Hat guy!

It's baseball. Stick the Royals in the playoffs and no one who's been paying attention should be shocked if they won it all.

Stick the Royals in the playoffs and no one who's been paying attention should be shocked if they won it all.

Ugh. Not this #### again. The Royals aren't good enough

As Shredder mentioned in another thread, the Rays are helping me feel better about the Angel loss. Assuming they can finish it out, a world series with no Sox of any color is an outcome I can be happy with.

The corpse is down, a stake is in the heart, but the Rays still need to cut off the head and fill the mouth with holy wafers. Even if TB loses game 5 they should be in decent shape heading home for 6-7, but I've seen too many Red Sox comebacks to feel comfortable. I want to see the Rays quickly put that kind of talk to rest.

I'm worried about Kazmir, he's pitched poorly for awhile and could well be injured. In his good ol days he dominated better Red Sox lineups when the rest of the team could do nothing against Boston. Let's hope he doesn't have to pitch until the world series.

Who is the Boston-lover that does the play-by-play with Buck Martinez? Is it Chip Caray? He is so pathetically pro-Boston it makes me want to gag. I hope the Rays win just so I don't have to listen to that man-love reverence in his voice.

...and furthermore!! Who was the retard in the booth (Caray again?) that felt it necessary to explain to everyone that when Shane Victorino got thrown at, and kept pointing to his ribs, that he was actually saying "Its OK if you want to throw at my ribs, just don't throw at my head". No sh!t. He beat that dead horse so long that finally the on-field commentator said "I don't think a translation is needed for that", which shut him up momentarily.

Tell me about it. The dumbass gets more excited over the Ortiz triple with the game out of reach than the Rays homeruns that decided the game.

He beat that dead horse so long that finally the on-field commentator said "I don't think a translation is needed for that", which shut him up momentarily.

Which would've been particularly awesome if that on-field commentator was Jeannie Zelasko.

Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods didn’t win the first major tournaments they ever qualified for.

Yeah, Woods waited for his first major championship as a professional.

Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods didn’t win the first major tournaments they ever qualified for.

While true, Tiger did win the first major in which he competed as a professional; Jack won his second. Playing as an amateur is quite different since schoolwork gets in the way of devoting full time to golf, honing your game, scouting the courses, etc.

In short, the best really did know how to win from the moment they turned pro.

"The corpse is down, a stake is in the heart, but the Rays still need to cut off the head and fill the mouth with holy wafers."

I thought it was garlic, not wafers?

I thought it was garlic, not wafers?
I'd play it safe and use garlic communion wafers.

Tell me about it. The dumbass gets more excited over the Ortiz triple with the game out of reach than the Rays homeruns that decided the game.

It's not bias, he's just really bad at his job. Listen to any game he does, he can't decipher which moments require Excited Announcer Voice.

Be fair. Any time Ortiz has to go from home to third is time for Excited Announcer Voice.

Who is the Boston-lover that does the play-by-play with Buck Martinez? Is it Chip Caray? He is so pathetically pro-Boston it makes me want to gag.

Uh... what? I suppose, to a certain extent, everyone thinks national announcers are rooting against their team, but the impression in the Northeast is certainly that Caray is pro-Rays. It certainly seems like every time Tampa Bay gets someone on base, he talks about stealing but Boston getting a baserunner means talk of double plays.

Of course, he sucks in general. I'm not exactly looking forward to Buck and McCarver, of course, but I could do with never hearing this guy again.

When Carey did the Cubs games, he lived in Orlando. If he still does, his kids at least are likely Rays fans.

It certainly seems like every time Tampa Bay gets someone on base, he talks about stealing but Boston getting a baserunner means talk of double plays.

Unless Ellsbury ever reaches base, that is appropriate. I don't expect Drew or big Popup or even Pedroia to try running on Navarro.

Overall, I've heard less biased announcing on NESN.

t's not bias, he's just really bad at his job. Listen to any game he does, he can't decipher which moments require Excited Announcer Voice.

This is certainly true. He's determined that his "signature" home run call is "BELTED!!!", which works fine when you realize from the moment the ball leaves the bat that it's going out. But when the ball barely makes it over the fence, you can't use your home run call until you know that it actually clears the wall. Which is fine for most home run calls, but not for that one. On questionable home runs, he says "Long fly ball... Drew going back... that ball was BELTED for a 2-run homer."

And he's so bad at judging things that on the Aybar home run last night, he didn't know that the ball was out until it was out of the park. But there really should have been no question. So he didn't say "belted" until you couldn't even see the ball any more.

Yeah, Woods waited for his first major championship as a professional.

