GAME FIFTY FIVE: Results aren't everything.

As any good poker player knows, how you play the game and how the game turns out are not synonymous: it's a game of skill, which is why poker is legal in California. But it ain't chess, as the player above, 1995 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion and best-selling author (and BEST poker author yet) "Action" Dan Harrington would know. As a former backgammon champion, Harrington mentions in his texts that cards ain't chess. If you could play perfect poker, and no one can, you'd still catch a lot of bad beats. And that's what yesterday sort of was. A baaaad beat.



Did Jorge block the plate enough to tag Julio Lugo out? Maybe. I won't say it was a bad call or claim I know better. It's a judgment call.



And all judgment calls are, of course, questionable. It's like asking whether this picture of Jennifer Garner hugging a Sox mascot is merely sweet or cancerous. I side with "cute" and "safe."

Having Okajibon blow the save/game hurt a lot, but the Yankees certainly earned it with amazing patience and yeah, a little luck. I'm thinking Papelbon played some games with himself to give A-Rod a semi-fat fastball. I talked to obligatory Yankee fan Nick Gidwani about this over IM.

nickgidwani (1:00:17 PM): see fastball

nickgidwani (1:00:18 PM): kill fastbal

nickgidwani (1:00:23 PM): that is arod in a nutshell

bluemonkjd (1:00:30 PM): and it wasn't a good fastball.

nickgidwani (1:00:35 PM): exactly

bluemonkjd (1:00:36 PM): think he was playing games with himself.

bluemonkjd (1:00:55 PM): papelbon: I threw two fastballs in a row. So he's thinking I'll throw the split. What if I throw the fastball?

bluemonkjd (1:01:12 PM): papelbon (shoulda): I got pitches to play with. Let's see if I can get him to swing at this shit.

But hey. Que sera sera, as Sly Stone once sung. Ortiz's 9th inning blast flies out most of the time. Bobby Abreu doesn't catch a probable (3rd!) Pedroia double most of the time and save two runs. Pigs don't always fly.

But was that the best Sox-Yankees game of the season? Absolutely.



Does it matter? Maybe in the wild card. Look at the numbers, Yankee fans. Sorry if facts don't tell you what you want them to. Godspeed. But as poker teaches us, anyone can get lucky for a game: