of the incredible top of the ninth. I could give you a longitudinal/latitudinal record complete with ball velocity and angular flight path of the booming double into the left field corner by our big bat, Magglio Ordonez, the blow which put two runners in scoring position with no one out. Or maybe I could write a second by second, heartbeat by heartbeat attempt of how Frank Thomas's fielder's choice felt, because really what the hell is more incredible than that single play that put us ahead, made even more enjoyable because the guy that hit it was a dinosaur, a brontosaurus and about as big as one, but a brontosaurus with arthritis and no teeth who's like blind in one eye and hit .163 on the year? Imagine that mental picture. Not a dinosaur baseball player, stop with that. But a big, fat guy with an aching back (I'm sure some of you reading know how much backaches can hurt), fading eyesight (could he even read Jonathan Dorf's advice to the budding playwright?), a guy who can't even really hit the ball out of the park in batting practice, and drop him into a bases loaded, top of the ninth playoff sitation. If ever there was a guy who'd need a personal pinch-runner, there's your guy. Imagine him pushing every last ounce of strength out of his aching body, lengthening his strides as long as possible, maybe wanting to collapse after hitting the first-base bag and fading off into the foul territory towards right field. I've gone running before where it's felt like I've had maybe ten strides left.

With no one out and the bases loaded, the Mariners pulled the infield in on the batter before, getting the force at home, so why they didn't get that force on Thomas, I don't know. It could be an example of the rudimentary AI on OOTP6 trying to go for the double play in that spot...I prefer to think that he hit the ball so hard that all first baseman Dunn could do was dive to his right and knock it down, firing to second once he got a firm grasp on it because his body was facing that direction and Eric Munson's kind of fat and slow, too. Let your mind wander in whatever direction that...:

1B Frank Thomas:
Grounds into fielders choice to the first baseman, Munson out at 2nd base.
M. Ordonez scores.
V. Wells to third.

...takes you. It takes me to a happy place. Most people hate .163 hitters on their favorite team but I'm fond of them. At least ones called "The Big Hurt."

Trying to explain it beyond a paragraph or two is like trying to explain what staring into the abyss is really like. I can't tell you, in general or specific or really any kind of linguistic terms that I know. Sometimes you're stuck staring for hours on end, unable to pull yourself away or bring yourself to care about anything else, and sometimes you realize what you're staring at is just a hole, and maybe if you fill it up a little bit it's really not so deep after all.

Maybe a 2-2 score really is like nothing-nothing, and if that's the case then maybe we did have a fifty percent chance of winning after seven frames. I don't really believe, not with the out of control downward spiral that was forming, same one that had formed in so many one-two-three innings, seven-run innings for the opposition and extra-inning losses. For some reason, we pulled out of it this time. I don't know why.

So instead of going back home down two games in the series, or knotted at one-one, we took a two-nothing series lead with us. They weren't buried yet but their last bottom of the ninth inning in Seattle was an example of the two games as a whole, an Ichiro single to lead off, then a strike out and game ending double play.

[kenyan_cheena]

:happ y:

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by kenyan_cheena

:happ y:

All I can say is thanks. Makes me feel good.

I edited the last post a little, give me a bit more and I plan to write some more. I'm shooting to actually play a game on Tuesday since I will have some time that day, I'm a little nervous because I haven't played a game in so long and also because I'm on some meds that are making me sleep a lot but I've been getting better at sticking to my plans for the first time in a while.

Anyway enough of that b.s. and back to writing. More in a bit.

[rem]

Hi Craig.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

More in a bit.

Sometimes I say a bit and it turns into a day. I got sleepy really quickly last night!

So where were we?

So instead of going back home down two games in the series, or knotted at one-one, we took a two-nothing series lead with us.

Game three starter Jon Garland gave up a run-scoring double in the second and a home run in the fourth to put us in a 3-0 hole, while our offense didn't get a man on base until the fourth. A single by Adam Kennedy after Ramon Vazquez's leadoff hit would put men at the corners with nobody out for the heart of the order, but after a couple of pop ups and a ground out to first, you got the feeling this was just the beginning of something an ugly. Adam Dunn led off the fifth with a blast that traveled halfway back to Seattle and after a long rain delay I threw in fifth starter Mike Nannini to mop up what was left of this mess. Instead Ichiro hit another home run, hustling around the bases with grass stains and muddy pants, I'm sure. I bet he helped out the ground crew during the 48 minute rain delay too.

