Toeing the Rubber

Posted By Tru on April 7, 2011

Note from Cyn:  Good friend and contributor to Toeing the Rubber, Tru is back again this season with his words of wisdom.  What follows is the first of hopefully many entries by him this year:

You’ve been stuck in the back end of the plane for several hours, wedged up against the window, with the old woman who is sprawled fast asleep in the aisle seat.  You don’t want to wake her and now that the plane has come to a complete stop and the captain has turned off the seat belt sign, the late arriving passengers slowly ooze out of the jet into the passenger terminal.

Bags in tow and a rental car that hasn’t been washed, you leave the airport and head for the hotel that is another hour and half of travel time.

Alone on the highway, where even the state police seem to know that you’re not real prey, you begin to think about things.  Crazy things, as your mind wanders all over the map and begins playing with you in ways that words would never be heard coming out of your mouth.  Fighting the urge to sustain this inane train of thought, the window goes down to let a gush of fresh air into the car as you try to turn your thoughts onto something a little less negative.

The radio is not getting anything other than the twang of a guy and his old dog, as they were both spurned then turned out by a former girl friend and on any level there is no relating to the sad events this guy is going through.  Well, maybe.

I really don’t understand whether it is just a fluke, or why it seems to stick in the back of my head that the Red Sox will never win another game for as long as I live.  All of the essentials are there, and individually, at least on paper, they’re all part of the upper end of baseball.  I’ll grant some are older and worn around the edges, but they too have their abilities and can contribute.  Even management has had enough experience, not just in assembling a team, but in keeping them focused on what they have to do.

So what’s the deal?

For as long as I’ve loved this game and paid attention to it, foolishly thinking that I have some inside knowledge, the answer is I don’t know.  Maybe it’s just that the term ‘pressing’ is affixed on new players who are surrounded by the crush of media who unfairly pushed them up onto idol mounts and they’ve never seen anything quite like it.  Sure, they’re all MLB talents and seen major cities and read the papers, watched the TV talking heads laud and denigrate; they should be used to this, right?

Maybe the idea that since Henry & Co. revitalized this franchise and built the brand into something better than any of our heritage with the club has known, they are now expected to win.  It’s not just about having good health, or luck… it is all about winning and as a fan, perhaps I’ve come to expect it also.  The culture change that has replaced a lot of the fear and loathing that always accompanied the Red Sox fan base, as you wanted to believe they could get there, but held onto that, “we’ll get em next year” attitude.  No, the fans now expect the Red Sox to win.

Oh, I could wander over this endless double yellow line as I hurt my head trying to figure out what will happen, and how the Sox will go on some ungodly win streak.  But the only thing I really have is simply faith.  Corny as it is, this is the stuff that always carried me, season after season, bad year after worse and always, seemingly coming up short.

For all the business experience anyone can have, there’s always been this neat little parable’s or phrases, that somehow sum up a situation; little anecdotes that describe a given situation or redirect people towards better things.  Hell, there’s even a business that made a small fortune in that kind of wall art, cards and other little gifts that are designed to inspire.  I don’t need any of that.  And neither do the Red Sox.

What I believe they need is the same thing I need; faith.

And it isn’t borne out of some spiritual thing.  It is a certain trust that they are, I am not going to be moved in a direction that makes me dislike or abandon them.  They go out there every day, so I will too.  I’ve done it for too many years and while I’m as worn, perhaps even more so as a few of the players, I’m up to the task.  I simply will not quit.  I have them and they’re stuck with me.

And for all of that, I say they’ll win today.  Because in their hearts, and in mine, we are that good.  We have faith.

Terrific.  Now I have to turn around and get off the right exit to my hotel.

Category: 2011 | Comments Off
Tags: Boston Red Sox, Keep the Faith, Red Sox Fans, Tales from Tru, Tru

Posted By Cyn on April 7, 2011

Here’s what I will say about this God-awful losing streak:  It’s okay to be disappointed.  It’s okay to be upset.  It’s okay to be annoyed.  Heck, if you’re the type, it’s okay to be embarrassed.  Don’t let anyone tell you you’re a bandwagon fan because you hate the fact that your team has gone 0-5 to start the season.

But, also, don’t let anyone talk you into being panicked about it.  Teams have losing streaks.  Sometimes to start the season, sometimes in the middle of the season and sometimes at the end.  Regardless of when the streaks occur, they stink.  No one is happy about them.  Not the fans, not team management, and certainly not the players.  Being bothered by your team’s losing streak doesn’t make you a bad fan but panicking about how the team will end up five games into the season does make you an over-reactor.   But, for the most part, that’s normal too.  People over-react.  That happens when you get poked at by all the other fans and even your own sports writers.

