The Faces Behind the Box

Did you read your sports page Monday?

I mean really read your sports page?

When you read the paper Monday, you saw an article on the Harvard baseball team, and how it captured the Ivy League Championship on Sunday in a 22-4 victory over the Princeton Tigers.

Many of you just glanced at the boxscore, some others would have read enough to see the highlights (Pete Alber's grand slam, Jason Keck's two-run homer, Aaron Kessler 4-for-6, etc. etc.). Even fewer would have gotten as far as understanding how long it took for the Crimson to effectively 'put the game away.'

Is it our increasingly fast-paced society that has forced us down such a primrose path?

If you are among the majority of those readers, you wouldn't know how much Sunday was a day of redemption for Pete Albers. With the Crimson up 1-0 in the seventh, Albers led off with a double, and was subsequently picked off--Harvard would lose 2-1, as Albers would also make the final out.

Then in the deciding game, Albers blew a tense game open with a second-inning grand slam, then added a single and double later on.

You also wouldn't realize what a day of redemption it was for sophomore pitcher Mike Marcucci.

When Harvard blew a six-run lead in the last inning against Princeton one month ago, spoiling its perfect Ivy League record, it was Marcucci who could not get a Tiger out in that two-out rally. Marcucci struck out two of three Princeton batters this time in the ninth, closing out Harvard's title.

You also wouldn't realize how upset David Forst was about his Saturday performance--having gone 1-for-6 in the first two games, he vowed that Sunday would be different. How is three hits in his first three at-bats for you?

Could you have been able to hear the sibling rivalry erupting between Harvard's Jason Keck and his senior brother of Princeton, Michael? Could you guess how much ribbing Jason had to take for an entire year when Michael's school ousted Harvard last year in this same playoffs?

Could you hear Jason's joy when his two-run homer extended the Harvard lead yesterday to 11-2?

And I'm sure you wouldn't have been able to comprehend the frustration of Coach Joe Walsh after going 1-5 in his last six games against Princeton, and of the possibility of losing the Ivy League title again to the Tigers.

Think this second-year head coach felt a giant Tiger leave his back?

The wave of sports media is evolving to the shorter, more succinct style: The blue bar flashing across the screen on ESPN2, the quick-hitting stories on the Internet, the often-accessed wire story page even The Crimson uses every day.

Lesser features, more emphasis on the scores, more statistics, less stories on the human aspect, the road back from defeat.

When one examines the story of the Harvard baseball team, quite a few different angles emerge. The next time you read a sports story, take a few extra minutes and read the entire article. Then maybe you won't be one of the masses who just exclaims "Man, 22-4. They beat the 'ell outta them."