Stories.

Who lives?

Who dies?

Who tells your story?

Right now we know what Lance McCullers Jr.’s story is.

Six years ago, at the end of the ALCS, we knew Nelson Cruz’s, too.

Even if it would change a dozen days later.

I spent Sunday at the Richard Rodgers Theatre (not that Richard Rodgers, whose story you might also know), learning stories I didn’t know.

We saw Hamilton, my wife and our kids and I and 1,315 others who I imagine came from 500 different places, mine a city 1,500 miles away where our daughter acts and sings and dances and opened for us a world we didn’t know, making a trip to see a Broadway show that, five years ago, I might’ve spent, if anything, a third of 60 Minutes learning about — that is, if it happened to be stuck between a story on international espionage and another about an elite athlete or a bad-ass entrepreneur or an iconic rock band, you know, whose artistry really spoke to me.

I’m learning lately about mindfulness, and about things that have mattered less to me than they should, or more.

I’ve become very clear about two things that drive me. To create. And to compete.

I think I’ve always known both, though probably not really understanding why. I’m learning.

Thom Yorke and Michael Chabon and Larry David and Anthony Hopkins and Ellen Raskin create, and it fires me up.

Yu Darvish. Every time.

Dennis Smith Jr.

Deion and Cliff and Josh and Jamie Benn, and JD signing Colby. Collin’s baserunning, and what Jacob and Daniel brought to Tuck.

What Aaron Rodgers has twice straight done to Dallas, too, which doesn’t mean I was down with it — but, man, I respected it a ton.

McCullers and Houston’s Game 7 game plan Saturday night: Same.

True, too, I imagine, for some folks who have seen Hamilton but might reject part of the message. If there’s someone out there who doesn’t respect the work, I’m guessing he or she’s probably between hollers to promptly remove yourself from a specific lawn.

Competing was a big part of what got me out of bed each morning in high school, especially starting February 1st each spring. These days, it’s a big part of what I make my living doing, though I think I’ve understood for most of these nearly two decades of writing that I do that because I don’t want to be that guy, the one who competes 24/7 with whatever is in the way, even if it’s really not. For me, a creative outlet — this one — has always helped to dim that other light, for a least a day part or two.

The fire to compete will never die in me, not that I’d want it to. It’s aliveness. Competing with those in your own bunker? Can’t stand it. It’s divisive and it’s distracting and it’s the worst.

Having a teammate’s back, and he yours, and finding a way to find a way? The best.

I’m writing something right now, forgoing a break to eat, that’s fringy baseball content at best, and maybe it’s basically no more than a give-up because I know I haven’t written in more days than I’d like, and yet I’m in no mood to concede that there are baseball teams still competing that aren’t mine, one that’s the only truly legit rival my team has ever had, the other featuring a special baseball player that it made sense for my team to ship away three months ago.

Right now I’d much rather be taking my sports pulse than looking back, or ahead.

I’d have preferred rolling out the door this morning, bitter at the clock for dragging its way to Game 1 tonight.

I want that feeling of the bus to the District Playoffs, U2 on my headphones. Of seeing my kid on stage, pushing her limits, or my other kid, up with runners in scoring position, pushing his.

Of four drummers in “There, There.”

Of 24 curve balls in a row to close out Game 7 and a pennant, with the catcher not bothering at times to put any fingers down.

Of Hamilton, on its 924th night at 226 W. 46th, absolutely bringing it.

When you’re gone, who remembers your name?

Who keeps your flame?

Who lives? Who dies? Who tells your story?

To create — with courage — is a good way to give the story a hook.

This winter demands a good amount of creativity from the folks who build the baseball team around here, and even if that’s not really what today’s entry is about, it applies and it gets me all stoked, and I do recognize that none of the rest of this is what you paid for with your free subscription. Apologies for that.

But, yeah — to create and to compete — it’s a big part of why I’m not just a sports fan but insane about it, and dependent on it, and why the process of what a GM and his crew are faced with in the off-season fires me up almost as much as 3–2, two outs, two-run deficit, three runners off with the pitch, and maybe why a musical I saw this weekend impacted me far more than I’d have ever imagined, for 90 percent of my life, it could.

Let’s go, not-Houston.

Go get it, Yu.

Create. Compete.

Give us a story to tell.