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It Is Now Officially OK...
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Fitzy wrote this 1 year ago | Permalink | 8 comments |
To expect great things from this 2008 Red Sox team. I was far from the "Well, I'm hapy they're back in the playoffs the year after winning it again" frame of mind, but I wasn't locked into the "Win or else it's a total failure" mindset either. I was somewhere in between. And I think alot of people share that mentality; great team, we're one of eight, screw what everyone else has done, or where we're playing! Let's give this thing a friggin' whirl!
But now that the Sox are up 2-0 in the ALDS...Now that the Sox won those games in Fake Mountains in the Outfield Stadium...NOW that they've run 11 straight in the postseason against the Angels, and have some serious clutch/mojo/magic (pick one) running with them, I think it's officially OK to leave the "Whatever happens/Just hapy to be here" thoughts behind with your empties from Friday night, and get on board with "Team Wecanwinthewholefrigginthingagain".
This team has it all. Clutch hitting. Great pitching. Speed. Smarts. Offense. Defense. A bench. A bullpen. And best of all experience. Nobody on this team sweats. Nobody panics late in the game. Nobody believes they're ever out of it. Nobody makes a series of mental mistakes that kill a team of this, or superior, talent when it's on the line. It's a gret team, and don't let the 95 wins, the wildcard or the lack of spectacle lead you to think anything other than this being a tremendous team, that does everything well and has a chance to run it back. When it counts most that's when they show up, and that may be the difference between teams with 100 wins who had all the expectationsa nd talked big and now have their backs up against the wall, and those who are defending champs and walk tall, speak softly and carry a big stick named Josh Beckett into Game 3 at home.
It's not about looking forward and underestimating an opponent, thinking it's a given or in the bag. No. It's abut getting that feeling, finally sensing that there could be something big, something special in this postseason, in this team. I know just as well as you and any other good Sox fan should that it ain't over yet, but you think any of us are doubting anything the 2008 Sox can do?
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Goodbye Skanks, Hello Playoffs!
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Fitzy wrote this 1 year ago | Permalink | 6 comments |
First off,m may I? Ok, cool - F**K YEAH! Playoffs baby! Smoke a pack for me, RemDawg, we're back in it to win it.
That said, Plenty of other teams, and shoddy play, and injuries, and a litany of other factors helped to knock the Skanks outta the playoff picture and into the picture Jeter will hang on his wall from TPC Sawgrass, but I dare say delivering the knockout blow always feels good.
I was all set to revel in the preDICKtionary idiocy of that guy whose “Sox will collapse/Yanks will stage greatest comeback ever” video was making the YouTube/sportsblog rounds today. But then, in a total shocker, about as much of a shock that the Skanks are “Gone Baby Gone (drowned in a “Mystic River” of terrible, if you wanna double your Dennis Lehane pleasure), I found this message on YouTube about his video: This video has been removed by the user. Hey, at least I was ballsy/dumb enough to leave my Dolphins/Pats prediction video up, and I am taking it on the chin (like your mom) for that. Well-deserved, I might add.
But this is not a time for Pats ramblings. It’s Sawx talk, baby. They did it. They scratched, clawed, outlasted and outplayed enough teams to make it to the dance, and right now that’s all I, and all Sox fans, should be concerned with.
AL East title? Cool, but not necessary.
Difficult field to face? Sure, but they’re playoff teams. They’re supposed to be difficult to face. That’s the idea.
Facing Anaheim, with the Angels and John Lackey’s always-open triangle mouth getting home field advantage? Whatever it takes. I’ll roll the Dice-K with Beckett, Lester, Matsuzaka and a 4th against Lackey, Saunders and Weaver right now. Besides, we’ve beat ‘em twice. 2 outta 3 ain’t good enough. 3rd time’s the charm sounds better to me.
Party on Wayne, Garth, Papi, Lil’ Dusty, Ellsbury Beret and Co. You earned it. But rest well, ye merry gentlemen. The job ain’t done yet.
Playoff baseball next week and hopefully beyond. Hey everyone, don’t call or expect your emails to be returned till November. Love, Fitzy
Tags: red sox pedroia fitzy yankees playoffs becket...
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Same Olde Sonnanstine and Dance
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Fitzy wrote this 1 year ago | Permalink | 5 comments |
Well, another day, another gut-wrenching, grab-you-by-the-ear-like-that-uncle-you-hate loss to the Rays in Tampa for the Sox. Andy to Andy Sonnanstine, AGAIN. And no offense from us, AGAIN. With Josh Beckett throwing a gem for the Sox, AGAIN. If I were Beckett I'd be pissed for the donut run support, but ESPECIALLY over that borderline "As bad as the blown call in the Denver/San Diego game Sunday" call, with the humpire calling a hit-by-pitch in the 8th when the ball CLEARLY hit the bottom of the bat. Hey ump, when's the last time you saw a guy get hit in the wrist and the ball travel 30 feet ther other direction? Sure that didn't cost the SOx but it was just a sign of how things were gonna go on this night.
But what really sucks it like a Polaroid picture is that the Sox piled on the runs Monday night in the 13-5 barrage that shall be known as "The Massacre at Kazmir", and the whole time you couldn't help but have the feeling, "Dudes, you're up by 10 runs, you've hit 5 homers, take it easy. Don't shoot your proverbial baseball load tonight! Save some runs because god forbid we are in a tie game or one run game and we wish we had some of those runs from the Monday massacre and you guys are all scored out!" Well, said fears came true tonight. Talk about a kick in the baseballs.
