Jim Murray said that in response to a person opining that the game was boring.
As a Stats Ball guy, the game is never boring. The game within the game becomes the game within the game within OUR game.
My wife walked into the room and spied me watching a 9-1 game.
"Why are you watching a game that is so out of hand?"
My short answer to her was that I like any baseball.
The real reason was that I had two hitters still 'alive' in the game and was also interested to see if this particular Manager would still allow his players to run with a big lead.
No matter the score, the game is never dull. Whether the score is 9-1 or 1-1, we still want our hitter to come up with the bases loaded and we still want our pitcher not to give up another run.
We rehash the game through box scores and numbers.
Last night as Jason Motte came into the Cardinals game to get one out for a save, I saw a Cardinals fan give a fist pump when Motte was summoned from the bullpen.
Motte is a good closer, not lights out. I know that fan was probably a Stats Ball player and that Motte was on his team.
Cardinal fans were cheering right along with him, wanting the same outcome. But like us, he had two irons on the fire. A Cardinal victory and a Motte save.
Bob Costas turns his nose up at the thought of fantasy baseball.
He calls himself a baseball purist and that fantasy 'bastardizes' baseball.
My response would be that Costas has never played and never opened his mind enough to give it a chance.
I'M a baseball purist and can enjoy both. Why can't Costas? I'll never get it.
In Costas own way, he is taking baseball and bastardizing it.
He does not wax poetic about the sport for free. When he shows his life long treasure of a Mickey Mantle card, he is usually getting paid doing it.
I know that Dan Okrent has regrets about giving us the roots for our game.
He shouldn't.
Anything that adds to the enjoyment of living life should be looked at as a positive.
There are millions of fantasy players looking at baseball through a different specter.
But, they are looking at baseball nonetheless.
More than any other sport, baseball is a numbers game.
It's always been a numbers game.
I write all this because I got the 'Look' last night.
You all know the 'Look'.
It's when we mention we are into fantasy baseball.
I get it all the time, but last night I got it from a baseball person and to tell the truth, this time it just pissed me right off.
I'm proud of our hobby.
I asked the guy who gave me the 'Look', to name the current rotation for the Minnesota Twins.
When he couldn't, I gave him the same 'Look'.
"How can you call yourself a baseball fan?"
I know that naming the Twins staff has nothing to do with the deepness for which a fan is measured, but at the same time, I wanted to give him a taste of his own medicine.
It is my favorite question in situations like this and I keep on top of the Twins rotation just in case they challenge me back
Anyway (which is one word for 'I've already talked to long....)
I thought about that Jim Murray quote last night and thought to myself that if we Stats Ballers have a hitter or pitcher in a game, we're never bored and will even watch a 9-1 game to completion.
Something I bet Costas would not do, unless he were getting paid.
