Boo! Scary! Like Halloween. So this is what October baseball is all about – frightening. Like baseballs through the legs of zombies. One after another, sometimes two in one play, errors they are called. Too bad the players couldn’t have worn masks. Seven errors in two games, albeit in the two most important games of their illustrious 2011 season. Yes, the Milwaukee Blewers saved their scariest performances for the final two games of the NLCS, eventually getting spooked by none other than Tony LaRussa’s St. Louis Cardinals, a team they finished six games ahead of during the regular season.
But this wasn’t the regular season. In fact, this was the post season, a time of year the Screwers are all too unfamiliar with, just as the Cardinals ARE familiar with. This means playing opponents with costumes that don’t say Pirates, Astros or Cubs, three teams responsible for the Beast Mode antics popularized by Prince Feedler, Tony Choke and company. This means you should possess defense and pitching, not act as if possessed by the Spirit of Choke.
This means not starting pitchers with ERAs from the 17th century, like Marcum’s 16.20. This means trying to tell the truth when someone is so bad that you simply say,”He ‘s horrible, has been for the last six weeks, so he won’t be starting a very important game six, on our own field, with our own towel waving crowd,” instead of saying, “He’s fine, just a couple of bad pitches, it’s unfortunate, he’ll be fine”.
Yes, in the epic octagon managerial battle of Tony LaRussa versus Ron Roenicke, one would have to say Ron had to submit this time, even if all it came down to whose bull pen was going to be less bloodied, and it turned out to be the one belonging the guys in red and white.
When you give up 43 run in six games chances are your Beast Mode offense won’t succeed in outhitting the opposition, as was clearly the case when the Screw Ha’s turned Alberta Pujols and company into Murderer’s Row and ordained their number seven hitter, David Freese, the new NLCS MVP.
That means 96, wins, an NL Comedy Central title, and a shaky at best Divisional win over the Snakes means nothing. It means you don’t even get a pennant to hang next to the lonely one collecting dust at $7.50 Miller Park. It means all those towels you handed out to wave in the air came in handy when the diehard fans who had waited 29 years for a magical trip back to that thing called the World Series, ultimately used those same towels to cover their noses from the stench and wipe up the mess that spilled onto the field Sunday night.
It also means your first baseman has gone 0-4 in the clutch for the last time in a Brewer uniform. And it means the job openings at firsdt base, third base, shortstop and centerfield are once again wide open.
It means Mr. Melvin has a lot of work to do in the off season in between his sips of LaBatt’s, because ultimately it means this team, unmasked, was exactly who we thought they were, Alice in Dairyland dressed as Monsters, Inc.. Scary.
The roof to the coffin, er, $7.50 Miller Park is mercifully closed for the 2011 season. Beaten Mode is officially underway.
And For what
© 2012
