Opening Day blog 2010: Bitter, party of one, your aging and overpaid team is ready

Before I go into my Astros' opening day rant, I do have to briefly lavish praise on to the Sun Devil baseball squad. They lost their first game of the season Friday night, 6-5 at Oregon after starting 24-0. All this despite having its coach shown the door just a few months before the season started. They rebounded from the initial loss and are now 25-1. Will the overachieving squad be able to keep this pace up? Since I don't follow NCAA baseball closely enough until post season, I wont try and guess. I sure hope however that there's a role for interim coach Tim Esmay after the season is over.

Moving on to the Astros, the unbridled optimism I generally have going into opening day is non-existent this season. Really, I'm trying to muster some type of positive outlook about this year's version of the former Rainbow Warriors, but this is best I can do:

Phil's glass-half full outlook:

• Roy Oswalt is back in his 2005 form and gets a promise from owner Drayton McLane for a new backhoe if he wins the Cy Young.


• Lance Berkman is suddenly tearing up the plate from the right side and successfully gets his option for 2011 picked up with a clause that says he can open up a Cracker Barrel franchise in Minute Maid Park if he steals 5 bases in 2010.


• Kaz Matsui in his walk year is playing through his litany of nagging injuries. There will be a heroic moment at the end of game where he comes in to hit a game-winning bloop single despite the fact that his anal fissures have returned with a vengeance.


• Carlos Lee, gets in-season Lipo surgery in May and successfully lobbies management to move to Centerfield and arm wrestles the rights away from Berkman for the "Big Puma" nick name.


• Team goes on a bit of a run in June, solidly in 3rd place by all-star break and 8 games behind first place Cardinals. Because of this mid-season success, the Astros feel like they are one bat away from winning it all. The struggling Dodgers are able to unload Manny Ramirez on to the Astros and it only cost them five prospects and a promise to bench Manny when the Astros and Dodgers meet in September. Rush order put in on Astros' doo-rags for Manny's debut.


• Team within two games of the first place Cards, until: Carlos Lee takes Manny to Houston staple James Coney Island. World Hot dog eating champ Kobiyashi happens to be there and challenges both players to an eating contest. Both players go missing for 3 days and wind up on DL with undisclosed dietary issues.


• Oswalt sensing he is on a sinking ship demands a trade to the Atlanta Braves. McLane reluctantly agrees but only if the Braves will give him the rights to Dale Murphy and Biff Pocoroba.


• Berkman steals his 5th base and opens his Cracker Barrel at MMP. Enough said.
  Astros go on to lose 17 of 18 to finish the season. Despite the final day of the season being "Dale Murphy day" the team sees a record-low home attendance of 4287. Dale Murphy wasn’t able to make it.


• Team finishes 71-91.

Reflections on the decade - part one

The last time I posted anything on my blog, I was on the 5th week of my six week sabbatical. That was more than four months ago. I could use the proverbial “I’ve been too busy” as my excuse but frankly it’s just been more about being lazy and uninspired.

Last night I didn't sleep very well and as I was trying to get back to sleep, I started reflecting on the past decade for some reason. Lots of random memories started popping in my head and I soon realized getting back to sleep would be a futile effort.

So with the ‘inspiration’ back, I just have to overcome the laziness and be consistent about posting between now and the end of the year.

Even though this first reflection is sports-related, there wont be many reflections about sports. Given the mediocre teams that I root for, that obviously shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone.

October 20, 2005 - The Houston Astros win their first (and only) NL pennant

Here it was the night of game 6 of the National League Championship Series, perhaps the biggest and best moment ever for Astros’ fans and I’m at a dinner in San Francisco with a dozen reporters talking about AMD’s latest channel strategy. Normally I enjoy being at these type of work activities but I have to say, as the dinner went on, I found myself looking at my blackberry more and more.

I did go into the evening with the mindset that I wasn’t going to get distracted by the game. I was still so distraught over what had happened in game 5, that I was convinced the Astros were a cursed franchise and had no shot at winning the series. In case folks don’t remember, the Astros were up three games to one in the best of seven series and it appeared the Astros would clinch the NL pennant at Minute Maid Park in Houston with a game 5 victory. However, a 3-run homerun by Albert Pujols in the top of the ninth on a hanging slider from Brad Lidge gave the Cardinals a come from behind win. It also sent the series back to St. Louis with the Astros still up 3-2 in the series but the momentum was now in favor of the Cardinals.

That game I was able to watch on TV and sat there in stunned silence when Pujols hit his bomb. It was very similar to the feelings I had after a certain Houston Oilers playoff game in Buffalo back in 1993 or the 1997 Rose Bowl. To say it felt like a kick in the gut was an understatement.

I felt like there was no chance, even with Roy Oswalt on the mound, that the Astros were going to get a game 6 win. I obviously underestimated the mental fortitude of the team. When I saw the final score (6-1) come across my blackberry (Tricia was sending me pitch by pitch notes over that last inning) I didn’t know what to think or how to feel. It was a day I never thought would happen and here I was working and needing to restrain my emotions.

I was ultimately able to watch the game thanks to the DVR but it was a moment I desperately wanted to see live, one I had waited my whole life to see. The fact that I wasn’t able to enjoy the moment live was compounded by the fact that the Astros got swept in the World Series. No live moments of euphoria to enjoy there, that’s for sure.

Now as I think back to that evening, it was further reinforcement that I was at a point in my life that required me to be a responsible adult. It helped me realize that no moment as a sports fan could replace the joy and satisfaction of being a provider for my family.

Sabbatical blog - day 31; Rants and Randomness

• Less than 2 weeks left for us here in Breckenridge. We leave Aug. 14. I go back to work on Aug. 17 and officially begin my sabbatical detox program
• Monday was a nice relaxing day here for us. First day in a couple of weeks we didn't do a whole lot. Tricia had the show "The View" on TV yesterday morning. How that show is still on TV is beyond me. The collection of personalities they have on that show are very uninteresting.
• Yesterday we hooked up with the Prairie family and rented a pontoon boat and floated around Lake Dillon for a couple of hours. What a fun and relaxing time it was. While the water was too cold for anyone to swim in, it was an amazing setting and atmosphere. I enjoyed it more than any boating trip I've ever been on in Lake Travis. Nothing beats a lake settled in among mountains and pine trees.

• Things I'm tired of hearing about and won't seem to go away include Cash for Clunkers, Plaxico Burress, athletes who Twitter, Jon and Kate, Michael Jackson, North Korea and health care reform.
• I am extremely blessed to have a great job and good health insurance. But, I know many are not so fortunate and I feel like there do need to be changes to our flawed system. I just hope that our lawmakers take their time to make changes that are responsible and don't result in abuses to the system while creating more efficiencies for those with urgent needs.
  
• Since I'm around my kids all day now, I'm paying closer attention to some of the things they watch on TV. I'm convinced that SpongeBob Squarepants represents more than half of Nickelodeon's programming.
• ESPN likes to make a big deal about Sportscenter being in Los Angeles now instead of Bristol, CT. Can someone please explain why I should care what city they broadcast from?
• Astros started playing real teams over the past week and have been exposed for the house of cards that they are. Sure glad they ignored my advice and stood pat at the trade deadline and didn't try and go after any mid-level prospects for their barren farm system. Should bode well for the future. Particularly this season which will end in a fourth place finish and probably 10 games below .500.
• 31 more days until the Sun Devils kick off against that powerhouse Idaho State in Tempe, here is how the Pac-10 media is predicting ASU to finish. Here's a hint, it's not in first place. I'm absolutely blown away by the fact that USC was voted first place. Those writers really went out on a limb with that pick. Kudos to the four writers who didn't give USC first place votes. Note to Pac-10 reporters, Mark Sanchez is now with the NY Jets. Pete Carroll wouldn't have been so whiney about Sanchez leaving early if he had a good option at QB.
  

