Game seven. It’s what every baseball fan dreams
about. After a 162 game marathon season, and a nearly month long postseason, it
all comes down to this one all-hands-on-deck game. We’ve watched the ebb and
flow of this series play out before us, two evenly matched teams neither of
which has managed to win consecutive games. Game seven will take care of that.
In my opinion, the Royals have played better
baseball, but the Giants have had Madison Bumgarner. The 6’5” 235 pound left
handed pitcher from the sticks of North Carolina has been a magician on the
mound in his two starts, and the Royals have looked outclassed against him.
Luckily, he won’t be starting tonight’s game, but if Tim Hudson falters early,
I expect to see that big, goofy kid lope in from the bullpen. So, if the Royals
plan on winning the game, they better score early before that happens!
Although I would love to see the Royals win, at this
point even that doesn’t matter. Either team would be a deserving champion. I
just love the immediacy of it, the all or nothing, now or never strategy that
will be forced on the naturally risk averse managers. At the end of this night
the matter will be decided.
Don’t you wish this was how all of life worked?
While it is true that we confer far too much glory and adulation, not to
mention money, on sports in this country, one of the reasons we do is game
seven of the World Series. In this increasingly complex, interconnected world
where one thing always leads to another, where no great issues are ever decided
once and for all, where ultimate victory is so seldom achieved, sports provides
moments of clarity. Just try to imagine what a ticker-tape victory parade would
look like the day that we win the War
on Terror, a V-T Day, if you will. You can’t, because it will never happen. That
conflict will crawl along for generations. Or, how about the interminable cat
fight between Democrats and Republicans, the left vs. right? When will someone
finally prevail in that 200 year tug of war? Not going to happen. And what
about this epic good vs. evil thing that human beings have been a part of since
Eden? This side of eternity, that battle is an endless stream of inconclusive
skirmishes.
But tonight, there will be an answer. The matter
will be resolved. There will be a winner and a loser and it will be recorded in
the record books. One team will be vindicated and the other vanquished. Unlike
in the sterilized world we have tried to create, the real world produces
winners and losers. Not everyone gets
a trophy, only one team takes the champagne bath, and they do so with callous
disregard for the potential hurt feelings of the guys in the other clubhouse. Instead
of endlessly frustrating gridlock, the great contest will explode in a fireball
of spectacle.
And this is why
Americans love sports.
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