The Sports Guy’s latest column at ESPN.com deals with GM Theo Epstein’s departure from the Boston Red Sox.
Maybe I’m biased — I’ve gotten to the point where I look for a new Sports Guy column every day, even though I know it’s not daily (but I don’t know how often it is produced) — but I think this is the best Sports Guy column I’ve ever read. For just a moment it transcends sports, yet barely avoids becoming sappy or turning into an after-school special.
I watched game three of the Red Sox – White Sox ALDS this year and I didn’t feel elation. (Did I write about this already?) I felt somber. I noticed my own feelings and thought that I should feel a kind of manic satisfaction over the Red Sox loss. Certainly I’m not happy to see Epstein leave the Red Sox. Maybe I just root for a guy who’s roughly my age doing one of the most interesting “average joe” jobs in my favorite sport. Or maybe somewhere along the way I developed a healthy amount of respect for the Red Sox. Sure, I don’t like Manny or Ortiz — but I don’t laugh at them anymore.
Maybe I’m sad to see Theo go because I read Moneyball. Maybe I’m sad because his departure is indicative of an epidemic ravaging not only the sports world, but this whole country — young people with genuinely new and good ideas, pushed aside by wealthy old men.
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