Published: October 29, 2006 09:45 am      

Somewhere up there, Jack Buck is smiling

My friend S.W. Zemboven is a St. Louis Cardinals fan, and that must be his real name since he once received mail addressed that way.

In fact, S.W. might be the only St. Louis Cardinals fan I know around here, so in that regard I’m happy for him now that his Cardinals are baseball’s world champions ... even though S.W. is a Duke basketball fan and even though he once brought a young man to the brink of tears and public humiliation in front of his girlfriend the day the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl.

(The young man in question had the gall to be rooting for the Ravens that day, which was wrong on his part since S.W., with a white-hot passion, hates anything and everything that has anything to do with Baltimore. And for the record, I was not that young man. Not that S.W. hasn’t brought me to the brink of tears and/or public humiliation — yes, it’s an odd friendship — but on that particular day when the Ravens won the Super Bowl, I was at Daggett’s Super Bowl party handing out business cards I had printed that morning that read, “Don’t even ask because I’m not discussing last night’s Maryland-Duke game.” ... Yes, it was that Maryland-Duke game.)

So, while I am happy for S.W. and Cardinals Nation at large, I do feel a twinge of sadness as a baseball fan who has a confrontational streak of his own, because now I can no longer end baseball arguments with my friend by saying, “Hey, the Orioles have won a World Series since the Cardinals have.”

Yes, hard as that was to believe, given the state of the Orioles, and given the Cardinals are contenders year-in and year-out and had won four National League pennants since their last world title, the Orioles’ last world title came in 1983, while, prior to Friday night, the last Cardinals world title came in 1982.

Of course I’m still in a position to be able to end baseball arguments that way with Philadelphia Phillies fans (1980), Pittsburgh Pirates fans (1979) and Chicago Cubs fans (1493), but there are three problems with that:

1.) Having lived with one for four years, I am very afraid of Philadelphia sports fans.

2.) The last time the Pirates won a world title, as we all remember, they overcame a 3-1 deficit to beat a team that is very near and dear to my heart.

3.) What challenge is there in making fun of Cubs fans?

Q: What did God say to the Chicago Cubs?

A: “Don’t do anything until I get back.”

Ba-da-bum.

The Cardinals were left for dead in September with just 83 regular-season wins, yet ended up as the team with the fewest wins to ever become a World Series winner — which is a testament to the Cardinals organization, to the Cardinals’ doggedness, to the Cardinals’ pitching and to the playoff system as we know it.

With wild cards and three tiers of play, baseball’s postseason is a wide-open crapshoot for any team that can reach October, with the exception of the New York Yankees. With apologies to our friend Phil Caruso and other people like him, what’s not to love about that?

Well, some baseball purists are still of the notion that the 162-game regular season must count for more than it does, and there is merit to that line of thinking. But the fact remains the industry of baseball has never been healthier than it is now, as evidenced by the latest labor agreement, and the reason for that health is nearly every team in the whole darn shooting match has a chance.

The Detroit Tigers in the World Series? What could be more unfathomable?

Sadly, Peter Angelos and his warehouse minions who run Chicago Cubs East continue to scratch their heads for the answer to that one.

It’s only the Raiders?

We talk about athletes’ dead-wrong feelings of invincibility, and anymore I’m beginning to wonder if Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger really doesn’t have one after all.

First, of course, there was the motorcycle accident in June that nearly cost him his life. Roethlisberger, as has been well chronicled, wasn’t wearing a helmet that day, and since I don’t understand even getting on a motorcycle, it goes without saying I don’t understand getting on a motorcycle without wearing a helmet. However, there are thousands of riders out there who don’t like to wear helmets and don’t. So in that very slim context, that one was semi-understandable.

What I don’t understand at all, after suffering one concussion just four months ago, is Roethlisberger’s refusal to wear the specially-designed helmet made available for players who have suffered concussions. Now whether or not that helmet would have prevented the concussion Roethlisberger suffered last Sunday is impossible to say since the special helmet is merely a precaution. Still, it just doesn’t seem too smart not to take every precaution possible when you’re talking about your noggin.

So, will The Benny, listed as questionable on the Steelers’ injury report, play today? Should he want to? As a competitor and the quarterback of the team, of course he should want to. But should he be allowed to?

Charlie Batch, the Steelers’ quality back-up, is a capable NFL quarterback as he has proven time and again during Roethlisberger’s past absences. The Oakland Raiders, the Steelers’ opponents today, have been just as capable in proving themselves to be a perfectly dreadful football team. Thus, the thinking goes, the struggling Steelers would beat the Raiders if Keanu Reeves were playing quarterback. So, to be safe, just let Big Ben sit this one out.

Hell, it’s only the Raiders.

So, Alex, let’s try Famous Todd Appel Quotes for a hundred.

And the answer is, “What does it say that the thinking in the matter of the neurological well-being of a man who has suffered two concussions in four months, would even involve whether or not the defending Super Bowl champion, currently in desperate straits, will need said man out there to win a ... football game?”

Hmmm. What is ... “Sad, really.”

Mike Burke can be reached at mburke@times-news.com.