As you may know, recently in Make Predictions. Win cash., Talker offered a $100 cash prize to the Talker who could most accurately predict the results of the 2017 baseball season.
The premise is simple. Make your playoff predictions either through email at [email protected] or in the comment section below. You need to pick the Wild Cards for each league, the Division Series winners, the League Championship winners and the World Series winner. Whoever is closest wins $100.
The contest goes until May 1st.
One of the first takers was Bill Pruitt, whose poetry and prose have graced our screens. Perhaps most memorable is Bill’s magisterial birthday gift, “Ode to the Talker.”
Bill was too gentlemanly to cash his (misspelled) check from Says who you can’t get rich being a writer.
Bill’s entrance in the contest was not surprising. Along with our other court poets, Bill is profiled in Says who you can’t get rich being a writer. In the article, Bill discusses that while poetry has provided ample psychic rewards, his financial gains have been negligible.
To rectify the situation, Bill is including a genre-making poem, “The Pennant Races in Rhyming Couplets.” As Bill fully expects to win the contest, he will — quite validly — be able to claim he was paid $100 for the poem.
An earlier baseball poem set in St. Louis
As a warm-up, Bill is including “Apoclypse at Grand & Dodier,” set in his beloved home town of St. Louis and the old Sportsman’s Park.
The Pennant Races in Rhyming Couplets
Oh Muse, I to the Triad Triple Goddess sing,
O Ninefold One, reveal to me, bring
Knowledge of that sport inscribed to you,
Where the sacred nine in structure holds things true
Nine players on the field, nine innings to a game,
Sacred to Helicon and the Muses’ flame
Show me how out of games 121 score and ten
(The number before the best ten get to play again)
Show how the matchups interweave and coil
Divide and connect through spring, summer, fall
Till we come to the playoffs, pause and regroup
Tell what morsels emerge from this murky soup
For 162, the Red Sox will prevail
For no rotation sets up like Porcello, Price and Sale
And in the playoffs will haul down the Stros
(Who in the wild card had dispatched the Os)
While the blue-blooded Royals boldly sink the Mariners,
And then, despite the Trumpish trolls who diss those whom they call foreigners
It is the Panda, the Venezuelan Sandoval,
Who steals home to win the pennant and shock all
Meanwhile in the Senior Circuit surge
The Nationals, as the role of Demiurge
Is shared by Harper, Scherzer and Roark
But lo, it appears their bite is less than their bark,
When the Cardinals, of Medieval tradesmen comprised,
Fowler, Wainwright and Carpenter, uprise,
In a show of force that had the Dodgers smashed
In a surprisingly one-sided wild card match
To knock off the Nationals in five rounds,
Now face the Giants, (who had put the Cubs down),
To harry Frisco on the bases to and fro
While every game is close, and saved by Oh
Till in the series all you hear about is 2004
When the Cards were steamrolled and swept out the door
By the Sox, but now it’s more like 1946
When the series went seven, Redbirds missing no tricks
Unfortunately for the Cardinals, there was no Game 5 of the 2004 World Series as the Cards were “Bedazzled” by the Sox in a sweep. Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, October 28, 2004
Game 7 of the 1946 World Series. Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, October 16th, 1946
As Molina keeps making base runners lose face
And Carpenter keeps taking the extra base
As the playoff team with the season’s fewest wins
Beats the one with the most, again
In layman’s terms, Bill has predicted.
AL Wild Cards: Houston, Baltimore
Division Series winners. Boston over Houston; Royals over Mariners
League Championship winner: Boston
NL Wild Cards: St. Louis, Los Angeles
Division Series winners. St. Louis over Washington; San Francisco over Chicago
League Championship winner: St. Louis over San Franciso
World Series: St. Louis over Boston. Bill predicts the Cards will take a 3-2 lead over the Sox in world series contests. St. Louis won in ’46 and ’67, both in 7 games, while Boston won 4-0 in ’04 and 4-2 in ’13.
SEE
Happy First Birthday! Distinguished poet Bill Pruitt offers “Ode to the Talker”
