In October 1978, the Yankees and the Red Sox met to decide the American League East division title in baseball’s most famous one-game playoff: a Yankees victory that capped a 14-game comeback. That fall also marked the beginning of my father’s freshman year at Boston College, which naturally attracts a large portion of its student body from both New England and the New York metropolitan area. Needless to say, tensions ran high on campus, sparking a food fight in the dining hall and, more impressively, inspiring some adventurous student to hang a banner across the bell tower of Gasson Hall, a 200-foot tall Healy-esque building. The banner read, “Sox Yanked Again.”
On Tuesday, the Twins and the Tigers met in their own one-game playoff to kick off the 2009 postseason. While it’s unlikely that Minnesota pinch hitter Alexi Casilla’s name will forever be punctuated by profanity like that of the Yankees’ Bucky Dent, his game-winning RBI in the bottom of the 12th inning sealed a game that may have been even more dramatic than that fateful one in 1978. The Twins’ 6-5 comeback victory was baseball at its most exciting, and if it’s any indication of what’s to come, we are sure to learn the same thing my dad did over 30 years ago—there’s no better way to experience baseball’s playoffs than as a college student.
There’s surely something to be said for watching the playoffs from your team’s city, living and dying surrounded by your fellow fans, or actually going to the ballpark for that matter, but the geographical melting pot of higher education and the general college student lifestyle make campus the best place to take in the playoffs as a whole.
Diversity is always a selling point espoused by college admissions officers, with students’ varying backgrounds supposedly creating a stimulating intellectual environment. But for sports fans the real value of diversity is clear—everyone brings their own teams. It’s one thing to develop an irrational hatred for the city of Philadelphia when living in Denver. When the rival fans are living right next door, however, you can really have some fun with the kind of trash-talking that tests friendships.
If there’s one problem to be found in the playoffs, it’s that the games last too long and end too late. While a 1 a.m. finish may be a legitimate gripe for someone who has to be at work at nine the next morning, it should be of no concern to a college student. In a place where a 10:15 class is considered an imposition, and five hours of class in a day is considered unreasonable, the lackadaisical bloat of a major league game fits right in. Game lengths may be a greater concern to the attention spans of the modern student—Tuesday’s game lasted a stunning four hours and 37 minutes—but that’s the beauty of baseball. Go to Leo’s or take a nap after the fourth inning, and you’ll be back for the end-of-game excitement.
Of course, none of that matters if the games aren’t any good. Thankfully, after one of the most boring finishes to a regular season in recent memory (save the Tigers-Twins saga), there are plenty of interesting storylines for October. The Twins and Rockies are hot teams whose momentum could surprise the stalwarts who’ve been able to coast for months. All three National League division champs backed their way into the postseason, but have the talent and starpower to bounce right back to midseason form. And the Yankees are back, giving the half of the student body from New York and New Jersey a rooting interest (and the other half a team to root against).
Whether this October is one for the ages or a postseason of unrealized potential remains to be seen, but the beauty of being in college is that whatever the result, it will be easy to see. Playoff fever probably can never consume campus fully without a local hook (and that won’t be happening anytime soon—sorry Nationals fans), but for baseball diehards, the atmosphere at Georgetown will unquestionably change for this month. And if your team does happen to win it all, you know how to rub it in. Just be careful climbing Healy.
