Powers Unfiltered

I have to admit, I was pulling for the Mets in the NLCS — but now that it’s the Cardinals and Tigers, some long-unaccessed memories of the 1968 World Series come flooding back.  (OK, OK, I’m old.)  I was eight years old and just entering my formative years as a baseball fan; I can’t remember a single World Series event of any kind before that, but I remember this one well. 

My grandparents had just moved in with us at our house in New York, and my grandfather was a fanatical baseball fan.  He had pitched a little semi-pro ball when he was 17 or 18, and had been a sportswriter on several newspapers in the Midwest after that — he knew baseball.  My grandfather was a National League fan, and I inherited that from him; we were rooting for the Cardinals as Bob Gibson and Lou Brock and Curt Flood and the rest took on Denny McLain, Mickey Lolich, Al Kaline and company.  I sat and watched transfixed as the ’68 Series went seven games, with more twists and turns of plot and momentum than I can remember —  but the Tigers won that one. 

Like Robert Anderson, I’ll be rooting for the Cardinals this time — I’m a LaRussa fan from his tenure in Oakland as well — but mostly, I hope the series is as entertaining as the last time these two teams met.