• Longhorn fans, nice non-conference schedule you have - Louisiana-Monroe, at Wyoming, vs. UTEP, vs. UCF. Sorry you weren't able to squeeze your annual barnburner with Rice in this season.
  
• I still can't get used to hearing the following: "Arizona Cardinals, the defending NFC champs."
  

Movies I've seen for first time over the past week include;

• An Everlasting Piece, a very funny Irish comedy. Not a new movie, I believe it was made in 2000 but it's worth checking out;
  
• Chariots of Fire, seriously, had never seen it before. Thought it was just ok.
  
• Observe and Report which had like maybe two funny scenes in it and the rest was really bad;
  
• I Love You, Man. Very funny with a great soundtrack featuring songs from Spoon, Vampire Weekend and Rush.
  

Sabbatical blog - day 23; my first "fourteener"

I had no clue what I was getting myself into today when my friend Neil and I decided we would hike up to the top of Quandary Peak which is 14,265 feet at its highest point. I went to one web site, read about it and it said it was about a 3 hour roundtrip hike. Yeah, not so much. At least not for a rookie hiker such as myself. It took me 3 and a half hours to get to the top.

Still quite the fool at this point that we were almost there

I figured once we made it past the treeline, we were probably halfway there. Nope, not even close as downward hikers let us know. The 'fun' was just getting started as we began the rocky climb on our way to the summit. It was about this time when I started asking what I had gotten myself into as the pauses became more and more frequent. I kept reminding myself that this was indeed a marathon and not a sprint and took the advice of some OU Sooners we ran into on the way up (also first-timers) who gave us the simple advice of setting small goals for ourselves as we climbed.

Mama and baby mountain goat looked a lot less tired than me at this point

Once we made it to the ridgeline before the final pitch, which was probably still another 1000 feet and pretty steep, we were telling ourselves that we could do this. We started the final pitch, which was even more rocky than what we experienced prior to the ridgeline, and soon found ourselves stopping every 40 or 50 steps. We stopped asking the people coming down how much further we had to go, as it had become a bit demoralizing. As we kept going up, I had lost sight of the summit and kept finding myself looking at false summits. I wised up and stopped looking up.

At this point we're at 13,000+ feet, which is the part where the air really starts feeling thin. I had honestly thought about throwing in the towel here, but as I was resting, some dude was coming down and told me we only had about 700 feet to go. That was all the motivation I needed. I made up mind then that I wasn't giving up and I was getting to the top no matter how long it took me.

About 30 minutes later, I was there. Probably one of the most rewarding things I've ever done because the view from the top was amazing. The pictures I took don't do it justice. It was also some of the most powerful wind gusts I have ever experienced. When I was standing taking pictures, I thought I was going to be blown off the mountain.

My favorite pic from the top

The way down took about two hours and my legs felt like jello coming down the rocky terrain until we hit the treeline. As we were descending and wondering when we would hit the trailhead, I kept thinking there's no way we just hiked up all of this. Also, one other interesting highlight from the way down, a few snowflakes fell upon us. First time I've ever seen snow fall in July.

As I write this blog, I'm sore, tired but feeling good that I didn't give up.

Sabbatical blog - day 17: Rants and randomness

• Had a couple of great hikes with the Prairie family the past few days. Wasn't quite the energy burner for my kids that I had hoped for because they were still as hyper and antagonistic toward each other as ever. However, everyone had fun and that's what it's all about.
• Only thing I think I'm missing about Austin right now is that the Astros' games are not broadcast out here. Why does FSN assume everyone in Colorado wants to watch the Rockies? I mean I know Austin is the exception because everyone there DOES want to watch the 'stros. Who wouldn't?
• I'm not buying into the Astros as a possible NL Central champ or playoff team. Still feels like smoke and mirrors to me or a by-product of playing in a division full of under-achieving teams (see Chicago Cubs.) I'm still advocating for building for the future and trading for tier one prospects if anyone is willing to deal with the Astros.
  
