ICHIRO FINISHES OFF THE RANGERS!

Earlier tonight I was at my oldest son's baseball game.  He was playing right field when a ball came creeping through the second baseman and into right.  He stormed in picked it up and as the runner on first advanced past second, he fired a laser to the third baseman and pegged the runner out.  The coach yelled, "ICHIRO!"  I smirked and as my kid ran in he had a smile on his face too.  He knew what he did and while it wasn't the play of the year, it was pretty damn awesome.  I once wrote a story about how another coach he had called him Ichiro. Read YOU CAN ALWAYS DEPEND ON ICHIRO TO GIVE YOU A CHANCE for reference on that. I like the nickname and I think he likes it too.

I should have known that hearing Ichiro tonight would somehow send vibes to Yankee Stadium... because it was Ichiro just a few hours later winning the game for the Yankees in a walk-off... it don't get much better than that.

Tonight it was Hiroki Kuroda against Yu Darvish. Darvish went 5.1 innings and gave up 7 hits and 3 runs.  Kuroda went 6.2 innings, gave up 5 hits and 3 runs. And both pitchers were followed by their respective bullpens.  It was clearly knotted up pretty good all game. Who would win? Who would lose? No one knew...but I should have guessed.

In the 9th inning, Ichiro came up to the plate and cranked out a home run to right field.  Ironically, the same position my 10 year old was playing when he lasered that kid out at third base tonight.  Now, you can call my crazy, I believe in vibes... I'm superstitious, I believe in the planets aligning a certain way and never washing a dirty uniform after a big win. Tonight, the Yankees pulled one out, the way they did it in April and the beginning of May and if I'm in that clubhouse and I'm Ichiro,  I'm folding up my dirty uniform and putting it in my locker for tomorrow, because tonight was big, for the Yankees and Ichiro... and for my kid.  Both will sleep soundly tonight... both did good... and I believe it was all about the vibe.

Final: Yankees 4 - Ranger 3.

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