This Week in OB1og

Coco robs Wright in center

Yeah, it’s been a little over a week since my last post and I apologize, but it is not like there has been any public outcry/outrage over it. I don’t even have a good excuse except that maybe I didn’t feel like sitting in front of the computer after getting home from work all week. Instead, I watched the Sox sweep the Mets, which is something I haven’t done much of this year. Well, no one had watched them sweep the Mets yet; I mean watch the Sox on TV. I think the Orsillo Cam is brand new and, quite frankly, it frightens me.

So, the idea of this post is to catch up on this week’s activity, much like This Week in Basball does and a bit like Ed just did over on The Ed Zone.

I guess I’ll start with last Saturday because I can’t remember further back than that and it’s also the day after I posted Flickr pictures of Portland Rose Gardens that apparently no one bothered to view except for Ed and someone else. Of course, it’s hard to tell because Flickr only has counts for individual photo page hits and not photostream page views, so if you view the gallery photostream pages only, then I must ask why? Okay, so many photos are fine to look at that way, but most of the ones I put up were of flowers and you really need to see a larger version to get the detail and colors.

Mt. St. HelensIf anyone has any suggestions on how to better drive readers to view them, then leave me a comment. If you just aren’t interested in the photos, then that’s fine too. If you do like the photos, then you should check out the newest set of Mt. St. Helens. I also added some new ones of the Oregon coast and split up the Portland Oregon set. These finish off the photos I took on that trip while venturing from Oregon. My Mom and I spent the last weekend in Seattle and I have pictures from Seattle and Safeco Field to put up later.

Forgive the tangent, the photo thing was bugging me. So, last Saturday I had Sox tickets for the Phillies and it was a good pitching matchup between Brett Myers and Curt Schilling. Of course, Myers was arrested the day before, or at least arraigned, for spousal abuse and that would add some flavor to the outing since the brain-trust in Philly thought it would still be fine for him to pitch. I ended up ditching attending the game in favor of watching it on TV. I made it just about to the T station and turned around because I figured it would be a rainy game and I didn’t want to deal with it. Unfortunately, the weather held out in Boston and it was only raining on the South Shore. Oh wells, it was still a good game to watch on TV for a couple reasons.

First, Myers got beat down by the Sox with their bats and the fans with their jeers; and good for them too. If I went to the game and posted about it, the title likely would have been “Assclown on the Mound.” Yes, a continuation of my series of Ass* themed ballpark postings, but instead of being about fans, it would be about the idiot on the mound. That asshat shouldn’t have been allowed to pitch. Sure, innocent until proven guilty and all that, but his wife and two witnesses confirm what happened and that’s enough for me. No man should ever hit a woman. Punch a f-ing wall or something.

Second, David “Big Papi” Ortiz, hit another walk-off bomb into the batter’s eye to win the game. I’m sorry to have missed that as it would have made two games in a row where I would have witnessed Mr. Clutch in action. Make no doubt about that either. I’m ashamed to have questioned it before, but with that one and his walk-off single on Monday — that’s right kids, walk-off hits to win two games in a row — has burned any such thoughts from my mind. I truly haven’t seen anything like it in sports.

So, after we blasted the Phils out of town for our third series sweep in a row, in come Pedro Martinez and the Mets. I think I owe Joe, Juice and/or Ed a beer for this one as Petey did end up pitching against the Sox. I know two of us bet against the other two that he’d find a way to bow out of facing his old team. From what I heard later this week, he didn’t want to face them, but it was his turn. Anyway, I thought the Sox brass showed a lot of class by showing the video montage on Tuesday night so as to encourage the fans to celebrate Pedro rather than treat him like Johnny 👿 Demon. Of course, the fans didn’t disappoint and gave Petey the ovation he deserved and it carried over to the next night when he made his start. My hope is they would have done so without any kind of prompting anyway.

