Hmmm... It's kind of musty in here, I detect the faint yet distinct odor of cigarettes and Sierra Nevada with the slightest whiff of Haagen-Dazs hovering in the air. I didn't really expect the powers that be here at Hossboss Productions to provide any kind of upkeep on my office, especially when I arrived at 3am to find it boarded up. With bear traps randomly placed in front... And police tape stretched in front of the door. I suppose one could argue that this was the site of a crime scene... Well, just as you can't keep a good man down you can't keep me down either. I've broken into much more fortified fortresses than this popsicle stand, I can assure you, and if I'm
still here when the dawn breaks and the resident yokels are alerted to my presence and attempt to set foot in my bunker they'll be greeted by Harry and Jerry, (they go along well with Barry and Gary) my 'roided up doberman pinschers who love feeding on the weak and pasty. It would be a veritable smorgasbord for these two overly muscled terrors unless the staff here have magically tanned and hit the weight room in the past year. The fact of the matter is, I thumbed my nose at the Gods and was reckoned with, but I haven't returned to bemoan the turn of events that brought this somewhat weekly vent to an abrupt end, I've returned to celebrate my San Francisco Giants
finally scaling the mountain, a long and arduous trek in which many men and countless serpas died in vain. So if this subject matter does not interest you, be off and resume your day for I have as little interest in you as you have for my team. But you're welcome to don some bacon-scented clothes and come feed my dogs.
I've said for a very long time I wish I didn't care so much about the Giants but I realized last week that isn't true, I just wished for a championship. Just one. The Cubs and Indians, and the Red Sox until they won it a few years ago, were always the teams cited when talking about tough luck teams, but the Giants had gone 56 years without winning it, such a drought they were still the New York Giants at that time. The city of San Francisco had never experienced a baseball king. And you know what? The wait was worth it.
I can't believe I'm actually saying this but I am happy the Giants lost the World Series in 2002 to those ridiculous Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim of Orange County of Southern California of the Lower Region of the West Coast, and their insipid fans banging their Thunderstix while a Rally Monkey danced on their Disney scoreboard. Ok, I might still harbor a shred of bitterness... But, it's true, I really am, despite Game Six of that series being the most cruel, the most heart-breaking, the most devastatingly kicked in the nuts so hard you're not sure if you want to vomit or cry or pass out fromthe sheer pain and humiliation of it all, loss I've ever experienced in my lifetime. So nauseous you can't even attempt to drink it away because your stomach is too knotted to allow for the consumption of alcohol. And then you think of the guy who popped that bottle of champagne when the Giants were winning 5-0 in the seventh inning at that sports bar you were at in Prague which in your heart of hearts you know is what triggered the team bus to go hurtling off a cliff and it takes everything in your power not to beat him senseless then send a black and orange bouquet to his room in the ICU (Se, it's taken me eight years but I finally forgive you). However, I'm not happy we let that opportunity slip through our fingers just to make this victory that much sweeter, it's more due to the fact that if the Giants had won it in '02 there would've been the inevitable criticisms afterward when the Barry Bonds steroid allegations came out and instead of just saying his home-run record was tainted and should have an asterisk, these same people would've said our title warranted an asterisk as well. That's not the kind of cloud you want hovering over your first ever championship because, no matter how non-threatening that cloud may be, it still blocks what should be a glorious sun.
This Giants team is the antithesis of that squad though, a group of guys minus any true superstar who banded together, set aside their egos and personal agendas, and truly put the team first with their eyes on the ultimate prize. I've been following this organization for over thirty years and I truly can't recall liking any team as much as this one and, no, that sentiment isn't born out of some kind of distorted post-orgasmic bliss where you profess your love before your seed has even dried, for I've been saying that for months. I imagine my affinity for this roster is what made my reaction to finally winning it all even more emotional than I expected; I figured I'd squirt a couple but not completely lose my shit like I did. It strikes me that the last time I confessed to tears of joy on this site was when Obama won the election, however this time I know I won't be looking back on it two years later with a tinge of sheepishness. What's that you ask? Do I feel foolish or wrong as it pertains to our President? I'll just say this: any feeling of regret I have when I think back on the hope and optimism I harbored on November 4th, 2008, is due to the naivety I displayed in thinking a president could actually go up against the political machine that is our big business driven country and make serious changes that quickly. The great poet T.S. Eliot once said "Between the Idea and the Reality... lies the Shadow." The good Doctor Thompson actually used that line to describe the political landscape in his "Fear and Loathing on the '72 Campaign Trail" and, while almost forty years has passed, I really can't say anything has changed. But enough talk of politics and his cohort, shadow, for this vent is one that should be devoid of both.
