Wednesday, November 17, 2004

Connecticut's Team

One thousand people showed up on the New Haven green today to see the trophy. On a weekday. I'm proud of us, Southern CT. According to the news estimates, we more than doubled the turnout in Hartford.

Pat & I were hoping that Sox announcer and Hamden native Joe Castiglione would appear. And our wish came true. Not only was he there, but he acted as emcee for much of the time. After having listened to him on the radio since 1983, it was great to actually SEE him while he was speaking. He was great. Somebody yelled out for him to do "the call." He thought about it for about a second, then just broke into it. It didn't hit me until then, as he was imitating his own World Series-ending description, that he used one of his favorite phrases: "(Foulke) stabs it!"
Other favorites include: "Rice is under it, he staggers, but he makes the catch," "Popped up in foul ground, Quintana going over, by the dugout, but he'll need a ticket," "Catorce ponchados por Pedro," "Boddicker rocks, kicks, and deals," "...to retire the side," and of course, the time-honored classic, "...(excitedly) back to the warning track, back to the waaaaall...(then dejectedly) but the wind holds it up and he tracks it down."

If I ever do get NESN, I think I'll still listen to games on the radio every once in a while, just to hear the best announcer in baseball. He looked so happy today up there. What a day for Castiglione. And look at those quirky quotes he has. So much more real than the contrived BS calls of Jon Sterling, announcer of the chokingest team of all time, the New York yankees. I'm just gonna say right now how happy I am that those arrogant A-holes lost, and we won. Just look at highlights of Games 1 through 3 of the ALCS. Get a good look at the faces of the yanks and their fans. Those are the expressions of people who knew 100% in their minds that they COULDN'T LOSE, and that they were better people for it. Think of that, and then watch the highlights of Game 7, when the Red Sox celebrated on THEIR field. But you cn't see the yankee fans' faces at that moment, because they all WENT HOME. In about the fifth inning. All that talk by Michael Y2K about how "Red Sox fans know deep down that something bad is about to happen," while yankee fans know they're going to pull it out-- For those statements to be proved TOTAL BULLSHIT has made my life complete. While leaving the event today, I got such a great feeling, thinking about how fun next year is going to be. That's right, media poet wanna-bes, the Red Sox have finally won it all, and I'm more excited about next year than I've ever been going into a season. I haven't lost my passion, I haven't switched to rooting for the Cubs, I haven't "lost my reason to live." Oh, but I'm "just another fan" now. Amother completely meaningless statement. The Red Sox are just another team because they did what every team is trying to do? A hundred plus years of history and tradition, now meaningless? You're a dumbass if you buy any of this. You want me to admit that the Carlton Fisk homer wasn't that great after all? Because the team won the World Series in 2004? Keep tellin' yourself that. If it'll make you stop writing crappy, untrue articles about my team, then please, consider them "just another team." Fine. No different from the Devil Rays. But I won't believe it until I hear someone say the words "Devil Ray Nation."

So back to today: Theo was there, as it turns out, and we all went nuts for him. He was pretty embarrassed about all the cheering, telling us to save it for Youk, since he likes the attention more. He also said he used to play soccer on the New Haven green. I got a lot of shots of Theo and Youk with the trophy right in front of them. We were about three people back from the stage, ten feet from the trophy. Lucchino saud some good stuff about RSN taking over southern CT from the empire. (Lots of talk about pizza from everyone, too. Not a big deal to me. The way I see it, asking me if I like thin or thick crust is like asking me if I want a thin or thick stack of money. Unless you tell me the thin stack is made up of hundreds, and the thick is all singles, I'll probably just take the thick, because, yeah, it contains MORE.) Everybody stayed around, signing for people for a good while. Just now I sat like a drooling idiot watching (and taping) basically the same story about all of this on every different CT news channel.

Quickly about Pedro, don't believe anything you read about what's going on. Especially things that appear in the New York Post. (This also goes for ANY story in the New York Post.)

And about Pavano, I don't see how we wouldn't get him.

I'm psyched about all the Johnny Damon's appearing inBrooklyn lately. I just happen to be going there soon, so I'll be on the lookout for them.

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