My sporadic blogging of late can be blamed on the World Series taking hold of my life. It’s been a few years (2005 ChiSox/Astros) since I have been captivated by the World Series. Last year, I would have rather watched Nancy Grace at the height of a child abduction than have watched the World Series. Despite my years of vocal support for the Tampa Bay Rays coming to fruition, I just wasn’t spellbound by the matchup against the Phillies. And so the World Series dipped off my radar.

This year, however, we were treated to a stellar matchup of big market, star-laden clubs and it did not disappoint. Game 1 brought us the Cliff Lee/CC Sabathia showdown. Game 2 had Pedro Martinez back on the mound at Yankee Stadium (his daddy’s house). Game 3 provided the Phillies fans with an opportunity to show the white-collar Yankee crowd how to “do” a World Series game. Game 4 had CC on 3 days rest, and Game 5 gave us another opportunity to watch the most dominant left-handed pitcher in baseball prove critics and analysts wrong yet again. Game 6, the elimination game, certainly won’t live in baseball lore as a classic, but we did bear witness to one of the best individual World Series games ever by Hideki Matsui, in what will likely be his last game at Yankee Stadium. 6 RBI on 3 hits.

I was a little bothered by Matsui winning the Series MVP, because he did not play the entire series. He actually did not start any of the games in Philadelphia. While he was the MVP of the clinching game, Derek Jeter was the MVP of the World Series. His ability to get on-base was the single most important part of the Yankees 2009 postseason run. And it sadly won’t be remembered because he’s Derek Jeter and he’s “supposed to” be that good. It sounds foolish, but Jeter is one of the most underrated players of this generation, perhaps the first athlete in the internet age to be underrated while at the same time be never forgotten by the media (both old and new). Jeter is written and spoken about at great length, yet somehow, I don’t think people truly understand how good he really is. And not just how good he is, but how valuable. Jeter excels on the field. He is one of the 3 best shortstops in baseball history. He’s a 5-time World Series champion. He plays in the largest market, for the most widely recognized American sports franchise in the world, and never, ever says or does the wrong thing off the field. He is as close to a perfect athlete as my generation will ever see and to me, the 2009 postseason was just another opportunity for us to bear witness to his greatness. Even if he wasn’t the “most valuable player.”