Rivalry week

And, no, we're not talking about college football, which you might reasonably have assumed because college football has all the best rivalries, or most of them, or at least those that involve mascots and fight songs and throwing stuff at said mascots, and pranking your rival by screwing with his card section in the stands and composing obscene lyrics for his fight song ...

 (Best of the latter:  Notre Dame's student section mangling the Michigan fight song by singing "Hail, hail, to Michigan, the a**holes of the world.")

Anyway ... no. This is not about college football.

This is about baseball.

Where those old and mortal rivals, the Cubs and the Cardinals, finish the regular season this weekend with the chance to ruin one another's day. If the Cardinals sweep or at least win the three-game set in Wrigley, they could cost the Cubs the NL Central title and (potentially) wind up playing them in the winner-take-all NL wild card game. If the Cubs sweep or at least win the series, they would likely keep the Cardinals out of the playoffs altogether.

Either way, it'll be sweetness squared for one fan base or the other.

As a devoted fan of sheer angst (and as someone who has no dog in this hunt), I favor seeing the Cardinals knock the Cubs into the wild card and then playing them in the one-game playoff. Can you imagine what torture that would be for both fan bases?  Nine or more innings of baseball, at the end of which your most implacable rival knocks you out of the playoffs?

"Jesus, NOT THE CUBS!" Cardinals Fan would wail.

"Jesus, NOT THE CARDINALS!" Cubs Fan would wail.

"Hey, at least your season didn't effectively end two months ago!" Pirates Fan would reply.

Pirates Fan being me, of course.  Who is simply jealous of both Cardinals Fan and Cubs Fan, and would like nothing better than to see them endure as much agony as possible.

Bitter? Whatta you mean, bitter?