Dave's World Post No. 200
*Shameless plug for my friends named Dan, part 1: My good friend, standup comic Dan Sally, finally has his long-threatened website up and running at dansally.com. Dan's a funny dude. Check out his site.
*Shameless plug for my friends named Dan, part 2: Dave's World's favorite indy rock band, Boston's Neptune, just returned from their five-week tour of Europe. They're playing tonight at The Midway in Jamaica Plain. Oh yeah, the connection to Dave's World is percussionist Dan Boucher, who is one of those people who could bring the Dave's World Empire crashing down in a hurry if he chose to speak to a supermarket tabloid reporter. Dan's quoted at length in a piece on Neptune in this week's Weekly Dig.
*Shameless plug for my friends not named Dan, part 1: I couldn't help but notice, on Andy Nesbitt's Foxsports.com football picks, they now have his headshot up on the site. Even better, if you click on Andy's face, you get taken to a page with all his bylines, and even the opportunity to "bookmark this expert's page." Well, my life would certainly be enriched by Nesbitt's expert opinions. Consider yourself bookmarked, pal.
*OK, so far, I've gone 4-2 in my baseball postseason predictions. Both misfires have involved the Chicago White Sox. You'd think I'd wise up, but I don't care, I'd rather sink with the ship here -- I remain steadfast in my belief this franchise has not suffered enough for the sin of throwing the 1919 World Series.
Besides, what about the Astros? When I was a tyke, the Houston Astros were far and away the coolest franchise in baseball. They had the state of the art Astrodome, the Bad News Bears played a game there, and, indisputably among the under-12 set, the Astros' uniforms were hands-down the greatest in baseball. Probably similar to the way the kiddies fell in love with San Jose Sharks and Anaheim Mighty Ducks a generation later. The Braintree American little League had one of those deals where each team wore a major-league uniform. I was forced to wear a Reds jersey as an 10-year old, but when I was 11, I was on the Astros, and I think I might still have that jersey somewhere. Seriously, back then, I think if you had given the kids then the opportunity of picking the Red Sox or the Astros, most of them would have went straight for the Houston shirts.
Anyway, the Astros haven't been suffering as long as the White Sox, but they've had their share of teases and almosts as well. Those early-'80s teams played sound, fundamental ball; the franchise had the misfortune of having Mike Scott's peak year coincide with the 1986 Mets; and last year was tough, as well. Oh, and they've never thrown a playoff series.
Incidentally, Houston, you may recall, got off to a lousy start this year. If the Astros win the World Series, this will mark the fourth straight season a wild card team that made the right moves, gelled at the right time, played its best ball at the stretch, and was the hottest team coming into the postseason would buzz through the playoffs and cut down a team that got off to a strong start and more or less cruised the rest of the way. There's something to be said for that.
Oh, anyway, this might be one of the best-pitched Series in history, the way things are lining up. Dave's World is going with the Astros in six.
*Read this somewhere. Can't remember where. But, 4/5s of the 2003 New York Yankees starting rotation is participating in this year's World Series: Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Orlando Hernandez and Jose Contreras. Remember that one next time someone tries to pinpoint what happened to the Yanks.
*Ya know, I'm just not all that worried about the Patriots. Do they have an uphill struggle in their quest to get back to the Super Bowl? Yes. There has been a tremendous amount of upheaval. The coordinators left town. There were several on-field personnel changes. There were a ton of serious injuries, none worse than Rodney Harrison. And the NFL stuck them with possibly the most ridiculous six-week opening stretch in league history.
All things considered, 3-3 ain't so bad, especially when one considers that the AFC East sure looks like one of those divisions in which 9-7 could net you a division title. And, none of the three losses are in-division. The Pats are healing up this week, and basically get a re-start next week. I'm not going to crown them Super Bowl champs, but it doesn't seem a stretch to see them winning the division title at 10-6 and once they get to the playoffs, they tend to kick it up another gear.
*So if the amount of time you spend reading Sports Illustrated has gradually slipped over the past couple years from "I read it cover to cover every week," to "I sift through the fluff and get to the good stuff," to "Sometimes if I remember I'll skim through it on the can, but usually it goes straight to the recycle bin," I need to point out there's actually a reason to look at the mag this week -- the Leading Off photography on the USC-Notre Dame game is tremendous. Seriously, no jokes here. Award-winning quality.
*Back to life's most important topic: Mexican wrestling. CMLL's Super Porky, all 5-8 and 350 pounds of him, makes his debut on WWE Smackdown tonight. That's almost enough to get me to actually watch WWE. Almost. I'm heading out to the big Western Hockey League showdown between Seattle and Everett instead. That's Everett, WA. The only semi-pro franchise Everett, MA has is the high school football team.
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