Parity Violation

They did more than any team in the forty-four history of the franchise. To get swept in the World Series is very disappointing … the Astros had chances to win pretty much every game, especially game 3. Yet, it wasn’t meant to be. I said after game 5 of the NLCS I just wanted to get to the World Series – that I’d be “happy” to get swept. Well, I’m not excatly happy, but the Astros overachived – coming back from 15-30, losing 300 RBIs in Bagwell, Kent, and Beltran. Yet, somehow they reached a place where no Houston baseball team had ever been – the World Series.

So, hats off to the Astros. They’re still my team.

Roy Oswalt was on Letterman last night, delivered the Top 10 list “perks of going to the World Series.” It was pretty funny, except for #3 which was morbid and even the crowd didn’t find it that funny. You can watch at the KHOU site, but you need to register, and then Letterman’s site has it for reading.

The World Series. Go ahead, say it again. The Astros are in the World Series. Ahhh. It’s hard not to smile. Really, it’s more relief than anything, after that crushing defeat Monday. I’m telling you, at Minute Maid, no one sat down from the time Berkman homered in the 7th to the time Pujols homered in the 9th. Well, actually I sat down a few times because I was tired and nervous … it turned out for good reason.

But all is forgotten. Are we about to fully exorcise the demons of 1986? The Angels won in 2002, the Red Sox last year – now the Astros, the last heartbroken team from that memorable postseason 19 years ago – they can win it all. I know the White Sox have waited almost a century, but I think we’re due. It’s going to be one well-pitched World Series, we can count on that.

Bill Simmons described today in is Page 2 column the exact feelings I had going into the 9th inning against the Cardinals in Game 5. He wrote

During the ninth inning of Monday night’s Cards-Astros game, I wasn’t hoping the Astros would win. I was hoping they wouldn’t blow it. There’s a difference. Weird things happen when you haven’t won in a long time; the poor Astros have never even appeared in a World Series. After awhile, in that situation, you start expecting to lose. Then one of those seasons rolls around when good things keep happening, and they keep happening, and you wait for the other shoe to drop … only it never does. Eventually, you reach a point that Houston fans reached Monday night — you drop your guard, assume everything is different this season, give in to the moment — and that’s when sports can truly crush you. It’s happened to me. I didn’t want it to happen to them.

I didn’t drop my guard, I was nervous the whole inning, so when Pujols hit the homer I was numb but not surprised. I knew if he batted there’d be the chance for a colossal disaster. I must have been channelling my brother, who apparently was nervous about losing even last year to the Braves when we were up 12-3 or whatever in the 9th inning.

The Astros character is being tested in a way I can’t imagine. Let’s hope they can bring it together tomorrow night.

Well, no one said it was going to be easy. There are many many things to second guess and many what ifs to ask but it comes down to this – the Astros still have 2 chances to win 1 game. Are we the 1986 Angels? Or are we something else entirely. The Cards showed what they were made of, coming off the mat tonight – we’ll see what the Astros have on Wednesday night.

The Astros have been here before, but never quite like this. Just one more win, and they’ll go to the first World Series in franchise history.

Such an imperfect team… an injured Bagwell, no one with 40 homeruns, no Beltran, no Kent. Yet somehow, they find ways to win, with dominant staring pitching and a rock-solid bullpen; they’re on the verge of going where no Astros team has gone before… not the 1980 or 1986 teams which suffered heart-breaking losses. Not the 102-win 1998 team which roared through the regular season only to hit a buzzsaw named Kevin Brown in the NLDS.

No, if it happens and you gotta believe it will, it’ll be this team. A mix of future Hall of Famers and youngsters, who pulled the NL wild card out from a 15-30 start, who battled back from being down 6-1 against the Braves to win in 18 innings.

It could be a magical night at Minute Maid. I can’t wait to be there.

As an aside, Billy Hatcher through out the first pitch yesterday. That was great to see. Hatcher’s 14th-inning gamne-tying home run in Game 6 of the 1986 NLCS was, in the words of Mike Sowell, the most dramatic moment of a dramatic series. It also was probably the greatest moment in Astros playoff history, at least until last year.

