My favorite part of the
Amy Poehler section is how she relates her experience with making Parks and
Recreation into a hit TV show to Leslie Knope’s hard work and determination
toward building her park. In the chapter “Let’s Build a Park” Poehler brings
the show’s cocreator, Michael Schur, in to comment on some of the early ideas
that went into the creation of the show. While explaining his hard work and
dedication, Poehler explains that it is, “demonstrated [by his] love for the
Boston Red Sox” (246). That year, he had every message sent to him about the
Boston Red Sox by friends and family printed and sent it out to them as a holiday
gift. As of 2019, the Washington Nationals are the most recent World Series
Champions. Winning a World series is like building a park; it takes hard work
and you have to want it the most, as Leslie Knope did.
Unlike most Nationals fans my family and I watched National’s
throughout both the regular season and the playoffs. Their season started out
pretty rough. Though they had possibly the best starting pitching staff in the
league and the offense was sloid, their bull pen (backup pitchers) was just
awful. They would go up by four runs and consistently in the last two innings,
one of the closers from the bull pen would come in and blow the game. I
remember many times over the course of the summer screaming at the TV screen.
My brother Matt would ask, “Why are you so upset, it’s just a regular season
game? One game means almost nothing.” He was right, but it was still hard to watch.
The team’s luck began to turn when they brought on Gerardo Parra. He is a good
player, but his contribution to the team was more than simply physical. He
lightened the very serious mood that the Nationals were playing with. It is
hard to win a baseball game when you are very aware that your career depends on
it. Parra’s walk-up music was “Baby Shark” and he influence the team to start
dancing after every home-run. The celebration of the small victories led the
team to a chance at the playoffs.
After this, the team started to go on ten-game winning streaks,
and they were having fun while doing it. You could visibly see how much they
love the sport during the games, which is so rare in any sports these days. The
bull pen started pitching like they were completely different people and the
offense were cranking out four home runs a game like it was nothing. This
entire time, my brothers and I are patiently waiting for a chance at the World
Series (which we weren’t at all expecting, they had never made it past the
first round of the playoffs before). I have been watching Washington sports for
twenty years now with little reward. This has only made the victories of the
last few years that much sweeter.
By the time they had made it to the world series, the
Nationals had already played in four games which could have knocked them out of
the playoffs, but they wanted it and never gave up until the game was over. In
the World Series (best of seven games), the Nationals went down 3-2 in the
first five games, none of these victories were on the home field for either
team. Things were not looking great for the Washington Nationals. The Astros needed
to win won of the last two which were both on their home field. Sure, enough
though, through the combined strength of some of the biggest names in baseball
right now, The Nationals beat the Houston Astros in a seven-game series. This
was a huge upset. The odds Vegas had stacked against them were staggering.
Anyone who had bet on the Nats was getting rewarded quite handsomely. I went
into my psychology class the next day and my teacher, Dr. Merz (who is a
Yankees fan) took the first ten minutes of class to talk about the World Series
and just how impressive it was that this team had won it. He said it was the
most important thing he would talk about with us all week, but his job required
him to teach or he could get fired, so we moved on. But my family and I still
haven’t as we stayed loyal to our favorite team the in their losses and certainly
in their victories.
This Leslie Knope
meme exemplifies both the Washington Nationals’ 2019 season and myself while watching
the early parts of their regular season.
Works
Cited
Poehler, Amy. Yes, Please.
Dey St., an Imprint of William Morrow Publishers, 2018.
“10 Things Every Boss
Lady Can Learn From Leslie Knope.” Accion, us.accion.org/resource/10- things-every-boss-lady-can-learn-leslie-knope/.
Gotta love a post that combines baseball and Parks & Rec.
ReplyDeleteI have to admit, I did not watch any of the regular season games, and I barely watched any World Series games, but I did go to the parade once they had won! I was dragged there by my boyfriend but man, I was glad I went. The best part was when the coach gave a speech where he explained the mindset for the World Series. When they were down, he told them to stop thinking about the odds and "just win today." The theory was that all they had to do was go 1-0 a few times. I have applied this to my everyday life and it makes big projects and tasks seem a lot more within my reach. The Nats gained a new fan at the parade. (My personal favorite funny moment was all the "he who shall not be named" jerseys that had been altered. His name rhymes with Spice Shaper. Many, many jerseys had been duct taped to read "Loser" instead.)
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