Rising to the NLCS (The Dodgers and Me)

The only thing standing between the Dodgers and the World Series is the St. Louis Cardinals. The team that’s as good postseason money as anybody with 3 straight NLCS appearances.

But for some reason, I’m pretty confident this Dodgers team’s magical ride won’t end. I feel like it’s 2008 all over again when this was the first trip in 20 years. I wasn’t confident about the 2009 NLCS because I felt like Philly already had our number. This year, I’m feeling much different.

It hit me when Juan Uribe hit that home run in Game 4. I was wearing my Kershaw replica jersey that I kept on from my tutoring gig and I jumped around my living room like I jumped during the two walk-off wins at Dodger Stadium I attended this year. Once again, the excitement around this team is like nothing I’ve seen since 2008.

Housekeeping Notes (Couple Links, Videos and More)

I've been neglecting to post some links in here on what I've done. So let me show you some of the good of what I've been up to as I'm surrounded by a wave of Blue Euphoria after the Dodgers found another way to win a close game.

I'm going to write a piece about memories of the 2009 LCS tomorrow but let me preview it by saying this. I wasn't confident the Dodgers were going to win that series. This time? I have a lot more faith.

My weekly Pac-12 Roundup/Power Poll - Stanford-Washington leads it off. (Bro Jackson)

My 1st time ever attending, much less covering a cross-country meet. It wasn't just 85 degrees but it was a dry heat at a dirt road course with a difficult hill to climb at one point during the race. Nevertheless, it's a great story where I took a lot of video but also inspired me to get back more consistent on running. (Daily Breeze)

Yasiel Puig: Let The Wild Horse Roam

My Tuesday was a bit overwhelming attending a funeral for a close mentor. So I didn't get to check out much sports news til around 4 p.m. and sure enough, I saw four words ring out. "YASIEL PUIG GETS BENCHED."

Naturally, I rolled my eyes but I wanted to see what folks were raising a ruckus over. Turns out Puig was late to the stadium and was punished. No big deal. You're late for work, you face consequences.

Of course, people made a big deal about him being out the night before. But had he been on time, nobody would say anything. So it's no surprised that Puig - who's never been a fan of the media - cussed the media out and wanted to only talk baseball.

As Will Leitch mentioned this year, sports fans (and some media) have a problem with accepting youthful mistakes. People think folks should mature as fast as they did, not realizing it's harder when cameras amplify your every move. We expect too much of teenagers and 20-somethings with prodigious talent to act like adults instead of realizing adulthood is a process not based on age or talent.

Alex Rodriguez and the Overkill of Hate

Alex Rodriguez has gotten so much crap dumped on him that you almost start to feel sorry for him. Most of it is by his own doing - his vanity, insecurity, lack of awareness, being so good that folks are naturally jealous. But since MLB announced he'd face a 211-game suspension for his involvement in the Biogeneis scandal, I realized that he's become a bigger villain than he should be.
 
Then you step back and realize who's making him a villain. The same powers that made Barry Bonds one a decade ago.

Major League Baseball has used him as a scapegoat for their sins. The other dozen players who got suspended? Who cares besides Ryan Braun's arrogance catching up to him. MLB wants to punish A-Rod like he's the worst cheater in baseball history because he's an easy target and they've gone out of their way to make him look worse than he may be.

How Bout These Dodgers?: Another Day, Another WOW

 "Another incredible moment in the Magic Castle" (Vin Scully after Adrian Gonzalez's walkoff hit)

So after another exciting win at Chavez Ravine, how can you not watch every single game with these Dodgers? How can you see the Dodgers down by any deficit and not wonder how, but when it's going to be overcome? How can you see this team and not think "They just might get to the World Series"

When Chris Capuano pitched a terrible five innings and allowed four runs, it felt like a bad prelude to a good ending. When Adrian Gonzalez and a fresh-off-the-DL Hanley Ramirez led a 6th inning rally to cut the lead to 4-2, I sat back nodding.

And when Andre Ethier dusted off his Captain Clutch cape and tied the game on a pinch-hit bomb in the 9th? My calmness was validated and it erupted into cheers! It felt like 2009 again seeing him step up and swing away like he knew the ball was gone.

But oh there's more!! How crazy is it that freaking Carlos Marmol, the relief pitcher, stepped up to bat in the 10th and sent a ball to the warning track. Yeah, it's been that kind of run where a pitcher getting a walkoff hit wouldn't be the craziest thing.

