6:27pm: I just got in from working late and already the Astros are winning 2-0 after a double, and error, and a grounder (with a stolen base in the middle). Houston has scored more this inning than they did all last night. Only one run is earned though. Darvish has been struggling, and it doesn't look to be letting up.
6:30pm: Yuli Gurriel is getting a ton of boos after the incident where he used a racial taunt against Darvish. Or was it the other way around? I forget. Neither of 'em are WASPs.
6:31pm: Also on TV right now is the Edmonton Oilers
6:33pm: Gurriel is getting a long at-bat here. 13 pitches later he flies out to right field. This half-inning was only about 10-12 minutes, but it sure felt a lot longer I'm sure to Dodgers fans. 2-0 Houston.
6:35pm: Boeing is really turning up the charm offensive against the Shiny Pony with this "Boeing cares about Canada" commercial aren't they?
6:37pm: The Shocktop is poured into a pint glass, the oven is on, it's pizza and beer and baseball night at Third Edge of the Sword World Headquarters in Sancti Spíritus, Cuba. And just on cue, a commercial for The Pint plays. Last year I watched Game 7 at MKT where it wasn't until the entire bar erupted in the 8th inning of that epic battle that management figured out we wanted to hear the game audio and not shitty Taylor Swift songs. There are definite advantages to watching these games at home.
6:38pm: That asshole Taylor (Chris, not Swift) blasts the Dodgers' first hit of the game and gets a leadoff double.
6:44pm: McCullers takes out the other asshole T (Turner) at the top of the Dodgers lineup. With a hit-batsman though...not a strikeout like I was hoping that sentence would mean.
6:50pm: Puig also gets hit, and now the bases are loaded.
6:52pm: That looked ugly for a second, but Pederson hit to SS and the inning is over.
6:59pm: Beautiful looking shot of the sky was just on. Having been to Dodger stadium I can say it's a decent enough ballpark that's more notable for its amazing parking than anything about the stadium. You can get a Dodger Dog there though. I can't get a Dodger Dog in Edmonton...which suddenly made me think of all those concession snacks you can pick up at Commonwealth Stadium during the Eskimos home game that is hopefully going to be decided on Saturday. (If it's decided on Friday, that's bad)
7:02pm: Darvish throws Gonzalez a slider that acts more like a changeup, and now it's runners on second and third with no outs. Darvish's night is almost over.
7:04pm: A sacrifice RBI by McCullers Jr. makes it a 3-0 game with 2 outs. LA is losing the narrative worse than Harvey Weinstein...
7:08pm: I was just mouthing "homerun" and Springer does it! Astros take a 5-0 lead and Darvish isn't going to last until the end of the second inning.
7:19pm: While I was wolfing down a Bacon Double Cheeseburger Delicio pizza, the Dodgers have come back. That's the big thing about LA I remember from the NLCS: you score on them and the next half-inning they come right back to score on you at least as much and quite often even more. You even saw it in the first inning, where LA loaded the bases (not entirely their doing, to be fair) and could have blown the game away the other way had Pederson hit out of the park.
7:22pm: McCullers gets out of a jam of his own creation again. This can't be sustainable, and A. J. Hinch agrees: just before the double play to end the inning he made the call to his bullpen. The starters aren't going to survive into the fourth inning.
7:27pm: Altuve flies out from a pitch from...CLAYTON MOTHERFUCKING KERSHAW! I would have thought Morrow would have stayed out for at least 2-3 outs. Kershaw can't go more than about 60 pitches tonight and the Dodgers might find themselves out of pitchers by the end of this game.
7:29pm: On the other hand, the Dodgers need 60 quality pitches right here and right now. Kershaw shuts the Astros out for the first inning of this game.
7:34pm: Seager gets a good hit that should be an easy double, but a slip and fall on the basepaths means he barely gets back to first. The Dodgers have been their own worst enemy for much of this game. And McCullers is his own team's worst enemy, hitting Turner again.
7:36pm: Bellanger is up and that's the only reason McCullers is still in this game. He swings wildly on the first pitch to justify Hinch's decision.
7:38pm: Bellanger strikes out again and that's McCullers Jr's night.