I averted my eyes for most of the rest of the chaos, glancing up briefly in the eighth to finally see one of our runners advance past first base...on a catcher's interference. Can't make this stuff up. Dunn hit Seattle's fourth home run in the top of the ninth, and they'd tack on another run before the inning was done to make it nine to nothing. Catcher Yorvit Torrealba would put us on the board with a meaningless three-run blast in the bottom of the inning, but he's not gritty enough to hit one of those eight run shots, and our day was so miserable that even that wouldn't've been enough.

Funny thing is when you're actually a decent team, you can have those kind of losses once in a while, as long as you don't string eighteen in a row together. Next day is a matchup of fourth starters, and our man Ryan Franklin comes out with as much panache as Jon Garland if you will. A leadoff single by Juan Pierre followed by an immediate caught stealing minimizes the damage, because after a groundout Franklin loads the bases with a walk, Ichiro single, and another walk. But Doug Mientkiewicz strikes out and despite four baserunners, we're not losing yet.

Things to wonder about through a one-two-three bottom of the first include: will we ever score a run again on a Seattle starting pitcher, why in the hell is Doug Mientkieblah playing third base a year after winning the Gold Glove at first, and will Ichiro ever make an out?

I can't even pretend to give a decent answer to any of that, but with the game still scoreless in the bottom of the second, Vernon Wells hits a single and after a strikeout, Frank Catalanotto draws a walk. Then Scott Podsednik stepped in...the top of the order hitter so brilliantly acquired three months ago who had hit below .200 since August (that's bad), the guy that would put this team over the top and keep us at the top of the division (oops), the guy that was oh-fer in the series (bastard)...somehow with one swing deposting a ball into the right field bleachers, he made that insane trade look brilliant, clearing the bases, dashing any hopes of three straight Seattle victories, sending the home crowd into a frenzy, even making a cynic like me crack a smile. Who cares what you bat in September when you do that in October?

There were some touchy moments the rest of the way, as Adam Dunn launched another bomb the next inning in the midst of getting two runs back, but Podsednik, possessed by Mark Lemke, would equal those two runs by clubbing a fourth-inning double to plate the two guys that reached ahead of him. With a sixth inning bunt single, "LDS Jesus" actually batted in the ninth with a chance at the cycle, but "Adam the Acrobat" Dunn put any stop to that with a diving stop to snare a rocket going down the right field line. "The Acrobat" had scored a run in the previous inning, drawing a walk and then coming home on a Rich Aurilia double, but it didn't feel like he'd swung the game by eighteen runs, just two. Probably cause he's so big, who cares if there's a couple dirt stains on his uniform? It doesn't have the same psychological impact as it does when the guy's five-nine and just jacked a ball four hundred-some feet.

Move ahead to the bottom of the ninth. Batting with men at second and third, two out, Dunn had the opportunity to tie the game with a hit, a chance he never would have had if not for denying Podsednik a possible triple, a chance that wouldn't have existed had he not scored a seemingly meaningless run in the eighth after a seemingly meaningless walk. But with two guys on, if he unloaded what seemed like his forty-eighth four hundred and forty something foot blast of the series, we were heading back to Seattle. So much for "LDS Scotty," instead we'd have "Amazing Adam" splashed all over the Midwest and Western newspapers, and some junk about the Yankees over the NY Times.

If Scott Podsednik could have batted for us (but only right now, the way he was hitting today) to determine the outcome of the game, we would have been set. Instead it was up to the right arm of Joe Roa, and the 36 year old had been brilliant a year ago but slightly shaky down the stretch this year, losing 3 after September, giving up a bunch of runs in the process, inflating his ERA above league average at four and a half runs per nine. Also, Ichiro was on deck. He batted .500 during the series and .344 during the series and had dirt all over his uniform and ****.

