No. 222 – Rooster

Performer: Alice in Chains

Songwriter: Jerry Cantrell

Original Release: Dirt

Year: 1992

Definitive Version: The studio version.

As I write this, a huge streak has just been maintained. I hadn’t watched any postseason baseball on TV this year, and given that I hate both the Cardinals and Red Sox, the chance of me willingly watching the World Series was zero. However, Laurie and I went out to dinner with friends the other night, and they had Game 1 of the Series on the TV. I watched St. Louis gloriously self-destruct in the first inning, so my streak of watching at least some postseason baseball since 1969—when I was 5 and didn’t know what baseball was—continues.

Ten years ago, the potential that I might miss the postseason would have been inconceivable. Heck, nine years ago, I delayed going to Chicago to see Laurie for the first time specifically because I wanted to watch the World Series—featuring the very same Cardinals and Red Sox—in its entirety.

I still love reading about baseball and following it on a daily basis, so it’s not my love of the game that’s on the wane. It’s just watching it—live or on TV.

What happened? The biggest factor is I became painfully aware of the laborious pace of Major League games—particularly in the postseason—after watching minor-league baseball for two solid years. Minor-league games zipped along, rarely taking 3 hours unless the game went several extra innings. One amazing night in 2004, the Clippers played a doubleheader—two seven-inning games—in a total of 3 hours, 20 minutes.

Major League games? You’re lucky if they finish one game in less than that now. Four-hour nine-inning games aren’t uncommon. It seems every game features an endless series of guys stepping out of the batter’s box constantly, pitchers taking forever to throw the ball, managers changing pitchers after every batter from the seventh inning on. It’s ridiculous … and boring.

It’s true: I don’t find watching Major League Baseball games, in general, to be exciting any more, because The Powers That Be allowed the mind game to run unchecked and drain the energy from the actual game. They say “Play Ball” for a reason, you know, not “Think Ball.”

There’s also a practical matter to consider—I don’t have cable. That means most of the games—particularly the early rounds when I would have been more inclined to watch—are out of my purview unless I make a conscious effort to go somewhere to watch.

So here we are: A streak of watching postseason baseball for 44 consecutive years had been in grave danger but averted due to happenstance. (Full disclosure: Thanks to SiriusXM, I heard several innings of the Reds-Pirates play-in game via radio.)

That’s all prologue, but it’s indicative of where I’m going with this, trust me. Just as unbelievable that my unquenchable thirst to watch baseball games might have reached the point of satiety, just as incredible now that I parted company with Rush (as mentioned) at one time, it seems inconceivable—and that word means what I think it does—that there would be a time when Dave and I weren’t friends. But it’s no less true than the other two.

By the end of the summer of 1993, a breakup seemed inevitable. The rift between Dave and I had been widening for a while, mostly over softball. As I mentioned, I quit the coed team in August in disgust at a lack of playing time at MESS specifically, but also a lack of team focus in general.

Dave and I also pretty much stopped doing anything together away from the softball diamond due to his new responsibilities as a father. Unfortunately, I was needier than usual after my breakup with Jenna at the end of 1992. The few times Dave and I connected, there was friction of some sort (mostly due to softball).

Finally, there was the card column. It had been my brainchild, but after 18 months, I was tired of doing it. More to the point: I was tired of going in early on Thursday to bang it out with Dave. The tension between us—at least as far as I was concerned—was too much for me to handle. Like watching baseball games, it stopped being fun.

So in September 1993—when I really was just discovering this amazing song—I called it quits. We met at The Journal, and I told Dave I was out—out of the card column, out of softball, out of, well, everything.

It didn’t have to go that far, of course, but I didn’t see the point in continuing a friendship that seemed to be nonexistent anyway. Besides, I had become closer friends with the other guys in Sports, including Brendan, who were anathema to Dave. We were moving in different directions, so I just pressed the launch button.

After my nuclear strike, nuclear winter settled in. Our paths didn’t cross at work, although Dave had moved to the main newsroom from Fenton long before. I was on the vampire shift; Dave worked normal hours. We didn’t have to see each other.

But it made for some discomfort when we did, such as during the 1993 World Series soon after our breakup. I ended up watching the famous final inning in The Journal newsroom, as mentioned earlier. Dave worked the late shift that Saturday and was watching, too, and it was like I went out of my way to not acknowledge his presence.

It was ridiculous and childish, but then my breakups tend to be just that. Why should ending a friendship be any different?

(To be continued)