Dan Dunn’s Podium

I’ve had multiple requests about Monday’s game. I don’t think I could describe it, couldn’t do it justice. I got enough requests that  I’ll give it a try.

I’ll set the stage a bit by saying that I was at Sunday’s game, the loss, the night before.  That was a long, slow, game, but dramatic and filled with emotion.  Beckett was clearly off.  I give the Sox credit for being close.  Still, it was draining and hurt the spirit.  

Side note: I think that is the first game in Fenway I’ve been to with more than 39,000 attendees.  Is that a record for the modern era?

Monday’s game had a different atmosphere.  Sunday people had arrived hoping to cheer a coronation.  Monday people came to cheer a win, but with a healthy fear for a loss.  Game 5 in Anaheim was a grim prospect, so Game 4 was a quasi-must-win game.

People were ready to stand and cheer.  Virtually any 2-out situation or key at-bat brought some of the crowd to its feet.  The rules were unclear, though.  It wasn’t unusual to look out at the park and see whole swaths of the park standing, then a bright line of division with a swath of sitters.  Who could tell what made one section stand or sit.  In my section, the very front rows tended to sit, but everyone else stood.  I was often the front-most stander, and that was a bit odd.  I really didnt’ care.

There were very few Angel fans.  I didn’t see any on Sunday and saw one on Monday.  I think he might have been the reason so many people stayed seated in front of me - they didn’t want to be like him, standing alone in the second row.  He got ejected eventually.

Lester was pitching a gem, and everyone knew it.  The question in my mind was whether or not the Red Sox offense would find the stroke.  They were 9 innings into a shutout streak, and you can never tell when those will break.  When the Sox got two in the fifth, the stress relaxed a half-notch. No one was writing any conclusions, but you had to like being ahead 2-0 better than the alternatives.

When the 6th and 7th passed without any threat, you started to feel a rise in expectations.  The math kicks in: “only six more outs!”  And then the Angels struck.

Okajima started smoothly with two outs.  He walked Teixeira.  A two-out walk seemed harmless enough, but with Guerrero coming up, it’s a bigger deal than you’d think.  Masterson came in and walked Guerrero.  It’s hard to blame him.  In person, Guerrero is downright scary.  He has no meaningful strike zone.  His bat can hit anything, anywhere.  Then Torii Hunter.  The situation was still manageable, still room for error: a single wouldn’t be fatal.  Just get by.  Then there was the passed ball, and suddenly it was second and third.  No more room for error.  And just like that, the mistake - single to Hunter, tie game.  Masterson got out of the inning from there.

Here’s where words fail me.  The game is frozen, but still moving.  Maybe it’s me frozen.  But the pitches keep coming, each one of them filled with risk and hope.  The game  can change now now now now now but it doesn’t change.  We’re all stuck in this weird limbo, hopeful, fearful, unable to change the outcome, unable to predict the outcome, just stuck.   We cheer, we sit, we stand, but we’re all just stuck.

The feeling changes in the ninth with an Angels lead-off double - you can feel the earth tilt against you.  Then a picture-perfect bunt gets the runner to third.  You know that the odds are really stacked against the Sox now.  The Angels are likely to score, and you know that the Sox are unlikely to muster another two runs, having scored only two in the last 18 innings.  Then, still frozen, something crazy happens that you can’t see too clearly, as Varitek charges up the third base line after a pitch.  Then you see the ball bounce away, and you know that you are doomed. Still frozen, but now doomed and frozen.  You wait for the Angel to run home.  Instead, he turns and walks into his dugout.

As you all know, what actually happened was that Varitek tagged him, then dropped the ball.  On the far side of third base in an unexpected place, you can’t tell that from the bleachers.  From the bleachers, it feels like a miracle just happened.  I was in shock, but I told Twitter what I knew. The top of the ninth passed without damage.

Then the bottom of the ninth.  It was never a sure thing, a nice one-out double, a close two-out single.  The night before had been full of chances, but no runs.  You knew there was hope, but until the run crossed the plate, it was only potential.  We’d seen potential fail before, and fail recently.  When the run crossed the plate it was joy, releif, and happy mayhem.