Unfortunately for the Mets, it would appear the hype and activity surrounding Pedro took its toll on him because he got jacked around the park by the Sox. I was sorry to see it, but you can understand how it happened. His normal routine had to be all messed up with the two days in Boston, so couple that with the emotions of the thing and you can see how he might not be focused on the job at hand. His stuff certainly showed he was off and that might also be attributed to an injury. It was too bad, but make no mistake that if he comes back to face us in the World Series, things will be different, so in that case, maybe it was good to get out of his system now. Roger Clemens may have been the man, but Pedro is still the best Sox pitcher I have seen in my baseball lifetime.

Last night I attended the game with Joe and we watched Curt Schilling beat “Billerica’s own” Tom Glavine. I think that became the real prefix of his name this week. It’s great to see a hometown boy make good, but I was glad to see the Sox keep their streak going and win the game. Yeah, it turned out to be the pitcher’s duel that Beckett vs. Pedro was not, but the Sox played AL and NL ball to beat the NL team. A couple solo shots, some bunting, a few sac flies and a stolen base won it for them, but there were two other outstanding plays that made a difference. The pick off of Franco at second ended a threat. He had huge lead with every pitch and I wondered if they’d put something on and they did. I guess I wasn’t the only one that noticed. 😉

The last, which deserves a paragraph of its own, was the catch made by Crisp. Our seats are in center, so we can’t see into the triangle or over where the Monstah meets center. At first blush, the ball looked like it was either going to clang off the wall in center or he just wasn’t going to get to it. I lost sight of Coco after he made his break, but thought he might make it there cuz he’s just so damn fast. I quickly turned to watch the video board. It was dead silent in our section and then all of a sudden the crowd along the first and third base lines let out an enormous roar, he must have made the catch! The rest of my section turned to watch the board and they finally replay it and we let out a huge roar. What an incredible catch. The Mets fan in front of me was immediately deflated because if he doesn’t make that catch, the game is tied, but now it’s Pap in the ninth. Good Night.

I will say, I was also impressed with how many Mets fans were in the stands. They travel well I guess as it felt a lot like a Yankee game, just without any venom. Although, there were a few events in the stands that suggested otherwise. Thinking back over the years though, many of the NL teams travel well. Seeing the Reds, Cubs and Cardinals at Fenway in past years also saw a lot of their fans turning out.

Finally, this week also saw my favorite sports writer of all time Peter Gammons have emergency surgery for a brain aneurysm on Tuesday. Ed had some very kind words to say about Peter in the post I linked to above, so I won’t try to match them, but I do have a little anecdote to add.

I had the chance to shake Peter’s hand one day at Fenway, but didn’t want to bother him. I was there with my Mother and Noelle to take part in a day of filming Fever Pitch as guests (us and fifty to sixty plus other family and friends) of one of the associate producers. Anyway, Noelle and I were waiting for my Mom under the stands and in came Peter. He met the producer, Chris — who coincidentally Noelle had met years previously when they were filming Osmosis Jones in Plymouth — and off they went. Knowing how nice and gracious Peter is, I should have just extended my hand to Mr. Gammons, told him I was a big fan and left it at that, but I just didn’t do it and it kind of bums me out. I guess I was thinking about Mookie harassing John Valentin when we worked at Papa Ginos and Val would come in from time to time as he lived in the area.

Peter will still be in the hospital this week, but according to his blog, his CD comes out on Tuesday (see the bottom of the gray sidebar with his bio and photo in it). As an owner of the first Hot Stove Cool Music disc, I was already looking forward to it and it’s too bad he won’t be able to be out and celebrate it with his fans. I hope Peter makes a full recovery and that he can get back to the ballpark — be it Fenway or a Cape League field — soon, whether he’s covering the game or just watching.

Time to watch Jason Johnson blow the Sox streak against Dontrelle and the Marlins. It’s already the 3rd and they are down 5-0. All good things must come to an end, but I hope they still set the errorless game streak mark tonight if they lose.