How do you explain what happened in the deciding five seconds in English, not tongues, and have it make sense? What is the difference between close and not close enough? Can you even break things down on that small of a level? In a way, I think I've spent 2,000 posts trying to do that. I'm not sure I've figured it out yet.

But it's been a hell of a ride, as any struggle always is. For me on a personal level it's been a bumpy ride but it makes those good moments a little better, even if they're not there all the time, and even moreso when there's someone who understands to appreciate it with. You never have this grand epiphany, but little tiny ones, and all those little tiny ones (I think) are what living life is about. At least that's how it is for me, right now, having come back from some crazy attempts to find one incredible mind blowing experience and always ending up disappointed.

Infield's back, we only need one out. Runners leading off second and third, outfield at about normal depth, maybe a little deeper than what we'd call normal. Roa toeing the rubber towards the third base side, like always, settles in to that stretch position that's become so familiar the last couple years. Who the hell would've guessed he'd ever be a White Sox closer anyway? Dunn waving this big stick around in the left-handed batter's box, the kind of guy who'd look imposing in the box even if he was holding a toothpick. This is all background, like the first note or two of a song, click the button on the stopwatch...now as Roa nods his head to whatever Yorvit Torrealba did from behind the plate, maybe it was the real subtle middle finger up against his nose or a cup adjustment or something. Maybe a second or two's gone by when Roa does that real quick kick of the leg and in comes the 88 mile an hour splitter, always the splitter, big trouble if it doesn't split because then it's just hanging there but this one splits, darting down towards the bottom of the strike zone and then below it, threatening to burrow a hole in the ground, but then it's not burrowing but heading back through the infield, it's a rocket, the seams are splitting and the cover's flying off, it's low on the ground and to the right of the second base bag.

Then suddenly the ball's gone. I've stopped counting seconds or trying to guess or compare it to guitar riffs because I'm just dumbstruck by now, it's taken me about nine minutes just to write the last paragraph and Adam Kennedy's made about fifteen diving stops by then, thirty-seven throws to first from his knees, the ball's pounded into another glove something like sixty-three times, Ichiro is crying on deck and getting even more dirt on his uniform and full on sobbing just in the span of ten seconds, I swear Podsednik drove in another ****ing run by now and I'm still not totally sure what's gone on because this is all in, like, eleven or twelve seconds.

Not really. Actually it all just happened once. But you blink your eyes and wonder if you really just saw that, is it really real, could this really be? I never imagined anything like that, it doesn't even seem possible. But I blink my eyes and...

I'm pretty sure we won. I don't know how, or why. But we won, it says it right there. We won! We won, we won, and it's on to the ALCS.

[ifspuds]

Go PALE HOSE!

[CTSoxFan]

Awesome to see you back Craig, I've kind of drifted away from the board, but I always check back once and awhile, especially to see if you've re-appeared. I wondered whatever happened in the ALDS against the Mariners. Go Pale Hose, keep the miracle going!

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by ifspuds

Go PALE HOSE!

Originally Posted by CTSoxfan

Awesome to see you back Craig, I've kind of drifted away from the board, but I always check back once and awhile, especially to see if you've re-appeared. I wondered whatever happened in the ALDS against the Mariners. Go Pale Hose, keep the miracle going!

Thanks guys. This really is me who has re appeared, after drifting away for what I thought would be forever. Just being back and writing and enjoying it more than I can really describe is a miracle in itself. As for another miracle...the Pale Hose are in the ALCS, on the biggest stage in the American League, playing the Yankees.

Strangely enough, the NLCS features the National League versions of our clubs, difference being that the other Chicago team is the best in the league, while the Mets are not nearly as good. Well, they're not way over the heads so much, just lacking one big bat. It's a different approach to offense, I guess, with only Jim Edmonds hitting over 20 home runs, and catcher Jason Phillips the only other guy over 15, but the second best team batting average in both leagues. The Cubs hit just .248 as a team, near the bottom few in the majors, and were just middle of the pack in run scoring, but they allowed 55 less runs than any other team. Fifty five. Not eleven or thirteen, not a couple of bad Armando Benitez outings (thank you Cleveland for pitching him in the 13th inning of a seemingly meaningless April game to make this all possible) but fifty five. The team ERA was 3.11, or less than Mark Buehrle's ERA last year. That's as a team. Our staff was solid this year but still only 3.80 overall.

The Yankees probably aren't even the best team in their city, but they terrify me. Their payroll is $134 million, or roughly $80 million more than ours. They have many players you have heard of who play in N.Y. like Jeter, Rodriguez, Matsui (OK guess that's the whole list) and many players who are only still good in this world's 2007, the NL MVP of the last two seasons in B. Giles, his second base playing brother, a fleet of foot, solid in all facets except home run power centerfielder in R. Winn, the AL Cy Young of last season in J. Vazquez, this year's likely Cy Young in J. Schmidt, an ace closer in D. Weathers, a bunch of solid setup men like J(ay) Powell, S. Shields, C. Politte, some dude named Harper. The names aren't really important, also it's too much coloring in to do, and sometimes I get like a 3 year old with a crayon, and I start writing all over the walls. Point is they have lots of good players, and we may really and truly be in the ALCS, but I think we're faking it. We were 3 and 13 in mid April, won 60-some games last year and the year before and 75 before that and my long-term memory is still more than a little sketchy but I'm sure the real-life Pale Hose were pretty awful about four or five or eleven years ago. Time to get creamed, smile and say thank you and ask, hope, pray, beg for another taste, just a nibble, a morsel, a crumb, a drip or a drop, roughly a year from now, when we have an idea what this all tastes like and can maybe swallow it all up.

We're in New York. We're facing an ace pitcher in Jason Schmidt. Mark Buehrle kind of on the same pay scale as him since they both make eight figures a year. His pitching is fantastic but not really in the same stratosphere as Schmidt, who's won 41 games in two years in pinstripes, walks about that many batters annually in what's a half year for Buehrle, and has struck 245 a year for the last two. That's a two in front of that, not a 1. Like I said, prepare for some delicious ass-whoopin' pie, maybe two with one covered in whipped cream so it can get smashed in someone's face, since this is all really some sick joke pushed on us, sick and twisted, meaningless until some future date when the awful, gut wrenching punchline's revealed.

Instead we win.

It's not nearly that simple. Yet...it is.

They strike first on a fourth inning home run by a young left fielder named Bronson Sardinha, who I am sure is not a real person (but, as was discussed years ago in these very forums, search his name and "dynasty reports" forums if you dare, actually is).

But in the top of the fifth we mount a two out rally, or rather the wheels come flying off the most expensive train ever, Titanic style. You couldn't come up with a greater Titanic metaphor than this. After a Yorvit Torrealba single over the head of a lunging Jeter, Jeremy Giambi (the little Giambi, his brother's on the injury list) bobbles a sharp grounder hit by the pitcher Buehrle. Then leadoff man Ramon Vazquez, who reached base at an incredible, ridiculous .400 clip this season, hits one of those mighty swinging bunts, but catcher Trey Lunsford, a career journeyman who's only starting because of the dearth of catchers in the league, tries to throw the baseball before grabbing it and that's all the opening a speedy middle infielder needs to beat a throw. Bases loaded, Scott Podsednik, "LDS Jesus," shows he's no Dexys Midnight runners by battling Schmidt after taking the first pitch for a called strike, taking a fastball out of the zone, fouling off two in a row, taking another pitch out of the zone, just making contact with a nasty slider in on his hands to keep the at bat alive, fouling another pitch off, another, and one more way into the seats down the third base, left field line that I saw and sat near and even in a few times growing up. Finally, maybe out of a sign of surrender, Schmidt falters, missing badly with a fastball and then bouncing a slider in the dirt, one that's smothered by Lunsford but for no real point. It's ball four and with the bags already full the runners are all moving up anyway. That happens again one pitch later, but with A LOT more hurry as Schmidt uncorks one that Lunsford can't handle. Buehrle of all people slides in about a second and a half ahead of a hurried throw to the plate, and we're up a run. Big bopper Magglio Ordonez flies out to center field, but we're up a run in the ALCS, which seems absurd in and of itself.

Buehrle strikes out the side in the bottom half, and I'd love to say that set the tone for the rest of the way, but that would be a lie as the score would be tied again an inning later.

