A few nights ago, the Chicago Cubs reached the World Series for the first time in over seventy years. I'm sure you've heard the Cubs backstory ad nauseam - all the curses, general bad luck, et cetera. I know the media made damn sure you were aware of it all and then some. It provided a great storyline, but this current Cubs crew busted through all that by winning over one hundred regular season games and eventually three straight to capture that National League pennant. As a Mets fan, I'm...kind of happy for them? I don't know. Sweeping their asses in last year's National League Championship Series was pretty fun, but that was then I guess, and this is now. I'm rooting for them in this World Series, It's been a long time coming.
Or, maybe I'm rooting for the Cleveland Indians. That's not such a bad thing, is it? They're a good team. Swept the Red Sox, whooped the Blue Jays in five - I mean what's not to like? They're likely the underdogs here, against a team that hasn't won crap in over a century. Not that the Indians are any better at long title droughts. After the Cubs appeared in their last World Series in 1945, the Indians last appeared - and won - three years later. Even though the Indians haven't won crap in pretty much the same amount of time, it's the Cubs who seem to endure this strange sense of being "cursed." I don't feel like looking at the betting lines but I'm sure the Cubs are somehow the favorites in this World Series. And if they are, that's fine. Vegas isn't always right.
The Mets, somehow, made it to the postseason. You probably don't even remember. One and done against the San Francisco Giants in that stupid Wild Card Game. Given their personnel losses I was surprised they even made it to the playoffs, so most fans weren't likely expecting a repeat performance of their World Series run they achieved last October.
I'm not quite sure how to follow sports. I could blame that on my father, I guess, but that seems lazy. He was never big into sports. Didn't really show much fandom to follow in his footsteps. And that's okay. That's where he came from, so I developed that fandom on my own. One of my uncles was a big New York Mets fan, and watching a few games with him as a kid I sort of dug their blue pinstripes. It all came together in 1986 when they beat the Red Sox in the World Series. I wasn't there with my uncle when they won the game, but I'm sure he was a very happy man.
After the Mets won the 1986 World Series, I found myself at some sort of crossroads. I wanted to support them, but...I don't know. I started drawing things. Logos and such. I was able to draw the Mets logo fairly well, but there was another team that seemed to burst out better from the pages: the Toronto Blue Jays. On television - during the black and white, five channel era - the only time I got to see the Blue Jays was when the New York Yankees were playing them. Coupled with the fact upstate New York being Yankees country much, much more than Mets country, I got to see the Blue Jays more often. At some point between the late 1980s and early '90s, I anointed myself a Blue Jays fan. So much so I started buying (or having my parents buy for me, really) Blue Jays apparel.
All of that Blue Jays apparel sure came in handy when my friend Matt and I went down to Florida with his family to visit his grandmother. Matt is a big St. Louis Cardinals fan, owning twice the gear to support his team than I ever did at that point. In Florida, we'd dress ourselves in our respective team's fan gear - red for his Cardinals, blue for my Blue Jays. Cotton shorts, fake button-up jerseys, and hats. I'm sure we looked like dorks walking side by side around the streets of Orlando.
The Blue Jays wound up winning back to back World Series while I was claiming to be a fan of theirs. After a strike canceled a good chunk of the season along with the 1994 World Series, I'm not terribly sure what happened to my fandom for them. Or for the Mets, for the matter. The canceled World Series left a very sour taste in the mouths of baseball fans everywhere. Along with plenty of personal life changes around that time, I shifted my focus to college sports and the N.B.A.
I frequent a sports message board where one of the rousing topics seems to be what I like to call geographic team affiliation. According to some on this message board, you are not allowed to root for any team that is not in close proximity to where you reside. According to them, if you live in or somewhere near Miami you have to root for the teams there (Dolphins, Heat, et cetera). They refuse to take into account some people might move around a lot, or live somewhere temporarily. Or, heaven forbid, root for any damn team one wants to. I fall into all of these categories.
