I didn't follow baseball very closely this year, so it was a bit of a surprise to see three AL teams all crack 100 wins. It is pretty amazing when one team breaks the century mark. Houston, New York and Minnesota had great seasons. Hard to say who will emerge as the AL champion. On the NL side, Los Angeles nearly matched Houston's incredible 106 wins.
A big season doesn't necessarily translate into a World Series. I found that out many years ago when the Seattle Mariners posted a staggering 116 wins only to lose to the Yankees in five games in the AL championship series. The Yankees had won only 95 games during the regular season. I keep waiting for the Mariners to return to form but after 18 long seasons I have pretty much given up hope. It seems that magical season took all the air out of their sails. The Mariners only won 67 games this year after getting off to a hot start.
You really have to be a fan to follow a team through all 162 games. I've caught a few games over the years. You could buy a cheap seat for about 6 bucks back then. One time I found myself sitting between two ardent Red Sox fans in Fenway Park. Boston was about as hapless in the 80s as the Mariners are now, but this old man and young woman knew the stat lines for all the players and were shooting them back and forth across my bow, until I offered the woman my seat, so that they could better compare notes. The game is a religion for some. I used to be this way about football when I was a teenager, but in time I developed other interests.
The game is much better to watch in person than it is on television. You have to have a view of the field to see all the different alignments a team makes for each batter and each situation. Television focuses mostly on the duel between the pitcher and the hitter. Still, it is a long slog and if you aren't versed on the game it can be quite boring.
You underestimate the athleticism of these players until you see one of those incredible catches by a short stop and throw to first base, or one of those leaping catches at the wall to save a home run. I once tried to take a pitch at 90 miles an hour from a machine. It wasn't even a blur. I didn't see the ball at all. Imagine facing Nolan Ryan, whose fast balls were clocked at over 100 miles an hour.
Baseball is a strange and mysterious sport. It requires a devotion not like any other sport, as you prepare yourself for key moments when you have to deliver or shut up. The concentration level is intense. One momentary lapse and the whole season is lost as Bill Buckner found out in the 1986 World Series. A moment he was never able to live down.
It's a bit frustrating to see the Astros vying for another World Series title, as I wonder why the Mariners could never put together a championship season given all the great players that have come through Seattle. Probably their best chance was in the 90s when they had Junior, A-Rod and Big Unit on the team. Seeing Pete Alonso break the rookie home run record made me think of a young Ken Griffey, Jr. pounding balls into the outer bleachers of the Kingdome.
The city invested heavily in a new stadium in the late 90s, only to see the Mariners come up short of an NL title, let alone a World Series. Eventually Rodriguez and Johnson would win titles at New York and Arizona. Anyway, here's to the Astros. May good fortune smile on them again.
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