wide awake in america

8 days to go until i see u2 live again.  that means it's time to link a u2 release that included two live tracks to baseball cards.

it's not a full length album, but i feel pretty strongly about wide awake in america being one of u2's most important releases, so i'll give it its own post.  the four song ep was released in may of 1985, and the live version of 'bad' blew me away. then, a couple of months later, they played 'bad' at live aid and it was all over.  i was convinced that u2 was the best live band ever, even though i had never been to a concert.  critics (for what they are worth) seemed to agree about u2's elevated status as a live act.

do you know what else was bad in 1985?  tommy lasorda's decision to have tom niedenfuer pitch to jack clark in the 9th inning of game 6 of the nlcs.

it was only a bad decision because clark hit a 3-run home run.  if he had struck out, as lasorda hoped, the game would have been over and the series would have been tied at 3 games apiece, and lasorda would have made a successful, although questionable, call.  lasorda points to the fact that niedenfuer

had struck clark out earlier in the game (when niedenfuer entered the game in the top of the 7th) so it was only logical that he would get clark out on strikes again.  never mind first base was open, the tying run was on third with the go-ahead run on second, niedenfuer was in his 3rd inning of work and that he hadn't pitched more than 2 innings in a single outing since september 2.

is there anything worse than a card that is from 1985 featuring jack clark as both a giant and a cardinal?

well, yes there is.  this is actually a pretty fantastic o-pee-chee card.  the subject matter is bad though.  very bad.