Spring Break
A decade none of us saw coming
Adam Loghides
Issue date: 1/21/09 Section: Sports
As a sports "traditionalist", I find myself with my head buried in the sand. The thought of looking up and seeing a bunch of Cardinals flying east for the Super Bowl is enough to make a grown man, who loves sports the way they used to be, throw up just a little bit in his mouth.
Imagine a man who dies early in the year 2000 at the age of 80 and lived a life where he saw two World Wars, the internet come of age, cell phones and computers that are the size of their hands and Yankee dynasty after dynasty. What that man would have missed this decade is what we all have marveled at over the last nine years.
The decade led off with a franchise in Baltimore winning a Super Bowl. Ah, but remember where that franchise got its start? In Cleveland, as the Browns. Who in their right mind would have thought we would see the Browns franchise ever get to, and win a Super Bowl? But wait, it gets better.
The year 2001 arrived and, nearing the end of yet another Yankee dynasty, along came a team from Arizona who appeared snake bitten in Games Four and Five of the World Series. Lo and behold, that dynasty died in the desert a few nights later, and the Diamondbacks were the world champions of baseball.
In 2002, a rally monkey took over the baseball world and the Anaheim of Los Angeles, who had never even sniffed a world series, won a world championship.
The next year brought with it the chance to see the Cubs and Red Sox both reach the World Series. In traditional style, they both fizzled and missed by one game, while the Yankees reached yet another World Series. As normal as that may have seemed, the Yankees still lost the series to a bunch of fish from Florida. Are you kidding?
One inning away from elimination the next year, the Red Sox came back and won Game Four of the ALCS against the hated Yankees. Then the unthinkable happened. The guys from Boston came back from a 3-0 deficit and stole a pennant right out from under the Yankees. They couldn't actually win a World Series though, could they? They not only won it, they swept it.
Imagine a man who dies early in the year 2000 at the age of 80 and lived a life where he saw two World Wars, the internet come of age, cell phones and computers that are the size of their hands and Yankee dynasty after dynasty. What that man would have missed this decade is what we all have marveled at over the last nine years.
The decade led off with a franchise in Baltimore winning a Super Bowl. Ah, but remember where that franchise got its start? In Cleveland, as the Browns. Who in their right mind would have thought we would see the Browns franchise ever get to, and win a Super Bowl? But wait, it gets better.
The year 2001 arrived and, nearing the end of yet another Yankee dynasty, along came a team from Arizona who appeared snake bitten in Games Four and Five of the World Series. Lo and behold, that dynasty died in the desert a few nights later, and the Diamondbacks were the world champions of baseball.
In 2002, a rally monkey took over the baseball world and the Anaheim of Los Angeles, who had never even sniffed a world series, won a world championship.
The next year brought with it the chance to see the Cubs and Red Sox both reach the World Series. In traditional style, they both fizzled and missed by one game, while the Yankees reached yet another World Series. As normal as that may have seemed, the Yankees still lost the series to a bunch of fish from Florida. Are you kidding?
One inning away from elimination the next year, the Red Sox came back and won Game Four of the ALCS against the hated Yankees. Then the unthinkable happened. The guys from Boston came back from a 3-0 deficit and stole a pennant right out from under the Yankees. They couldn't actually win a World Series though, could they? They not only won it, they swept it.
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