Quicker than you can say Chad Ogea, the World Series that nobody cares about is as level as the Florida horizon. And this is how you say Chad Ogea:
Chad. O.J.
These are the two most famous syllables in sports as well as the criminal justice system, but with only a euphonic coincidence.
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More importantly, there is absolutely no resemblance at all to Cy Young, which appears to be the chief qualification for beating the Florida Marlins.
The Marlins digest Cy Young Award winners without swallowing–Maddux, Smoltz, Glavine and Hershiser, to name four–and along comes the fourth pitcher on a bad Cleveland staff pitching against the best pitcher on a better Florida staff and the Marlins play bleak ball.
“We’re very appreciative of what Chad did,” said Indians manager Mike Hargrove.
Like Molly Brown on the Titantic. It might not be pretty, but thanks for the lifeboat, boys.
What is more impressive is not what Ogea did, but how he did it. Ogea could be the homeliest pitcher to ever win a World Series game, certainly to stem the teal tide the Marlins appeared to be.
“I knew I had good stuff coming out of the bullpen,” Ogea said. “What I told myself is not to throw the ball through the catcher, but to the catcher.”
If self-advice is all it took, the rest of us would still have teenage waists and a reasonable cholesterol count.
Ogea throws the ball like he is trying to win a prize at a carnival, finishing with a high leg kick instead of starting with one, almost as if somebody has left roadkill in front of the mound.
So disjointed is Ogea’s motion that even his own body is in mutiny to it, the rest of him following his arm in protest. If his lower body were luggage, it would end up in Arkansas while the rest of him lands in Vermont.
After the string of classic throwers the Marlins had faced and beaten, stepping in against Ogea had to be as off-putting as finding lugnuts in the cappuccino.
Ogea is two months back from rehabbing a strained elbow ligament, the injury the most dramatic thing that has happened in an uneventful career. Until Sunday night’s 6 2/3 innings of more or less effective baseball.
“There were guys all over the bases,” Ogea said. “I got out of a lot of jams.”
“Ogea pitched a great game,” conceded Marlins manager Jim Leyland. “It isn’t like Kevin Brown didn’t. The other guys are on scholarship too.”
The Indians beating Brown and the Marlins in their park is as significant as it is overlooked. This is a Series badly in need of drama if it is going to grab a national audience the way it has the folks in South Florida.
While 67,000-plus swell Pro Player Stadium into its usual function as a football arena, only a few more than that are watching around the nation. The opening game created roughly the same curiosity as the history of macrame. If the ratings were any lower, they would be sanitary socks.
One TV executive is already miffed that it will now go beyond four games, convinced that the national pastime is not baseball at all but Jennifer Aniston’s hair.
The wonder of two teams that don’t belong must give way to curiosity about which one will win the World Series, never mind that whichever it is, the sentiment that neither one deserves it will always be there.
The novelty of baseball in Florida now surrenders to the reality of Jacobs Field in Cleveland.
“I know it’s going to be cold there,” Leyland said, “but if we’re sitting around watching each other shivering, we got problems. In the situation we’re in and what the stakes are, the feet get cold, but the heart stays warm.”
In these latitudes and with this growing season, the Series has not been the Fall Classic as much as the Continuous Summer Extension. Frost is not on the pumpkin around here, the mold is on the avocado.
The thing will move to Cleveland where there is a chill in the air, a designated hitter on deck and Charles Nagy on the mound, as Cy Young-free as young Ogea. More maybe.
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