From our One for the Ages desk

Last night the hardwatching staff witnessed (with roughly 17 other baseball lovers) the masterly complete-game shutout San Francisco Giants ace Madison Bumgarner laid on the Kansas City Royals in Game 5 of the World’s Serious.

It was the very embodiment of the great Robert Francis poem, Pitcher.

His art is eccentricity, his aim
How not to hit the mark he seems to aim at,

His passion how to avoid the obvious,
His technique how to vary the avoidance.

The others throw to be comprehended. He
Throws to be a moment misunderstood.

Yet not too much. Not errant, arrant, wild,
But every seeming aberration willed.

Not to, yet still, still to communicate
Making the batter understand too late.

Man, did the Royals understand too late.

Bumgarner’s postseason numbers: 4-0, 0.44 ERA, and a knee-buckling 1.20 opposition batting average.

Wow.