Coyne's Clippings (October Baseball Edition)

BR checks in from NYC with an interesting article on Brad Radke, tonights Game Two starter for the Twinkies.

Also, "I looked up my family tree and found three dogs using it." a little shout out to Rodney Dangerfield in this sports mail bag. Caddyshack was the best!

From the other day, Bill Simmons has a cool column about Red Sox nation and the current state of it. Note, he now lives in L.A., but the opening paragraph sums up a bit about the Boston state during the year. While I never take it for granted, its always good to be reinforced why this area is great for baseball.

You can only feel so involved in a pennant race when you're 3,000 miles away.

Here in Southern California, some Sox fans frequent Sonny McLean's, a neighborhood bar in Santa Monica that shows every Boston game. It's the kind of place that makes you feel like you're home again, if only for a few hours. Almost like one of those "Total Recall" experiences that Quade had. Maybe I don't stop by Sonny's that often, but I like knowing it's there. You never know when you might need a Boston fix.

The air is lighter and so is the mood in New England when the Sox are in the hunt. Then again, there's a difference between being in a Boston bar in September and actually being in Boston. During the tail end of a pennant race, there's an extra surge of energy, a sense of purpose, a common ground. The weather makes you feel like you closed your eyes, spun around a few times and landed in San Diego. The city crawls with college kids and grad students, all of them hoping to make their mark. The girls look better than ever, squeezing those last few weeks out of their summer outfits and tans. On Saturdays, with everyone savoring those last few gorgeous days outdoors, it seems like 20 million people are crammed downtown.

The Red Sox dominate everything. You can't walk 10 feet without seeing a Sox hat, can't step into a bar without seeing baseball players on a TV, can't have a conversation without the topic turning towards the team. The collective mood of the city ebbs and flows with the fortunes of the team, like an oversized college campus, everyone riding the same daily roller coaster. When the Yankees come to town, you can feel it. It's like an invasion. The Yankees are coming.

Sure, you can follow the Sox on the West Coast. You just miss the little things. Walking into a bar and knowing that there's a 100 percent chance the game is showing. Seeing Sox hats and jerseys no matter where you are (Store 24, Dunkin' Donuts, Citizen's Bank, wherever). Loitering outside Fenway before game time, sipping on a beer and watching hordes of diehards happily filing through the turnstiles. Singing the "Bah-da-dah!" part of "Sweet Caroline," along with 35,000 other fans, as the Fenway P.A. system blasts the song between innings. You can't get these things from DirecTV and message boards. You just can't.

Finally, a post I've been trying to make for a couple of days. Last Saturday BR had a quality Baseball thoughts, while wondering just exactly when Roger Clemens will enter the "twilight of his career" article. LONG LIVE BOB RYAN! He's the best.