October is for sports lovers
Oct 12, 2016, 9:16 AM | Updated: 11:09 am
If you love sports you are enjoying a month-long athletic holiday.
It’s the October Overload, or as FiveThirtyEight called it, the Sports Equinox: that wonderful time of year when the Major League Baseball playoffs are in full flower, the NFL and college football seasons are approaching their midpoint and the NBA and NHL seasons are just getting starting.
It’s the antithesis of July when the only thing happening is Major League Baseball, unless you are an MLS fan.
In the past six days, I have watched more than a dozen sporting events. On Thursday, I saw the Cardinals resuscitate their season with a win in San Francisco. On Friday, I surfed the National League and American League Division series.
On Saturday, I watched Arizona State’s defense fuel an improbable win over UCLA, and on Sunday, it was a full slate of NFL games and the Blue Jays eliminating the Rangers.
On Monday Night Football, I watched the Carolina Panthers sink to unexpected lows, and on Tuesday I saw the Cubs calm their fragile fan base with a ninth-inning rally to eliminate the San Francisco Giants in the NLDS.
Tonight, the NHL season kicks off with four games, and in about two weeks, the NBA’s preseason ends and the regular season begins.
According to FiveThirtyEight’s research, there have only been 15 actual equinoxes in the history of North American pro sports where the NBA and NHL seasons had started before the World Series had ended.
The website did not include the college football season in its analysis of those overlaps, although we think it should, given its place in the hierarchy of American sports.
As FiveThirtyEight noted, Phoenix is the only city to have played in all four parts of the equinox. On Nov. 3, 2001, Arizona State lost to Oregon at Autzen Stadium in Eugene. On Nov. 4th, the Arizona Cardinals lost at home to the Philadelphia Eagles, the Phoenix Coyotes lost on the road to the Carolina Hurricanes, and the Phoenix Suns lost at home to the Houston Rockets.
None of that mattered when the Luis Gonzalez’s bloop hit up the middle gave the Diamondbacks a Game 7 win over the Yankees to capture the city’s first and only major professional championship that same day.
What memorable moments will October deliver this year? Stay tuned, sit back and enjoy the many options and possibilities at your fingertips.
