It isn’t often that I watch an entire baseball game on TV. I love going to one, though. Catching a game at a local minor league park is a perfect way for me to spend an evening off on the road. Last season, we saw the Asheville Tourists, Charlotte Knights, and Memphis Redbirds. And, of course, we watched plenty of Top Ten plays at various bars around the country.
I would not consider myself a “Denver Sports Fan” either. If the Broncos make it to the playoffs, I can not wait for them to take a tumble (Denver is so much more calm in the regular season), and the Nuggets only serve to get in the way of my hockey. If it involves the Crush, Rapids, Broncos, or Nuggets, I glaze over like a deer caught in the wrong party dress at a bah mitzvah.
And yet, I have always had a soft spot in my heart for the Rockies. Perhaps it is because my mom took to them so quickly, after years of being a die-hard Cubs fan. Maybe it’s because they don’t cost an arm and a leg to see. It could be that they are like a manatee, so quiet and docile. Whatever it may be, I talk about the Rockies in hushed tones, with the reverent respect that one should hold for a baseball team, and it’s dicey relationship with superstition. When you play 162 games in a year, superstition takes hold where it would not in other sports.
Well, tonight, the Rockies played game 163. 163? Yes, they played in the craziest of all baseball games, the wild card playoff game. One game, after your team does the unexpected and ties another team, and you both wind up in the right place at the right time. When that happens, it turns into a cross between Michael Jackson’s “Bad” video, and a high school production of “West Side Story.” You have to dance, you have to fight, and no one knows who will be left standing.
The Rockies, in a game that should have ended an hour and a half earlier, danced the dance, came out with war wounds, and were winners in a game that should have never existed. Matt Holliday, potential MVP of the league, was the dog of the eighth inning, when he took a step the wrong way on a fly ball and scored the tying run. And later, he was the hero of the day, scoring the game winning run in the thirteenth (yes, 13th). And it wasn’t a walk off run, but a carry off, as Holliday slid in to home, and used his face to break the momentum. Cheering turned quickly to concern, and while the TV viewing audience watched Holiday squirm in pain, his team mates, oblivious to what was happening, celebrated like they hadn’t been to the post season since 1995. Oh, wait, the Rockies haven’t.
So I will be following this next series, seven games against the Phillies. You may not read about it here, because this is a hockey blog. But know that I will be watching, and cheering on, the Rockies in the post season.
At least, when I’m not watching the Avalanche.
Go Rockies.