Battle of red, battle of white
By Wade Kwon
I hate our national pastime.
No, not celebrity gossip. Baseball.
But I enjoy a good yarn. And some decent drama.
Last year, I even managed to watch the Red Sox streak through the playoffs and World Series to make history. (It helped that I was surrounded by jaded journalists who love underdogs.)
So kudos to columnist Jayson Stark at ESPN for his game wrapup, "South Side redemption." It’s a compelling read, well written and well reported. It even plays up the Chicago White Sox’s triumph in near-obscurity.
He even mentioned Birmingham’s key contribution to the game, via les Barons.
Relievers Cliff Politte and Neal Cotts got the first three outs, squirming out of a two-on, one-out jam in the eighth. So then, in the ninth, it was Bobby Jenks’ turn.
Jenks is another guy who seemed to sum up this team’s year. Claimed on waivers over the winter. Pitching in Birmingham in April. Then standing on the mound with a World Series to finish in October. Perfect.
He’d thrown 41 exhausting pitches in Game 3, less than 24 hours earlier. But there was “no way in hell I wasn’t coming in” to pitch this game, he said.
Of course, he had to make it as terrifying as possible, though. Of course, as his teammates crowded around the top step of the dugout, he had to give up a bloop leadoff single to Jason Lane — followed by a Brad Ausmus bunt that moved the tying run to second base.
“What an inning,” Blum would say later. “It was scary. It was quixotic. What’s that mean, anyway — quixotic?”
Hey, you’ve got us. But it sounded good. Whatever, it was Jenks-otic. And that was the last thing anybody in Chicago needed, after all the Bartman-esque things that have gone on there for the last 88 years.
Check out the full column. As I mentioned to a colleague in Orlando, it’s not about just the mechanics of the sport, but your passion for your subject matter.
I may hate baseball, but today, I hate it a little less.
