The Game I've Been Looking For

Finally the Rays and Red Sox were able to give me what I wanted. A good game. As the postseason looms on I keep watching games where one team blows out the other. This is not what I want to see in the playoffs. I want to see games going into extra innings and players coming through in the clutch to put their team on top.

Of course there have been a few games that were kind of exciting but the one that tops the list was Saturday's Game 2 of the ALCS between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Boston Red Sox. The game lasted 11 innings and took 5 hours and 27 minutes to complete.

"It felt like an eternity--just back and forth," said B.J. Upton of the
Rays. "They scored runs, we'd score, they'd score--it was like that the
whole game."

If this doesn't classify as an exciting game I just don't know what does. This game was all offense as both starting pitchers, Beckett and Kazmir, struggled early in the game. Both teams scored 2 runs a piece in the first inning. I like to see teams score early and often and that is exactly what happened in this game. The final score ended up 9 to 8 with the Rays on top. The game ended with a sacrifice fly in the 11th inning off the bat of B.J. Upton which scored pinch-runner Fernando Perez from third base.

The Ray's designated hitter had this to say about their well earned victory: "Nobody said it was going to be easy. Unfortunately, we didn't want it to be five hours, but it is what it is. The best thing you can do when you play five or six hours is get the win, and we got that."

So as the playoffs keep winding down and we get closer and closer to crowning the world champions I hope to see many more games like this. It just makes baseball so much more exciting when teams score 8 or 9 runs a piece. These kind of games are what the October classic is all about.