Happy Clinching Day!
By Neal Pollack
Around 8:45 p.m. a week ago Wednesday, my friend Jerod called. “This is it,” he said. The D’Backs had already lost humiliatingly to the Cardinals, again, knocking the magic number down to two. Now the Dodgers had the bases loaded against the Padres, who by the end of the season were fielding a Triple-A club, and not even a very good one.
“I’m listening in the car,” he said. “Are you watching?”
“I’m watching on ESPN GameCast,” I said.
“Why are you whispering?”
“Because it’s the night I volunteer at the yoga studio ... .”
“You’re watching the game at the yoga studio?”
“If I volunteer, I get free classes.”
“That’s classic. So do you know what’s going on?”
“The computer is a little slow.”
“Well, they just yanked Estes, and Manny’s coming up.”
“Hang on, I’m gonna go outside.”
I did, and now I could stop italicizing my voice.
“FUCK, DUDE!” I said. “THEY’RE GONNA FUCKING DO IT! THIS HAS BEEN THE MOST AWESOME MONTH EVER!”
“I know, right?”
“We’ve gotta start planning for the playoffs!”
“Totally,” he said. “Let’s talk tomorrow.”
I went back into the studio office. Manny grounded out to second during savasana. But he homered later as part of a six-run eighth inning, and the Dodgers went on to dismantle the Padres 12-4. Jerod sent me a text message, which I received while wet-Swiffing the studio floor.
“Manny!” It read. “53 rbi in 50 games with dodgers.”
The next morning, I began to examine my playoff attendance opportunities. I got an e-mail from the guy who I buy loge tickets from during the season at incredibly discounted rates. His best seats, for the Division Championship Series, were going for $450 per set of four. Otherwise, he had a lot of crappy reserve and pavilion seats that he was offering for 70 bucks each, or more. Ah, I realized. This is how he makes his money.
“I want to go to a playoff game,” I said to my wife.
“How much are tickets?”
“One hundred and twelve dollars and fifty cents each.”
“That’s not too bad for a World Series game.”
“That’s for the first round.”
“Jesus Christ! You can go to one game. No more.”
“But ...”
“Maybe it’s not a good idea to be spending a lot of money on baseball tickets when the financial system is collapsing.”
Dammit, woman, I thought. Why are you so wise? Look, it’s never a good time to spend money on baseball tickets, really, unless you actually have money to spend. But I’d ridden to hell and back with this fucking team. I’d watched Andruw Jones bat more than 200 times. I’d attended a game that Esteban Loaiza started. I wanted payoff.
When I called Jerod, he agreed that our broker wanted too much for Round One. Maybe we’d pony up for an LCS game, and definitely if the World Series miraculously returned to Dodger Stadium. We could spend a third of that money and have a series of kick-ass viewing parties with lots of beer and weed and salty food.
Meanwhile, we had other avenues. Jerod’s wife was trying to schmooze tickets out of her corporate division boss. Another friend of ours has a longstanding relationship with a ticket provider of good standing. He’d landed World Series tickets in New York after 9/11, so getting DCS tickets in Los Angeles shouldn’t be a problem. Or maybe some other miracle would occur. That seemed like a good overall plan to me. I e-mailed my broker and told him no thanks for this round, but asked him to keep us in the hopper for the next two series.
A couple of hours later, the Dodgers clinched. I learned this as many true Dodger fans did: By watching Albert Pujols hit a home run against the D’Backs on GameCast. “Whoo-hooo!” I said, raising my fists weakly as that little cartoon ball left the little cartoon stadium in the box on my screen. It was about as exciting as getting Rick Roll’d.
Later that night, the Dodgers celebrated. Manny hopped from TV camera to TV camera like a channel-surfing seven-year-old. Russell Martin and Matt Kemp sprayed fans with champagne. The players loved one another nearly to the point of French-kissing as the Stadium turned into a party. I was there a lot during the 2004 and 2006 seasons. It never felt like that, even after we clinched. This team was different. This was magic.
“GAWWWWWWWLEEEEEE!” exclaimed 20-year-old Texan Clayton Kershaw as his Dodger pals drenched him with alcoholic liquid. “THIS IS THE GREATEST FEELING I’VE EVER HAD IN MY LIFE!”
I yelled upstairs to my wife.
“You’ve gotta get down here and see this,” I said.
Regina could give half a shit about the Dodgers, but, to her credit, she came downstairs.
“This makes me want a beer,” she said.
“So let’s have a beer!” I said. “Let’s celebrate.”
“We can share one.”
“Hell no, I want my own.”
“Share one.”
As Regina and I shared a beer, we watched the Dodgers dump liquid all over much-reviled (by me, at least) owner Frank McCourt. You had to give Frank credit, man. He held the line all year, and got us Manny for nothing. McCourt put on swim goggles and a snorkel, and he danced aggressively with his boys.
I began to tear up.
“Look at that,” I said. “They’ve really come together! I LOVE THIS TEAM! Isn’t it something what they’ve done?”
“Mmm,” said my wife, as she sipped a Dos Equis Amber in the basement. “Incredible.”
“You don’t even know what they’ve done, do you?” I said.
“I know it makes you happy,” she said.
Oh, it did. It made me very happy. We were going to win it all, and the road to glory began Wednesday night in Chicago, New York, or Philadelphia. That was my night at the yoga studio. I really need to find someone to take my shift.
Published: 10/01/2008
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