Another Long (and Sometimes Boring) World Series

The Los Angeles Dodgers wrapped up the 2025 World Series last night with a four games to three win over the American League Champion Toronto Blue Jays. Last night's game was exciting as the two evenly matched clubs played eleven innings to decide this year's championship. Unfortunately, it was another one dimensional game in which the game was decided by home runs.

I've written of the times of World Series games for the last several years. But, I'm not going into the length and boredom factor of each game as in years past. Here are the actual times of game for each of the seven in the 2025 “Fall Classic.”

Game 1     3:13
Game 2     2:36     This was the most snappily played game of the series.
Game 3     6:39     This was an 18-inning game. Had it been two games, each would have been long.
Game 4     2:54
Game 5     3:02
Game 6     3:02     Yes, it's the exact same length as the previous game.
Game 7     4:07     The game went 11 innings.

All together it was 1533 minutes of baseball. Not all of it was good when nothing happened at the plate due to walks, strikeouts, or hit batsmen. To put it another way, it was 25 and a half hours of  “America's Pastime.” Or, to put it another way, over a day of your life was gone if you watched every single game and every single pitch.

Rather than ignore the time the extra innings added to Game 3 and Game 7, I've calculated the average length two ways. The actual average time of game was 3:39. But, if recalculated using an average time per inning, the number is 20.716 minutes. Then, when that average per inning is multiplied by 9, it results in a time of game of 3:06.

While both times are still way too long for me, it's better than it had been before MLB implemented its time clock to speed up play. It's helped, but now the Major League Baseball powers that be need to go back to the drawing board and shorten the time between pitches.

Random Thoughts in the USA Midwest in the Middle of October

It's raining! Finally, it's raining! Where I live in the Middle of the United States it's been a beautiful fall. We've had daytime highs in the low 80s and night time lows in the upper 50s and low 60s. It's been terrific except for one problem. We haven't had any real rain in over six weeks. I've been watering my garden and bushes every other day. With the nice days the tomatoes have continued to roll in every day. But, as I look out the window now, it's finally raining. Glorious rain! Thank God for small favors!

The rain has motivated me to write a bit since my beloved Missouri Tigers football team is out of town this weekend. The team is now 5-1 having suffered its first loss last weekend in Columbia to a good Alabama team, 27-24. Missouri could have won the game but shot itself in the foot several times and the errors ended up costing Mizzou a win.  Tonight the team is in Auburn, Alabama to take on that breed of Tiger. Mizzou is a one and a half point favorite according to the so called experts.

-Have you been watching any of the Major League Baseball playoffs? I haven't. But, then I never went to a game all season and never watched an entire game on TV including these boring playoffs. MLB continues to focus on the long ball at the expense of other facets of the game. MLB promotional types continue to screw up at every turn. I've written in the past a monkey could do a better job. It's amazing to me how whenever MLB makes a decision its the wrong one. Keep it up MLB and you'll kill the Golden Goose.

-Just to be fair while I haven't watched an entire baseball game all year, I've not watched an entire professional football game either. The pros could care less about me and will never earn my loyalty again after having dumped on me twice when my home town teams moved away to other cities.

-There are some other things I could write about politically where I live. But, I'm not going to change anyone's mind with what I write and they won't change my mind if I let them respond to anything I write. It is what it is. And speaking of off limit topics a friend of mine has a sign he puts up every year at he and his wife's NFL Championship party.  It reads "No elections, no genuflections and no erections!"

Have a great weekend and I will write again soon.

-

Missouri Tiger Football Off to a Great Start

If you read this blog frequently, you know I'm a big fan of college football and specifically the Missouri Tigers. Mizzou is off to a 3-0 start, beating up on cupcakes Central Arkansas and Louisiana (the team formerly known as the University of Louisiana at Monroe).

The Tigers also had a huge win over their archrival Kansas nine days ago on September 7th. The Tigers got down 21-6 ten minutes into the game and then clawed their way back to a 21-21 tie at the half. Missouri dominated the chickenhawks in the second half, outscoring KU 21-10. In the last 50 minutes of the game, Mizzou outscored Kansas 36-10. Mizzou ran away to win the game 42-31.

Mizzou will take its undefeated record into this Saturday night's game against South Carolina (2-1) at Faurot Field in Columbia at 6 p.m. CDT. ESPN will show the game nationally.

Pro Football Hall of Fame Induction

I'm late in posting this, but congratulations to the 2025 Pro Football Hall of Fame Class in Canton, Ohio two weeks ago today, on August 2nd.  While I've lost interest in the National Football League, due to its business practices and monopoly, I still have the utmost respect for these players who are among the best to ever play the game.  The 2025 class includes Defensive Back Eric Allen, Defensive End Jared Allen, Tight End Antonio Gates and Wide Receiver Sterling Sharpe.

By clicking the links for each player, it will take you to their induction speech.

Jared Allen

Sterling Sharpe

Eric Allen

Antonio Gates

We've Lost Our Mom

I am going to try and keep this factual but the fact is I am grieving.  We lost our Mom on July 19th and it has been a tough two and a half weeks.  I touched on her fall in my last post in July.

She was in excruciating pain the last two weeks of her life and the medical community did very little to alleviate that pain. I will always hold the hospital where we took her in high contempt.  The nurses were compassionate at times, but the doctors did little for her and unless I demanded to speak to them would not make any effort to give us an update on her daily condition.

Mom was with her family as she celebrated her 98th birthday on July 18th in the hospital.  She was in a lot of pain but did not want people worrying about her.  She was happy to be surrounded by her extended family from her kids to her great grandkids.  She died the next day of an apparent heart attack.  I don't believe her body could take it any more and her heart wore out from the pain and the medications she was on for other illnesses.

We buried her yesterday with our Dad at the National Cemetery here.  The funeral was tough to take and so was the graveside service. Still, I know her soul is with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in Heaven.  As a Christian we will see each other again on Judgement Day.  I know that my Redeemer Lives!