However, I'm sleepy, and even though my mind is going my body is shutting down, and my typing is just getting atrocious. So...

Buehrle strikes out the side in the bottom half, and that set the tone for the rest of the way. Vernon Wells hit an emphatic three-run home run into Monument Park in the eighth inning, a triumphant way to pump the valve of the heart of our order, plating both number three hitter Ordonez and cleanup man Munson who had reached ahead of him. Ed. note: The previous sentence contains many lies and possible mis spellings, and perhaps poor metaphors since I am very sleepy. Also, odd twist but I am my own editor. However Wells really did jack one.

Yorvit Torrealba would bring plate another run in the ninth, bringing his postseason average to .333 and the score to what it would look in the books, 6-3 as Joe Roa would close it out without incident in the bottom half. It's only one game, it's all some kind of dumb luck I think, but look here, this win puts us 3-0 in the playoffs on the road and we find out that this $134 million team has some guys who are not True Yankees like Derek Jeter since they do stupid ****. Those are the guys in previous paragraphs who I did not color in. Little Giambi is OK by proxy since his brother hit lots of home runs in pinstripes. That catcher who made the error and that relief pitcher who gave up a big home run are not. Also of note, Rodriguez went 0 for 3 walking and striking out once after hitting 4 home runs in 3 games in the first round sweep of Cleveland. Jeter whose name starts with J like another J everyone loves went 1 for 3 with two runs scored, and a largely meaningless home run in the eighth, but I'm sure if he was batting eight more times it wouldn't have been meaningless at all.

However enough about them. Like the first three words of this post, GO PALE HOSE! Like the Titanic, just unstoppable. Unstoppable.

[ifspuds]

I'm telling you, there's YORVIT! code in this game. The team with the most Yorvits is automatically favored in all matchups.

[cknox0723]

If you're just joining the ride or reading this post by accident, hang on for a sentence or two. It's game two, ALCS in Yankee stadium, and we're not the Yankees. That's gotta be enough to keep reading, right? If not...this isn't the prettiest team you'll ever see in an ALCS, but it's the kind of team that silly announcers and writers would love, because the wins are coming for no single reason, just a combination of goofy stuff.

But game two goes as well as game one, which means we tally another one in the win column. Way to **** up the suspense, I know, but a three run top of the first deflated the home crowd about as much as I just killed all the suspense there. Well, as much as you can deflate a capacity crowd cheering on a ninety-some win team in the house that Jeter probably built single-handedly some offseason, as much as I can wreck the suspense in a paragraph that you might just be skimming. If you're actually reading, congrats. The runs scored in pretty typical fashion for a team that's not so awesome: leadoff hit by SS Ramon Vazquez, one out walk by RF Magglio Ordonez, single by cleanup man Eric Munson, sacrifice fly by CF Vernon Wells, two-out double by 1B Frank Catalanotto. Just one of these guys was on the team through all of last season's last place carnage.

Magglio Ordonez would hit a solo home run to left to lead off the third and stretch the lead to four. Scott Podsednik would walk to start the fifth and do the sort of crazy things on the bases you can dream on, stealing second, moving to third on a ground ball, scoring on a fly ball to right center. A Ramon Vazquez walk to start the seventh would lead to another one, and if no one's figured the big secret, it's that a leadoff baserunner is very, very, very helpful to scoring a run, especially when they actually score.

Esteban Loaiza would pitch a brilliant seven innings, even more betterer than his first-round outing that led to a win. Seven innings, three hits, two walks, 6 k's, 13 ground ball outs. It's six to nothing when he leaves and six to nothing when the game goes final. The home crowd really is demoralized now, because who the **** are the Pale Hose to come in here and win two games from the YANKEES who have won all these championships and have all these All Stars and Cy Young pitchers plus a payroll greater than the GDP of Anguilla?

I don't know who the Pale Hose are to pull all that off but it sure helps when you're not giving up any runs.

Two-nothing lead going back to the second city, two games from the World Series, three home games ahead of us. All I can think about is how I don't know how to handle good things, and this is no exception. Isn't it May, where we're 3 and 13? Is this heaven, just Iowa, or are we really a team that can play with this $400 billion fake baseball team?

