Revenge of the downtrodden

And so we will get the Nightmare on Nielsen Street, aka the World Series That Will Come For The TV Suits Like The Walking Dead.

In other words, we got us the Astros and the Nationals, y'all.

Darn those Major League Baseball people, anyway. If only they had a sign that read "You Must Be This Tall To Ride This Ride," then 5-foot-6 Jose Altuve does not take Aroldis Chapman into the seats in the 11th inning last night, and the 'Stros don't walk off with a 6-4 win that sent the ratings-monster Yankees off to their winter's sleep.

This is a shame, for those who judge the worth of a sporting event only by its TV ratings. For the rest of us it's the revenge of the nerds, or the stumblebums, or the downtrodden.

This is because before the Astros got good a couple of years ago, they'd won all of three playoff series and zero World Series since they were born the Colt .45s back in 1962. And the team they're playing, the Washington Nationals, are the spiritual descendants of the Washington Senators, whose legacy of entrenched crumminess stretched back to the early days of the 20th century.

The only time the Senators won a World Series, after all, Calvin Coolidge was president. And the last time they played in one (which was the last time a ballclub from the nation's capital has played in one), FDR was selling the country a New Deal.

So, you know, this is the Series of the chronic have-nots. It may not make any money for the teevees, but it's kind of a cool deal for those of us who still appreciate the ironies of history.

The best one here?

Neither contestant is where it used to be.

If some miracle had occurred back in the day when the Senators and the Astros were dependably awful, Washington would have been carrying the standard of the American League into the Series, and the Astros would have been the National League's representative. Now, of course, it's exactly the opposite: Washington, the traditional AL city, is the National League champion, and Houston, the traditional NL city, is the American League champ.

It is enough to make one's head spin, at least if one is of a certain age. Of course, if one is of a certain age, one's head spins a lot of the time these days anyway.

In any case ... play on, gentlemen.