Alignment and Re-alignment

It has been a busy month.  Yeah, it's been busy in sports, but I've been busy too and away from this blog.

Right now I have a precious commodity: a little time.  I've been able to multi-task and as a wind down, watch SportsCenter and keep up on the happenings of sports across the nation.  Being able to follow sports is one of the simple pleasures that can keep us grounded when the realities of life threaten to pull us out into space.  Even when the sports world is seemingly off kilter itself, it helps to ground because, unlike real life, an off-kilter sports world can be amusing and add an extra layer of suspense to a pastime already built on suspense.  Seeing the topsy-turvy start of the baseball season and which teams are doing well and which aren't is more interesting than usual.  Without further ado, a look at what's going on in the off-kilter world of sports and how that can keep fans on-kilter.

MLB

The Nationals/Montreal Expos franchise hasn't had a real good season since the strike shortened 1994 year.  Now, they're leading the NL East.  Their pitchers (who are finally healthy) are throwing lights out.  They have a couple of great young rookies this year who have really sparked the offense.  Bryce Harper plays the game the way we were always taught to play.  Even if he hits a pop-up that is surely going to be caught, he sprints to first.  This has paid off on the rare times where the sure thing isn't and the fielder muffs the catch.  Harper is fast enough that, if there isn't someone in front of him slowing him down, he probably has an in-field double off the error.  It is good to see a team that has done so poorly do so well to start the season.  And the nationals aren't the only one.

The Baltimore Orioles have been the whipping children of the AL East.  With teams like the Yankees, the Red Sox, and in the last few years, the Rays in the same division, not keeping up with the other teams means a sure losing season.  Up until today, Baltimore has been dancing with Tampa Bay for first place in baseball's toughest division.  As of right now, the Yankees have a share of first with the Orioles.  Both are a half game ahead of Tampa Bay.  However, Tampa leads the Yankees 7-2 in the top of the ninth.  That means, unless the Yankees manage a 9th inning surge they were known for three years ago, we're going to have a third team leading the division in the last 24 hours.  And how is this for competitive, there isn't a team in the division with a losing record.  "Cellar Dweller" Boston is 29-28, good enough for three games out of first.  Five teams within three games of the lead!  If the whole division can keep this up, we might see a September to rival last years 52 card pick-up of a playoff race.

Los Angeles

And how about the friggin Dodgers?  Last year's yard sale team watched its owners go through the ugliest Hollywood divorce since OJ and Nicole.  They verged on bankruptcy due to the nastiness and were scooped up for 2 billion, (yeah, with a B) dollars by some guy from L.A. named Magic.  Since then, even injuries to their power hitter star haven't derail baseball's best team (16 games over .500!).  Tinseltown is finally fun to watch again.  Earlier this season, L.A. was the place to be for sports.  The poor staff at the Staples Center had 4 games in 2 sports in a little over 48 hours!  Over the course of the weekend, both of L.A.'s basketball teams played playoff games, one played two from Friday to Sunday.  There was a playoff hockey game in between two of the basketball games at the same facility (on the same floor! well, kinda).  And the Dodgers were also off to their hot start!  If you think your life is off kilter, try being one of the poor staff members taking apart a hardwood floor to put up an ice rink, then taking that down to put up another hardwood floor with different designs painted on it.  Yeah, I think teaching college students from around the world how to write a traditional style American essay five times a week for about an hour and half each day is looking pretty cooshy after that.

NBA

With both of the aforementioned L.A. NBA teams out of the playoffs since then, we could have two teams that have won one championship each meet in the finals.  If Miami can put Boston away, they'll face the Oklahoma City Thunder.  The Thunder, of course used to be the Seattle Supersonics, and that relates to a rant I won't get into here.  The Sonics won the finals in 1979 and never got to go back until they had the misfortune to face the best team in NBA history, Jordan's 1995-96 Bulls (remember them? the 72-10 regular season record and 15-3 in the playoffs Bulls? yeah, those guys--btw, Seattle gave them two of the three losses).  Now the franchise is back in the finals.  Will they face the Heat and their 1 championship (2005-06) or will they face the winningest NBA championship franchise in history (17 banners).  The only American sports franchise with more championships is the Yankees and they had a 44 year head start.

I think the Thunder-Heat match up would be the most amusing to watch.  I think the edge would go to the Thunder, though.  They play better as a team, have more strength off a deeper bench and pairing their two main scorers against Miami's main scorers (Durant/Westbrook VS. Wade/James) OKC has a clear advantage.  Add that Bosh is still hurt even if he is playing, and I see the Thunder giving the state of Oklahoma its first championship outside college football.  Of course, this is a no brainer, since Oklahoma doesn't have any other professional teams.

Breaking News: Miami just beat Boston to force a game 7 in Miami.  Whoever wins gets to face a rested OKC team.

When our lives need alignment, sports may not do the aligning for us, but they can help put the trouble away for a bit.  There is something to be said for mindlessly cheering our favorite teams.  Even when sports itself needs a realignment (would you believe that as late as the 2002 season one division actually included San Francisco, New Orleans, the L.A./St Louis Rams, and the Atlanta Falcons?  And it was called the NFC West!) we can watch with amusement and anticipation as they go through their aligning to make a sport make more sense.  (Now if NCAA football would figure out their geography--Boise and San Diego aren't exactly east of anything).  We can look at the scandals, the oddities, the successes, the failures, the surprises, and the predictables and take solace that our lives will never be as weird as all that.