THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE, Oct. 5, 2014
Fall means ...
Raking up the pine needles and the leaves in the yard, feeling pretty good about yourself ... until the next morning, following a slight breeze, when the yard looks just like it did before you grabbed your rake the day before.
And ...
The sound of cowbells and klaxons at high school football games, following a nice play by the local team.
And ...
Playoff baseball, although, in the Year Nobody Could Hit Good Pitching, why are aces suddenly getting clobbered in the postseason?
If you're a fan of L.A. teams, this could be a quick playoffs.
For those badmouthing the A's for their late-season free-fall, remember one thing - they did make the playoffs. Yes, their wild-card game was a capsule of their season - strong start, followed by leaking oil to the end. They gambled that more pitching would make up for getting rid of their best hitter, and it bit them in the ... well, you know. But they tried. In previous years, they were eliminated from the playoffs by better pitching.
The Mariners, meanwhile, received much more praise for ALMOST making the playoffs. If you listen closely, you can still hear the serenade of "We. Are. Proud of You. Say, We Are Proud of You."
This for a team that was primed to overtake Oakland in the final two weeks of the regular season, then their usually stellar pitchers suddenly turned into meatballers for four straight games, effectively knocking them out of the race. They closed strong against an Angels split squad, but the damage had been done.
No excuses next year, M's. Go buy another .300 hitter so you have two of them, keep pitching the heck out of it and maybe get a few more clutch hits with runners on base.
And ...
Trying to find playoff baseball on TV.
Even if you have the TV listings in front of you, it doesn't mean your cable or satellite provider gives you all the channels you need to watch the game.
Some games are on the MLB Network, which not everybody gets. Same with Fox Sports 2, which hardly anybody gets. The other day, one of the games ran long on Fox Sports 1 (What? A baseball game ran long? Get outta here!), so the start of the next game was shifted over to Fox Sports 2, wherever that is on the dial.
Apparently Fox's precious programming is too good to interrupt with trivial division series games.
Say what you want about the good ol' days of Curt Gowdy, Joe Garagiola and Tony Kubek on NBC, or Keith Jackson, Al Michaels, Jim Palmer and Howard Cosell on ABC, but at least you knew where to find the playoff games.
And ...
The end of college football dreams, far too soon.
I remember quarterback Taysom Hill almost single-handedly leading Highland High of Pocatello to the state 5A title in 2008. Nice to see Idaho kids do well in college, like he has been at BYU, until he suffered a broken leg Friday night against Utah State.
Then there's Oregon, which seems to trigger a lot of hatred in these parts (Please - if your school had a deep-pocketed donor too, you wouldn't complain).
That the Ducks lost in the regular season isn't news - they usually stumble once along the way - but the fact the loss probably knocks them out of the national title hunt is troubling, only from the perspective that SEC teams seem to get a mulligan when they lose, while teams on the outside are effectively eliminated with one loss.
The new four-team playoff was supposed to minimize that possibility, but, if the Pac-12 continues to eat its own, I'm afraid that just means more teams from the South will end up with a chance to play for the national title.
Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.