Smoke and Mirrors

(photo from Yahoo! Sports)

And so for the second day in a row, we must pose the question: Why does A.J. run? And by this, of course, we mean what the bloody hell was going on there when he clearly struck out to end the game, the umpire made an out call, signifying THE GAME WAS OVER and THEN Pierzynski decided to take off for first, hoping he could con the umps into reversing the call? Which he did. Because there is no instant replay in baseball.

Then he steals second and Joe Crede hits a double and before you can say "Jeffrey Maier" or "phantom tag" a game that should be going to the top of the 10th inning is over and the ChiSox have won on a walk off hit.

Wha?

I am justifiably pissed off if I'm an Angels fan right now. And aside from those godforsaken Thunder Stix, it looks like Orange County-ers might be starting to get the hang of this baseball thing. And this isn't good for them. This is how rivalries start. This is what gets blood boiling and starts tempers flaring.

It's not the fault of the White Sox, per se. They were just taking advantage of what the umps gave them. But the Yankees do that shit all the time and you'll never get a Red Sox fan to admit that it doesn't fuel the rivalry. So if you're an Angels fan, I say stomp your feet, curse the pale hose and throw something. Maybe a Thunder Stick.

It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out. If the Halos lose this series, they're going to point to that botched call as the turning point. And I'm not sure they're wrong. Who knows? Maybe we're looking at the seeds of baseball's next great rivalry. Maybe in fifty years, Angels/ChiSox will make Red Sox/Yankees look like a tiff over a parking ticket. Of course, for that to happen, someone is actually going to need to physically kill someone else. And obviously I'm not wishing for murder here, I'm a (mostly) reasonable human being. But rivalries sure do make sports fun, no? Gotta say, it's nice to be a spectator for once, though. My poor heart, she can't take it.

I would also like to express my displeasure with the fact that Lou Piniella appeared to be heavily sedated during the broadcast. The commentators have the benefit of instant replay. They saw it was a bullshit call. I saw it was a bullshit call. Likely A.J. Pierzynski knew it was a bullshit call. The only people who didn't were the umps. But even still, Piniella calmly expressed his belief that it wasn't correct and piped down. What? What the shit is that? This is Lou Piniella! If I have to hear senile old men rambling on in the booth, I at least want one of them to throw a temper tantrum and start ranting about how in his day, the base paths ran uphill and it wasn't 90 feet to first, it was 180! And they played all year round and had to run through the snow in bare feet! And catchers didn't get those pansy-ass big gloves to catch things, they used their bare hands! And the only way you got to first was knocking the ball (or another player) out cold! None of this "dropped third strike" horseshit! I mean, c'mon. You mean to tell me that had that call gone against the Devil Rays, Sweet Lou wouldn't have eaten the catcher's mitt or one of his middle infielders to prove a point? I don't think so. Where's the fire, Lou? Where's the passion? Where's the madness?

As for the other game, welp, not terribly exciting. Reggie Sanders sure hit the shit outta that ball though, huh? Funny, I don't remember anyone talking about being scared of him last year. It was all Pujols, Edmonds, Walker, etc. But he can hit a piece, that's for sure.

But after watching the Cardinals play some AL style big homer ball and follow it up with some very NL type suicide squeeze action, I've decided they just might win the whole damn thing this year. And that'd be okay. Because St. Louis? Good people, it seems. I got no beef with them.