I stuck around the park, smiling like a fool, cheering and shouting.  I watched the team on the screen in the lockeroom, watched them come out onto the field.  I watched their young kids sprint around the infield.  I watched them douse the cop, Billy Dunn, with champagne.  I decided that there were too many lingerers and the party was going to run out of steam before anything magical happened and  I went home.

I spent Tuesday hoarse, tired, and still a bit shell-shocked.

And that is what it’s like to be there when your team wins the ALDS.

While we’ve been enjoying our beatiful fall weather, here comes a note from the north.  And not the Far North - from just 150 miles, a three-hour car ride north, comes the first snow of the year.  There’s enough snow on Mt. Washington to take out the snowboard.

I hurriedly put on my plastic boots, threw on my outerwear, and grabbed my snowboard to go make my first turns of the season. I knew there was a reason I left the board and boots up here after my last turns made nearly three months ago to the day.

Those pesky three months of spring, summer, and fall are over.  It’s back to winter on Mt. Washington.

Universal Hub points out the ongoing stupidity of the police unions on the civilian flagger issue.  NECN has video of “off duty cops harassing the flaggers, driving into oncoming traffic. . . the worksite temporarily shut down.”

I can’t say I’m unhappy about these incredibly stupid protests.  If the police unions were playing this smarter, they’d be more compelling.  Driving the wrong way down the road makes you wonder why that cop isn’t in jail, not about his detail shift.

For reasons that defy logic, the most popular post on my blog my post from last summer about the parrot in the Red Sox bullpen.  I’m not one to argue.  I people love the parrot, they love the parrot.  Here’s a parrot update:

The parrot has been absent all year.  I saw 20ish games, and there was no parrot in the bullpen.  Until! Sunday’s game featured the parrot, and tonight too.  The parrot these days is perched on a baseball.  

Side note: tonight may have been the best game I’ve ever seen.  The highs, the lows, the great plays, the great pitching, the clutch hitting - just great.  I’ll be able to ignore Francona’s blunders and bask in the glow.

Back to the parrot:

With much fanfare, the MBTA announced the availablility of secure bike racks at Alewife station two weeks ago.  At the time I was guardedly optimistic, but worried about maintenance.  I should have know better; the MBTA can’t keep anything in working order.  How secure is a bike cage with a door that won’t close?

I first noticed the problem last week, on the 26th.  As I approached the cage I noticed that it had far more bikes than any other day so far.  As I got closer, I realized the door was open! It wasn’t wedged open or anything; it just hung there loose, swinging in the breeze.  I looked to see if there was any obvious vandalism but didn’t see anything.  I parked my bike and went down to the station.  I found an MBTA employee and told her about the door.  She said she’d have someone look at it.  When I returned to the cage (not the same day), it was fixed.  I didn’t blog about it because I figured it was a minor snag.

Today when I parked my bike, the door was open again.  It wasn’t swinging loose, but the door would only close part way.  You had to push it closed.  I again looked for vandalism and didn’t see any.

Again, i went down to the station and found an MBTA employee.  I told him the problem.  He replied that he’d called the problem in, but no one would fix anything.  He went on a long rant about mangement, two years without an employment contract, bad faith negotiating, $300,000 bike racks, four-foot door hinges on five-foot doors, and repeatedly told me that I shouldn’t hold my breath for a fix.  At 7:30 tonight I got back to Alewife.  I can’t say I was surpised to see the door to the bike cage hanging open.

So, what do you think?  My bet is that it gets fixed again later this month, breaks again later this month, and is left to swing loose until it is permanently damaged by vandals.  Any takers?

Massachusetts is the only state that doesn’t have civilian flaggers at road construction sites.  It is the only state that has police for all street work.  Many have tried to change the policy, only to be thwarted by the unions’ clout in the legislature.  Governor Patrick forced a policy change through a regulation, avoiding the legislature.  The police union was furious and packed the hearing with hissing, jeering bullies.