Then you have the 12th. The Wild Horse Yasiel Puig doing what he does best to set up the win.

Hyun-Jin Ryu: Rookie of the Year?

Quiet as kept, Hyun-Jin Ryu has injected himself into the National League Rookie of the Year debate. I know Yasiel Puig has gotten the lion's share of attention as a rookie but the Dodgers' other lefty pitching phenom deserves to get praise as well.

Ryu (11-3) shut down the Cardinals Thursday with another brilliant outing (7 IP, 5 Hits, 0 earned runs for his fourth straight win) as he pitched with no fear of one of the best teams in the majors. He came at St. Louis' hitters like a veteran and when I thought he was done after 6 innings, he went out and pitched the 7th to finish off his night and relieve the bullpen a bit.

Earlier this month, Don Mattingly tried to drum up support for Ryu as Rookie of the Year and I'm doing the same now. Let's spell out his case.

A Moment of Respect for Mariano Rivera

I missed most of the All-Star Game due to Youth Group. It's something I've come to expect most of my life and the only times I actually watched most of the game was from 2007-2010 when I spent Tuesday nights at my newspaper proofreading stories and finishing up things before we went to press.

I happened to check Twitter after we wrapped up and I saw Rob Parker send this tweet.

What a moment! Nobody is on the field but Rivera. Warming up by himself. His team stayed in dugout and fans gave his a thunderous ovation.
— Rob Parker (@RobParkerLocal4) July 17, 2013

Soon as I got home, I watched the footage. "Enter Sandman" blaring loud and Mariano Rivera coming out to do his job like he's done every year. Except he was alone. No teammates. Just him on that mound and soaking up the praise of his last All-Star game from the fans, both teams and many viewers.

Back From the Dead, the Dodgers Keep Rolling

A month ago, I was ready to consider this Dodgers season a wash. On the morning of June 3, they were nine games under .500. Between injuries and lackluster hitting, nothing was going right. By June 19, they were 29-40 after losing Game 1 of a doubleheader to the Yankees.

Fast forward to today. The team just finished a 14th inning game to sweep the Diamondbacks. They're 1.5 games out of first place. They're 45-45 and all a sudden they look like a different team and I'm watching games with more interest than just as a loyal fan.

Instead of worrying where the Dodgers offense comes from, I see timely hitting coming from AJ Ellis, Hanley Ramirez, Adrian Gonzalez and yes, Yasiel Puig. 

A lot of credit goes to Puig, your reigning National League rookie/player of the month. I've still yet to come up with a non-pitching rookie who's impacted the team like this right away and if he makes the All-Star team, I'll be happy. But I want to give props to Ramirez, who looks more and more like the player he was from 2008-2010.

Stat Culture Gone Wild (And How It Can Mesh with Tradition)

When I was growing up, I loved numbers. Before I was a writer and a history buff, I loved math. Maybe it was my Dad's influence as a civil engineer but math came very easy to me.

As I became a sports fan who read everything I could, I became obsessed with statistics. Reading the box scores, seeing who scored what, who were the all-time leaders - all of that was a part of my education. It continued that way all through high school and part of college.

Then I became a journalist. Suddenly I had to learn a whole new set of rules because when it came to interviews, I couldn't just pull up stats and use them. Not when I heard folks question about the flow of the game or key moments. I'd sit in press conferences or postgame interviews thinking I had to take it to another level.

That's when I learned to study the game closer. Watch for moments. Watch for changes in tempo. Watch how players move. Watch and learn how a coach manages the game. Go beyond the box score and be an observer.

This has been my education the past seven years. Yet at the same time, stat culture has grown in its influence on front offices and fans. For better and worse, it's changed how sports is discussed.

Prep Report: Serra HS Baseball Playing for (and Chasing) History

Serra High School here in Gardena is an athletic powerhouse. You might have heard of a few football guys who went there. Marqise Lee, the No. 1 college WR in the country, and NFL rookie-to-be Robert Woods. One of the top female track-and-field athletes in the country, UCLA's Turquoise Thompson, also spent her senior year at Serra, where her mother is the head track-and-field coach.

Their football team remains one of the best in Southern California and their 2013 squad will be one of the favorites to win state. Their basketball team is one of the better small schools in Southern California and their boys and girls track program ranks among the best in the state and nation.