7:41pm: Penguins have taken a 1-0 lead in their game against the Oilers tonight. I'll be writing more about the Oilers in an upcoming blog post.
7:43pm: No team that plays this horrible rap/pop music during the World Series deserves to win. I'll be writing more about who deserves to win World Series matches in an upcoming blog post.
7:47pm: After three innings both starters are long-gone but the Astros still lead 5-0 and the Dodgers are leaving 2+ men on base every inning.
7:48pm: Nothing tonight can possibly make me happier than finding out these useless Toronto fans have to deal with a gametime other than 7:30pm ET, which apparently nobody in that evil city can possibly handle.
7:50pm: They just showed a shot of the 1960 World Series which ended with a home run hit past the fence...into the grassy area behind the fence. No seats behind the fences is the MLB version of the "no ads on the boards and no helmets" that you obsess over when watching old NHL footage.
7:53pm: Gonzalez takes second base on a wild pitch, after making it to first because the Dodgers didn't field his hit to third base properly. Houston is getting all the bounces, so let's not pretend this 5-0 score is just them doing amazing or Los Angeles falling apart.
7:59pm: Oilers take a 2-1 lead! Oh, and Kershaw is the third guy up to the plate but the Dodgers look likely to keep him in the game. Like I said, they need those 60 pitches.
8:02pm: 2 outs and nobody on, Kershaw comes out.
8:05pm: Kershaw's .184 batting average just dipped a bit. Inning over.
8:14pm: It's like this it's like that it's like this nigger...another scoreless half-inning in the book. The game is starting to move a litle faster now that Kershaw is controlling the Dodgers pitching and the Houston bats have cooled off a little. The game also feels more like an "anybody can win this" than it looked after the second.
8:20pm: Seager takes a walk after a long at-bat and now Turner is up with 1 out and a runner on first. The crowd is surprisingly involved in the game to this point. God I hope Turner breaks his leg and it gets infected and he never plays again.
8:26pm: A bounce finally goes LA's way: Turner is on-base after a ball dribbles into the left field, and in the fifth inning with a 5-0 score the 5th pitcher of the game is going to the showers.
8:30pm: The second chubbiest negro pitcher in the major leagues (Liriano, first place going to C.C. Sabathia) is on the mound now. He gets an out but Dodgers still have runners on the corners.
8:34pm: Now Chris Devinski is on the mound. Okay Hinch here's the deal: I can liveblog every pitching change you do in this game, but I also have a beer to drink and I have to manage the time a little bit here. Sorry buddy.
8:44pm: Every time Brian McCann is up to the plate I keep thinking about Brian McCabe, the Toronto Maple Leaf who liked to knock up chubby squaws.
8:48pm: Both managers are basically trying to outsmart each other. Hinch is replacing his defensive outfielders with pinch hitters and forcing Dave Roberts to micromanage his pitching plans to compensate. Kershaw has bases loaded with two outs.
8:49pm: Houston got played. 5-0 in the middle of the sixth, two and a half hours after this game started.
9:00pm: Edmonton and Pittsburgh are tied 2-2 halfway through the third period. Dodgers have two baserunners again, the question now will be whether or not they can capitalize on this situation. Barnes pops out for the first out.
9:01pm: Dodgers score a run. Ethier barrels one into the right field gap and Pederson crosses home plate.
9:04pm: Pittsburgh has taken a 3-2 lead with about 7 minutes left on the clock, and a now-thunderous LA crowd is quieted instantly as Chris Taylor swings and misses. 2 outs. 5-1.
9:05pm: Seager shatters his bat in a fashion that befits the phrase "shattered bat" and almost runs out the hit but not quite. LA is on the board but Houston still has the lead.
9:07pm: I think my Labbatt Blue has gone skunky. Being Labbatt Blue (or "Labatt's Blue" as my father would say) it's not easy to tell.
9:10pm: Beautiful sliding catch by Chris Taylor deprives Springer of another hit in the World Series.
9:14pm: I'm disseminating the accounts of this game and I don't have express written consent of the Office of the Commissioner of the Major Leagues of Baseball. Come get me, bro'.
9:17pm: Altuve gets a walk and the Oilers are 40 seconds away from losing yet another game.
