October is over, which means two key things.
First, THE ANGELS WON THE WORLD SERIES! Much more on them later.
Secondly, we will never have to see another of FOX’s brilliant ideas – those stupid October’s Magical Matchups commercials.
The commercials themselves weren’t that bad the first few times I saw them. However, FOX seemed to play that commercial at least once, if not twice, during each commercial break of baseball and football games.
Just how many times was that commercial from hell shown? Well, if FOX had 18 breaks between innings, 4.6 pitching changes during the game, plus three pre-game commercial breaks, that’s 25.6 times per game broadcast. There were 22 playoff games on FOX, which means viewers were brainwashed with that promo 563.2 times. And that’s just baseball.
For those who watched football, there are about 20 commercial breaks per game, with six games on FOX, and four pre-game shows with six commercial breaks each – a total of 144 times that October’s Stupid Commercial was stuffed down our throats.
Add on the 31 times in October sports fans may have watched the promo during the sports segment on the nightly news, and the grand total is 738.2 viewings of October’s Moronic Mutterings.
A subcommittee should be formed to investigate why FOX showed the world’s most stupid commercial so much.
Now that I’ve freed my body of anger, I can focus on the best story of the month – the Anaheim Angels. The Angels were a team that finished 41 games out of first place the year before, were chosen by most people to finish last place in the division, and were given 50-1 odds of winning the World Series.
The Angels ended up leading the league in batting average, and more importantly, productive outs.
This explains how they made the playoffs, despite finishing 29th out of 30 teams in home runs.
The Angels were matched up against the evil New York Rich Guys in the first round. The Rich Guys had tons of history and “magic” while the Angels had a history of choking.
Still, the Angels beat the Yankees in four games and the Twins in five, giving them their first World Series berth ever.
The defining moment of the World Series came in game six, when the Angels were down three games to two and 5-0 in the seventh inning of the game.
No World Series team had ever come back from a five-run deficit to win the game. Also, the Angels had done nothing offensively all game, and the Giant bullpen was pitching very effectively.
Scott Spiezio came up to bat and hit a three-run homer to bring the Angels within two runs.
The next inning, the Angels finished the best comeback in World Series history, and the ANGELS WON THE WORLD SERIES the next day.
• Someone that went highly overlooked in October: Zach Wells.
Wells may have had the best weekend ever for a goalkeeper, especially in the first game of the weekend.
On Oct. 25, Oregon State fired 25 shots towards the goal, a huge amount for soccer (the average is usually around 12).
None of them went in.
Wells had 11 saves, a school record, and also got an assist, the first by a UCLA goalkeeper in two years.
In his next game, he recorded another shutout, his sixth of the year.
• Also in October: The men’s water polo team lost to Stanford again.
Twice.
That’s five times in a row.
• Nate Fikse has turned into an offensive juggernaut. Who would’ve thought it? A punter-converted-place-kicker got 16 points and should’ve gotten 17 (If Bob Toledo hadn’t made a bad two-point attempt decision, again).
• And last, but definitely not the least: there was no gymnastics at all in October. A great month indeed! Unfortunately, that ends this month.
The Angels have won more world series than the Bruins have championships since Fall 2001. The Stat Geek’s column appears every Friday.