Since this Web site seems to be a hit with those who, like me, share that rare Steelers/Red Sox fan blood type, I'm
posting some thoughts about the Red Sox 2007 world championship, even though this is a Steelers Web site. I did watch the
Steelers Sunday afternoon, but it was tough getting into a football frame of mind in that 17-hour window between games 3 and
4 of the World Series.
To those of you who say that Steelers and Red Sox writing don't mix, I got a
sign from above that it's OK when I watched Game 4 of the World Series Sunday night. Among the 6 million fans that Fox
cut to during the telecast was a young girl wearing a Steelers winter cap. In Denver. Where the Steelers lost exactly a week
earlier. Weird.
So let me get these Red Sox musings out of my system, and then for the rest of this season Steelahs.com
will be all Steelers, all the time.
Without further ado:
- Best newspaper headline I saw on Monday:
"Twice in a lifetime" on the cover of the Boston Metro.
- Bobby Kielty is this year's Dave Roberts.
- The Red Sox seem to like winning championships in places famous for beer.
- Let's not forget Eric
Gagne's contribution during the World Series. In the ninth inning of Game 1, he shut down the Rockies' juggernaut
offense with the Red Sox clinging to a 12-run lead. For that, he gets a ring.
- My big superstition during the
postseason was not wearing the jersey of a Red Sox pitcher during a game that he started. The last time I did it was Game
3 of the ALCS when I wore my Matsuzaka shirt. Big mistake. I safely wore my Schilling jersey (over the long-sleeved Steelers
shirt that I wore during the afternoon) while watching Game 4 of the World Series. Maybe Josh Beckett is the Red Sox'
ace because I don't own a Beckett shirt.
- This championship is the seventh in franchise history. The team
that had long been known for not being able to win a World Series has the third most among teams that have stayed in the same
city, behind the Yankees (26) and the Cardinals (10). The Athletics have won nine, five in Philadelphia and four in Oakland.
The Red Sox moved ahead of the Dodgers on the all-time list. Five of the Dodgers' six championships were won in Los Angeles.
- You could trace the roots of this championship back to the 2006 trade deadline, when the Red Sox didn't make
a deal because they refused to part with any of their young pitchers. They suffered for the remainder of 2006 because of it.
But no pain, no gain. We all know that Jon Lester came up big in Game 4 of the World Series. But Clay Buchholz and Kason Gabbard
(even though he's gone) also contributed during the 2007 season. It just proves that you can never have too much pitching.
- Even though I'm in White Plains, NY, which is Yankee territory, there's a nice smattering of Red Sox fans
here. At Stop & Shop yesterday, I saw some Red Sox American League championship gear. Wouldn't be surprised to see
people wearing 2007 world championship garb around here in the coming weeks. White Plains is definitely safer for Red Sox
fans than say, Yonkers, which is just a few miles south in Westchester County.
- My fondest memory from the regular
season had to be the Mother's Day game, when the Red Sox came back from five runs down in the ninth inning to beat the
Orioles at Fenway Park. I was driving from New York to Pawtucket, RI, to visit my mother that afternoon and was listening
on the radio. When the Red Sox were coming back in the ninth, I tried desperately to get to my mother's house in time
to watch the end of the game on NESN. But I was probably about a half-mile away when the winning run scored. Great game, and
an early sign that it was going to be a special season.
- Anyone out there think there's a little less oomph
in this championship because they didn't have to beat the Yankees along the way? Not me. Yes, the Red Sox had a tough
time beating the Yankees in the regular season and probably matched up better with the Indians in the ALCS. But you can't
say they won the World Series because they ducked the Yankees. They did win the AL East despite resting key players
down the stretch. Division championships don't mean as much in the age of the wild-card. But the Red Sox got the
last laugh in the 2007 chapter of the Yankees-Red Sox saga by resisting the Yankees' second-half charge and winning their
first division title in 12 years. It's a nice little jewel in their 2007 crown.
- I'm surprised that
in the Fox viewer poll asking which team is better, the 2007 team or the 2004 team, the 2007 team won by such a large
margin. I'm going to have to give a slight edge to the 2004 team. That team was more potent offensively,
had Curt Schilling, Pedro Martinez and Tim Wakefield in their primes (or at least not as far down the hill as they are now)
and made history by coming back from a 3-0 deficit against the Yankees in the ALCS. But this team is built better for the
future. The 2004 team lost a lot of key components right away, like Martinez, Dave Roberts, Doug Mientkiewicz, Orlando Cabrera and
Derek Lowe. And Keith Foulke was never the same after the 2004 season. Somehow I don't see Jonathan Papelbon experiencing
that kind of dropoff. As far as starting pitchers go, Beckett figures to anchor the rotation for the foreseeable future.
Hopefully Daisuke Matsuzaka gets a little better after a year of adjusting to a new land and Jon Lester's performance
in the World Series is a peek at what's to come from him. And let's not forget about Clay Buchholz, who the Red Sox
put on the shelf at the end of the season so he wouldn't blow his arm out. Unlike 2004, there are no glaring holes to
fill in the starting rotation and the middle of the infield. Hence, the Red Sox should be able to defend their title in 2008
without misfits like David Wells and Edgar Renteria. Of course, let's not take championships for granted. But the
future looks bright.
The Steelers' game plan was a major factor in their 31-28 loss to the Broncos Sunday night. They should have
established the running game early against the Broncos' shoddy run defense. But that point's been beaten to death
on the blogosphere. I'm going to look at another piece of strategy by Mike Tomlin.
