Induction Falsified Again!

by hilzoy

I had no great hopes for tonight's Red Sox game. I know the Red Sox. I grew up in Boston. I used to love the Red Sox, until I decided that they were not a baseball team, but an instrument of torture in the hands of a sadistic God. My prediction for the game was essentially the same as the one I made three years ago, except for the Pedro Martinez part:

"They will be ahead 843-0 in the 9th, with two outs, when Pedro Martinez, who has pitched a no-hitter so far, walks three people in succession. He is replaced, and replaced again, but the walks keep coming, until the entire Red Sox pitching staff has done its best and our opponents, they who shall not be named, have scored 294 runs without a single hit. At this point the Red Sox stop walking people and start committing horrible errors: dropped pitches, lazy pop flies that miraculously drop through the gloves of outfielders, and so on and so forth. Still, we will think, it's 843-502; surely they won't be able to get another 341 runs before we manage one out. But they will. And then, having tied the game... I leave the rest to your imaginations."

I can't believe they won. I just can't believe it. I'm still expecting to wake up and discover that I fell asleep on the couch and missed the disastrous ninth inning in which they blew it all.

But they won.

The Red Sox actually won.

YAAAAAY!!!!!

Comments

[J. Michael Neal]

Blech. The only thing worse than the Red Sox winning the World Series is the Yankees winning it. The Dodgers winning it might be as bad.

[publius]

ugh - they are just as evil as the Yankees now. they will soon take their rightful place with the yankees, microsoft, darth vader, and the 1980 russian hockey team.

("Ugh" - sorry to take your name in vain)

[CharleyCarp]

Wah, wah, wah, guys.

Don't let the misanthropes get to you, Hil.

[dr ngo]

Although I have some sympathy with the previous comments, this is tempered by the fact that their opponents, the Colorado Rockies, were apparently recruited for their "character," which in most cases seems to be a surrogate for conservative Christianity. Not quite a fully-owned subsidiary of Liberty [sic] University, but too close for comfort. (And - surprise, surprise - no blacks in sight.)

Not to mention that most of them also look as if they were selected by the casting director of 1950s "B" Westerns - I've never seen so many square jaws in my life! (Even their one Japanese player looks like a samurai superhero, instead of the rather effective, but more stereotypical, Japonerds of Boston.)

Blecch. Go Sox. I guess.

PS: Wouldn't you have liked to see how Manny Ramirez handled that drive to the left field fence in the 9th, instead of his all-too-competent fielding replacement?

[Katherine]

Kaz Matsui, samurai superhero? Heh. You should've seen him with orange hair.

They're really not as bad as the Yankees, but nor do I much care about them anymore. Go Mets!!!!! (Yeah, you heard me.)

[katherine]

oh, and Boston sports writers? Shut up about Manny already. Really, shut up.

[Pooh]

This may be the first time I've ever substantively disagreed with Publius. Were I Atrios, that comment might earn you WotD, sir.

Bobby Kielty, supergenius.

[Steve J.]

Congrats, Hilzoy!

I guess you are finally getting to know what it feels like to be a Yankees fan.

:-)

[G'Kar]

Equating the Red Sox to the Yankees betrays a rather sizable lack of baseball knowledge. When the Sox win four or five titles in a decade, they may fairly be compared to the Yankees. Right now their best comps are the Toronto Blue Jays of the early 1990s, the Minnesota Twins of the late 1980s/early 1990s, the Oakland As, or the Cincinnati Reds. They've won two titles in four years. Let's not oversell it.

[Phil]

The Red Sox are not the Yankees, as G'Kar has pointed out, but a great majority of Red Sox fans have turned into something akin to Yankees fans: Smug jerks who think the title should be theirs by birthright every season. (Present company excepted.)

[Curt Adams]

Well, if induction is wrong again, can you induce induction doesn't work? Or does that introduce an "All Cretans are liars" paradox?

[G'Kar]

Phil, the one painful thing about winning is the bandwagon effect. Still, I don't believe it is fair to hold all Red Sox fans responsible for the crummy behavior of some Red Sox fans who don't know any better.

[Bernard Yomtov]

Well, I guess the song was right.

The Rockies have crumbled.

[Barrett Wolf]

As a recent used-ta-was resident of the Old Colony State, I feel called upon to point out that Boston-oriented sports fans don't have to turn into "Smug jerks" or anyhting else...

As a sports agnostic, I have been threatened with bodily harm for merely not caring about a game. In my own living room!

[DaveC]

If there was a sporting event that I would instinctively root against Bostonians, it would be the Figure-8 Demolition Derby, because they have an unfair training advantage.

Otherwise, whatever. Although I sort of liked the Rockies because Todd Helton went to Knoxville Central High, and he was the starting Tennessee quarterback before he lost the job to Peyton Manning.

