Old School

We treated Clare and her fiancé Chris to dinner yesterday at Old Warsaw, a venerable institution of Polish delicacies.  If she could, my daughter would serve pierogi at her wedding reception and, maybe for her father, sliced cucumbers in sour cream.  Try it sometime.

After feasting, everyone went to our house to watch game four of the NLCS.  When Javy Baez of the Cubs hit the first of his two homers, Clare took the opportunity to declare her intense dislike of him.  “He should keep his head down,” Clare said after Baez broke his 0-20 postseason hitless streak with a home run.  Indeed, Baez did a nice Sammy Sosa imitation circling the bases.  She also didn’t like how Baez wagged a finger in the face Yasiel Puig the night before after tagging Puig out on an attempted stolen base.  At one point, the name of Paul Konerko was uttered as a corrective.

Given that I turned the child into a baseball fan, she also got much of this dislike of showboating from me.  In truth, it’s not even showboating but another way of dealing with the emotions that come from being an athlete at work.  Maybe in time, Baez (and Willson Contreras, the Cub who really irritates me) will tone it down.  Personally, I’d save any and all displays for series clinching, not just avoiding a sweep.  I’m old school that way.