More on Astros in new Sports Illustrated
Publication Date, November 13, 2017
That 2014 Sports Illustrated publication that made the call on the Astros as the future winners of the World Series in 2017 is a ship that’s taken on a lot of wind in its full sails from firing the latest baseball shot around the world and then watching its 36-month flight of hope and destiny land successfully together in Los Angeles on November 1, 2017, but it got there. It happened. And it’s always going to be hard for anyone to top that kind of long-range projection again. Even if it gets written about the New York Yankees, the Boston Red Sox, or the Los Angeles Dodgers. Unless, or until, the vagaries of cash, ego, and power striation invade the Astros baseball culture as they years ago did the big boy clubs we just mentioned, the Houston Astros will remain everybody’s best choice as the next heavyweight champion of the baseball world three years hence.
Next week’s November 13, 2017 publication supposedly will go into the “Wild Ride” of the club from 2014 to 2017 nirvana and how “this World Series Trophy won’t be their last.”
In case “SI” misses this point, we feel the need to express it here.
Unlike the Boston Red Sox, the New York Yankees, or the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Houston Astros didn’t expect to just show up and be anointed for greatness by the club that lined up to play them this deep in the season. The Astros came to take the prize as a team – and that’s exactly what they did – and with all respects for the St. Louis Cardinals – against the three richest, most storied other franchises in baseball.
The first two fallen foes – the Red Sox and Yankees – apparently didn’t even know who did them in. They, in turn, placed the blame on their managers and fired John Farrell and Joe Girardi. The Dodgers, on the other hand, have gone a week without also canning Dave Roberts as their manager, but we shall see. Some of the Dodger family weren’t too happy with Roberts’ handling of his pitching staff, but the Astros did have a little to do with the Dodger pitching staff effectiveness. We shall see.
The point is even simpler: The Astros played harder and better than their foes. They played together as the team they are. Their energy was connected to the energy and shared challenge of their fans in Houston as a result of Hurricane Harvey. And they never gave up. Hit ’em hard – and they simply hit back harder. Knock ’em down – and they simply got back up and knocked their foes down – until they just stayed down – and left the scene forever in 2017 on a 4-3 roller ball out, one that features Jose Altuve and Yuli Gurriel – in a five second movie that now plays on variously in the minds of all Astro fans.
The Houston Astros are not merely the World Series Champions of 2017. – They are the kind of champions that shall live on in our hearts and minds forever.
Indeed – forever. As these words hit the page, may the joy it spills splash strong enough to hit you straight in the eye of your own heart and hope.
GO ASTROS! ~ FROM HERE TO ETERNITY!
And thank you, Sports Illustrated, for bringing our boys into the brighter light.
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Bill McCurdy
Principal Writer, Editor, Publisher
The Pecan Park Eagle
The Pecan Park Eagle 
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