Prof: Howdy friends. My apologies for being MIA lately; it’s really rude of my job to have all of these important meetings and deadlines during the baseball postseason.
Before I get to baseball, I have to say that while baseball season is the best season, it’s 1a. 1b is the beginning of Oscar Prestige Season, in which most of the “important” films are released, just in time for award bait. As an unrepentant film snob, I like to watch these movies a lot. I kicked off my Oscar Prestige Season this year by watching a movie I’ve been highly anticipating, “First Man”, the biopic of Neil Armstrong. It was an absolute triumph. Ryan Gosling used his greatest weakness as an actor – a kind of weird, cerebral coldness – to his advantage as the famously unemotional, detached Armstrong. Claire Foy was excellent as Jan Armstrong, a woman trying to walk the wire between supportive wife and a soul adrift. However, for me the powerhouse performance and one that held the entire movie together was the incredible portrayal of doomed Ed White, played by Jason Clarke. I fully expect these three to have their names announced in many press releases during nomination times for major awards.
Anyway, I know we’re all here for baseball. I have the scoop on Game Two of the American League Championship Series, so let’s get started.
Houston Astros vs Boston Red Sox – ALCS Game Two
Before we even get started with this recap, it’s important to note that Red Sox ace Chris Sale has been admitted to the hospital with a stomach ailment. Will this throw a wrench in Alex Cora’s plans? Time will tell, but it didn’t matter last night as Cora had another fine pitcher, David Price, starting. Now, Price isn’t generally known as a good postseason player. In fact, he’s notoriously shaky. However, he was just good enough to get the Red Sox within striking distance and bring on their bullpen.
Gerrit Cole got rocked fairly early; coughing up five runs including a three run double off the bat of Jackie Bradley Jr in the third. Houston tried awful hard to claw back – Jose Altuve drove in a run off Craig Kimbrel in the ninth inning – but it was too little, too late. Boston tied up the series 1-1 and when next these two teams play, it will be deep in the heart of Texas.
Final:
Astros 5, Red Sox 7
Monday’s game will be a continuation of the NLCS, with Milwaukee traveling to Los Angeles for game three.
Fan Interference 
I’m looking forward to seeing First Man but I’ll be out of the country from this evening until next Sunday, giving some lectures at Monterrey Tecnológico in Old Meheeco. I’ll be following the proceedings on my mental dialysis unit but I’ll also be muy ocupado so I don’t know that I’ll have a lot of time to post.
Regarding Neil Armstrong, I met him once, very briefly, around 1983 at the United Airlines passenger service counter at the Denver Airport. Several flights had been cancelled due to a snowstorm and we were queued up waiting to be given hotel vouchers. He was standing in front of me and I couldn’t see his face but the expressions on the faces of the women at the counter told me he was probably a celebrity of some kind. When he turned around to excuse himself for being in my way (he wasn’t but courtesy was bred in his bones, I guess) I was astonished. Of course I recognized him instantly. “Are you Neil Armstrong,” I asked. “Why yes,” he smiled. He looked at me a little curiously. “Do we know each other?”
So yes, everything you read about him is pretty much true. The guy was so instinctively modest and immune to his own hype he figured if I recognized him, we must have met before.
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I guess the pitching strategy thing is still evolving here in the postseason, but I think it odd that Porcello has apparently been relegated to the pen. In favor of Price? I dooooonnnnowwwboutdat….
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Meh. Both iffy as far as I’m concerned, what with Price not being good in the postseason and Porcello….well we all know my thoughts on Rick so let’s move on.
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I’m annoyed they didn’t stick with Porcello after he lit-out the Astros in the 8th. He made the hitters look bad, and that’s really difficult to do. Instead Cora went with Kimbrel, who tried to blow it again.
I think it’s certainly come to the point where, if Cora brings in Kimbrel, he must have somebody warming up the moment Kimbrel takes the mound.
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I’m in favor of it. GO STROS!
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