So I stopped by a local bowling pro shop to pick up a bowling ball that I had some work done on. And there were two guys there, and the TV was tuned to “Mindfreak.” This was mildly surprising since the Mets were playing the Yankees in the Bronx, and had just taken an 8 to 2 lead. Whenever you go into a bowling alley, and either the Mets or the Yankees are playing, a TV is tuned to it (unless the people there are avidly supporters of the other team, and even then they might tune in just to see if the NY team they don’t like is losing.) If the Mets are playing the Yankees, then it’s pretty much a given that it’ll be on. And I said, “You guys aren’t watching the game?” ( Note that I didn’t have to clarify which game I was referring to.)
And one of the guys said, “Nah. They’re losing 8 to 2.”
And the other guy, who clearly wasn’t in charge of the TV but was grinning nonetheless said, “No. They’re WINNING 8 to 2.”
Like I said, Mets/Yankees fans in microcosm.
PAD
• 
Was wearing my Yankees suck shirt yesterday, it made four people say to me, ‘nice shirt’, being in MA is so much fun!
Peter, you misspelled “Cubs / Sox” fans.
— Ken from Chicago
P.S. Contrary to national news reports, all of Chicago was NOT cheering the last year’s World Series champions.
This reminds me something from a couple of weeks back, and all the stupidity surrounding baseball’s “unwritten rules”.
It was a Yankees/Orioles game, and the Orioles were up like 6-1 or something late in the game, and Corey Patteron (big Cubs fan *sigh* for lost potential), the Orioles centerfielder, stole 2nd base.
Apparently one of the Yankees coaches has a hissy fit about it, and how that was breaking those unwritten rules: you don’t pile on the runs by stealing bases and such.
Yet, in the week before, the Yankees had twice overcome deficets of like 5-6 runs to win.
I love baseball, but I swear, sometimes the stupidity is too much to overcome.
Oh, and PAD, I was wondering if I could get some advice on how to deal with a swollen thumb from bowling. I think I still need some adjustments made to my recently drilled ball (which I’ve only gotten to use for the second time last night), but I was wondering if you had any tips.
It’s funny, I grew up in SoCal, about equal distances from Dodger Stadium in L.A. and the “Big A” in Anaheim, but there was *never* the kind of cross-town rivalry that the Mets/Yanks or the Cubs/Sox have. At least not that I ever noticed. In fact, I considered myself a fan of both teams back then. Although now, I despise the Angels now that I live in Seattle and follow the Mariners. 😉
“Oh, and PAD, I was wondering if I could get some advice on how to deal with a swollen thumb from bowling. I think I still need some adjustments made to my recently drilled ball (which I’ve only gotten to use for the second time last night), but I was wondering if you had any tips.”
If your thumb is swelling, it doesn’t sound to me like whoever drilled it did it right. Either the span isn’t right or the thumb hole is too small. If you don’t have one already, you should have a thumb slug in your ball so that your thumb will emerge more smoothly from the ball on release. Basically, the ideal fit is when your thumb makes a slight popping noise when it emerges from the ball upon release. When you watch the pros on TV you can actually hear it.
PAD
If your thumb is swelling, it doesn’t sound to me like whoever drilled it did it right.
The guy who did it is a former PBA bowler who has his own pro shop at an alley. So, I think this is just my needing to learn stuff about bowling to ‘get it right’ in the long run.
Having never owned my own ball before, it’s probably not a surprise that some adjustments are needing to be made. And the ‘thumb slug’ is something I passed on when I had the ball drilled, but will probably look at in more detail now. Thanks.
Whereas, from the Boston perspective, the prefered outcome would involve the earth opening up and swallowing the stadium (or at least the entire field and both dugouts and bullpens). 🙂
But as long as that doesn’t happen, go Mets since knocking the Yankees (Two-Thou-Sand!) out of the playoffs before they start is always good.
I’m a lifetime Phillies fan, and you just know it’s bad when you hear the “E-A-G-L-E-S” chant reverberating around Citizens Bank Park as an expression of disdain for the Phils. The Phils are like some pathetic drunken slob of a relative that comes to visit every summer. They’re a mess, but they’re part of the family and you love ’em so you hope that one day they’ll get themselves together and turn it all around. Probably never happen though.
Where have you gone RICHIE ASHBURN?
so let’s root, root root for the home team,
if they don’t win we won’t watch!
Good thing these arn’t the guys in charge of “supporting our troops”
😛
so let’s root, root root for the home team,
if they don’t win we won’t watch!
