Walk Off

There’s a special tie to Baseball history that continues to thrill fans of the game, especially in October.

This year I’m torn. Cubs, Dodgers, Yankees, or Astros? If you’ve been watching the 2017 MLB playoffs it’s been a treat so far. Readers of this blog know by now I’m a dedicated Cubs fan, however . . .

First of all, there’s Jose Altuve, the Astros 5′ 6″, 165 lb. sensation, what a joy to watch. He plays the game with reckless abandonment. Will he hit a home run, steal a base to manufacture a run, or simply fly around the bases from first to score the winning run? He’s currently batting .466 in the playoffs and has captured the hearts of baseball fans everywhere. Don’t believe me, just tune into any ALCS game this season and listen to the broadcasters revel in his accomplishments.

In complete contrast is the Yankee Rookie sensation Aaron Judge, 6′ 7″, 282 lbs., built for power and speed. With an unassuming smile, and calm demeanor he goes about his business professionally. Criticized by the press for batting .172 in the first two ALCS games against the Astros. His attitude is best summed up with this quote, ”To a certain extent," Judge said, "I enjoy failure. It's part of the game. There's always room to grow, there's room to improve. So it's been a fun ride. And it's my first year, still pretty crazy.”

Judge, an All Star in his rookie year, the Home Run Derby Champion for 2017, and American League Home run leader, with a record 56 (eclipsing Mark McGuire’s record of 50 in 1987). Star credentials for the historic Yankee franchise already being compared to Babe Ruth with gargantuan blasts.

And how about the Dodgers? Exactly 29 years to the day from Kirk Gibson’s memorable walk-off, fist pumping home run, Justin Turner launches his first walk-off home run to seal a Dodger victory over my Cubs in Dodger Stadium! What a season for the Dodgers: 104 Wins and just 58 losses. The previous record setting, World Champion 1955 Dodgers had 95 wins and 55 losses. Are the Dodgers destined to win another World Series this year? We’ll see.

And what about my Cubs? Well, with last nights loss to the Dodgers they are currently 3-0 in the NLCS. But there’s still hope. Lets’ get Ben Zobrist, the 2016 MVP of the World Series, on base in the lead-off spot. Then have Bryant and Rizzo drive in the runs the Cubs need to win the next three games this Post Season. Remember, it’s the best of seven. If the Cubs win we could be in for another exciting game seven!

As you can probably tell by now, being a Cubs fan all these years, it’s not really about who wins the World Series (Go Cubs). It’s the thrill of victory for the team that provides the most suspense and entertainment for the fans and proves once again that Baseball is the greatest game of all.

Cubs, Dodgers, Yankees, or Astros? Who are you rooting for this year?

Comments

The Gopher Problem and the High Powered Solution

Vacationing in Maine this week, just a short drive down the coast from Freeport, it is hard not to think about the outsized impact one frustrated outdoorsman had on the gear we all use today. Bad equipment can ruin a perfectly good day on the water or the trail, but it takes a special kind of vision to turn cold feet into a century-old empire. This is the story of the company we now know as L.L.Bean, but more importantly, it is a masterclass in integrity, learning from failure, and standing behind your work. In 1912, Leon Leonwood Bean faced a persistent problem: returning from expeditions in the Maine woods with cold, wet feet. Instead of complaining, he got creative. He had a local shoemaker stitch waterproof rubber soles onto the flexible leather uppers of a hunting boot. He called it the Maine Hunting Shoe and mailed a flyer promising perfect satisfaction. Then reality arrived. Ninety of his first 100 pairs failed when the rubber separated from the leather. Not an effective product...

Beyond Facts-The Deep Dive

✨ In this episode, Beyond Facts: Reimagining School–in the Age of AI . . . This week's podcast is a bit different; it's another example of how Artificial Intelligence (AI) can offer tools to creatively enhance your analytical presentation of information. We took this week's blog and copied it into Gemini with the question, “If a story is to work, it must, on some level, create an illusion of escape and also achieve a goal simultaneously. Does this apply to my blog post that follows?” What's created is not just an analysis of the writing, but an AI-generated discussion produced “On the Fly” - Enjoy! Did you know that the word "school" comes from the ancient Greek word scholē , which originally meant "leisure"? Not a rigid schedule or droning lectures filled with "facts," but free time for thinking and conversation. To the Greeks, learning happened best when life slowed down—when you had room to reflect, to ask questions, and to wrestle ...

Stamps and Snow

In this episode, Stamps and Snow . . . You don’t usually walk into the local Post Office expecting a time warp . . . but here we are. All we wanted were stamps for this year's Christmas cards— yes, the old-fashioned paper ones that require licking, sticking, and hoping the Postal Service is feeling ambitious this week. But holiday errands have a talent for slowing you down, almost like the universe whispering, “Relax. You’re not getting out of this line any faster anyway.” So we waited. And while we waited, we talked (Are you surprised?). Because the Post Office is one of the few places where people still look up from their phones long enough to talk . . . Maybe it's because they're holding packages. It’s the modern town square: part civic duty, part free entertainment, part sociology experiment. The discussion began with holiday specials streaming on Netflix, Paramount+, and other services during this time of year. One gentleman who has lived in Vista since 1958 told us,...

On Becoming Real

Some things get better with wear: old shoes, old friendships, and old books. Especially old books. A new volume arrives with crisp corners and a spine that hasn’t yet learned to bend. An old one has been somewhere. It has traveled through time in the hands of people who may no longer be around to tell us what they found inside. The copy of The Velveteen Rabbit (first published in 1922) on my desk is one of those books. My friend Don Hanley gave it to me. This late-1950s Doubleday edition features William Nicholson’s original illustrations and cream paper boards softened by age. Worn corners, a split spine, and colored tabs mark passages worth revisiting. Don didn’t hand me a keepsake. He gave me homework. When we talked about the book recently, he pointed me straight to the nursery conversation between a young rabbit and an old Skin Horse. The rabbit had noticed the mechanical toys around him—the ones with internal gears, bright paint, and stick-out handles that seem terribly impressiv...

On The Fly

Search This Blog