It is October. The leaves are turning all sorts of colors, the weather is getting colder (to some degree . no pun intended) and football is king of the sports world as usual.
But October also means baseball is finally getting exciting . sort of.
After six long and mostly boring months of the regular season that took us through the dog days of summer and into the beginning of fall, the playoffs are now taking over.
Perhaps surprisingly, but probably not, three of the four division series ended up being 3-0 sweeps with the Yankees, Angels and Dodgers rolling through. The other was the Phillies 3-1 domination over the Rockies.
For the fan, this was and is terrible.
The four remaining teams were all favored to get to this point. They are all big-market teams with a lot of spending money, but are not good stories for fans that do not root for them.
No Tampa Bay Rays, Florida Marlins or Texas Rangers are involved this year. There aren’t even the Cubs, who you love to hate but at least their inevitable collapse is worth checking out.
Absolutely no one story that you can grasp onto.
How am I supposed to get excited when Jeter, Manny or Utley etc. are searching for yet another championship ring?
It is what makes baseball one of the worst fan-friendly professional sports there is.
The rich get richer, and the poor are left to attempt a miracle, something that doesn’t happen often or last for long.
But trust me; baseball is not sad about these playoff matchups.
Both the TV networks showing the games and Major League Baseball itself must be dancing right now. Big markets mean money, big names mean money and that is all they are after.
Football has become America’s pastime because it-at the very least-tries to draw its fans in.
Not that the NFL isn’t after money as well, but they are interested in allowing teams to have a shot at turning things around.
With both the draft and salary cap, the NFL gives a team like the 2007 1-15 Dolphins a shot at making the playoffs in 2008, which is exactly what they did.
Baseball on the other hand is more interested in making the New York’s, Los Angeles’ and the Philadelphia’s of the baseball world better so they can win the big one and make for everyone involved more money.
As a fan you had to love to see a team like the Rays make it all the way to the World Series last season.
A team that totally sucked for its entire existence stuck it to Boston and actually won the American League.
Unless you are a Red Sox fan, you were pulling for the Rays: myself included.
It was a great story and it made baseball compelling, even though they lost to the Phillies in the World Series.
Unfortunately, all this complaining gets us nowhere.
Bud Selig’s wallet and all the others of those involved are fat and that is what matters to them. And it will always be that way.
So if you are a baseball fan, enjoy your playoffs.
As a fan of the Reds, one of those aforementioned “poor teams,” I honestly have better things to do than pay attention to teams I don’t care about.
Plus, football is still on, which will be tough to compete with because it is absolutely, unequivocally a better sport. Period.