Just this school year, they've won state titles in football and girls' basketball. Their track team heads north to the state track-and-field meet this weekend as the favorites to win several events and the boys' team title.

But also this weekend, another Serra team is poised to win a division championship. Their baseball heads to Dodger Stadium on Friday for the chance to win the program's first CIF title. Yet, they're also playing for much more than just that. They're perhaps the first predominantly Black team to be this close to a CIF title in three decades, although that has not been confirmed.

Battle for Los Angeles (Dodgers vs. Angels)

I hate to say it but the battle for Los Angeles baseball supremacy this week feels lackluster. Maybe I'm saying this as a Dodgers fan, but the facts support me.

In one corner you have the Angels, who've won eight straight games and appear to be finding their mojo after struggling mightily. In the other you have the Dodgers, who've won three out of their last nine and appear on the verge of firing Don Mattingly as manager.

Clayton Kershaw also picked a bad time to have a rough start, giving up 4 HR's to the Cardinals on Sunday. Considering he's been hot the last few starts, you can forgive him for that. The Dodgers have bigger problems to worry about.

Jackie Robinson: Honoring vs. Remembering His Legacy

I saw "42" this past weekend and I went in worried they would sanitize his story and Hollywood-ize to make it some feel good piece. I was wrong because it was quite solid.

While the movie didn't introduce anything new to me, it did show the strength Jackie had as well as how much he needed the support of his wife, Rachel, to be his rock. It showed that Jackie often had to go it alone and despite having Rachel, a few teammates and legendary newspaper scribe Wendell Smith by his side, he had to face the abuse and loneliness in 1947.

I loved how it showed that Jackie only didn't fight back because he was told to, not because it was his nature. We have a way of thinking that our civil rights icons were passive aggressive and it demeans their struggle by making them appear weak compared to folks like Malcolm X, Stokley Carmichael and the Black Panthers.

(Let's clear up that logic now. 1) He grew up in California and attended UCLA so he wasn't uncomfortable speaking up to White people.  2) He was court-martialed in the Army for refusing to moving to the back of the bus and later acquitted. 3) Branch Rickey told him that in 1949, he was free to be himself. Not fighting back is a tactic, not a sign of weakness or lack of passion)

Remembering Ralph Wiley

Happy birthday to Ralph H. Wiley. All these years later your legacy is still going strong! @bomani_jones @vgoodwill @jadande
— Cole Wiley (@colewiley) April 12, 2013

As his son posted above on Twitter, today is the birthday of Ralph Wiley, one of the greatest sportswriters we've seen. For Black sportswriters, he is perhaps the best of the post-civil rights era and influenced so many of us to write with style and cool.

Even though I didn't realize it at the time, I feel blessed that I got to read Wiley at ESPN during my college years before he passed in 2004 at the young age of 52. Re-reading those pieces the last couple years, I see a writer who wasn't afraid to speak his mind and did it while humanizing his subjects. He was intelligent but never lost his edge or his ability to relate to the audience he wrote.

I realized today that I saw in him what I see in James Baldwin. Both were insightful, clever, perceptive, sympathetic and had the balls to say what must be said, not what you think you should say. Baldwin was a witness to his era and so was Ralph Wiley. That's why they still speak to me today - they didn't just record or respond to history, they enlightened it so we could learn from it later.

Wiley's influence can be seen in writers like Jason Whitlock, Scoop Jackson, JA Adande and Bomani Jones. It's seen in The Shadow League, one of my favorite sports websites of the past year. It's seen in former ESPN colleagues like Bill Simmons, who never fails to praise him, and more.

Kershaw's Court: Hail the Young Prince

I've slowly been getting into a baseball groove since my March was consumed by the Lakers and March Madness. I used to get hyped for Opening Day and it didn't hit me until Saturday when one of my NABJ colleagues came down for the weekend since he was hoping to see his Giants beat my Dodgers to kick off 2013.

Well Opening Day came and went while I was at work and during a break, I saw that Clayton Kershaw not only threw a 4-hit masterpiece with 94 pitches, but even helped his own cause with a 414-foot bomb to centerfield to break a 0-0 tie. My friend told me he couldn't believe that ball was going over the fence until it finally landed.

The last Dodgers pitcher to throw an Opening Day shutout? Fernando Valenzuela in that magical 1981 season. The last pitcher to throw a shutout and hitting a home run? Bob Lemon in 1953. The fact that it was against the hated Giants made it even better.