[canuckistani]

The rumoured Christianist leanings of the Rockies management made it easy to cheer for the Sox, and I was extra delighted to see a humilating ritual crushing and mass castration delivered.
Where's your Messiah now, Rockies?

[canuckistani]

The rumoured Christianist leanings of the Rockies management made it easy to cheer for the Sox, and I was extra delighted to see a humilating ritual crushing and mass castration delivered.
Where's your Messiah now, Rockies?

[Ugh]

yay sox!

yankees, microsoft, darth vader, and the 1980 russian hockey team.

Darth Vader was at the Kennedy Center last Friday (really!), he didn't seem all that bad (except for when he choked to death one of his minions while the National Symphony Orchestra Pops played the Imperial March).

[J. Michael Neal]

Although I have some sympathy with the previous comments, this is tempered by the fact that their opponents, the Colorado Rockies, were apparently recruited for their "character," which in most cases seems to be a surrogate for conservative Christianity. Not quite a fully-owned subsidiary of Liberty [sic] University, but too close for comfort. (And - surprise, surprise - no blacks in sight.)

What a load of crap. Let's start at the end. Nothing but white guys? Willy Tavares, Manny Corpas, Ubaldo Jimenez and Franklin Morales don't meet the usual definition of "white." You want to limit it to just non-Hispanic blacks? The list of those on the Red Sox roster is Coco Crisp. That is vastly longer than the Rockies' list of LaTroy Hawkins.

On the Christian thing, it just doesn't bug me that much. Yes, the Rockies make a big deal out of being run along Christian principles. However, they do not just pick up Christian players. I'm agnostic, and as opposed to the religious right as the next guy, but getting exercised about this is making a mountain out of a teacup.

[J. Michael Neal]

Although I have some sympathy with the previous comments, this is tempered by the fact that their opponents, the Colorado Rockies, were apparently recruited for their "character," which in most cases seems to be a surrogate for conservative Christianity. Not quite a fully-owned subsidiary of Liberty [sic] University, but too close for comfort. (And - surprise, surprise - no blacks in sight.)

What a load of crap. Let's start at the end. Nothing but white guys? Willy Tavares, Manny Corpas, Ubaldo Jimenez and Franklin Morales don't meet the usual definition of "white." You want to limit it to just non-Hispanic blacks? The list of those on the Red Sox roster is Coco Crisp. That is vastly longer than the Rockies' list of LaTroy Hawkins.

On the Christian thing, it just doesn't bug me that much. Yes, the Rockies make a big deal out of being run along Christian principles. However, they do not just pick up Christian players. I'm agnostic, and as opposed to the religious right as the next guy, but getting exercised about this is making a mountain out of a teacup.

[John Thullen]

I have geographical reasons for enjoying the Rockies season-ending streak (14 of 15) and their sweep of the Phillies and the Diamondbacks in the playoffs (7 for 7).

But I could tell as soon as the camera panned through the Red Sox (one of my favorite teams over the years) dugout in the first inning of the first game of the Series that the Rockies were up against battle-hardened veterans who were going to take no hostages.

You could see, too, that the Rockies were pressing from the get-go. They had an 8-day layoff and they were so up that they felt like vomiting, but you could tell they were flat, too. All of that adrenaline to go with the lead-booted sinking feeling that you are up against warriors who are going to eat your liver and maybe take some souvenier scalps and ears home with them to boot.

That's a deadly combination for a team.

The Red Sox were better. Good for them. Hooray for Yaz.

As to the Christianist issue, it makes me sick, but if you Google an article in the Boston Globe, August 31, 2008 headlined, "Faith Binds Many On Sox", you'll see that the Red Sox were bragging then that they had the highest number of players of the Evangelical persuasion in baseball.

Curt Schilling, he of the stigmata seeping through the sock in the 2004 Series, said "I wanted to be able to glorify God's name when all was said and done."

Like steroids, Christianist evangelism is endemic in baseball and sports at large. I hope God's feelings won't be hurt when this American fad passes too.

What makes me cringe is the contant exhibitionist pointing at the sky for every little thing. I yearn for Bob Gibson or Don Drysdale to take the mound and bring a little atheistic or agnostic, 98-mile per hour high cheese to these showoffs.

As Gibson might say, "You can call time out now, stand up and brush the dirt from the seat of your pants, step out of the batter's box, and thank God I wasn't aiming at your head."

Shut up and play.

As to the race issue, the Rockies carry (despite Tom Tancredo's nearby presence) a dozen or more Latinos on the team, and Yorvit Torrealba, the Rockies' catcher, will tell you to visit the Philadelphia Phillies' stadium for a game or two if you want to witness the full racist Monty.

Beantown ain't exactly Desmond Tutu's model city either.