I'm one of those sports fans who doesn't own any apparel these days. I still have a few college t-shirts, but I like to think those don't count. There are no jerseys in my closet, no images of basketball or football players on my bedroom walls like I had when I was a kid. No autographed baseballs in glass cases on my mantle. I have a few Mets hats, a Twins hat, and that's roughly about it. I get my sportsy fill by simply watching events on live television and proceeding to either make fun of them or get annoyed because the team I want to win is losing. There's no shouting, no throwing things at the screen, no Super Bowl parties of any sort. This probably makes me sound like some sort of hipster, that I'm too cool for all of these things, but that's not the case at all. I just don't care all that much, and outside my brief Blue Jays phase, never really jumped into that whole fan gear craze again. Although I do feel the need to get some apparel supporting my alma mater.
Because I have lived in quite a few spots in this country, I enjoy keeping tabs on certain teams. Not scream at the top of my lungs, not root incessantly for them - simply enjoy seeing them when I can. It's not the end of the world if I can't get a Mets game on television down here. I won't punch a hole in a wall if the networks here don't pick up the L.S.U. game. I won't high tail it over to a bar just to watch the Bills game. I'm just not that emotionally invested in sports like I used to be.
The Cleveland Indians last appeared in the World Series a couple of times right after the 1994 strike. I separated myself from baseball then, but still kept tabs on what was going on. As for the Cubs, I didn't really care about them so much as the crosstown White Sox. The White Sox reached a fever pitch in the early to mid 1990's, thanks to Michael Jordan retiring from basketball to go and play minor league ball in their organization. The 1993 White Sox advanced to the American League Championship Series, where they were promptly taken out by "my" Toronto Blue Jays.
My fickle fandom has come to an apex with this 2016 World Series. Two teams I can appreciate because it's been so damn long since they won anything, but also two teams I don't really follow much. I used to wear an Indians cap back in college, so maybe that shows I side with them a bit more. On the other hand, I've been to Chicago way more than I have Cleveland. I have a few friends in Chicago and its surrounding area, while there are none in Cleveland and northeast Ohio. I'm picking the Cubs in six. Or maybe the Indians in seven. When do the Mets play again?
Anyway, the World Series begins Tuesday night - the same night basketball starts back up.
Or, maybe I'm rooting for the Cleveland Indians. That's not such a bad thing, is it? They're a good team. Swept the Red Sox, whooped the Blue Jays in five - I mean what's not to like? They're likely the underdogs here, against a team that hasn't won crap in over a century. Not that the Indians are any better at long title droughts. After the Cubs appeared in their last World Series in 1945, the Indians last appeared - and won - three years later. Even though the Indians haven't won crap in pretty much the same amount of time, it's the Cubs who seem to endure this strange sense of being "cursed." I don't feel like looking at the betting lines but I'm sure the Cubs are somehow the favorites in this World Series. And if they are, that's fine. Vegas isn't always right.
The Mets, somehow, made it to the postseason. You probably don't even remember. One and done against the San Francisco Giants in that stupid Wild Card Game. Given their personnel losses I was surprised they even made it to the playoffs, so most fans weren't likely expecting a repeat performance of their World Series run they achieved last October.
I'm not quite sure how to follow sports. I could blame that on my father, I guess, but that seems lazy. He was never big into sports. Didn't really show much fandom to follow in his footsteps. And that's okay. That's where he came from, so I developed that fandom on my own. One of my uncles was a big New York Mets fan, and watching a few games with him as a kid I sort of dug their blue pinstripes. It all came together in 1986 when they beat the Red Sox in the World Series. I wasn't there with my uncle when they won the game, but I'm sure he was a very happy man.
