Sunday, November 04, 2001
The Great American Game, an annual refuge from everyday worries
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
Linda- I use the abbrev TGAG later in the article; please try to keep it in title else it needs explanation.
Every year, in early October, this family comes out of hibernation to watch the Yankees’ post-season travails. This year we started worrying early, through the September slump, but the team was rescued by the misfortunes of other contenders and experienced their usual miraculous recovery, managing to boost themselves into the Series.
And so we were once more treated to the familiar spectacle of the Yankees rising to the occasion and annihilating the opposition
Although we, the October fans, are not taken seriously by the real day-to-day followers of the team, this family can claim some additional credentials. During the season, we hear Yankee radio announcers Michael Kay and John Gambling, worthy successors to Mel Allen, Curt Gowdy, Red Barber and Vince Scully. We can also match some memories with the real fans... Looking at the dour slumped figure of Joe Torre in the dugout accompanied by the faithful bulldog Don Zimmer , we hark back, fondly, to Billy Martin, standing on the dugout steps, ready to jump in and claim infractions, during his winning years of 1976 (ALC) and 1977-78.
In the next 16 bad years we heard and watched the games, off and on. The managers kept changing - Billy came back three times, interspersed with Bob Lemon, Dick Howser, Gene Michael, Yogi Berra and Lou Piniella, then Bucky Dent, Stump Merrill and Clyde King, until Buck Showalter pulled the team together (1992-95), and Joe Torre led them back to victory (1996, 1998-2000). During the bad years starting pitchers Tommy John, Phil Niekro and Ron Guidry and closers Goose Gossage and Dave Righetti labored mightily, as did Don Mattingly on first, Willie Randolph on second and Graig Nettles on third base, with the powerful Dave Winfield, the scrappy Rickey Henderson (still active as a Mariner, seen in the playoffs) and the elder Ken Griffey in the outfield . Those were the years of inadequate pitching. We used to watch the ruling Kansas City and Atlanta, marveling at the skills of Maddux and David Justice.
Some of the recent winners, Bernie Williams, Paul O’Neill (also Wade Boggs and Luis Polonia) came with Showalter in 1993, eventually joined by the badly needed pitchers, David Cone, Andy Pettite and Mariano Rivera - and Derek Jeter - to win the division title in 1995 (Bernie has actually been a Yankee for 10 years). Jeff Nelson and Graeme Lloyd joined the team in its first Torre World Series year, 1996, and the rest is history.
We, one tune baseball followers, really did not know what toexpect of the wild-card Mets, perennial underdogs who hit it lucky, so it seems, in beating the St. Lois Cardinals, who had slain the Amazin’s perennial rivals, the Atlanta Braves. In the first year 2000 WS game they looked a bit like country bumpkins, missing their outfield plays and making errors, while the athletic Yankees caught balls and relayed them with style and precision. Only their stellar pitcher, the remarkable Al Leiter, was playing like a possessed, holding the Yankee hitters in check. The Yankees, nervously retying their glove straps (this Knoblauch mania seems to have infected others) and stoically holding their nerves in check, seemed to be ready for Dr. Freud’s couch, as they kept missing scoring opportunities and leaving men on bases in this longest ( 4 hours 51 minutes) World’s Series game.
The poets who write the sports for the New York Times, sometimes leave the plebeian box scores of the games out of the paper, while singing love paeans to their team (hello, neighbor Robert Lipsyte, nice piece on October 22, miss your New York column), therefore I cannot give the details of the first game, but it was remarkable. So was the second - my office water-cooler seminar group had two in-depth sessions deconstructing the Clemens broken-bat incident (he really needs that shrink).
By the third game we began feeling sorry for the Amazin’, and our wish-fulfillment came. But the Yanks held, the veteran O’Neill had recovered his hitting ability (he has great control with slower pitchers), Martinez owned the Mets, and the fearless Jeter (he needs no shrink) was Ruth-like. Manifest destiny for the Yankees was evident.
Friday following the final game seemed to be a good time to do some Third Avenue sidewalk interviews while shopping, and our fellow New Yorkers did not disappoint me. Vaguely remembering some statistics rules from Baruch, I tend to do testing in individual samples, to validate the reliability of the results. I can tell you that the drugstore people were all Yankee supporters, the Police Academy recruits were four of out of five Yankee, the hardware and florist bunch predominantly pro-Met, and the sidewalk coffee shop loungers and my building co-tenants came across as more smartass and anti-TGAG. The Yankees had the majority, 57 percent, with 23 percent for the Mets and 20 percent other. All samples combined fell within 2 standard deviations, which makes them totally unreliable, with many more tests theoretically indicated for precise results, if anyone cares. These were the types of responses that makes me mistrust political pollsters.
Some of the answers to my vague "Did you like the Yankees or the Mets?" ran an interesting range..
Most were positive, or wishful: "Mets in seven (who says I have to accept reality)," "I’m a Yankee, but I was rooting for the Mets," "Wish the games had gone to seven," "I didn’t care, they were great games." The dismissive type answers, "We certainly did," and "Yes (by yes I mean yes)" came up twice. Negatives - "Who they?", "I don’t care," "Ask my husband (yes, he told me but it was in one ear, out the other)"and "They should pay those salaries to medical researchers" were a minority.
To all this, dear fellow New Yorkers, my answer is in the immortal words of John Gambling: "The Yankees win! Th-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a Yankees win!" Now, time to return to reality, politics and the Middle East.