Good thing these arn’t the guys in charge of “supporting our troops”
😛
so let’s root, root root for the home team,
if they don’t win we won’t watch!
Good thing these arn’t the guys in charge of “supporting our troops”
😛
Tom, that’s not just a Boston perspective, it’s the perspective of everywhere outside of the NY metro area. Although, if you put a gun to my head and made me choose, I’d pick the Mets to win over the Yankees.
Actually, I’d picked the hordes of Satan to win over the Yankees.
My three favorite teams are the Dodgers, the Mariners, and whomsoever is playing the Yankees.
Ken wrote: “Peter, you misspelled “Cubs / Sox” fans.”
Ken’s right about that! You couldn’t go anywhere this past weekend in Chicago and not know the Cubs were playing the Sox. I went to the opening day of Taste of Chicago, a huge summer event in itself, and at the ticket window, one of the ticket vendors had a running score of the game posted. And as I walked through the throngs of people, no radio was necessary to follow the game, as I kept hearing random snippets of game updates.
Not to be too much of a jerk (though I must admit enjoying it), I state the following facts:
New York Yankees – 39 World Series appearances
New York Yankees – 26 World Series Championships
That is all.
As a Blue Jays fan, I would love to get one of those Yankees suck shirts I’ve seen Red Sox fans sporting.
And I reply to Kremlin with the following facts:
New York Yankees: 0 21st century World Series Championships
New York Yankees: 1 Greatest…Choke….EVER!
Yeah, that was a choke of monumental proportions.
And I stated right on this blog, Oct. 19, 2004, when PAD wondered if Schilling could pull off a miracle and if the Red Sox could win the next two in the Yankees’ back yard: “Anything can happen in baseball if you wait long enough. Sooner or later a team will come back from a 3-0 series deficit and win a seven-game series. It’s gonna happen. The question is, will it happen this year with Boston? Attitude is everything in a baseball game. The Sox have to go in there with the mindset, ‘We need to win this one ball game.’ And then, if they win, they need to go in the next game thinking the exact same thing. History means nothing. It really doesn’t.”
I was at the Mets / Jays interleague game last weekend, and I couldn’t believe how many Mets fans had made the trek up to T.O. to watch the game. On gay pride weekend. They’re like cockroaches. The Mets fans, not the gay priders. Still, New York fans. Woah.
Also, speaking of the Mets and how hard they got blown out in this Yanks game… how in the name of Sweet Jebus Christ are there 4 Mets on the starting line up the all-star game? 4! I mean, COME ON!
how in the name of Sweet Jebus Christ are there 4 Mets on the starting line up the all-star game?
Because fans, many of whom don’t actually know enough to say their opinion is valid, get to pick the starting lineups.
7/4/06:
Cleveland Indians: 19 runs, 21 hits. Six home runs
Yankees: one run, nine hits. No home runs.
We may be 30 games back or whatever, but it still feels good to beat those Ðámņ Yankees.
** Whenever you go into a bowling alley, and either the Mets or the Yankees are playing, a TV is tuned to it **
Not in Chicago. You ignore what happens in flyover country, we’ll ignore you too.
Because fans, many of whom don’t actually know enough to say their opinion is valid, get to pick the starting lineups.
Like sportswriters and managers are any different?
Like sportswriters and managers are any different?
Well, for one, they’re paid for their opinions.
But Joe Q who stops by the MLB.com website because he saw the Yankees playing last night?
Managers will occassionally get it wrong too (there’s too much favoritism there as well when it comes to the reserves), but it beats Joe Q who wants the entire Yankees roster to be on the All Star team.
The All-star game is for the fans. It is a meaningless exhibition game some players (or team management) don’t even want the players to play in. THe whole point of it is for the fans to see their favorite players playing with and against each other. The players already have their awards. It is all-stars-and who becomes/remains stars is really determined by the fans
and therefore, the fans should be the ones determining whom they want to see play-or else it might as well fade into even more of an irrelevancy than it already has.
It is a meaningless exhibition
And that would still be true if not for the completely asanine idea to give the league that wins the All Star game home field advantage in the World Series.
They couldn’t find any other way to get these players to actually play so that ratings wouldn’t continue to go down. Long gone were the days when Pete Rose ruined a guy’s career in an All-Star game.
I don’t really have anything to add, but still I thought I’d just post and wish everybody a good July 6.
You know, “Spirit of 7/6” and all that …
Ðámņ, wrong thread.