Exactly. And by 12 strokes.

He also won 2 of his first 7 tournaments after turning pro in late 96.

One more TB win would:

Make 2008 the 5th time in 8 years that a team plays in its first World Series (01 Ari, 02 Ana, 05 Hou, 07 Col)
Means all four 90s expansion teams will have reached the Series
Reduce to 3 the number of teams never having made the series (Tex, Sea, Mon/Was)
10% of teams never having made the WS would be lowest % since 1962 expansion (and probably lower than all of NFL/NBA/NHL in modern times?)

Also, the NL is guaranteed to have its 10th different Series team in 11 years (only St. Louis repeats in 04, 06)

10% of teams never having made the WS would be lowest % since 1962 expansion (and probably lower than all of NFL/NBA/NHL in modern times?)

Of course. No team from those other leagues has made the WS.

6 NFL teams have not made the Super Bowl. But the Super Bowl has been around a lot less time than the WS. 2 teams which have not made the Super Bowl did play in pre-SB NFL championship games. So, 4 out of 32: Browns, Texans, Jags, and Saints.

Shame Repoz,

Don is a Lucky's man, as are the rest of Sterling Coop.

Lucky Stripes.

Caray has been hopelessly biased towards Tampa.

So we have Sox fans saying Chip is biased towards the Rays and everyone else saying he's biased towards the Sox. Any time a national announcer says something positive about one of the teams, the other team says he's biased. Everyone's just used to watching games with their home announcers and almost never get either a neutral or opposing viewpoint. In this series, I'd expect the Sox fans to feel that way since they're getting trounced; there's simply more positives to talk about for the Rays right now. Doesn't make him biased. However, he's also a crappy announcer, as NJ in DC said in post 13.

6 NFL teams have not made the Super Bowl. But the Super Bowl has been around a lot less time than the WS. 2 teams which have not made the Super Bowl did play in pre-SB NFL championship games. So, 4 out of 32: Browns, Texans, Jags, and Saints.

Let's make that 3 out of 32. The Browns won the NFL Championship in their first year in the NFL. And then 3 more times over the next 15 years. Actually, they appeared in the Championship game their first 5 years in the NFL.

The New Browns haven't been in the Super Bowl, although they've claimed the history and heritage of the Old Browns, who are now the Ravens.

Let's make that 3 out of 32. The Browns won the NFL Championship in their first year in the NFL. And then 3 more times over the next 15 years. Actually, they appeared in the Championship game their first 5 years in the NFL.

Doesn't that depend on whether you consider the current Browns as genuinely connected to that franchise in more than just name, or believe that the Browns franchise that won the championship is now in Baltimore (which, historically, is the way sports leagues handled such matters).

Oh, and I hate the fact that sports announcers are always biased against my team, regardless which team I happen to be rooting for. It's infuriating.

Edit: And to no one's surprise, I was too slow.

Caray has been hopelessly biased towards Tampa.

If he stopped mentioning the score, would that help?

Chip is just not good. Next question.

Wait I thought Chip was biased towards the YANKEES? Damn you Chip!

If he stopped mentioning the score, would that help?

Well done.

Weird to me is that if TB wins the pennant, it will be the second time in a little over a decade that a Florida expansion team has gone to the Series in its first > .500 season. And yet the Rangers continue pennantless forever, let alone the Cubs continuing so since 1945 ...

It's not bias, he's just really bad at his job. Listen to any game he does, he can't decipher which moments require Excited Announcer Voice.

I'll second that. It was apparent in the LAA/BOS series, too. There were fly balls to left or right that he got all excited about, but were caught shy of the track. He announced Bay's HR to center in Anaheim like a lazy popup until it was gone. At first I thought it was bias but you're right, he's just bad.

And yet the Rangers continue pennantless forever, let alone the Cubs continuing so since 1945 ...

The Rangers are the only franchise never to make it to an LCS. The Brewers haven't made the NLCS, but they have made the ALCS. The Nationals haven't made it there, but the Expos did in 1981.

Wow, you have to give Chip Caray some props here.

In a discussion about what might be the dumbest Mike Celizic column ever -- itself an achievement of historic proportions -- the conversation still turns to how bad Chip Caray, unmentioned in the article, is.

Impressive!

He's really bad at his job AND really biased. If he was actually a competent announcer I may be able to take the anti-Sox bias or vice versa but the combination is just unbearable. Not to mention that the guy quacks and squawks like a duck when he gets excited (IE whenever the Rays or Angels make a big play of some kind).

Caray is to hack announcers as HatGuy is to hack journalists.