After the Mets won the 1986 World Series, I found myself at some sort of crossroads. I wanted to support them, but...I don't know. I started drawing things. Logos and such. I was able to draw the Mets logo fairly well, but there was another team that seemed to burst out better from the pages: the Toronto Blue Jays. On television - during the black and white, five channel era - the only time I got to see the Blue Jays was when the New York Yankees were playing them. Coupled with the fact upstate New York being Yankees country much, much more than Mets country, I got to see the Blue Jays more often. At some point between the late 1980s and early '90s, I anointed myself a Blue Jays fan. So much so I started buying (or having my parents buy for me, really) Blue Jays apparel.
All of that Blue Jays apparel sure came in handy when my friend Matt and I went down to Florida with his family to visit his grandmother. Matt is a big St. Louis Cardinals fan, owning twice the gear to support his team than I ever did at that point. In Florida, we'd dress ourselves in our respective team's fan gear - red for his Cardinals, blue for my Blue Jays. Cotton shorts, fake button-up jerseys, and hats. I'm sure we looked like dorks walking side by side around the streets of Orlando.
The Blue Jays wound up winning back to back World Series while I was claiming to be a fan of theirs. After a strike canceled a good chunk of the season along with the 1994 World Series, I'm not terribly sure what happened to my fandom for them. Or for the Mets, for the matter. The canceled World Series left a very sour taste in the mouths of baseball fans everywhere. Along with plenty of personal life changes around that time, I shifted my focus to college sports and the N.B.A.
I frequent a sports message board where one of the rousing topics seems to be what I like to call geographic team affiliation. According to some on this message board, you are not allowed to root for any team that is not in close proximity to where you reside. According to them, if you live in or somewhere near Miami you have to root for the teams there (Dolphins, Heat, et cetera). They refuse to take into account some people might move around a lot, or live somewhere temporarily. Or, heaven forbid, root for any damn team one wants to. I fall into all of these categories.
I'm one of those sports fans who doesn't own any apparel these days. I still have a few college t-shirts, but I like to think those don't count. There are no jerseys in my closet, no images of basketball or football players on my bedroom walls like I had when I was a kid. No autographed baseballs in glass cases on my mantle. I have a few Mets hats, a Twins hat, and that's roughly about it. I get my sportsy fill by simply watching events on live television and proceeding to either make fun of them or get annoyed because the team I want to win is losing. There's no shouting, no throwing things at the screen, no Super Bowl parties of any sort. This probably makes me sound like some sort of hipster, that I'm too cool for all of these things, but that's not the case at all. I just don't care all that much, and outside my brief Blue Jays phase, never really jumped into that whole fan gear craze again. Although I do feel the need to get some apparel supporting my alma mater.
Because I have lived in quite a few spots in this country, I enjoy keeping tabs on certain teams. Not scream at the top of my lungs, not root incessantly for them - simply enjoy seeing them when I can. It's not the end of the world if I can't get a Mets game on television down here. I won't punch a hole in a wall if the networks here don't pick up the L.S.U. game. I won't high tail it over to a bar just to watch the Bills game. I'm just not that emotionally invested in sports like I used to be.
The Cleveland Indians last appeared in the World Series a couple of times right after the 1994 strike. I separated myself from baseball then, but still kept tabs on what was going on. As for the Cubs, I didn't really care about them so much as the crosstown White Sox. The White Sox reached a fever pitch in the early to mid 1990's, thanks to Michael Jordan retiring from basketball to go and play minor league ball in their organization. The 1993 White Sox advanced to the American League Championship Series, where they were promptly taken out by "my" Toronto Blue Jays.
My fickle fandom has come to an apex with this 2016 World Series. Two teams I can appreciate because it's been so damn long since they won anything, but also two teams I don't really follow much. I used to wear an Indians cap back in college, so maybe that shows I side with them a bit more. On the other hand, I've been to Chicago way more than I have Cleveland. I have a few friends in Chicago and its surrounding area, while there are none in Cleveland and northeast Ohio. I'm picking the Cubs in six. Or maybe the Indians in seven. When do the Mets play again?
Anyway, the World Series begins Tuesday night - the same night basketball starts back up.