| Talkin' baseball on this fine fall day. New skipper in KC Friday was, as Jim's dad in the “American Pie” movies might say, a “good news day.” The Kansas City Royals hired a new manager I wished my hometown team, the Texas Rangers, had hired last year when they interviewed him during their manager shopping expedition.
Normally, I wouldn't care about personnel moves from the Royals, or about a managerial prospect who didn't get hired by the Rangers. But this manager, Trey Hillman, is different.
Yeah, he's built a championship team in Japan and has spent years cutting his teeth in the New York Yankees minor league system. But Hillman's hiring is more special for me personally because Hillman went to my high school, Arlington Sam Houston, graduating a few years before me.
I was a team manager for the Sam Houston baseball team my senior year of high school when Hillman dropped by practice one day. That was in 1986. Little did I know that 21 years later he would be a major league manager.
Having Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Vernon Wells (an Arlington Bowie product) from your area of town (Southeast Arlington) is great, but a major league manager is even more special. (Major Leaguer Ben Grieve lived in Southwest Arlington.)
Hillman has a great reputation and was considered the top managerial prospect this off-season, as he interviewed with two other teams, Oakland and San Diego, last off-season. The Royals jumped on the chance to hire him before anyone else could snatch him up.
Sure, Hillman, 44, toiled for many years in baseball before reaching his goal of becoming a major league manager. But baseball is a business in which paying your dues is an expectation. And the Royals' gain is everyone else's loss.
Fall Classic ... Brrrr! Make That Winter Classic
With Boston winning Sunday night to punch its ticket to the 2007 World Series to face Colorado, this series could be played in sub-freezing temperatures and with possible precipitation.
Forecasters call for wonderful weather in Denver this week, but a weather system hitting Colorado over the weekend might bring some wintry weather, or at least that's one forecaster said. A quick glance at the weather on the “Rocky Mountain News” Web site shows temps in the 7os Saturday, 40s on Sunday and 50s on Monday, though.
My first game at Coors Field in Denver was snowed out, Yeah, snowed out. But that was in the spring, when snow showers are not uncommon in Colorado.
Whatever the weather, the series will determine which team can stay hot on the field, as the Rockies have won 21 of their last 22 while the Red Sox are coming off a 4-3 divisional series win over Cleveland in which they were down three games to one but outscored the Tribe 30-5 in the last three games to secure a berth in the World Series.
Should be a fun series.
Prediction? Rockies' win streak and magic gotta end sometime. Red Sox win the Series in six games.
Don Munsch can be reached by e-mail at dmunsch@fbherald.com.
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