With the celebration of the Boston Celtics 17th NBA title winding down, the other Boston champions, the Boston Red Sox, have been standing in the shadows the past few weeks, waiving their arms, saying, "Hey, what about us?"
Today, they are really making the most of their opportunity to re-grab the spotlight. The Sox open up a three-game series against the St. Louis Cardinals, who are making their first appearance to Fenway since the 2004 World Series. Quietly, the Red Sox have remained the best team in baseball, posting the best record (along with the Cubs) as they near the mid-point of the season.
The Sox, specifically Curt Schilling, refocused the attention of the Boston sports fans back towards the Red Sox with Schilling announcing on Friday that he will be undergoing season-ending, and potentially career-ending, shoulder surgery next Monday.
Schilling posted a 53-29 regular season record (along with 9 saves) with the Red Sox in his four years here. More importantly, he went 6-1 in eight postseason starts in helping the Boston win the World Series in 2004 and 2007.
Overall, his career mark was 216-146 with a postseason record of 11-2. He was a 20-game winner three times, and made 1 All-Star appearance. The discussion around whether he will be voted into the Hall of Fame will largely be focused around his dominance in the postseason, as he and John Smoltz have been the two most dominant postseason starters of their generation. I don't believe he gets into the Hall solely based on the merits of his regular season performance. He will always be know as a 'big-game pitcher' and that is what the voters will have to think of he his time on the ballot comes up.
Not only was the Boston Celtics season a success on the court, it was a beneficial one for me, as I tuned into more Celtics games on the radio and realized what a good broadcast team Sean Grande and Cedric Maxwell are. Maxwell might be the best radio commentator in the league, as he could say something memorable at anytime.
His "LOOK OUT BEHIND YOU" scream of a call, directed towards Paul Pierce during Game 6 of the Eastern Conference finals as Tayshawn Prince tried to come up from behind Pierce and steal the ball was a pretty hilarious call, but Max not to be outdone topped it with a call during Game 6 of the NBA finals.
In the final seconds, Grande was waxing poetically about how the mission has come full circle and that the Celtics were back on top after 22 seasons, and in the middle of what Grande hoped would be his signature call, Maxwell screams out, "I GOT THE BALL!!!" as a rebound of the final shot ended up in his hands.
Max is classic.
With this being the Random Thoughts, Sights, and Sounds weekly post and now that were are into Sounds portion of the program, I leave you with smooth sounds of Jim Kosek, meteorologist from Philadelphia. Channel 5 needs to get rid of Harvey Leonard or Channel 7 needs to ax Pete Bouchard or Channel 25 can push Kevin Lemanowicz out the door so Jim can come to Boston. He's awesome. I want him screaming at Maria Stephanos "ARE YOU COMING ON TO ME!!"
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment