As usual, I’m sure things were very quiet in my absence.
Watching and following Boston sports from 3000 miles away might actually be the best way to do it.
The games are finished earlier, there’s no idiotic post-game hotsportztakes and forced worries following uplifting wins, and you’re not tempted to tune into sports radio to hear how they can take the best wins and make them feel like devastating losses.
You just watch the games, read what coverage you want to seek out, maybe text or tweet with friends, and just generally enjoy the experience. The David Ortiz grand slam on Sunday night was easily one of the top five sports moments we’ve had here since 2001, and we’ve had a lot of them. It was a moment where you knew the odds were infinitesimally small that the game could be tied up on one swing, that the odds instead favored an inning-ending out, and yet, you also just knew that Ortiz was going to do something big. You knew it. Everyone knew it. Then it happened.
It’s why we watch sports.
The Red Sox now lead the ALCS 3-2, heading back to Fenway Park for two chances to advance to the World Series. The Patriots are 5-1 and the Bruins are 4-2 after a nice win over old friend Tim Thomas.
Looking through my emails and catching up on the message board, I see that yes, the usual suspects have done their best to try and elicit concern, panic, conspiracy (If anyone actually thinks Belichick was trying to shame Rob Gronkowski into playing by giving him the black jersey for being the practice player of the week last week – when the team faced Jimmy Graham – they need to have their head examined.) and outrage over the current state of affairs.
I think its pretty pathetic, but apparently people like it, and tune in for it, so clearly, I’m the weird one.
A couple of sports media links from today:
Tim McCarver not quite ready for retirement– The headline to Chad Finn’s media column today might send a shiver down the spine of Red Sox fans, but the FOX analyst is still stepping down at the end of the season.
Tom Caron the before and after look of Red Sox playoffs – Bill Doyle has the NESN studio host busier than ever these days with the Sox in the postseason.
Boston Sports Media Watch 
You have discovered the secret to enjoying Boston sports – don’t live in Boston. You can enjoy your team and laugh at the Hotssportztakes of the local team such as whether Kirk Cousins should replace RGIII in Washington. No one here is talking about Gronk’s doctors or dissecting the Peavy-Iglesias trade further.
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Or, you can live in Boston and (a) don’t subject yourself to inane sports talk radio (this is key), (b) only read the stories you want to read from folks who aren’t hacks and who don’t have an agenda (admittedly, a small number but they ARE out there), and (c) just enjoy the damn ride — including dealing with all the highs AND the lows — of following the various teams.
I found that once you eliminate the sports media whores, frauds, fake tough guys, and jagoffs from your life, the fun of watching sports again, win or lose, returns almost instantly.
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If I’m being entirely honest, there are days when I just can’t help myself. And I know that let’s “them” win but what can I say? I’m a sucker.
I needed to hear how Felger and Mazz would go doom/gloom after that Ortiz walkoff. And honestly? It was almost artistic how they did it.
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You hit the nail on the head,J.R….and for those who say, “you must be listening all the time, how else can you comment on it?” …I say, BULLCRAP. It’s a channel surf world we live in. I might stop at these shows (D&C and F&G) for a total of 1 minute a day if that, and they never disappoint. Same crap, made up drama and storylines EVERY FRICKIN’ TIME…..no, you don’t have to listen a lot to know what these gasbags are doing.
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JR, I think you make a pretty good point. That said, it’s dismal that the options are all so poor. It is pretty dismal when the Sox have an astounding win such as last Sunday night and there is nowhere to turn. The moment I see Mazz, Tanguay, and Merloni glaring through the tube at me on CSNNE’s post-game, I feel true despair.
I just want a post-game that can discuss the win without trotting that sort of loathsome spectacle.
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Tom Caron, in a contest not even remotely close, has THE worst voice of all sports media hacks. It’s ‘fingernails-on-a-blackboard’ awful, and surely he knows this. In a twist of a popular phrase, he has a voice made for silent movies.
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Even though I like his broadcast overall, I think Castiglione’s voice is just about as bad. They’re both high-pitched and fairly nasal. That’s better for rock singing, not so much for sports broadcasts.
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Serious question–Do any of you people like anyone from Boston? Pitino hit the nail on the head with the “Fellowship of the Miserable” talk. It is F’n SPORTS people. Good Lord. THe cheap shots you take at some of these sportswriters is disgusting. They all probably have the jobs you wished you had. Amazing how mush you all bitch about these people, but yet continue to read them, watch them, or listen to them, (or all three). Seems like everyone on here is so miserable. Again, it is sports!!! Relax. Go Sox!!
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Sites are self-selective – people come here because they’re interested in the topic, and they return, and comment, because they enjoy the community, so to a certain extent commenters continue to reinforce their own tone. The radio hosts occasionally reference this, usually by disparaging the callers as attention-starved whiners. So there’s plenty of love all around.
I do get tired of commenters here and elsewhere talking generally about “hacks”, as if all, or the majority, of radio/TV/newspaper reporters and commentators are that, hacks. (I didn’t include websites because a lot of the websites, like this one, are run by amateurs–not a disparagement!–and the quality can vary REALLY widely. I’ll say this: if you’re paid to do something, then expectations rise accordingly. If it’s something you do on your own time, you’re free to suck, and no one will care. I think Bruce does a very good job here.)
Disliking someone’s style or method doesn’t make that person a hack. I do wonder how the people here (there are several) who toss around the insult “hack” would do as sports reporters or commentators…it also makes me wonder how hack-ish other folks think them to be at their own chosen occupations. So I think it’s best to back off of the gratuitous insults.
A few cases in point: Gary Tanguay. He’s pretty roundly abused at this site for being a house man, almost never willing to criticize the team he’s covering. (yyyeeeEEAAAaahh.) Does that make him a hack? No. He’s good for what he does: host some (generally) congenial shows that cover general team topics but don’t criticize too strongly or dig too deeply. As quick-hit, SportsCenter-type programming goes, he’s fine. Second case: Mike Felger, perhaps the most reviled person at this site (though competition is stiff). He trolls listeners and disparages the home team–pretty much the opposite of Gary Tanguay. But being the opposite of Tanguay isn’t enough to keep him from being a hack, apparently. And of course he’s never right (I recall him being the only, or at most one of the very few, commentators this spring who predicted a 90+ win season for the Red Sox.) Why does he focus on negative issues all the time? Because pissing people off is the key to talk radio (not just sports talk radio). I think if you listen closely to what he says, and get over your anger that he’s complaining about your favorite team, you’ll hear some legitimate points. And if he ticks so many people off so consistently, I guess he’s not a hack, either. My last case in point: John Dennis. I can’t stand listening to him, can’t stand his pomposity, his politics, or his very ugly trolling on a lot of topics outside of sports. But is he a hack? He’s headlined one of the most successful morning drive programs in Boston for the better part of thirty years, so even though I despise almost everything he says, I have to concede that he’s not a hack. He’s just odious.
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Love how miserable everyone on here is. Vin Scully, Dan Patrick, Mike Lupica, and Len Berman could all work in this city, and you people would bitch about them. You are never happy, especially “DryHeave”. Classy name. Are you people as miserable in real life as you are on here? It’s friggin’ SPORTS, Relax. You complain about all of these people, yet you seem to be able to recite what is said or written by each of them. Amazing…..
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