Had reason to be at a bar tonight. Not that that's a stretch in and of itself, mind you, but the majority of the people I was there with I had never met. All the while, a local small college basketball team was competing to join the March madness thing I used to follow and still hear about from time-to-time. One of the guys in my group was extra interested because he and his wife were introduced to one another by the guy who happened to be a coach of one of the two teams (The University of Northern Colorado Bears).
My sports-watching background is such that if I get interested in a contest of non-baseball proportions, I still become vested, and yearn to learn who wins and who loses. I get drawn in. For better or for worse. But this game was exciting not just because the guy I was hanging out next to knew a coach, but because the guy I was hanging out next to was also from Iowa.
There's something about people from Iowa. It's not like we had any mutual Iowa friends, or were back-of-the-hand familiar with each other's hometown. In fact, we weren't even the same age. But put a couple strangers at the same table who are obligated to spend a few hours together and have them both be from Iowa, and you've got a recipe for camaraderie. I can't explain it.
It's like those octogenarian WWII or septuagenarian Korean War veterans you see from time-to-time who wear those navy blue hats ordained with ornamental embroidery signifying their time in a certain infantry or battalion or whatever. (I'm not taking for granted veterans, or military personal in general, I just don't have a proclivity to such things and therefore can't quite describe it.) Put two strangers from Iowa in a bar who both know they're going to be in each other's company for a few hours, and suddenly you have two guys who may as well have been in each other's wedding.
————————
So it was that I found myself watching—and rooting for—the University of Northern Colorado Bears to win a game that would garner them entry into the dance, or show, or whatever they call it. It was a game that was close down to the last half-minute or so. And in the end UNC did indeed earn their first-ever berth to said dance.
But it got me thinking about a subject that has no shortage of dialogue over the decades. About how this game had a gripping sense of urgency about it. Especially as the game got closer to the end. Much in the same way a close football contest might keep a viewer on edge until the clock runs out.
Until the clock runs out. The clock runs out and, sans a tie, the game ends. In baseball, when the clock runs out.... Wait. In baseball, there is no clock. Save for the one that tracks the duration of the game for no other purpose than that of posterity. No, sir. There is no governing clock in baseball. None.
And that's kind of cool, you have to admit. Because baseball games tend to average about two-and-a-half to three hours. Any longer than four, and they makes the news. Like when the Colorado Rockies and San Diego Padres battled for 22 innings, for over six hours, back in April 2008. At the time, it was the longest game since...
The longest-ever game in MLB history was an eight hour-six minute contest between the Chicago White Sox and the Milwaukee Brewers (then of the American League) in 1984 that went 25 innings and was eventually won 7-6 by the Pale Hose.
That's like two-and-a-half games. In one game. Even when other sports go into overtime, or sudden death, they're not likely to extend fifteen minutes beyond regulation.
————————
So I'm just saying... look how unique baseball is because of this. And don't get me wrong: there is a ton of urgency in a baseball game. The best chance for a team to nudge ahead and stake its claim to victory could just as easily happen in the first inning as the last. Or the 22nd, for that matter.
I mean, it's cool the Bears are in the Dance and all, and I hope they fare well as a 16th seed, and at least don't get blown out—and maybe even pull off an upset. But regardless. If you watch, you will no doubt—and uncontrollably—have your eye on the game clock. And while you're doing that, every once in a while, think about how baseball has no game clock whatsoever.
You had me at Dancing Bears.
ReplyDelete