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by cknox0723

Two-nothing lead going back to the second city, two games from the World Series, three home games ahead of us.

Jon Garland couldn't get out of the fifth in our lone first round loss, and somewhere between Alex Rodriguez's run-scoring double off the left field wall and the 3-1 count he runs on Marcus Giles two batters later (before finally serving up a meatball that's hammered into left), after an inning that's put us in a two-nothing hole and doesn't end until 39 mostly ****ty pitches, I can't help but wonder if he'll ever get through another fifth inning again. The home half can't get untracked against 22 year old Tyler Clippard in his first ALCS start, hitting into what would have been two double plays if only there were four outs in an inning.

Garland resumes making me wish he was an Anaheim Angel in the top of the second, throwing the ball nowhere except over the plate, giving up an almost home run to number eight hitter Trey Lunsford, who is closer to Dale Berra than Yogi in the pantheon of Yankee catchers. Fortunately our little sparkplug, our little Eckstein, "LDS Jesus" hauls it in on the warning track. The pitcher Clippard hits a hard bouncer down the third base line, Eric Munson makes a sharp play on it and good throw across the infield on it to nail him, but I can't help but notice that everybody on the other side's hitting the ball really hard. Jeter hits it really hard at no one, Randy Winn hits it really hard at no one, and the situation goes from two outs and no one on to two outs and guys at the corners. But Rodriguez who sucks at this sort of thing strikes out, and far away in fictional New York, at least two people take a baseball bat to the fake TV, in a display that Jeter could appreciate and Rodriguez couldn't. (Get it, since he swings and misses so much? I'd mention his four home runs in the ALDS but no one cares about those when you strike out with men on base!)

The home side bats look even more sickly in the bottom half, strike out, pop out to catcher, walk and then caught stealing, so the farthest the ball travels is negative feet. Negative. After two innings, the score's two-nothing but if we were playing best ball golf or what is that thing you play in the backyard with the wickets, croquet? If we were doing that, it would be like five wickets for the Empire and I think our ball would be back on the patio, on top of the grill, getting barbecued along with that sneaky piece of chicken on there for the one person that won't eat hot dogs or hamburgers.

Garland actually pitches a one-two-three third, with the only moment for pause a long, long, long, long fly ball to center field off the bat of Brian Giles that "Hercules" Wells hauls in while sitting on top of the fence. He had himself positioned just like that, good coaching.

Yorvit Torrealba, who I think is maybe the best White Sox catcher ever, including the original "Pudge", he doubles into the left field corner to start the third, raising his postseason average to something like .550. Only this team at its absolute worst could take that and do nothing with it...but that's just what happens. Groundout to short, bloop single, strikeout, and there's two out. #3 man Ordonez draws a walk, cleanup man Munson hits into another hypothetical double play. inning over, no runs, no nothing. Next turn at the bat, everyone strikes out, Podsednik ending the inning by staring at a bender and then turning around to stare at the umpire, then maybe calling him a few choice names, and then he's gone. Salt in the wound, or dirt in the wound, or whatever the hell the expression is. I'm pretty sure at this point the croquet score is them 10 wickets and we're back through the front yard and on the street, maybe there's a car coming and everyone has to yell "CAR!!" like it's a pickup street football game.

I'm pretty sure the Yankees are mailing in their A.B.'s now, Jeter's not getting hits, they're getting thrown out on the base paths, the score says only two-nothing but this is just a horror show, a comedy of errors, and I think they're laughing too hard to score any more runs. To start the fifth, Torrealba, who is batting eighth but I swear is the best hitter on this team, singles to left, and then everything goes wrong. Garland, batting only because it will be interesting to see if he spontaneously combusts when he goes out for the sixth, but he can't get a good bunt down and the lead runner's cut down. Clippard gets a little wild, hits shortstop Vazquez, walks second baseman Kennedy. The bases are loaded for our number three man Ordonez. He hits into a 'round the horn double play.

But baseball is not nearly as black and white as life is. You lose your job, your house, your dog gets run over, your girl breaks up with you all in one day, lots of people would say they'd smile and nod but I bet most of 'em would do something rash, drugs or pills or hari krishna ****, move across the country or cry on their mum's sofa or something. I've been guilty of it, you lose your job and the one person you think is on your side, you're gonna end up not caring about street football, not caring about "the next inning," you're just gonna see darkness, a 20-run deficit.