That's no excuse, of course, but Colorado is as white as it gets with a very large Latino population.

Finally, if Clint Hurdle, the Christian manager (he doesn't make too much of a big deal about it, despite statements by the Rockie owners) somehow had a very hungover, heathen Mickey Mantle or a questionable character like Pete Rose on the team, two of the Rockies now in the lineup would have sat out the Series.

That Clint Hurdle wants to win in the worst way and that God may be in favor of Hurdle winning is mere coincidence, whether he would admit it or not.

I'll bet the Devil fields a better All-Star team.

Finally, the Monforts, who own the team, are full of crap. What do you expect from guys who run low-wage slaughterhouses and meatpacking plants?

[John Thullen]

The Globe article is August 31, 2005, not 2008.

What, God hasn't time to preview?

[d]

Hilzoy's post cracked me up -- as a Sox fan, I can relate. Somewhere in the back of my mind last night, I feared that if the Rockies won the game, the series was over.

I reminded myself, though, that this team nearly blew a huge lead over the Yanks before pulling out the division in the end; nearly lost (badly) to Cleveland before coming back and destroying them; and nearly blew a 6-run lead Friday night before putting the game away in the last two innings.

It's funny, though. Even winning the World Series in 2004 didn't do away with all the neuroses caused by the Sox not having won the series since my grandfather was six.....

This isn't healthy, but I suppose it might be fun.

[Dantheman]

John T.,

"I have geographical reasons for enjoying the Rockies season-ending streak (14 of 15) and their sweep of the Phillies and the Diamondbacks in the playoffs (7 for 7)."

I have the opposite reason for rooting against the Rockies, since I root for one of the swept teams. As such, I have some quibbles.

"Curt Schilling, he of the stigmata seeping through the sock in the 2004 Series, said "I wanted to be able to glorify God's name when all was said and done.""

In the famed words of former Phillies GM Ed Wade: One day in five, Schilling's a horse. The other four, he's a horse's [posterior].

"visit the Philadelphia Phillies' stadium for a game or two if you want to witness the full racist Monty"

A bit overrated these days, given how the City has taken to Ryan Howard, Jimmy Rollins, Donovan McNabb, et al. However, in popular conception, we still are the same folks who booed a visibly drunken Santa Claus at a halftime show 4 decades ago, though.

[The Vega]

Hilz, John, this lovable loser thing no longer applies. The Red Sox have built a great organization and a pretty good pitching staff. They may not be the Yankees (26 world championships), but they and the Yankees will be battling for the AL East title for some years to come.

I mean, get over it. You're winners! Sorry if that undermines your persona.

[John Thullen]

Dantheman:

No quibble from me re Schilling. I suspect Schilling created his God from his image, rather than the other way round.

And, yeah, I know my view of the Phillies' fans is a little dated. I grew up in Pittsburgh and even with the great black teams of Clemente, Stargell, Parker, et al,. you didn't really want to ask anyone privately what they thought about it, the idiots.

I mentioned Torrealba because he remarked on the racial abuse he recieved from Phillies fans a couple of weeks ago. Knowing their reputation, however, I'm sure Todd Helton felt like Jackie Robinson in 1949 when he came to bat.

At least no one got hit by a C battery in the ear. ;)

[Dantheman]

"At least no one got hit by a C battery in the ear."

Nor did a former DA, and soon to be mayor (and now governor) egg anyone on to throw snowballs from the upper deck at Clint Hurdle, as Ed Rendell did with respect to Jimmy Johnson.

[dr ngo]

: (And - surprise, surprise - no blacks in sight.)

JMNeal: What a load of crap. Let's start at the end. Nothing but white guys?

I call "crap" on reading comprehension, JMN.

"No blacks in sight" is not - repeat NOT - equivalent to "Nothing but white guys."

(FWIW, I was well aware of the Hispanics on the Rockies.)

Learn to read.

This has been a public service announcement.

(Co-sponsored - in general, if not in this particular case - by Gary Farber, Esq.)

[jcricket]

Hilzoy's post cracked me up -- as a Sox fan, I can relate. Somewhere in the back of my mind last night, I feared that if the Rockies won the game, the series was over.

I was thinking the same thing (as a Sox fan). Even though the Sox were up 3-0 in the series, and even if the Rockies won another game (3-2) the Sox would have two chances at home...

I think now, though, after 2 wins in close range, the curse is gone and us Sox fans can go back to just being loudmouths who root for our team with gusto - instead of selling ourselves as perennial losers/underdogs.

Pity the poor Cubs fan, though.

[Dantheman]

OT -- A new front opens up on the War on Christmas. Link is a 3 1/2 minute animated short, preceded by ad. I thought it was pretty funny, but take that with a grain of salt, as I know some of the folks involved.