Linda- I use the abbrev TGAG later in the article; please try to keep it in title else it needs explanation.
Every year, in early October, this family comes out of hibernation to watch the Yankees’ post-season travails. This year we started worrying early, through the September slump, but the team was rescued by the misfortunes of other contenders and experienced their usual miraculous recovery, managing to boost themselves into the Series.
And so we were once more treated to the familiar spectacle of the Yankees rising to the occasion and annihilating the opposition
Although we, the October fans, are not taken seriously by the real day-to-day followers of the team, this family can claim some additional credentials. During the season, we hear Yankee radio announcers Michael Kay and John Gambling, worthy successors to Mel Allen, Curt Gowdy, Red Barber and Vince Scully. We can also match some memories with the real fans... Looking at the dour slumped figure of Joe Torre in the dugout accompanied by the faithful bulldog Don Zimmer , we hark back, fondly, to Billy Martin, standing on the dugout steps, ready to jump in and claim infractions, during his winning years of 1976 (ALC) and 1977-78.
In the next 16 bad years we heard and watched the games, off and on. The managers kept changing - Billy came back three times, interspersed with Bob Lemon, Dick Howser, Gene Michael, Yogi Berra and Lou Piniella, then Bucky Dent, Stump Merrill and Clyde King, until Buck Showalter pulled the team together (1992-95), and Joe Torre led them back to victory (1996, 1998-2000). During the bad years starting pitchers Tommy John, Phil Niekro and Ron Guidry and closers Goose Gossage and Dave Righetti labored mightily, as did Don Mattingly on first, Willie Randolph on second and Graig Nettles on third base, with the powerful Dave Winfield, the scrappy Rickey Henderson (still active as a Mariner, seen in the playoffs) and the elder Ken Griffey in the outfield . Those were the years of inadequate pitching. We used to watch the ruling Kansas City and Atlanta, marveling at the skills of Maddux and David Justice.
Some of the recent winners, Bernie Williams, Paul O’Neill (also Wade Boggs and Luis Polonia) came with Showalter in 1993, eventually joined by the badly needed pitchers, David Cone, Andy Pettite and Mariano Rivera - and Derek Jeter - to win the division title in 1995 (Bernie has actually been a Yankee for 10 years). Jeff Nelson and Graeme Lloyd joined the team in its first Torre World Series year, 1996, and the rest is history.
We, one tune baseball followers, really did not know what toexpect of the wild-card Mets, perennial underdogs who hit it lucky, so it seems, in beating the St. Lois Cardinals, who had slain the Amazin’s perennial rivals, the Atlanta Braves. In the first year 2000 WS game they looked a bit like country bumpkins, missing their outfield plays and making errors, while the athletic Yankees caught balls and relayed them with style and precision. Only their stellar pitcher, the remarkable Al Leiter, was playing like a possessed, holding the Yankee hitters in check. The Yankees, nervously retying their glove straps (this Knoblauch mania seems to have infected others) and stoically holding their nerves in check, seemed to be ready for Dr. Freud’s couch, as they kept missing scoring opportunities and leaving men on bases in this longest ( 4 hours 51 minutes) World’s Series game.
The poets who write the sports for the New York Times, sometimes leave the plebeian box scores of the games out of the paper, while singing love paeans to their team (hello, neighbor Robert Lipsyte, nice piece on October 22, miss your New York column), therefore I cannot give the details of the first game, but it was remarkable. So was the second - my office water-cooler seminar group had two in-depth sessions deconstructing the Clemens broken-bat incident (he really needs that shrink).
By the third game we began feeling sorry for the Amazin’, and our wish-fulfillment came. But the Yanks held, the veteran O’Neill had recovered his hitting ability (he has great control with slower pitchers), Martinez owned the Mets, and the fearless Jeter (he needs no shrink) was Ruth-like. Manifest destiny for the Yankees was evident.
Friday following the final game seemed to be a good time to do some Third Avenue sidewalk interviews while shopping, and our fellow New Yorkers did not disappoint me. Vaguely remembering some statistics rules from Baruch, I tend to do testing in individual samples, to validate the reliability of the results. I can tell you that the drugstore people were all Yankee supporters, the Police Academy recruits were four of out of five Yankee, the hardware and florist bunch predominantly pro-Met, and the sidewalk coffee shop loungers and my building co-tenants came across as more smartass and anti-TGAG. The Yankees had the majority, 57 percent, with 23 percent for the Mets and 20 percent other. All samples combined fell within 2 standard deviations, which makes them totally unreliable, with many more tests theoretically indicated for precise results, if anyone cares. These were the types of responses that makes me mistrust political pollsters.
Some of the answers to my vague "Did you like the Yankees or the Mets?" ran an interesting range..
Most were positive, or wishful: "Mets in seven (who says I have to accept reality)," "I’m a Yankee, but I was rooting for the Mets," "Wish the games had gone to seven," "I didn’t care, they were great games." The dismissive type answers, "We certainly did," and "Yes (by yes I mean yes)" came up twice. Negatives - "Who they?", "I don’t care," "Ask my husband (yes, he told me but it was in one ear, out the other)"and "They should pay those salaries to medical researchers" were a minority.
To all this, dear fellow New Yorkers, my answer is in the immortal words of John Gambling: "The Yankees win! Th-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a Yankees win!" Now, time to return to reality, politics and the Middle East.
# posted by Wally Dobelis @ 5:01 AM 