Either you love and understand baseball or you don't. And in order to love baseball it is essential you understand it. That seems like a relatively simple statement but I really don't think even the majority of self-avowed baseball fans truly grasp the nuances of the game. My whole life I've heard people say, "baseball is boring" and while I couldn't disagree any more vehemently, I understand why they say that. There's a lot of down time in the game and the season sometimes seems to drag on unmercifully, but those happen to be qualities of the game I love. Every pitch in a baseball game
has a multitude of things going on, it's a constant guessing game between the pitcher/catcher and the hitter, and a pitch can not only set up the next, it can also set up a pitch for an at-bat later in the game. A football team at its very worst can only lose one game a week but it's theoretically possible for a baseball team to lose seven. A football team, 16 in a season; a baseball team, over a hundred. There are always some gut-wrenching losses over the course of a year, and it would be easy to dismiss them due to the length of the schedule, but any player whose team is eliminated from
the playoffs the final weekend of the year will spend an entire off-season thinking about a single game, hell, a single pitch that might've been responsible for the fishing trip they're on. On the flip side of that, if your team is fortunate enough to advance to the playoffs you've already been put through the wringer then are thrown into a pressure cooker where the intensity of each game makes you realize you really have entered into a second season in which some of the greatest players of all-time have succumbed to the glare of the spotlight and unknown players have risen up to insert their name into baseball history. Cody Ross went from afterthought this year to never having to pay for his own drinks in San Francisco the rest of his life. Hell, he could run for Mayor and win.
This wouldn't be a true vent if it was all sunshine and handjobs, though, so let me blow off some steam towards all the "experts," those incredibly savvy baseball pundits, who never gave the Giants credit the entire postseason. Oh my, the Giants beat Philladelphia because the Phillies didn't hit against us. What the hell does that mean? Talk about flawed logic... The Indians only massacred Custer and his men because they decided not to fight that day. Give me a fuckin' break. Then, after beating the best team in baseball, everyone and their third cousin picked Texas to win it all, citing their offense as being the difference. From the beginning of time, good pitching has bested good hitting. Also, a big FUCK YOU to these same experts who systematically predicted a loss for every game Lincecum started in the NLCS and Series since he was matched up against Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee, respectively. An especially big GO FUCK YOURSELF to Eduardo Perez of ESPN who appeared every game day on Sportscenter to eagerly display his ignorance to an expectant sporting nation. Let me tell you something about Tim Lincecum, the kid's a two-time Cy Young Award winner, led the NL in strikeouts the last three years, but more importantly, is a goddamn warrior who I'd hand the ball to in a must win game every single fuckin' time. And you know what? Matt Cain might be my second choice. Wow, that just felt really good. Which leads us to:
If you have a problem with the Giants hoisting the trophy you might wanna tune out the next several years because we have everything in place to collect some more hardware with the aforementioned young pitching we've assembled, as well as one more key ingredient. Its name? Buster Posey. The first rookie catcher to win a ring in 44 years was a vital cog in this machine and he will lead us to the Promised Land again, you can be sure of that. I must confess here, in front of an audience that has most likely shrunk with every paragraph, so it's actually not to difficult to admit since I'm probably talking to myself, I envy one Peter "I Love Full House" Liska, for stating that Posey is our Derek Jeter. He made this comparison before the playoffs even began and I agreed before Buster matched Jeter by also winning it all his rookie year. Some men are soldiers, some men are born generals, and Posey is the latter. In fact, if he had been leading in place of Custer at The Little Big Horn you can be sure those infernal Indians wouldn't have been so lucky as to find such an uninspired opponent to ensure their victory.
I suppose there's only one last thing to do and that is to thank the sporting Gods for picking this unlikely cast of characters as a team of destiny. While there is, inevitably, a champion at the end of every season, in every sport, it isn't always a situation where there is an amazing confluence of factors that makes you realize that despite being the underdog, this team is going to win and nothing is going to change that and if you're a fan you can bet your sweet little ass you're going
to have the time of your life watching this storybook tale unfold. I'd have to say that I've only experienced this once before with one of my teams, the San Francisco 49ers of 1981, a team coming off a 6-10 season (which was preceeded by a 2-14 trainwreck) who came out of nowhere to shock the world knowing the entire journey where their final destination lay and laughed the whole way as everyone said it couldn't be done. Sometimes there's no better motivator than a naysayer.
They were led by a young quarterback named Joe Montana who was another General (and anyone who thinks Dan Marino was a better QB is outta their fuckin' tree and probably hates animals while not celebrating Xmas)(( hey! You know what? Fuck Derek Jeter and fuck the Full House loving Peter Liska! Buster Posey is our Joe Montana! Yes!)) who rose up and won the first of what you knew was going to be multiple championships. And, frankly, I can't think of anyone who deserves and is going to enjoy this impending Giants dynasty than me.
If you've made it this far you're either a huge Giants fan or a hard-core masochist. Or really enjoy my writing which only proves your masochism. When this vent was set aside I had an amazing number of people ask me if I was ever going to return to it and tell me how they missed it. Then again an amazing number for me has always been seven... I don't know if this is the return of Kevin's Vent (hell, for all I know the cops are waiting outside my office here at Hossboss HQ's with three tranquilizer darts for Harry, Jerry and me) but I do know this was the site I wanted to get this Giant happiness off my chest.
wanna rip on Kevin? Tell him what you feel. Email him here