Red Sox sweep Rockies; Dynasty?

Unless you're a big fan of the winning team, series sweeps in the postseason leave most of us feeling a little shortchanged. The baseball season is over already?? * This year, five of the seven postseason series were swept, and only the ALCS went the whole seven games. I said before that I wouldn't be surprised if Colorado won all three games in Denver, but I'm not surprised either that the Red Sox swept the Rockies to take the World Series title once again. Boston is dominant in almost every aspect of the game, and even though the Rockies fought back to within one run on Sunday night, they could not even it up. The fans in Denver were cheering loudly to the very end, which was nice to see. After that historic winning streak by the Rockies, destiny was just not on their side this year. In any event, Boston Manager Terry Francona and the whole Red Sox team deserve a lot of credit for being champions, and for acting like champions should act.

As for the future, there are big questions about free agents such as Mike Lowell and Curt Schilling, who may be ready to retire, but there is plenty of reserve depth on the roster. The superb rookies Dustin Bedroia and Jacoby Ellsbury, plus young closer Jonathan Papelbon give Boston the assurance of having a highly competitive lineup for years to come. Is this the dawn of a new dynasty?

* And as for the unduly fast conclusion to this year's baseball season, at least they finished before Halloween. Playing on October 31 would have been very strange.

Coors Field: "unfair"?

WaPo columnist Thomas Boswell recounts the standard gripes about the way baseball performance is distorted in the mile-high Coors Field, and then reminds us that Fenway Park has its own "unfair" conditions with the quirky angles and unbalanced outfield dimensions: "That's life. Get over it."

Whither A-Rod?

After Joe Torre was in effect let go by the Yankee front office, the departure of Alex Rodriguez is a logical consequence. The only question is, what other team has deep enough pockets to be able to afford him? Well, there is one located about 200 miles northeast of the Bronx...

The mail bag

Both Mike Zurawski and Mark London alerted me to the replacement of the turf that just got underway at Wrigley Field. Despite its aesthetic charms, the "Friendly Confines" have earned a lousy reputation among players for the bumpy, uneven surface. So, they are installing a modern drainage system and reducing the field level by a foot or two, which may allow for another row or two of seats. That would shrink the already-tight foul territory to absurdly tiny proportions, however, and I hope they think twice about that. See Chicago Tribune. That story reveals an interesting bit of trivia: The bulldozers uncovered the concrete base of the goal posts that the Chicago Bears used to use before they left Wrigley Field in 1970. It was approximately one third of the way down the first base line.

Posted (or last updated or commented upon): 29 Oct 2007, 1: 52 AM .

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My blog practices

My general practice is to make no more than one blog post per day on any one category. For this reason, some blog posts may address more than one specific issue, as indicated by separate headings. If something important happens during the day after I make a blog post, I may add an updated paragraph or section to it, using the word "UPDATE" and sometimes a horizontal rule to distinguish the new material from the original material. For each successive day, blog posts are listed on the central blog page (which brings together all topics) from top to bottom in the following (reverse alphabetical) order, which may differ from the order in which the posts were originally made:

Wild birds (LAST)
War
Science & Technology *
Politics
Latin America
Culture & Travel *
Canaries ("Home birds")
Baseball (FIRST)

* part of "Macintosh & Miscellanous" until Feb. 2007

The date of each blog post refers to when the bulk of it was written, in the Eastern Time Zone. For each blog post, the time and date of the original posting (or the last update or comment thereupon) is displayed on the individual archival blog post page that appears (just before the comments section) when you click the [LINK / comments] link next to the date. Non-trivial corrections and clarifications to original blog entries are indicated by the use of [brackets] and/or ~~strikethroughs~~, as appropriate so as to accurately convey both the factual truth and my original representation of it. Nobody's perfect, but I strive for continual improvement. That is also why some of the nature photos that appear on the archive pages may differ from the (inferior) ones that were originally posted.

The current "home made" blog organization system that I created, featuring real permalinks, was instituted on November 1, 2004. Prior to that date, blog posts were handled inconsistently, and for that reason the pre-2005 archives pages are something of a mess. Furthermore, my blogging prior to June 1, 2004 was often sporadic in terms of frequency.

Blog errata
(preliminary)

April 4, 2008: "Andy Ashby" should be "Andy Jones"

April 3, 2010: "Mike Morgan" should be "Nyjer Morgan"

: "" should be ""

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