Tomlin called timeout
before Jason Elam's 49-yard field goal attempt at the end of the game. But at least he didn't wait
until the split-second the ball was snapped. He called the timeout well before the ball was snapped, thus giving Elam just
one shot at making the field goal. The in-vogue thing this season has been to call timeout just as the ball is snapped, which
essentially gives the kicker a practice shot. So Tomlin giving Elam just that one shot was almost old-school.
BUT ...
The bigger picture here is the problem in the first place with calling timeout before potential
game-winning or game-tying field goals. Yes, Tomlin only gave Elam one chance, but by calling timeout, he gave Elam more
time to line up his kick. Icing the kicker doesn't work, especially someone as good as Elam. Being a young, rookie coach,
Tomlin has a chance to break the mold of head coaching customs. In this case, however, the leader was a follower.
IN OTHER NEWS ...
Will I be able to watch the Steelers game on Sunday? It will be a game-time decision. I'm
having a minor, 20-minute procedure done on Friday afternoon, and I'm going to be sore for a little while. I'm hoping
to feel well enough to get to Sports Page on Sunday at 1 p.m. We'll see. Either way, I probably won't be able to drink
alcohol. Which means no Sam Adams Octoberfests when I watch the Red Sox play in the World Series. Dang.
Not only did my girlfriend not have to put up with me watching the Steelers Sunday, but we saw her favorite band, America,
in concert. Sara even told me that she likes America the way I like the Steelers.
So it was Sara's night. But
we couldn't completely get away from the Steelers. In the lobby at the Paramount Theatre in Peekskill, NY, we saw
a guy wearing a Rocky Bleier jersey and a Steelers cap. What a great chance to plug Steelahs.com. I wrote the URL
on a piece of paper, walked up to this guy and gave it to him.
The guy's name was Ken. He said he knew the
Steelers were going to lose to Arizona. He also said he didn't have a computer but he was going to get one. Oh well.
Whether Ken reads my stuff or not, he was a friendly guy. Just another example of the fine, upstanding, gregarious
citizens that meke up Steelers Nation.
Thanks to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette linking to my site, I had a big influx of traffic last week. I just want to tell
any new readers that my weekly game columns will be posted by Monday morning. Believe me, it'll be worth the wait.
OK, since Steelahs.com didn't exist when the Steelers won Super Bowl XL, here's my take on the officiating and
the game in general.
The Steelers didn't win the game because of the officiating. The best word to describe
the way the Steelers won Super Bowl XL is this: resourceful.
The Steelers had a ton of momentum winning three straight
road games to reach the Super Bowl. But they weren't at the top of their game in the Super Bowl. They didn't
get a first down until 19 minutes into the game, and even then Antwan Randle-El bobbled the pass from Ben Roethlisberger before
hanging onto it for the first down.
In the second quarter, Darrell Jackson DID push off on Chris Hope before catching
the pass from Matt Hasselbeck in the end zone. He did it with the official right there.
The Steelers showed their
resourcefulness on their first scoring drive. On third-and-6, Hines Ward caught a shovel pass from Roethlisberger to keep
the drive alive. Then on a broken play on third-and-28 from the Seattle 40, Roethlisberger found Ward near the goal line to
set up first-and-goal. Roethlisberger eventually ran it in for the touchdown. The Seahawks challenged the call, saying the
ball didn't break the plane of the goal line. From what I saw, that ball barely crossed the white line. Maybe by about
three inches. There certainly wasn't enough evidence to overturn the call.
Roethlisberger only completed 10
passes in the game, and one of them Ward caught a couple of inches off the ground. That play was a microcosm of a game in
which the Steelers didn't look pretty doing it, but got it done.
The Steelers did have one touchdown that
didn't have to be forged from trickery or a busted play. That was when Willie Parker ran 75 yards for a touchdown
and a 14-3 Steelers lead.
Another call the Seahawks squawked about was the holding penalty on Sean Locklear, which
negated a big play. Maybe it wasn't the type of hold that's called all the time, but if Locklear hadn't held,
Clark Haggans would have been all over Hasselbeck. And Locklear did it right in front of the official. The Seahawks just didn't
know how to get away with stuff. It's not the Steelers' fault they were stupid criminals.
To put the game
away, the Steelers had to reach into their bag of tricks with the reverse and touchdown pass from Randle-El to Ward. Roethlisberger,
who wasn't helping the Steelers with his passing, for the second time found another way to help in a big spot when he
threw a key block on that play.
That touchdown sealed the deal on One for the Thumb for the Steelers, who helped
themselves in Super Bowl XL a lot more than the officials did.
A few random thoughts from watching Sunday's game that didn't make it into my column:
I must admit
that during a commercial in the Steelers game, I did have to get up and watch the end of the Phillies game on another
TV at Sports Page. It was like rubbernecking when you drive past a car accident, watching the culmination of the Mets'
monumental collapse.
Santonio Holmes was a bright spot Sunday. He finished the game against the 49ers on a high
note, and picked up where he left off against the Cardinals.
The Cardinals threw so many damn screen passes on
Sunday. I was dying for one of the Steelers defenders to pick one off. He would have had nothing but green grass between him
and the end zone.
I'm not sure, but this might have been the first time the Steelers ever faced Kurt Warner.
I should look it up, but I'm in a hurry.
One thing about my latest rankings. Sorry I rambled on so much about
some of the bottom feeders. Had to get the Newport shout out in there about Fargas.
And finally, Joey Porter needs
to update his Web site: www.joeyporter.com
