Or should I say FORMER Vancouver Canadians?

The franchise that was formerly the C’s, back when the current C’s were the Southern Oregon Timberjacks, which bailed on the city when the Parks Board wouldn’t let them upgrade Nat Bailey Stadium, has continued their Yankee-like empire of Pacific Coast League wins, sweeping the New Orleans Zephyrs 3-0 as 2003 Vancouver pitcher Brad Knox took a shutout into the 8th inning on his way to a series clinching victory.

"This is a special team, this is a bunch of guys who deserve
everything," manager Tony DeFrancesco said. "They went through this
summer, we had over 180 transactions, but there’s something special
with these guys. They came back from being down 2-0 to sweep Salt Lake.
We swept a very good New Orleans team. It was a great effort by the
whole squad out there."

The River Cats, who rallied to take three straight from Salt Lake in
the first round, will face the International League champions — Durham
or Richmond — on Tuesday at the Bricktown Showdown in Oklahoma City.

2004 Vancouver Canadians outfielder Nick Blasi has been one of the big reasons the Rivercats have held it together during a tough year. And to paraphrase Kevin Smith’s Clerks, "He wasn’t even supposed to be there this year."

Sacramento, which is 9-0 in championship-clinching games, celebrated in
the infield wearing black PCL Championship T-shirts following the
three-hitter. League president Branch Rickey presented the PCL trophy
before DeFrancesco gave the MVP award to center fielder Nick Blasi, who
hit .457 in the playoffs.

"He’s been consistent," DeFrancesco said. "He’s gotten a lot of big
hits for us. He’s our leadoff man, our catalyst and he deserves
something at this point."

C’s alumni Gregorio Petit, Kevin Melillo (both ‘04), Brian Stavisky, Brant Colamarino and Jeremy Brown (’02) were also involved in the scoring, in what is the sixth PCL division title for the ‘Cats in their eight years of existence. 14000 fans turned out for the game.

Just think - if some of the local civic fathers (and loudmouth neighbours) had been a little more forward-thinking, we could have been watching our C’s win this game, in our city.

Alas…