Baseball induced schizophrenia

I grew up in Cubs land.  One of our neighbors lived and died by the Cubs.  Well, lived and wandered around in a state of profound depression by the Cubs.  Sadly, seeing as they were, you know, the Cubs, there was a lot of the wandering around bit.  Others were nearly as committed.

Now, my household was sort of baseball agnostic.  As I remember it, my dad tended to follow mostly just the Bears (more sighing, more often than not, although I did have the entire "Superbowl Shuffle" memorized back in the day...  "We are the Bears shufflin' crew, shufflin' on down, doin' it for you...") and baseball we just didn't watch that much. 

And my mom grew up in Sox land, so there was that influence, albeit a small one. 

The Cubs are just kind of ever present, so even if you're not a real fanatic, they kind of impinge on your consciousness more than the Sox.  There's the whole WGN thing, there were the day games that were on TV virtually every day in summer.  It was almost harder to ignore the Cubs than not.

I went to college and grad school on the south side, where there was much more of a Sox presence, even if just because their part was closer.  But those were also, at least for much of it, the years of the Bulls, and they trumped everything. 

As not a super fan of anything, I suppose I've tended to be a fair-weather fan more than anything else, which sort of makes me feel guilty.  But, basically, I'm mostly ambivalent about sports, and so I get caught up in whatever's making the news.

Now, since leaving Chicago, I find myself mostly just wanting all teams associated with Chicago to win.  Sadly, this often leaves me looking at the sports pages muttering "frickin' Cubs" or whatever.

Two years ago (three years ago?  shows how much attention I pay) I got completely caught up in the Cubs pennant run.  Watched all the time, was tangentially caught up in the Red Sox, just because it was all so much fun.  And then they tanked.  And it was awful.  Just gut wrenching.  I gave a horrible lecture the day after their total collapse, and apologized to the class that the Cubs had gotten me so very down that I couldn't summon up energy to attempt to make the revolutions of 1848 interesting.

I'm unwilling to let that happen again.  But tonight I found myself turning on the game and getting involved and pumping fists and all that.  At least until I had to leave.  Sigh.  I may not be able to help getting involved.

In the meantime, I'm going to critique one of the sportscasters.  Frankly, I could probably critique a bunch of them, but I only watched for a while and so have one thing that I really noticed.  I don't know her name, but the woman who was broadcasting during the pregame was just so bizarrely dressed to my eye.  She had flowing blond hair, big chandelier earrings, and a fur coat with a very dramatic collar.  The coat made a certain amount of sense, as it was apparently quite cold.  The hair, whatever.  I think it's the earrings that set my teeth on edge.  She looked like she was dressed for a fancy dress party, and the guy next to her should have been in a tux.  I feel sort of bad for being bothered by this, because on the one hand, she should be able to wear what she wants.  But it ended up just looking really weird to me.  Really.

Uh.  Anyway.  Go Sox!

Comments

[rbb]

The sportscaster's name is Jeanne Zelasko. I have absolutely nothing against female sportcasters as a concept; but she, in particular, is a crime against nature. I've forgotten the details, but during the all-star game she did something absolutely insulting to a legendary baseball figure. I think he commentary is inane, her style offputting.

[spudsayshi]

Heh. Thanks for the info. Yeah, there was just something really off about her in the brief bits I saw. She had the sportscaster voice down, but... something was odd.

However, I'm currently much more annoyed by the announcer who, during the last minutes of the fourth game, mused about how much a Sox victory would mean to the south side and its Polish, Italian, and Irish neighborhoods. And I think another European ethnic group, too.

I think I get what he was trying to say, in refuting the "southside = ghetto" idea, but by ignoring the vast minority populations, I thought he was ridiculously insular. Or something.

Anyway.

[rbb]

Well, I understand what you're saying; but keep in mind that the minority population of the South side has largely abandoned baseball in the last 20 years, in favor of basketball. (MJ's fault, perhaps?) In the 1970s, a young man growing up in the Robert Taylor Homes might grow up to be a Hall of Fame baseball player (Kirby Puckett). Today, that's not likely to happen -- baseball has become increasingly irrelevant in the black community, to the extent that less than 10% of current major leaguers are African-American. So, I think a case could be made for de-emphasizing the extent to which the White Sox victory would be meaningful in Bronzeville, Woodlawn, Englewood, etc.

[spudsayshi]

Yeah, I know. But what about, say, Pilsen? Didn't they even make a biggish deal about Latino players in this World Series?

That is interesting, though, that baseball has so lost interest in the African American community. Hmmm.