9:18pm: Altuve steals second and the clock winds down in Edmonton.
9:25pm: Keuchel is warming up in the Astros bullpen and Turner breaks his bat on an easy popup to first.
9:26pm: It's worth noting that this game has now exceeded three hours.
9:28pm: Houston shuts the Dodgers out again and we move onto the final two innings. 90 minutes ago I bet somebody the game would be over by 9:50pm. Looks like I'm about to be humiliated.
9:32pm: A guy named Wood is pitching in the postseason for an NL team wearing white and blue. Not as fun as the last time that happened.
9:35pm: It's interesting as they go through crowd shots how few celebrities they can find at a Los Angeles Dodgers Game 7. Contrast that with the LA Lakers, or for that matter the Chicago Cubs last year. They can't all be in counseling after being ass-raped by Kevin Spacey, can they?
9:39pm: Joe Buck just mentioned that Dodger Stadium is the third oldest ballpark in the majors (after Fenway and Wrigley). I've been to all three, but I'm wondering who the fourth is. The answer? Angel Stadium in Anaheim (which I've also been too, which is really nice.
9:44pm: Forsythe pops out and now the Dodgers have 4 outs left to go. Can they finish this game is under 6 minutes?
9:45pm: Mavin may not be a defensive specialist but he can catch a ball, and we're into THE NINTH INNING OF GAME 7 OF THE WORLD SERIES. It doesn't get more exciting than this...except of course for when it does. Exciting hasn't described this game since Kershaw first handled the rosin bag.
9:49pm: Verlander is now pitching in the bullpen, just like Greg Zaun predicted. Here's time for your regular reminder that Greg Zaun took steroids. But Jamie Campbell can't say "Cleveland Indians". Man I wish TSN had the rights to more things.
9:51pm: Springer has been quiet in the back half of this game (everybody has, to be fair), but now he's at-bat and wildly swinging at everything.
9:54pm: The good Chase (Utley, not Hedley) is pinch hitting to start the 9th inning. Still 5-1 Houston.
9:55pm: Utley strikes out. Maybe should have gone with Hedley? And how many kids in America got named "Chase" in the past 20-30 years? Did they all become big league ballplayers?
9:58pm: Chris Taylor breaks his bat and is thrown out on his way to 1st base. Cory Seager might be the Dodgers last batter of the 2017 series.
9:59pm: They did it! Seager thrown out at first on an easy play and the Houston Astros have their first ever World Series trophy!
10:00pm: The crowd has been quiet for most of the night but they sound like zombies now...appropriate enough for the day after Halloween.
10:06pm: Some highlights from the box score... Springer hit .379 tonight and Gattis is the only other hitter in this game over .300. Each team used 5 pitchers on the night, and only Kershaw and Morton went longer than 2 1/3 innings. Morton is awarded the win and Darvish the loss, despite them pitching on opposite sides of the game.
10:09pm: Altuve is the worst interviewee. Well, one of the worst. The worst still has to be every negro on the Eskimos during our 2015 Grey Cup win. All Walker or Odel Willis could do is yell tribal woots, meanwhile Reilly and Justin Sorensen were giving thoughtful interviews.
10:13pm: Greg Zaun is a horrible guy and a horrible player on a horrible team. But he hates and doens't understand millennials, so God bless him.
10:15pm: "The Houston Astros are your World Series champions!" The least creative trophy name ("The Commissioner's Trophy") in sport is officially being given to Jim Crane...the owner? Really? You guys give the owner the trophy first? Worst trophy presentation overall, I suppose.
10:19pm: Anyways, the game is over. The Houston Astros are the World Series champs, my cable box just shut off after 3 hours of inactivity and I don't feel like turning it back on. This didn't hold a candle to last year's epic game, and to be fair even if you aren't a Cubs fan you can't say that Houston finally winning a World Series compares to the Cubs ending a drought so long that the previous Cubs WS win wasn't covered in HDTV, or colour TV, or TV, or even radio...it was in newspapers. So this was a decently long drought ended in fairly pedestrian fashion. Good on you, Houston. #HoustonStrong or whatever bullshit that's about. Goodnight.
