"It's great to be young and a Yankee."

This part of post was written last night, starting at 1am, and then picked up intermittenly between bouts of dozing:

None of the games were really blowouts, by any stretch. The most the Southsiders beat the good guys by was 4.

9-6, 7-3, 2-1. No blowouts. But they might as well have been, from where I was sitting. They looked like the Mighty Ducks taking on Trinidad. (Cheers, Alex L.) The White Sox looked like they had a plan and were executing it. The Yankees looked like Kevin Arnold's garage band ("The Electric Shoes." Awesome.) at their first gig. 


Everytime the top of the inning rolled around, I half expected the Yankees to start looking around at each other completely panicked and bewildered, like they were in a dream where the curtains were about to raise, and they were all collectively realizing that they didn't memorize any of their lines.

Ok, I'm exagerrating. It is more to point out how seamless everything about the White Sox was, and how strained everything on our end was. Phil Hughes was the losing pitcher tonight, and he really wasn't all that bad, but he did lose, so I'm not too impressed. I mean, it's like March Madness rolls around and ESPN shows the Top Ten Buzzer Beaters and they all look so fantastic, but for my money, the only ones that were REALLY worthy were the ones that won the champtionship game. Because who cares how awesome you were if there were no dividends? No, it's not how you play the game. It's whether you win or lose. Everyone's been so misinformed. (Nice job, Mr. Rice.)

Moving on.. sorry, I'm more than a bit tired right now, having gone on zero hours of sleep for the past 2 nights, and it's starting to take its toll. I'm scared I may just slip into some kind of micronap mid-day at work, and I won't realize I'm asleep, and start doing what I normally do inmy sleep. Which is ramble incessantly. And stick cheese slices on my face. And scoop peanut butter into the sink. Make a sandwich out of whipped cream, proscuitto, and ice cubes.

Argh, focus, asshole. Not you. Me.

So, Hughes was kind of effective but mostly ineffective. He gave up a homerun, as he want to do, and it came off the bat of Alex Rios, as is want to happen.

This is where I resumed writing this morning.

Strange and I watched the 2nd half of game together. He's one of 5 people (at most) who know how to deal with me during baseball games. And he's also THE only person I know who loves 2 teams almost equally. How is that possible? It's "strange," even. (See what I did there?)

So Strange texts me a few innings into the game: "3rd straight night of our announcer ripping us. I'll give you the quotes when I see you." So he comes to meet me at a bar, and it's the first time I've seen him in ever (IN EVER, JERRY. IN EVER.) And he tells me how the announcers can't stop marveling at how sparse the stadium is.

"South Side Sox blog said Ken Singleton nailed the attendance thing - I guess the variable pricing (Tix way more $$ for Yankees, Boston, Angels, Cubs (Which one doesn't belong there??). Still disappointing for a first place squad vs NYY, but I guess it's a sign of the times. These games have had a playoff feel.  I'm sure tonight is no different. Hopefully this is the year they meet in the ALCS - although my head may explode (pause) if that happens."

Um, yes. If the Yanks playing Chicago in the playoffs, the entire city of Manhattan would be on high alert. With Strange and I on opposite ends of the city, it would be like some kind of medival joust.

And this is when I finally got to finish it, at 8:37pm.

Upper East/Lower East Gauntlet

Anyways. The game flew by ("Sorry we picked the one 2-hour game of the season to meet up to watch the game.") And the Yankees lost. Chris Sale was on my fantasy team last year and I remember he was like my go-to "holds" guy (pause?)

And last night he was filth. Pure filth. In the most poetic, paralyzing way possible. The baseball cornered like it was on rails.

And it was both breathtaking and heartbreaking.

Also, Addison Reed? Not a bad looking guy. I'm sorry for the ridiculous brevity of this recap. I'll make it up to you this weekend. A special apology to Strange. Also, a special retraction of the apology because your team swept the Yankees and it was bad.

I was talking to my dad today, and he said he never gets nervous before he gives presentations because if you know your subject matter inside out and backwards, if you're prepared and confident, you can't go wrong.

The White Sox played this series the way my dad does public speaking. The Yankees played this series the way I did high school math tests. You justify not studying with the excuse you can't study for math, you can't memorize math, you don't know what problems you'll be asked to solve.

But there are ways. And not identifying the gaps in your scope of faculties sooner rather than later amounts to painful floundering.

The difference is that at my best, I could never master math. At their best, the Yankees ARE baseball.

You're better than that, guys. Put on some montage music and get back to work!

I need sleep. Or a cheesesteak.