I hate the Yankees. I hate their uniforms, their dirty stadium, their pompous owner, their arrogant players, their boorish bandwagoning fans, their money, their tradition. I hate the Yankees. Beating the Yankees is good.
What memories! Royals-Yankees, full house, mid-season series. Was this 1980 all over? Flip the venue, and last night’s result reminded me of when the R’s went to Yankee Stadium in June 1980 and scored NFL-like numbers of runs. That’s when the script was set for that October’s series. That roar you heard last night at the K was present every night back in the day. Happy, yet sad, again.
Chris N. was contemplating a nickname for the Royals. How about the Retread Royals? Kevin Appier, Brent Mayne, Michael Tucker, and Joe Randa all started with the Royals, went away, and then came back. Throw in career minor leaguer Aaron Guiel and you’ve got a lot of mileage on some of the tires.
Appier’s performance was fantastic. The only way to explain it is Tony Pena. That man is amazing.
Jeremy Affeldt is a sick, sick man. When he’s on, he has some of the best stuff I’ve ever seen. I remember Rick Honeycut, Frank Tanana, or someone like that in the early 80s would shave off a few layers of skin from their fingertips before pitching. I wonder if that treatment would help Affeldt and his blister issue.
The Royals have two inspired and one horrible choice for pre-At-Bat music. Joe Randa’s “She Sells Sanctuary” by the Cult is about as good of a choice as you can find. Surprised Dave V. and I haven’t spent an entire night talking about this. Brent Mayne uses “This is Radio Clash”. Very nice. Finally, did Mendy Lopez really use “Fight Fire with Fire” by Kansas? I see the local angle, but at least use one of Kansas’ good (popular) songs if you’re dipping into their catalog. Something tells me he didn’t pick the song. He hit his first home run in two years last night, so maybe I should shut up.
(If I were choosing music for when I was batting: “Safe European Home” by the Clash, “Hail, Hail” by Pearl Jam (two songs that have great beginnings that could be played for 5-10 seconds as I calmly strode to the plate), “Paid in Full” by Erick B and Rakim, or “Dust In the Wind” by Kansas (But that one only works if I was a base-stealing fiend and with fans who could figure out the pun).)
The old highlights of Royals-Yankees games were great, if overdone. Royals Stadium was a very different place than the K. Artificial turf, 12” outfield walls, zero advertising around the field. All the players were skinny. And they all hustled too much. Witness Mickey Rivers firing the ball back to second when Buck Martinez was safely standing at first with no thoughts of advancing. The brawl between George Brett and Craig Nettles was one of the all-time great baseball moments. I can’t believe A) it happened in the deciding game of a playoff series and B) neither player got ejected. I watched that game a few years ago, and it just made me sad. That Royals team was much better than the Yankees, then they fell apart in game five.
Overrated chant? At a professional baseball game? Really? D- for the KC fans on that one.