5 Minutes with dcbove

dcbove mans the Cleveland Spiders in the AL East. He has been doing so since season 7 and in this team the Spiders have appeared in the World Series 8 times and won 4 of them. 

1/What If Sports. How long have you been on the site, and how did you end up here? What is your favorite game here? Favorite team or experience on the site? 

          My very first experience on WIS is Season 7 of Capra. I had found the site looking for stats for college football bowl game previews and had followed a link to one of WIS's "Bowl Projection" articles. HBD is the only game I've played (with the exception of one free season of GD).

          My favorite experience or accomplishment? Rick Christensen's career Capra lead in pitching wins and winning percentage, if only because of the seasons of sustained success that it required. I'm afraid that Rick won't be all that gracious when Junior Hernandez breaks his record.  Rick thinks he could have squeezed out a few more seasons of 8 to 10 wins if he had too.

2/Sports. What are your favorite teams in the real world? Favorite players and/or sports memories? What drives you crazy about sports or sports culture? 

          My favorite teams are the Buffalo Bills, the New York Yankees, and Tottenham Spurs.  I figure that liking the hapless Bills and the evil, corporate Yankees provides a certain sort of karmic balance. Spurs have become a favorite to watch on weekend, winter mornings.

          My greatest pro sports moment is the 1996 Game 4 World Series homer by Jim Leyritz. I'm just the right age to not remember the late 70s' Yankee World Series wins and have endured the late 80s/early 90s' debacle during high school and college. That homer was the blow that convinced me that my favorite team just might finally win a title!

          The greatest sporting event I ever attended was the otherwise meaningless March 8, 1994 ECAC Hockey Preliminary Round Game where Cornell beat Princeton 5-4 in Overtime. Literally(!) the most thrilling event ever. And I can't find an account on the internet other than the final score. I guess you had to be there.

3/Music. What are the last three things you listened to? All-time three favorite artists? Best show you've seen? 
          My favorite band: seminal Australian psychedelic, space rock band The Church (start here.) Other than that? I still like 80s college rock bands with punk roots like The Replacements and Husker Du, goth roots like The Cure or The Mission or psychedelic roots like The Soft Boys. This millennium really hasn't done much for me.

4/Aside from sports and music, what are your favorite hobbies, films, books, etc? What might surprise us about your interests?
          Hobbies? I play golf well enough to find my ball after I hit it. I like to read history, sci-fi/fantasy, and popular science. I'm a software developer and I write more software in my spare time. I just finished watching all 6 seasons of the Clone Wars on Netflix. So, yeah, I guess I like Star Wars.
   
5/Survival. Where are you from originally, and where are you living now? How do you pay your bills, assuming you do? 
          I've lived in upstate New York my whole life with only one short-lived stint in Cleveland. Jacobs Field remains my favorite ballpark, far better than either of the Yankee Stadiums. I do manage to pay my bills.