It’s no secret that I’m a baseball fan, a big Dodger and Cub fan (except when the Cubbies are going up against the Dodgers), and a super fan of Dodger broadcaster Vin Scully.
Mind you, the Dodgers have already clinch the National League West, but a couple of other teams haven’t found their playoff positions as yet.
I pretty much know the rules of the game, but love it more for the ambience and the occasional spectacular plays, feats of climbing walls to catch fly balls, and players tumbling into the stands and coming up the ball.
Herein come the problem, where I will write a piece about something I know nothing about, and don’t really care to get into the nitty-gritty, up-close-and-personal details of the intricacies of magic numbers, wild cards or playoff games.
So, there I was last night watching the for-show-only second of a three-game series with the Dodgers’ arch enemy, the San Francisco Giants and --by the way -- I have no idea where the arch rival business comes from, although they seem to hate us, when we really don’t give a damn about them, at least not enough to hate them or chant “beat S.F” the way they carry on a mantra of “beat L.S.” whenever we’re in their ballpark.
While munching on bagels and cream cheese, I’m listening Vinnie go over the playoff schedule at least three times.
Three times, and I’m still out in left field of understanding how it works or even which teams are still up in the air.
I don’t care. It will all get sorted out, and I’m more than content to wait for the final results.
If those teams are still up in the air as to who wins what, like winning the wild card, when the Dodgers take off for parts unknown in the east, the Dodgers will really, truly, honestly be up in the air, while those teams are still jockeying for position. There’s mixing sports metaphors for ya.
Depending on the results of the games in progress as the Dodgers are winging their way east, they will either land in Chicago to play the Cubs, or in Philadelphia to play the Phillies.
Imagine the flight plan filed by the Dodgers pilot.
“Tower, this is Capt. Joe Guessing, filing my plan to land at either Chicago’s O’Hare or Philadelphia‘s International Airport. Clear skies. Weather not a problem; scoring is. Over and out.”
The Dodgers flying to a destination unknown conjures up some interesting scenarios.
I have visions of the Dodger plane, aided by tail winds, arriving near Chicago early, with no results in yet from the playing field, leaving the landing field in limbo.
Then what if the games go into extra innings. It could happen. I can see the Dodger plane circling for hours in a huge landing pattern between Chicago and Philly.
If one of the games goes on for, like 19 or 20 innings, that could be the biggest one-plane stack up of plane waiting to land in the history of flying.
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