Our long national nightmare is over. The polls are closed, the kind of people who care about this can cheer or mourn, and the rest of us (who think it's kind of ridiculous) can have a quick item to note on the offday between games 1 and 2. That's right, Red Sox Nation (shudder)! Jerry Remy is your new President! Deadspin has the best artistic take on the whole silly, silly business.

It's still better for the mind to think about contrived stunts for easily-amused "fans" than to spend the whole day fretting and worrying about Daisuke Matsuzaka. He started the season with such promise, muddled along with an alarming number of crummy outings, and finished on the strong side. But we're inclined to worry. If the Red Sox can get to Kelvin Escobar early and give Daisuke a cushion, good. If it's a pitcher's duel, and we have to wait for Dice's One Bad Inning per start, we'll worry more. The good news is that AnaheimOrWhatever hasn't seen the Gyroball yet this year, and the element of surprise has been kind to Matsuzaka all season.

There was plenty of playoff baseball last night. The Diamondbacks and Rockies put Chicago and Philly, respectively, on the ropes; both have 2-0 leads and we're very close to an all-Western NLCS. Possible snow in Denver this weekend! Closer to our immediate interests, the Indians pummeled Chien-Ming Wang and the Yankees 12-3. Alex Rodriguez, seeking postseason vindication? 0-for-2.

Of course, a lot can happen, and the Yankees may rally and take the series. But the frustration of Yankee Nation (yeah, we said it) is already showing alarming signs of boiling over. A Massachusetts carpenter named Carlos Ortez was working a job in New York when he got assaulted by two douchebags from Pennsylvania, shortly after a barroom conversation about which team he supported. We have no proof that the two guys from Pennsylvania were Yankee fans, but we don't exactly need Sam Waterson to put the pieces together. Assuming they are, it's kind of funny (well, not for poor Carlos) that it's taken Yankee fans six years to reach the levels of misery and helpless fear that it took us a good 60 years to achieve.

We know you're focused on the Red Sox, and the Patriots, but we have to share a couple of stories from training camp in Rome that have made our hearts (which, at the core, are green) soar. Stories about things like "take-no-prisoners scrimmages" involving Kevin Garnett. And things like "Ubuntu" chosen as the Celtics' unofficial motto. And things like the team bonding by exploring the glories of Rome in a way that's tricky to do in Waltham. Saturday at 2:30, the preseason begins. This is gonna be fun.