I got so caught up in trying to reach various bonuses before I leave for Thanksgiving that I missed my very own blog's one month anniversary! Awww. As anyone I've ever dated will tell you, that shouldn't come as a surprise. I am a cruel and selfish human being.
But that's life.
This being a poker blog, I figured I'd spend the belated anniversary entry on everything but poker. Makes sense to me.
What are some other interests I have besides poker?
Baseball
Ahhh....my first love.
I'm a huge baseball fan and have been my entire life. I remember going to a game with my dad when I was about six and watching Eddie Murray hit a bottom-of-the-ninth, two-out, two-strike, game-winning home run over some team I can't remember for the life of me. Yes, I know everyone seems to have some sappy story like that, but it's true.
So living in the Baltimore/DC area and having just watched the Orioles' biggest star (okay, okay, maybe second-biggest) hit a game-winning home run, I naturally became a huge fan of the division-rival Red Sox.
I don't know why it was that I did that. I think most likely it had to do with my natural love for numbers, and the Red Sox in the mid-eighties had a lot of guys who put up big numbers: Jim Rice, Wade Boggs, Dewey Evans, Roger Clemens.
Boggs was probably the best hitter in the league at the time and Clemens was undoubtedly the best pitcher, so that was probably enough to convince an impressionable young buck like myself to root for their team. (Quick quiz: before Clemens became dominant in 1986, who was the best pitcher in the AL for the first half of the 80's? Answer at the bottom.)
As time moved on and so did most of the players I grew attached to, I kind of separated from the Sox. I realized how much of a business the game really was, and as much as I enjoyed watching the game and tracking its endless stats, it eventually became tough for me to root for what is essentially a corporate entity hiring its mercenaries to play against another corporate entity's mercanaries. I didn't stop liking baseball, rather I simply began following the players and the game as a whole lot more than any particular team. I enjoy seeing individual players excel and break records, and I enjoy tight pennant (or, ahem, wild-card) races and playoff games; I just don't have any real affinity for a team that will have 95% turnover in players, managers and, often enough, ownership every five years.
But in your first entry you claimed to be an Astros fan, ya moron.
Yes, I did. You see, I follow some players and my favorite player from growing up --and also just about the only player left from when I was growing up--Roger Clemens signed with the Astros and so I became a temporary Astros fan. Yes, I know, most baseball fans would cringe and throw stuff hearing about someone so casually switching allegiances. Tough.
And yes, I did just say that that the lying, swindling, money-grubbing, back-stabbing, traitorous, unbalanced, selfish, lazy, took-the-last-four-years-in-Boston-off, chokes-under-pressure, asshole Roger Clemens is my favorite baseball player.
My response: the Red Sox didn't want him (twilight!), he signed for less money than the Yankees offered to go to the Blue Jays, in 1994 and 1996 he was the third and fourth best pitcher in the AL, respectively, and in 1993 and 1995 he was injured, he pitched a 15K one-hitter in the ALCS and has a 3-0, 1.90 record in the World Series and he just pitched this past season for his hometown Astros at half his market value so he could be with his family.
So nanny-nanny-boo-boo.
I do have to wake up in four hours to take my roommate to the airport (it's almost 6am right now), so I'll have to put off talking about other interests for another time...maybe I'll make this "variety week" or something. We'll see. Either way, I really gotsta get to bed.
Quick quiz answer: the very underappreciated Dave Stieb! No joke. Every year from 1982-1985 he either led the league, or just about did, in innings pitched, ERA and ERA+. So he would pitch more than just about anyone else more effectively than just about anyone else. Ergo, he was the best pitcher. Unfortunately, due to poor teammates some years and bad luck other years, his record was not quite as distinguished as his other stats and so his career often goes unrecognized for just how good it really was.
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