Game 1

I haven't talked a lot about the baseball playoffs, suffice it to say that I think a lot of it speaks for itself. The fact that the White Sox are there, for me, is surprising. When I got to Chicago, the Cubs made their run. I thought, along with much of Chicago that if 2003 wasn't the Cubs year then they certainly would make it soon. The White Sox weren't even a factor. Even after the Cubs blew it in Game 6 and Game 7, the odds, because of Prior, Wood and Zambrano seemed to be in their favor. Last year, both teams faded late (the Cubs still have never, in their history been to the playoffs in consecutive years). I was still there when they sent Carlos Lee to Milwaukee for Podsednik, when everyone expressed some shock, because here you were essentially giving away a big RBI man, after they'd lost Magglio Ordonez, for a guy who stole a lot of bases but didn't have the best On Base percentage for a lead-off man. Obviously its worked out (it worked well for the Brewers too). Still, I'm interested in knowing how Chicago on the whole, is embracing this, given that it is essentially a Cubs town. That being said, here are some observations from Game 1:

The way the White Sox started was a great indication that they had a game plan against Clemens. The at-bat Jermaine Dye had, working Clemens until he got the ball he could drive to the opposite field, was a thing of beauty. The way they attacked in the second inning, even before Clemens was hurt, showed they weren't going to be intimidated, despite the fact that their coaches and GM had twice as many at bats against him as the roster does.

Every playoffs seems to produce an AJ Pierzynski, someone who just happens to get rolling and ends up in the middle of everything. (By the way, my take on the umpires missing the two calls, first the Josh Paul third strike, then the catchers interference is this: get over it. The umpire made the call, that's it. He should have been more decisive, as decisive is sometimes preferable to correct on a close play, but he made his call and stuck, and then his colleague did the same.) Personally, I felt bad for him the way he got pushed out of San Francisco, but you can see how he could grate on people. He's the type of guy, like Claude Lemieux, Bill Laimbeer or Bill Romanowski that you just want on your side, because otherwise, you hate their living guts.

More than any other player these last two rounds, including Paul Konerko, the White Sox have been carried by Joe Crede, who's becoming a star before our eyes. My only concerns- the fact that he has a large zit near his mouth, or at least, he did during the Angels series, and his weird facial hair. He looks like, well, the brother of William Ligue, or just like someone who took the drive in from Calumet City or Chesterton (sort of white trashy). Still his isn't as bad as Aaron Rowand, who's pencil thin goatee makes him look like he's in the adult entertainment industry.

If these two teams will do anything, they will put on a great display of how to best play the game. Take Carl Everett's baserunning. He made sure to see where Lamb was going before breaking for home, and then he went, a lot of other players might not have taken the base on a ball hit that weakly.

Cotts and Jenks were incredible. It shows you, really, that for all the talk of control, of beating the hitter with great stuff, the great equalizer always will be a fastball no one can catch up to. Jenks may have served notice to the American League during the Bagwell at-bat, and in the ninth, that he's not a man to be messed with in the coming years.

One other observation from Saturday- the opening sketch of SNL (which was good, but they used the fact that Catherine Zeta-Jones can sing just a bit too much) featured Darrell Hammond doing the most dead on Brit Hume I have ever seen. I was amazed. Just when I thought he couldn't top Matthews, but he did.

Oh yeah, one other thing. It's great to win two in a row, finally. This Michigan team, say what you will about it, has guts. To win the way they did last week, and then to go into the Jim Shilander House of Horrors known as Kinnick Stadium and beat a good Iowa team, that takes a lot of heart and determination. Hopefully the trip to Evanston this week will go well too.

And for you State fans, try and remove the purple tire tracks from your back, its kind of embarassing.