For us in this game it was only two, and after Garland got through the top of the sixth unscathed, it was still only two. An Eric Munson double, a Vernon Wells single, suddenly it's a one run game. He steals second, Lunsford (looking more and more like Mike Figga) throws the ball into center field, and the tying run is ninety feet away. Raul Gonzalez hits a sharp grounder to second baseman Marcus Giles, who gets him out but the run scores and we're tied, we're tied, it's like we pulled out a driver on the croquet ball and hit it 300 yards.

Garland tries to give it all away next inning but thanks to Rodriguez coming up at another really inappropriate time, there's no Yankee runs despite Jeter bunting and scampering all over the basepaths.

Travis Harper comes on for the seventh and looks very much like a reliever pitching his first postseason game on the road for the team trailing two games in the series, maybe not so much when he comes in but definitely when Jeter skips a throw past first and Enrique Wilson's on first base. Vazquez lays down a pretty bunt on the first pitch, putting the lead run within a base hit's distance, and Harper walks Kennedy. Ordonez is killing my stomach, and whiffs in a pretty ugly at bat. Munson walks, the bases are loaded again. Vernon Wells steps in. Ball one, ball two, this is it, the fake home crowd is fake screaming very loudly, he's got to come in the strike zone now, here comes a fastball and Wells clobbers it but...

But. It's right at fake first baseman Giambi, not that one but his younger brother, and there all that goes. At least fake Giambi makes the third out of the eighth. Then Harper starts giving us opportunities again. Frank Catalanotto singles, Raul Gonzalez singles, and if you went in the kitchen for some chips there's two men on base now, nobody out, all we need's another hit, a wild pitch or something...but Yorvit Torrealba lines out to second, pinch-hitter Wil Cordero hits into a double play, and all we got is all we had, a tie score.

It's the ninth now, closer Joe Roa's on the mound but I'm still starting to freak out a little, especially when Jeter reaches on an infield hit, brings his average up to .500 for the series and he's been on base so much I expect he'll just start running around the bases and no one will stop him, who the hell could? But Randy Winn grounds out and we can win it in the home half with the top of the order coming up against their closer, Dave Weathers.

First pitch, leadoff man Vazquez likes it up in the zone and out over the plate (who doesn't?) and he cracks a liner into right field, just dangling out there the chance to win with a steal and a single, a double, a triple, it's not so far away now, it's not nearly so crazy, in comes 2B Kennedy, a solid .280 hitter on the season, but before he ever sees a pitch...

Vazquez gets picked off. Hit .344 on the year, huge reason why we even got in the playoffs, I can't bug on him too much, but picked off first in the ninth inning? Just stand on the bag, man, then you get one more out to play with. The fake crowd's quieted after that, wouldn't you be, and I just get one of those feelings you can't shake, like how you know something's gonna happen even though it hasn't happened yet. Rest of the inning goes nowhere, Roa comes in for the tenth and after the automatic Rodriguez out, everybody hits, bottom of the lineup starters, backups, defensive replacements, everyone. The string plays out single, walk, single, single, outfielders make an error, a bad throw and before help comes in the form of Akinori Otsuka from the bullpen, it's 5-2 visitors and it's too late, like a friend of mine who fell asleep in her pool two hours yesterday afternoon. It's ninety five, a hundred degrees here. Sure she got out before she turned into a lobster but damn if you didn't see some of the funky burns and patches of skin she got, this was after hot bath, warm bath, cold bath, aloe, some kinda oil, some other stuff. God damn lot of baths.

Scot Shields closes the tenth and our two-zip lead is down to two-one. See, that game was a catastrophe, but baseball really ain't so black and white, not when you look past today's game, you know? You get your bad sequences, your bad innings, bad starts and bad calls and bad decisions, but there's always a game tomorrow. Same is true with life, I'm finding out, but that's another story for another time, another place, another game, not when we're a loss away from a tie series. To put it that way is glass half empty though. Glass half full ****...we're up two-one over the m.f.'ing Yankees.