Today, a work crew from the MWRA (a state agency funded by state and local tax dollars) was blocked from doing work by police officers (funded by state and local tax dollars).  (link found via universalhub.com)

I’m sure those union members went home with a smile on their face.  They won the battle!  Those flaggers didn’t get anything done!  They got in front of reporters and cameras, and they showed the governor who was boss!

The thing is, the unions completely misjudged.  Taxpayers and voters are smart enough to see that this is about greed, not public safety.  Every one of us has driven by a cop on a detail, talking on the phone, sitting in his car, not paying attention to traffic.  Most of us have seen a cop on a detail on a dead-end street.  We all know that some road construction requires police presence, but many do not.

Patrick is going to win this issue walking away.  The unions don’t understand that.

What they also don’t understand is the downstream affects of this very public effort.  Question One is on the ballot in November; it seeks to end the income tax in Massachusetts.  How many voters will watch the news tonight, see the waste of taxpayer dollars, and just decide it’s not worth paying for?  The public unions are lining up against Question One, and they won the battle on the North Shore today.  But did they lose the war? 

Sarah Palin got 909 votes when she ran for mayor of Wasilla in 1999.  I got 1506 votes when I ran for state rep in 2004.  

I’m just sayin’.

The Senate tonight voted to approve the bailout bill.  Not only did they approve $700 billion (BILLION) in spending, but they approved $150 billion in tax breaks.  Apparently our financial crisis is so severe that we need to rescind a $.39 tax on wooden arrows.  Wooden arrows?  Are you kidding me?

Are our legislators so totally intellectually and morally bankrupt that an unacceptable spending bill of unprecedented proportions can be transformed into something acceptable by throwing in a little gift for everyone?  Can they really justify squandering such a huge sum because, at long last, the makers of NASCAR tracks have a smaller tax burden?

I feel like I can dangle a piece of tinfoil in front of Congress, hand them all a lollipop, and tell them to hire me as a Red Sox Playoff Game Historical Evaluator.  At $1,000,000 a game, I’d be dirt cheap in comparison.

One final item before I take my enraged self to bed: I’d like you all to refresh yourselves on the US Constitution, Article I, Section VII, which reads: “All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives . . .”  And then ask yourself: why is the Senate voting on a revenue bill that was defeated in the House?

We need to clean house.

I’ve been looking for a house for a few months, and a couple weeks ago I found one that I liked enough to make an offer.  After weeks of back-and-forth, we have a signed offer letter.

I wanted to stay in Arlington.  I didn’t really care what part of Arlington.  I want the place to be dog-friendly.  The house satisfies all requirements, and has a few nice-to-haves too. You can read the basics on the house on Zillow.

I was happy renting, but the house on Stowecroft has been losing its appeal.  There has been very little maintenance over the last 10 years.  The windows . . . it’s hard to tell whether they are open or closed.  Peeling paint all over etc.  So when house prices started to droop and mortgage rates stayed reasonable, I decided it was time to start the search.  This is the right cycle for me to buy.

Of course, there is a bit of anxiety about the current economic climate.  So far mortgage rates have been staying low (if a bit volatile).  I hope they stay low for a few more days.

Now the multi-step process begins.  House inspection tomorrow, then purchase and sale, and hopefully, closing in November.

Bush says that if we don’t do a bailout, then we’ll get a recession. It’s tough to argue that, but. . . when there are huge financial mistakes, don’t you expect a recession? I’m unconvinced that a bailout actually averts a recession. It just costs more.

Brad Feld: “I reread Nassim Nicholas Taleb’ brilliant book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. I reached a very simple conclusion - everything that I was watching being discussed on CNBC was probably incorrect and, more importantly, likely irrelevant. The actual events that occurred would take me less than five minutes to read the following week when I skim BusinessWeek in the bathroom. The commentary was just noise.”

All of these talking heads saying that we need a bailout are empty parrots. Bernake and Paulson haven’t slept in days - they aren’t capable of rational thought anymore. Bush was never a problem solver. McCain and Obama are focused on November, not the long term.

I haven’t changed my mind. Let the failures fail. Let a million successes bloom.