We’ll get past this folks.  We will.  More importantly, the Red Sox will.  The poet Tom Petty once said “The waiting is the hardest part”.  Damn straight.

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Random stat that doesn’t mean a damn thing and I’m writing it here so people will stop sending it to me:  No team has ever won the World Series after starting their season 0-5.  Whoopty do. You could come up with any obscure fact and attach it to this situation and it would mean as much.  If we have to trot this out let’s use it this way, in 2004 no team had ever come back from an 0-3 deficit in an seven game playoff series and it got done.  This is baseball…anything is possible.  Giving up on the team because no one has begun a season the way this team has is just ridiculous.

Blog suggestion for the day:  Over at Inside the Monster they’ve already decided it’s time to break out the superstitions.  Hey, can’t hurt.

Category: 2011 | Comments Off
Tags: Blog Suggestions, Boston Red Sox

Posted By Cyn on April 7, 2011

I'm going to let you guess what we named our team. (Hint, they didn't put down our last score...which was 9) Brought us good luck!

Oh how we’ll laugh about this past week come October!

In the meantime, I’m not here to write about last night’s game.  I’m here with some good news…but first a little bit of background.

Las night I attended an event run by Tickets for Charity and sponsored by Narragansett Beer. It brought together some local bloggers so we could learn about what Tickets for Charity does, network with fellow bloggers and enjoy free ‘Gansett and appetizers all at Jerry Remy’s Bar and Grill.  I’ve followed Tickets for Charity on Twitter for a while now but never had a very clear understanding of what they were about, so it was interesting to find out exactly how they work.  You can read specifics here but the short version is, instead of using an outside ticket source that ups the face value of tickets (for sporting events, concerts and other events), if you go to Tickets for Charity, the money you pay over face value goes directly to charity.  This relates to the Red Sox in that Tickets for Charity is in a partnership with them and the money spent on Red Sox tickets goes to the Red Sox Foundation.

So last night I’m networking along with Kelly O’Connor and enjoying myself at Remy’s in spite of the Red Sox score when it is announced that we’ll be playing a game to win some prizes.  The game was Taboo (or, really, a form of Password using the Taboo buzzer and timer).  Without using our hands we had to give clues so our partner could guess the word printed on a card.  All the words were related to Tickets for Charity, the event we were at and Boston Red Sox baseball.

Yeah, Kelly and I pretty much kicked butt.  There were three rounds, two plus the final between only two of the five teams and we scored 6,6 and 9.  It was fun and became exciting when we realized we had won.  I’m not overly competitive but it was sweet winning what we did.

And I’m telling you all this why?  Well the good people at Tickets for Charity not only gave me two tickets to Opening Day tomorrow at Fenway for ME to use, but they gave me two tickets to Opening Day tomorrow at Fenway to give away to my readers!  Not too shabby, eh?

Time is short.  Red Sox play today at noon in Cleveland and open tomorrow at 2pm in Boston.  So first the rules:  You’ll have to trust that I will meet you at Fenway and give you the tickets in person because I won’t be able to get them to anyone today.  The second is that the contest will run from the moment I hit “publish” on this entry (which will probably be just after 7am ET) until 2pm ET today.  Probably a little under 7 hours so my late morning/early afternoon readers have as much of a chance as my early morning folks.  Oh yes, and how do you win the tickets?  Simple.  You’re going to answer a trivia question about ME.  Let’s see how much you pay attention to my ramblings!  Send the answer to contests@toeingtherubber.com and when today’s Red Sox/Indians game is over a winner will randomly be chosen from all the correct responses.  (To keep it fair, I won’t be the one choosing.  An unbiased third party will do it for me!)

So that’s it.  Answer the question, email it to contests@toeingtherubber.com (no responses left in the comments of the blog or sent to any other email address will be considered) and by tomorrow you and and a friend could be on your way to Opening Day at Fenway.  Simple, right?  So what’s the question?

Here you go:

Since I began blogging, I have often referred to the player who got me interested in baseball.  The one I consider my “all-time” favorite.

Who is he?

That’s it.  Have at it and good luck!  Once again I’d like to thank Tickets for Charity and Narragansett Beer for the great time and very cool prize!

Category: 2011 | 2 Comments »
Tags: Boston Red Sox, Contests, Opening Day 2011