HOUSTON — It was the best of nights. It was the worst of nights.
It was a night when Philadelphians and Houstonians suffered whiplash, motion sickness, vertigo, and the emotional overload of agonies and ecstasies. Millions of people split their screens, picture-in-pictured, and otherwise tried to serve two major league masters as their cities’ most significant teams met at each others’ municipalities.
It was Philadelphians, mostly, since Houston football stinks.
I was one of them — working in Houston at a football game, living and dying on every pitch in Philadelphia.
The unbeaten Eagles traveled to Houston to face the oft-beaten Texans. Simultaneously, the Phillies and Astros, tied at 2-2 in the World Series and coming off an Astros’ no-hitter, wrestled at Citizens Bank Park for the upper hand in a classic Fall Classic.
It was a dilemma, like, which of kids’ candy do I steal after bedtime: Reese’s or Heath bar?
Answer:
Both, obviously.
Some of the following details might not be entirely accurate, and some of the times might not be precise, but have some indulgence and some grace. They were being compiled by an easily distracted writer sitting 80 feet above a half-empty football field watching a coworker’s YouTube TV broadcast of a baseball game that moved slower than the Blue Route when you’re headed to the airport at rush hour (that was me, Wednesday).
Julia Smith, wife of Philadelphia Inquirer Eagles writer E.J. Smith, provided the inspiration (and some of the information) involved in the sketching this road map of sports anxiety.
Smith tweeted, “My wife is going through it.”
His wife was all of us.
Timeline
At 8:14 EDT, Jose Altuve doubled and went to third on an error, then scored (damn), while the Eagles were winning the coin-flip (whee!). The Phillies started — before the Eagles did.
At 8:20, as the Texans matriculated through an Eagles defense playing without man-mountain rookie Jordan Davis (damn), Kyle Schwarber ripped a leadoff homer to tie it at 1 (whee!).
At 8:25, the Texans finished matriculating with a 2-yard touchdown pass to Teagan Quitoriano for a 7-0 lead.
At 8:38, after an 18-play drive, the Eagles evened it with a 2-yard, fourth-down dive from Miles Sanders (Landon Dickerson might’ve held on the play, but so be it.)
At 9:12, Kenneth Gainwell crashed in from 4 yards (whee!) as Nick Castellanos and Bryson Stott were stranding Bryce Harper on first base (damn).
At 9:15, Jeremy Peña bombed Noah Syndergaard out of the game with a solo home run for a 2-1 lead in the fourth inning as Fletcher Cox was leaving the field with an injury. Double damn (Cox returned almost immediately).
At 9:22, Davis Mills found Chris Moore with a 13-yard threader that was ruled an incompletion (whee!) then reversed as a touchdown (damn). Come on, fellas, this is hard enough.
At 10:04, C.J. Gardner-Johnson snagged his fifth interception of the season and returned it to the Texans’ 17. At 10:06, Jalen Hurts tossed a 17-yard TD to A.J. Brown for a 21-14 lead with 8:04 to play in the third quarter. Whee! Whee!
At 10:17, the Eagles held the Texans to a field goal as José Alvarado escaped a sixth-inning jam, and then a streaker ran onto the baseball field. Triple-whee, I guess.
At 10:29, Hurts hit Dallas Goedert with a 4-yard touchdown pass that, with a two-point quarterback sneak, made it 29-17 with 11:22 to play. Whee! The Eagles game was a lot less interesting at that point, especially since Schwarber came up with two men on and two outs in the bottom of the sixth ... but then he grounded out into the shift. Damn. Damn. Damn.
At 10:53, James Bradberry intercepted Mills with 2:08 to play (whee!), just after Harper popped out to end the seventh.
At 11:02, after David Robertson walked Altuve, Peña singled on a hit-and-run and sent Altuve to third while Hurts QB-sneaked for a last-minute first down, sent the Eagles to 8-0 for the first time in franchise history, and ended the cities’ double-vision.
Whee.
OK. Gotta go. Yordan Alvarez just hit a ground ball that sent first baseman Rhys Hoskins into spasms, scored a run, made an out, and the Wi-Fi is getting weak here.
Damn.
