heartbreak and hope

for the 2nd year in a row, the new york mets miss out on the post season with a loss to the florida marlins on the last day of the regular season. pretty stinging. shea stadium goes out with a wimper, rather than with the roar of a post season game.

im sure the team is disappointed, but probably not as much as their fans. its hard to let go of the season, and to lose when you expect to play another day is shocking.

im watching the closing ceremonies at shea. the crowd is pretty subdued. not surprising. it hard to applaud for old people you dont know when you team has just broken your heart, for the 2nd year in a row.

in other news, both the twins and white sox won, so the season goes into extra innings. the white sox will face rock's brother, freddy garcia, at the cell tomorrow in a make up game with the tigers. garcia, who won a world series with the white sox in 2005 and recently asserted that he had no friends on the team, that he was a tiger now.

should be a good game. the white sox are fighting to stay a contender for the AL central, and im sure detroit is annoyed about having to play a game after the season is over.

heres how all 4 games i watched today ended up

cubs 1, brewers 3
marlins 4, mets 2
indians 1, white sox 5
royals 0, twins 5

thats a lot of baseball. but i wouldnt have it any other way.

last day of the regular season

its incredible. 162 games in the regular season, and there are 4 teams still battling for playoff spots on the last day of the regular season.

thanks to mlb mosiac, im watching 4 games at the same time, white sox vs indians, marlins vs mets, cubs vs brewers, and twins vs royals.

mets and brewers are tied for the NL Wild card, a win by one and a loss for the other determines the winner. should both teams win or lose, they have to play a tiebreaker tomorrow.

the white sox are 1/2 game back of the twins. their situation is more complicated. a twins win and white sox loss eliminates ozzie's crew. if both teams win, the white sox have to play a make-up game against detroit on monday, if they win that, sox and twins play a tiebreaker on tuesday. so the sox have to win 3 in a row to take the AL central.

today is a big day. pennants are up for grabs. a timely hit, or a misplayed ball can mean the season for a team. pretty exciting, and im sure nerve wracking for all the fans involved.

im glad i can sit back and relax. the game against the brewers is more or less a scrimmage. the cubs already own the best record in the NL, and are just trying to keep their winning rhythm in place for the start of the playoffs.

but i have have to recognize how important a day today is, even if its not for my team.

162 games in a season. and it all comes down to today. amazing.

short rest

the white sox, mets, and brewers this week are throwing their star pitchers out on 3 days rest, last ditch attempts to clinch a spot in the post season. the only team who isn't doing it are the twins, who have no real "stars" in their rotation.

maybe this is naive of me to think, but i don't understand this tactic. i know that the post season schedule allows more rest for pitchers, and therefore teams won't need a full 5-man rotation. but what good is it to wear out your best pitchers before post season even starts? tired arms dont win games.

santana pitched the shit out of the ball yesterday, a complete game on short rest. an amazing performance and fitting for possibly one of the final games at shea stadium. but the rotation is in flux. as good as he is, santata cannot win 11 post season games on his own. same for sabathia.

what good is it to make to the post-season, only to be humiliated by teams with full rotations? i don't get it.

update

the cubs have already clinched the division and home field advantage for the 1st 2 rounds of the playoffs. the games this week is just to run up some individual numbers, and maybe rest the guys who have grinded all season.

i left for the gym with the game tied in the 8th. they didnt need to pull it out, not nearly as much as the mets did.

low and behold, even when they don't have to, the cubbies came through to win the game in the 10th. sweet.

and rosenblog said it the best in today's column

When did Howry become Carlos Marmol?

i love this game. i love this team.

cubs 9, mets 6

influence

game's not over, but this post can't wait.

7th inning, 2 on, no outs. daniel murphy hits a bullet right at d-lee who is attempting to hold speedy jose reyes on 1st. lee steps on the base and doubles up reyes, and no runs manage to score in the inning.

a pretty cool play, no doubt. but the best part came 5 seconds after.

my phone rings, its a text message from hey you "That was an amazing catch by the first baseman. I would have ducted."

um, what? hey you was watching the game? and paying attention? and realized what happened?!

is it possible? have i beat her down into becoming a semi-fan? have the lovable losers won her over with their charmed ways and good looks? is she actually now worthy of the fukodome shirt i got her in august?

im pretty proud of myself right now. much more proud than i am of jeff samardzija who just coughed up the lead in the 8th.