Roy Oswalt really stepped up, the Astros left St. Louis with a split. I’d like to think they can rattle off 3 straight wins at home and head on to the World Series, but realistically I think we just need to go back to St. Louis up 3-2 with Roy ready to pitch Game 6. That would work out well.

In the ALCS, there is much controversy surrounding the third strike but not third out thing… but what I want to know is why does this rule exist in the first place? Why does a swinging third strike have to be caught? I mean, I know it’s a rule but what is the reason for the rule. The infield fly rule is to prevent someone from dorpping an easy fly ball and creating a double play… so what’s the logic behind the dropped third strike one? Anyone know? I don’t. I theorize it goes back to the spit ball era or something, but that’s a wild guess

I don’t know why various web sites insist on talking about the fact the Astros are 5-11 against the Cardinals this year. We were 1-5 versus the Braves, guess what – we’re 3-1 in the playoffs against them which is all that counts. Not counting April when the Astros were mired in their 15-30 start, we’re 4-7 against the Cards… still not great though. But we played them well in September. I think it’s going to be a great series, I just hope we come out on top this time.

Well, probably not the greatest game ever, but certainly the best one I have seen. I really have no memory of the 1986 Game 6 NLCS game, though I’m sure I was watching it at the ripe old age of 8. This one was pretty darn unbelievable.

The game was exhausting, and exhilarating. I’ll steal my friend Dave’s line and say that I felt like I’d pitched 3-4 innings. And that was in the 14th. So many ups and downs. So many times standing and cheering for the big hit or the third strike. Somewhere around the 14th, my back started to hurt and I started to lose stamina. Today, it hurts to yawn, I don’t know what that means but I think it has something to do with all of yesterday’s cheering.

Most games have maybe one memorable moment … I have hardly any recollection of last year’s game 3 NLDS victory… something about a Beltran homer, and we won, but not that memorable. Game 4 last year I remember Biggio’s homer, even though we lost. Even this Saturday’s game… I remember a lot of singles, but nothing to write home about.

Moment after moment of Game 4 is indelible. Berkman’s grand slam. Ausmus’s homer that I thought was a double or triple or something. Bagwell pitch hitting with a chance to win the game in the 10th. Clemens as our pitcher of last resort. Burke’s final blast to send us all home happy.

I can’t stop smiling. It’s hard to believe I was there. It makes up for missing Kent’s homer last year in the NLCS. But this year, I have my LCS tickets, games 4 and 5. Hopefully the Astros will make a lot more memories.

Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn, who’s July NY Times op-ed piece spooked a lot of people into thinking that the church was changing its tune on evolution, has apparently recanted. Well, not really but he seems to have clarified his position. In the Reuters story linked to above, he’s embracing evolution and only saying that science must stay within its limits and can’t speak to the existence or non-existence of a Creator…

“I see no problem combining belief in the Creator with the theory of evolution, under one condition — that the limits of a scientific theory are respected,” he said.

Science studies what is observable and scientists overstep the boundaries of their discipline when they conclude evolution proves there was no creator, said the cardinal, 60, a top Church doctrinal expert and close associate of Pope Benedict.

“It is fully reasonable to assume some sense or design even if the scientific method demands restrictions that shut out this question,” said the cardinal.

Science and Theology news has a summary and a collection of links including quotes from a piece by George Coyne, director of the Vatican observatory.

I would agree that it’s important scientists not try to “prove” that God doesn’t exist or try to use excessive “random” language about that the existence of life and such. For example, I find it very irritating that scientists have proposed the “theory” of the inflationary multiverse. This tries to explain why our universe has all the neccesary physical parameters to allow life… and the idea is that there are infinite number of universes with different values of c, h, whatever, and we’re in the one of course conducive to life. Just a consequence of infinity.

This is, of course, nonsense. Completely untestable, since the other “universes” can never be seen or accessed. Just a lame attempt by athiest scientists to eliminate the need for a Creator “scientifically” and really metaphysics.