Yeah, the Sox are making the playoffs, and I still believe they're gonna go a long long way. But there's just something about winning the division by taking it from Tampa, that team full of chip-on-the-shoulder turkeys, this little team that could and would drive me nuts. Home field in the playoffs would be pretty sweet. Forcing Tampa to come to Fenway, giving us one less game in the St. Petersburg Slanted Dome, with the Fairweather Fans and those ANNOYING RATTLES! I can't believe a fanbase found something more annoying that Thundersticks. WOW.
In closing go Sox and DAMN YOU, SONNANSTINE!
Tags: red sox josh beckett andy sonnanstine tampa r...
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UNCOMFORTABLY NUMB
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Fitzy wrote this 1 year ago | Permalink | 9 comments |
It's well after midnight. The Sox, looking to win their series with the Rays, vault back to 1/2 back of Tampa and redeem themselves after a brass-knuckled gut punch of a blown-Paps-save loss the night before, have loaded the bases, in the bottom of the 14th, with no outs, down 4-1. The game has been as long as that last run-on sentence, and the remaining 20,000 or so semi-freddo fans are cheering their arses off. And then Youks hits a sac fly to right, scores one run. It's 4-2. Hey, still got two men on, only one out, and Tuesday night's 8th inning hero, Jason Bay is up. And the frozen fans are Bay-lieving. But Tampa has the scouting report that he's a sucker for low and away (unlike your mom, who likes it high and inside). And Bay whiffs. That leaves the game, the comeback, and the shot at getting back to a half-game out in the hands of Alex Cora. And that, much like bringing Mike Timlin in to hold a tie in extra innings, was all she wrote.
And for some reason I was not that upset.
I know I should have been. I had just spent over five hours of my life watching the game, hoping they hometown 9 could pull it out AND validate all that time spent watching (though at this point, considering how many thousands and thousands of hours we’ve all spent watching Sox, are a couple more in extra innings that big a friggin’ deal?) But I just couldn’t get too post-extra-innings-loss cranky. Come to think of it, I didn’t have my usual “What the rhymes-with-duck?!” reaction to Papelblown’s save the other night either. That one I chalked up to surprise, and a 3rd game left a shot at redemption. But I should have been unequivocally lava-crotched about Wednesday night’s game.
And then it hit me. I’m still in shock over Tom Brady going down for the season.
I can’t produce excessive to other but normal to me super-emotional reactions to my beloved Boston sports teams this week.
I’m uncomfortably numb. And like losing Brady on your reality AND fantasy team (two totally different but equally painful junk punches), this SUCKS.
I know some of you aren’t both Sox and Pats fans (heretics!) But if you were raised in or around The Hub then they’ve been your 1 and 2 sports punch for some time now. And when one loses you hope the other can win so as to provide some needed relief. Not that it’s their job to do so, or that they give two Fenway or Foxboro funbags about one or the other. But that’s what we do – “Pats lost, DAMNIT! Sure hope Sox can pull it out so the day isn’t a total loss.” – “Sox got swept, DAMNIT! Pats better win the 4 o’clock game or else I’m breaking furniture.” But there was no “WTF” in me at all Wednesday night. I shoulda been berating Francona for putting Timlin in, or panicking over the 4-game series with Toronto, downing an unnecessary midnight o’clock beer as I run possible “How the Sox don’t make the playoffs” scenarious through my neurotic head. But I didn’t. I just sat there, staring kinda blankly at the screen, half waiting for the nurse to wheel my back to my room as she pet my head and fed meds to me from a jello-shot cup. I’m comatose, shocked, psychologically incapacitated. And at a time when the Pats sure as Hell’s Belichick need me, as do the Sox, I’m in a sports coma.
I’m pretty sure I’ll snap out of it, soon. Hopefully in time to enjoy and root on the Sox this weekend, as well as the Pats when they need their fans more than ever (maybe Jet Favre and Eric Hamgini hatred alone can wake me from my funk.) the Sox are in a pennant race and they need their fans. It doesn’t say anywhere in the Red Sox Nation Constitution that taking time off to mourn the losses of another beloved team, be they from the Sox region or not, is allowed. You’re a Sox fan you root 24/7/365 and then some. Whatever it si, the Brady injury took the feelings right outta me, and I need to feel again. And fast.
Maybe a good weekend in Toronto where they all but lock up a Wild Card will get me the Soxtober injection that will do the trick. I know Tom Brady’s not running out onto the field Sunday, so I can scratch that off my list of “Cure-All’s”. But a strong showing by the Pats? That should slap me back into being the “loud-mouthed worrywart of a Boston sports fan who no matter the success of his teams still takes everything personally” that I can’t help but be. You know, Fitzy. Yeah, that’s the medicine I need.
Paging Dr. Cassel. Dr. Matt Cassel…patient Fitzy is ready in Room 1.
I am the guy from TownieNews.com where I vlog and blog about all things Pats, Sox, movies and more in the most entertaining and inappropriate ways possible. I can be reached at fitzy@townienews.com. Or check your local watering hole.
Tags: red sox fitzy jason bay sawxheads.com mike timlin
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