Tick Tock, Tick Tock - It's PLAYOFF TIME!!!

ZOMG, only 2.5 hours before the Colorado Rockies open up the 2009 National League Division Series against the World Champion Philadelphia Phillies.

Man, the excitement here at work is palpable, and yeah, I'm wearing a purple and black checked oxford to work. Gots ta support my boys. That said, I'm feeling rather skeptical about our chances this year. In the end, everything's going to come down to a couple of factors. First, how well can the Rockies' starting pitching keep Rollins & Victorino off the basepaths. After all, both Rockies catchers pretty much suck this year at throwing out runners.

Second, which Phillies' starting pitchers will show up? The Cliff Lee who handcuffed the Rox during one of his first National League starts? Or the very ordinary Cliff Lee from the past month? The Cole Hamels who shut down the world last post-season, or the current seemingly very ordinary Hamels?

A lot of writers talk about how the Rockies are much better against righties than they are against lefties, and this would be true. That said, the Rockies are a .500 club against left-handed starting pitching, so no, they are not ZOMG horrible in this department. The key will be whether or not Atkins and Barmes can avoid the punchouts and get on base. They've both had rough seasons at the plate (even though Barmes does have a couple dozen dingers), and the Phillies bullpen is fairly weak. So going deep into ABs will be critical.

I'll post more later on this....

The Good Doctor Mondo continues to improve. I haven't written much lately on this, because...well, I just don't blog much these days. Two weeks ago, we moved her to a Long Term Acute Care (LTAC) hospital down here in Denver, mostly because her insurance company would no longer cover a normal hospital ICU unit. That said, she is in the LTAC's ICU, and will probably be in there for another week or two. But she continues to make small strides every day in her recovery. We're hoping we can move her to a rehabilitation hospital in the next month or so. But as of now, we're at Day 107 of her hospital ordeal. And frankly, it's really fucking lonely living in a big house by yourself.

Poker continues to be a lollercoaster for me. A week ago Sunday was about the worst day ever. Bubbled *three* consecutive Bodog $100k satellites by one seat. Played about 20 tournies with no cashes...and just ran really really really bad. The worst part was that I had decided that if I could have hung on for two of the seats, I would have actually played one of them.

Results were a bit better this past Sunday, so perhaps I've stopped the bleeding a bit.