How Much Better Will It Get?

While following today's baseball action (I unfortunately had to make do with internet live scoreboards) I had my annual epiphany about how my baseball fandom varies so widely throughout the calendar year. During spring training, I'm obsessed with the upcoming season. After a long offseason, it's always exciting to rexamine the leagues and I absorb as much of the preseason predictions and analysis as possible. But after the novelty of opening day wears off, my passion for the sport becomes rather tepid. I look at the standings every few days and read a few weekly baseball columns, but I rarely if ever watch the actual games on TV. I guess it's just because the season is so long and each game is so relatively insignificant that as a fan, I'm strictly on cruise control. But come September's whispers of talk of magic numbers and home-field advantage, I get sucked back into the mix.

But then there's nothing like watching a playoff baseball game. During tonight's Cubs-Braves game, I magically saw the importance of every pitch, the subtleties of every managerial decision and I was absolutely mesmerized by the spectacle of it all. I know I'm only gonna sink in deeper as the playoffs continue which both scares and excites me tremendously.

As for today's games, could they have turned out any better? All three teams I rooted for were victorious and no one at work had a clue that I was a complete slacker all day. I think that things look especially bright for the Twins, who know that even if they lose on Thursday, all they need to do is hold fort at the Metrodome, which will be the loudest postseason venue they've visited since their Kingdome meltdown in '95. The Cubs also sit pretty, especially with stud-of-studs Mark Prior taking the mound at Wrigley on Saturday.