[ifspuds]

I thought for sure you had it with two on and YORVIT! at the plate.

[cknox0723]

Originally Posted by ifspuds

I thought for sure you had it with two on and YORVIT! at the plate.

There were just so many chances that led to nothing, but then again it was one of those games where it seemed like we were never going to have a chance in it anyway.

And then there are those games where you never really have a chance to begin with.

It takes some guts to pitch your ace starter on three days rest, more than I have with a two-one series lead. But there's this chasm between Jason Schmidt and 14-game winner Kelvim Escobar, who was a hell of a lot more solid than anyone coming off arm surgery can be expected to be. In fact Escobar's stat lines resemble Ryan Franklin's quite a bit, sure Franklin's got the shinier ERA, but you would too in front of the spectacular Pale Hose defense...hmmm...

There's no scoring in the first two innings, but Franklin starts walking people in the third and a single by Hideki Matsui gives the visitors the lead. Bottom half, we're at the same point in the lineup New York was, pitcher's slot and then top of the order, and lightning and lightning create a one-out storm to tie it. Leadoff man Ramon Vazquez singles to right, steals second, and Scott "LDS Jesus" Podsednik brings him in with a base hit back through the box.

Only trouble is our mediocre moundsman gives it right back. Three straight hits to the right field area to start the fourth, two of them lost in the outfield for what seems like days, and it's 3-1 with nobody out. How Jeter didn't make it 5-1 with a homer, I'll never know, I think this was the first time in the series he made two outs in a row.

There's two outs and a man on second with the pitcher's slot up in the bottom of the inning, not exactly a high octane situation for run scoring, but it's pretty apparent Franklin doesn't have much today anyway. So Enrique Wilson bats in his place and, blind squirrels and all, raps a single to right to make the score 3-2.

Only problem is Wade Miller comes out of the pen and gives that run back, plus one more on a long, long, loud two-run tater obliterated by Hideki Matsui. For good measure he gives up a triple to the infielder Giles and then a run-plating single to the other Giles before the misery is over. It's 6-2 by then and the air is definitely out of my balloon. Fifth starter Mike Nannini comes in and cleans up, pitching another scoreless inning to boot, but we haven't managed another hit by the team he makes way for right-hander PJ Bevis in the seventh.

Bevis carves up the heart of their order rather cleanly, and the bottom of the inning gives us the top of the order against a slightly gassed Schmidt, at least to start, which means it's about the best chance we'll have. Speedy gonzalez and the roadrunner start the inning off with a single over first and a little bloop over shortstop, and we're about as much in business as ever. But #3 hitter Ordonez pops out behind shortstop to waste one out, and cleanup man Wells whacks one up the middle that Schmidt slows down enough to corral and get an out at second. Vazquez scores from third to bring on the bullpen, but all Cliff Politte needs is one out, and all we've got is a measly man on first for Eric Munson. Not much of a rally compared to how the inning started.

Except, well, except if Politte just lays that first pitch in there, well maybe not lays but just takes a little tiny bit off to make sure it's in the strike zone, not if Munson puts one of those beautiful all or nothing swings on it so you hear the CRACK of the bat, not if the ball goes flying over the infield, over the outfield, not if it just keeps carrying until it lands ten rows into the seats into a frenzy of crazy people from Chicago.

Sure that takes all those runners we thought we had off the bases, but isn't that the point. It's 6-5, somehow, and there's still an out to give in the inning, but Wil Cordero strikes out and that thought's gone.

Sadly, as they say, that would be as close as we would come. Yorvit Torrealba would give us the lead run at the plate after his one out eighth-inning single, but their closer Dave Weathers would come out and shut down the rally with a couple of quick pop ups. Hideki Matsui would blast his second home run in the ninth off of Kiko Calero to increase the lead to two, and even though Eric Munson would come up in the ninth...representing the tying run after a Vernon Wells single...there's no way he could do it again...right?

I mean, the odds of that would be a million to one or something...

Right?

Maybe. Scot Shields would strike our man out on three pitches, ending any thoughts of the thousandth miracle already in these playoffs, and knotting the series up at two games apiece.

[Jestor]

welcome back, Craig.