Patton Dodd: October 2007 Archives

This is the way Sports Illustrated's Rick Reilly explains what is happening to the Colorado Rockies this fall: "When it seemed even [Rockies fans'] patience had run out, God looked down and said, 'Oh, geez, are those people still believers? Send them a gift basket.'"

It's gotta be God, right? The good people of Colorado--my home state--have been cheering in futility since major league baseball first came to Denver 15 years ago. As Reilly says, nothing short of the power of God could have prevented more futility, but somehow these Colorado Rockies put together the best late-season string of games in baseball history, winning 21 of 22 since mid-September. Starting tonight, they face the Boston Red Sox in the World Series.

Here at Burn or Burn, we've been careful not to encourage dishonesty: you'll notice that when we advise you to digitally burn a record, it's as an extra copy, say for your car. We're good citizens, and it is still illegal to download copyrighted music without paying, as a jury in Minnesota reminded the world last week when they ruled against a woman who allegedly grabbed songs through Kazaa, a file-sharing website.

There are some things we just expect from certain musicians. We know Radiohead will give us postmodern technological alienation. We know Kanye West will give us pious braggadocio. And after five LP and EP releases, we've come to know that Sam Beam, the impressively-bearded gentleman behind the Americana/folk outfit Iron and Wine, will give us gentle songs about love, loss, and religion.