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Wednesday, October 08, 2003
Fall brawl
Despite the Cubs' loss in Game 1, the NLCS looks to be a lot of fun, even if most people would rather not see the Marlins in the World Series, or else take away a lot of the luster of the Fall Classic. You know Fox would love to see Cubs in the World Series, and either AL team would be a huge jackpot.
With that said, what in the world is up with the split telecast of Game 1 of the ALCS and Game 2 of the NLCS? Wouldn't a situation like this call for the NLCS to be an afternoon game and the ALCS getting prime-time attention or vice versa?
Granted, it's one night, but this is the time for both series to have the spotlight on their own. I can flip back and forth between Fox and FX at home (or have two TVs going at work), but what about places without cable or without FX? And the list of cities getting each telecast on the local on-air Fox station is a bit random as well.
It's anecdotal evidence ...
But one of the better things so far from the playoffs was this amazing and scathing piece from Tom Verducci on Oakland's collapse. For all the Moneyball talk, it's hard to dismiss nine straight losses in clinching games, especially when there's a huge dismissal of "clutch" hitting by Beane and friends. But I guess "choke" hitting, pitching, defense, baserunning, etc. does exist -- you can quantify that just by taking the A's stats in those nine games.
To put this in a quizbowl context, I wouldn't be surprised if Beane and his disciples would want to ditch the playoffs altogether and just award the championship to the team with the best overall record at the end of the regular season, since all those models for creating a great team supposedly go out the window in a playoff tournament format (we'll save the discussion of best-of-5 and best-of-7 for another day).
posted at 2:29 AM
Monday, October 06, 2003
Quadruple whammy
Could it be a worse sports night in Atlanta? I'm sure everything is going haywire over at the AJC with all the sad news.
First off, the Falcons lost again, although Peerless Price finally woke up.
Then, the Cubs ended the Braves' postseason hopes for another year, although that was fun for me to watch. We're getting that much closer to a Cubs-Red Sox World Series where I totally expect either Jesus to throw out the first pitch or, "Game postponed on account of locusts." (Granted, my dream matchup is close to coming true of Cubs-Yankees is also close to coming true.)
And when it couldn't get much worse, in comes the news of Dan Snyder's death in the Dany Heatley car wreck last Monday.
If you're looking for the fourth bit of sad news for this area, how about the U.S. women's team falling at the World Cup? First WUSA goes under, and now the tournament that might've helped to resurrect some interest in the sport ends with a big thud. I hardly watched the tournament since it was lost in the shuffle of the NFL, college football and baseball playoffs. Even a big event like this gets lost among the Cubs and NFL action (or the death of a hockey player in Atlanta's case).
The only pro team to escape unscathed Sunday was the Hawks, but they're so pathetic anyway, that it's hardly worth mentioning. They did pick up a couple of serviceable free agents over the weekend in Lee Nailon and Stephen Jackson, but they're still looking at lottery balls come next May.
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