TOWSON, Maryland, Wednesday, September 6, 2017 - This game started yesterday; i.e., Tuesday. There was, at the outset, a two hour, fourteen minute rain delay. When the first pitch was finally thrown, it was after 9 pm. After all of this, the home-standing Orioles grabbed a rather quick 1-0 advantage; there was a couple of infield singles, a walk, and, well, you know how these things go. At the end of the first inning, the score read Baltimore 1, New York 0.
Don't get comfortable with that storyline. It did not last. By the third inning, C. C. Sabathia, the Yankees' cagey veteran starting pitcher, had things well under control. Meanwhile the Yankee hitters were getting a line on the Baltimore starter, Jeremy Hellickson.
In fact, the Yankees went ahead and put a crooked number on the scoreboard off of Hellickson, the crooked number being a 6.
By the time the Orioles came to bat in the bottom of the third, Hellickson was in the showers - the ones in the locker room, not the ones in the great outdoors - and the Orioles were way behind, again.
A lot of fans went home. It was already late, the Yankees were way ahead, and the weather was already wet and now was turning windy and colder. Even in the millions of homes around the Baltimore Beltway, Televisions were being turned off or turned to another channel.
In the largely empty, cavernous ballpark, the Orioles did what the Orioles do. They hit home runs. Manny Machado was first; his solo shot in the bottom of the third made it 6-2. Then came Jonathan Schoop, whose solo blast in the fifth made it 6-3. After Schoop, it was Mark Trumbo. Trumbo hit a two-run shot in the sixth to bring Baltimore within 6-5.
That is how the score stayed entering the bottom of the ninth. The current New York closer is Dellin Betances. He throws 99 mph fast balls and breaking balls that Joe Angel, the Orioles outstanding play-by-play man, calls "nasty." In that 9th, Betances struck out Pedro Alvarez and got another out and so there were two outs and nobody on. On a 3-2 pitch, Betances threw Tim Beckham one of those 99 mph fastballs. Betances and his catcher, Austin Romine, thought they had struck Beckham out to end the game. But the call went Beckham's way and Beckham took first.
That meant Betances got to pitch to Manny Machado. Machado ended the game with one swing. A two-run shot, his 32nd of the year and his 91st and 92nd RBIs of the year, gave the Birds a desperately needed walk-off win.
This is how pennant race baseball is supposed to be. Even at 12:45 am on the East Coast. In the Wild Card Race, the Yankees have the first berth and are 2.5 games ahead of the team currently holding the second berth: the Los Angeles Angels. The Angels are one-half game ahead of Minnesota, one game ahead of the Orioles, two games ahead of Texas, two and one-half games ahead of Tampa, and three games ahead of Seattle and Kansas City. Four other teams are still mathematically alive - Toronto, Detroit, Oakland and Chicago - but are realistically eliminated.
Tonight at 7:05 pm the Orioles once again play the Yankees. Sonny Gray starts for the Yanks and Kevin Gausman goes for the Birds.
A Short Poem by Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman, one of this nation's preeminent writers and poets, composed a whole lot of poems that were quite lengthy. He took his time to get the vivid picture he sought to convey. I studied Whitman and his poetry at the University of Maryland, and I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed learning what the great man was doing when he composed those verses so many decades ago.
One of my favorite Whitman poems is anything but long. He entitled it, "That Shadow My Likeness". This is it:
That shadow my Likeness that goes to and fro seeking a livelihood, chattering, chaffering,
How often I find myself standing and looking at it where it flits,
How often I question and doubt whether that it really me;
But among my lovers and caroling these songs,
O I never doubt whether that is really me.
I still own and use my text from the University of Maryland, purchased those many years ago at what was then called "The Maryland Book Exchange." It was one of two officially authorized book stores where Maryland students could obtain the texts the instructors wanted the students to obtain for any given course. This particular text is "Complete Poetry and Selected Prose by Walt Whitman." The text is edited by James E. Miller, Jr. I bought the book "used." It cost me $2.45. Houghton Mifflin was the publisher, and it was one of their "Riverside Editions." Professor Miller was on the faculty of The University of Chicago. The book was copyrighted in 1959. It is a wonderful book and one of my most treasured. Alas, it is paperback and showing its wear and tear.
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