Sports > October 25, 2007

By James Burnett | Staff writer

Like a cold Coors Light train telling people all over the world to join in, the Colorado Rockies swept through the MLB playoffs leaving a trail of refreshed and defeated teams in their wake.

Unlike the Coors Light train, the Rockies did not leave a watery taste in everyone’s mouth.

Instead, Colorado has rattled off 21 wins in its last 22 games, batting a collective .296 and pitching with a 2.80 combined ERA.

The Rockies made short work of the Phillys in the NLDS, sending them home to a city that boos its teams in its sleep.

The young Diamondbacks got much of the same treatment, receiving a beating that will make the team a little gun shy the next time they make it to the NLCS.

Welcome to Rocktober, a much less annoying version of Dane Cook’s Actober, and a cousin of the actual month of October, except with more purple. Not only have the Rockies been playing well, but they managed to become America’s default pick. Their current streak of wins, along with a lovable cast of characters has drawn the interest of many MLB fans whose teams have gone the way of the dodo.

Now they face a very formidable opponent in the Boston Red Sox, a task that might make Dinger, the anthropomorphized Triceratops and the Rockies mascot, want to go extinct. I do not claim to be a baseball genius, but I believe the Rockies can win this series. I submit these two reasons:

1. Team Chemistry. This may in fact be a clichéd term, but when it translates into on the field success it must be used. During their current rash of wins the Rockies fielding percentage has been an outstanding .992, with only seven total errors (MLB.com). These stats translate to the pitchers trusting their fielders and vice versa.

Combined with the aforementioned batting average and ERA, one can conclude that the Rockies are playing good team baseball. Any one player can step up on any given night.

The Red Sox exhibited this quality in their comeback win in the ALCS, but where was it at the end of the season when the Yankees were closing in?

The Rockies have been consistent, and despite a nine-day layoff (over which they will certainly get some much needed rest and play many simulated games) they will carry the team consistency into the World Series

2. The Karmic Bandwagon. Which is worse: a pink Bosox hat or a Rockies fan who only knows Todd Helton as Peyton Manning’s backup quarterback at Tennessee?

Probably not much difference in the amount of ignorance displayed, but whereas a fan with a pink Boston hat might be killed at Fenway, both the Rockies and their fans will take the Todd Helton ignorant bandwagon dweller any day.

Red Sox fans derive a sense of moral superiority from the fact that there team was tortured for years on end, and the fact that they can name every player past and present who has donned a Sox hat.

Karma caught up to the Sox in 2004, ending the drought and bringing with it a bandwagon of fans ready to capitalize on one of the greatest sports stories of all time.

Since then, through a very exclusive world view and a lofty team budget, the Red Sox and their fans have yet again tempted fate by alienating would-be fans and by spending money like George Steinbrenner at the College World Series.

The Rockies have never been to a World Series, don’t seem to care if anyone shows up with a pastel colored hat and haven’t spent exorbitant sums of money just to win a championship.

Karma is on the Rockies side, and it may have left the Red Sox in 2004.

Did I mention their mascot was a triceratops named Dinger?

Rockies in six.