• I am skeptical and I'm not a believer yet in this team, even after their sweep of the Cards this week. Now, that being said, it doesn't mean I'm not rooting for them or would be disappointed if they made the post-season, but the foundation for the future they currently have in place does not make me feel good about the next few years
• Saw "Bruno" yesterday afternoon. It sucked. It sucked really bad. Felt like Cohen was trying too hard to be over the top. "Borat" was over the top too, but it felt more natural.
  
• Finished "Salem's Lot" this past weekend and have now moved on to "The Stand". "Salem's Lot" was entertaining but predictable. Somewhat anti-climatic and didn't create much suspense.
• Below are some recent pics from here in Breck

If there's a fallen tree anywhere in Breckenridge, you can bet that these three troublemakers will find it

You don't even know how money I am

• Had awesome crepes at this place tonight

Sabbatical blog - days 10 -13; Only four weeks left in Breckenridge :(

Well, I failed to journal via this blog everyday during my sabbatical like I had originally hoped. Seems like every time there's some downtime to write, I decide to read or Clancy pulls me into playing Wii with him.

As of yesterday, we only have four weeks left here in Breckenridge. I guess I should not say "only" but given how fast our first week went by, it kind of feels justified. Needless to say, I'm not really missing Austin a whole lot right now and it seems like I have spent the last few days trying to figure out how to stay here past August 14 :). I'm pretty sure there's a critical mass of influential folks here in Breckenridge who are primed to start writing about microprocessors and servers and would be well-served by having an experienced PR guy here locally.

What's been going on here in the past four days?

• Wednesday we celebrated Tricia's birthday in style at Beaver Creek. As you can see by the picture, I spared no expense and bought her as many $1 PBRs as she could handle.
  

• Friday we hit the Alpine slide. A few years ago, we had done the Alpine slide in Steamboat Springs. That one is now officially lame after we did the one here in Breck. The kids had a blast not only on the slide but riding up on the chairlift. I'm still convinced that riding on a chairlift is one of the most peaceful and relaxing things to do and is even better in the summer.

• Today we said goodbye to my mom, brother Pete and his family. Not only were we sad to see them leave, but we also are even more sad they have to venture back to the 110+ degree temps in AZ.
  
• Also today, we ventured to the Breckenridge Beer Festival which is put on by my new favorite radio station. I will probably do another blog post that lists all the songs I heard on it that day and you'll see why it's now my favorite. The Beer Fest was a lot of fun. Tasted some good micro brews and heard some great live music. Check out the band Oakhurst if you're into bluegrass.
• Finished the evening off with some softball and baseball practice with the kids. Pretty sure we would not have been doing that at 7 pm if we were in Austin right now.
• 671 unread emails on my blackberry as of 10:40 pm MST.
  

Sabbatical blog - day nine; elevation exhaustion kicking in

Lots going on today again. We drove up to Blue Lake on what was probably the bumpiest road our mini-van has ever been on. We did a little bit of hiking up there. We were up above the tree line so it was very windy and a bit chilly. My kids had a blast climbing on the rocks and seemed to show no fear climbing up a steep slope. I think the dog enjoyed it as well and she did her best to drag me down the mountain.


Around 3pm this afternoon I hit the proverbial wall. I had taken the kids to the pool at the rec center and came home around 4:30. Next thing I know it's 5:45 and Tricia is waking me up for dinner. For the past couple of days I had been feeling good here and not too tired but this afternoon it all hit me. Perhaps I should hit Starbucks at 3 from now on, but then again, I'm on freaking sabbatical, I should have no reservations about taking naps. However, I don't always have the final say on that matter...

I did manage to catch some of the All-star game tonight. I just can't get over how bad the NL is when it comes this annual event. Then again, why should I care if NL has home field advantage for the World Series because when the Astros storm through the second half of the season and roll into the World Series, it's all academic at that point regardless of where they are playing.