In Search Of...: a new favorite MLB team
A word of warning: the $1 deal on PBR cans at the Deadwood during Cubs telecasts is dangerous. It is easy to get carried away.
Like I said last year, it is a welcome coincidence college basketball ends just as the MLB season gets underway. For the next five months, baseball will serve as a much needed stopgap until college football kicks off September 1. (Coincidentally, that’s when baseball season ends for me.)
Now that the sabermetricians are once again jotting stats and feverishly crunching numbers (I’m talking seriously crazy equations), I feel a need to remedy the fact I no longer have a favorite MLB team.
Though I was a big Red Sox for a long time, my allegiance to them has faded to almost nothing since they won the World Series in 2004. For whatever reason, I lost interest after they broke Babe’s infamous curse; as a fan of all hardworking, luckless underdogs, I guess the franchise lost its personal appeal to me. I was still a BoSox fan for the next couple years, and instinctively rooted for them Friday in their season opener against the Rangers, but my apparent diehard love has evolved into a passing and nostalgic interest. It’s sad, really.
During my time in SoCal, I developed a sweet spot for the Dodgers. Though the Angels were technically my hometown (at least home county) team, Dodger blue became my color. I watched many of their games, knew their entire lineup, and became fond of their longtime play-by-play announcer, Vin Scully. My visits to Dodger Stadium were few and far between, but I loved them. The Dodgers’ hometown fan base is crazy loyal and gritty, as one unfortunate Giants fan discovered firsthand on Opening Day. I grew accustomed to living in the same television market as a favorite baseball team, but, alas, I am now two thousand miles away. The only Dodgers games I will catch in the Midwest are those on ESPN (like last Thursday) or when they play the Cubs.
Don’t get me wrong: I still like the Dodgers. However, I will be unable to follow them as easily. My writing sessions set to the soundtrack of Scully’s metered and entrancing commentary are long gone; much like in long distance relationships, the intimacy and affection will slowly fade. As the years pass and the players change, I assume my feelings for Los Dodgers will develop into the same kind of sentimental appeal I feel for the Red Sox; they will forever be linked to my time in California, just as they are for my mom.
That brings me to my dilemma: which team’s colors will I be wearing now?
Though Iowa famously does not have any professional teams of its own, it lies within the gravitational tug of 18 franchises in neighboring states, including six MLB teams: Twins, Brewers, Cubs, White Sox, Cardinals, and Royals. Though there is a light salt and peppering of White Sox fans, almost everybody is a Cubs or Cardinals fan in eastern Iowa. (The Twins and Brewers have a very small minority of followers, and I would be surprised if there are any Royals fans outside of Kansas City.)
Despite my bevy of choices, and the admonishments of Bobblehead, a closet gopher, I have decided to concentrate my favoritism on the Cubs. This is also in spite of the fact I was an ardent Cubs hater for years. My hatred of the North Siders was founded 20 years ago when their day games pre-empted an after school video game show on WGN. It was cemented during the 2003 post-season when every Chicagoland suburbanite at the UI suddenly became the biggest Cubs fan in the world. (They were the same people who wore White Sox black and white two years later when the South Siders won the World Series. Their fair weather favoritism, a complete contrast to the diehard faith of older Cubs fans, disgusted me.) However, I started warming to the Cubs while living in SoCal. I realized how ingrained the Cubs and their hard-luck history was in my native portion of the Midwest. Cubs fans invaded NL West stadiums when the team made its west coast swings, and I could not help feeling a regional kinship with them; many, I was sure, were transplants like myself. Last spring I started watching weekend Cubs games on WGN.
I started a tentative dive into Cubs fandom last summer. Though I was mostly adjusting to life back in IC and transitioning the journals, I sometimes listened to games on the radio while working and watched games on TV on the weekend. Part of the Cubs appeal is their media presence. None of the other regional teams get anywhere near the kind of coverage the Cubs get. A local Fox affiliate broadcasts Cardinals games once in a blue moon, and the White Sox have a similar kind of television deal with WGN and Comcast SportsNet, but every other previously mentioned team is nonexistent on normal cable and radio in the IC area. If I want a team I can follow closely no matter what media I have access to, it is the Cubs.
However, that doesn’t mean I will be closing my search for a new favorite team. Perhaps the Brewers or Twins will pluck my heartstrings this summer. I plan to attend a Twins game with Bobblehead and his Missus, and the Brewers have one kickass namesake. But for now I need to put my Cubs hat to use.
Like I said last year, it is a welcome coincidence college basketball ends just as the MLB season gets underway. For the next five months, baseball will serve as a much needed stopgap until college football kicks off September 1. (Coincidentally, that’s when baseball season ends for me.)
Now that the sabermetricians are once again jotting stats and feverishly crunching numbers (I’m talking seriously crazy equations), I feel a need to remedy the fact I no longer have a favorite MLB team.
Though I was a big Red Sox for a long time, my allegiance to them has faded to almost nothing since they won the World Series in 2004. For whatever reason, I lost interest after they broke Babe’s infamous curse; as a fan of all hardworking, luckless underdogs, I guess the franchise lost its personal appeal to me. I was still a BoSox fan for the next couple years, and instinctively rooted for them Friday in their season opener against the Rangers, but my apparent diehard love has evolved into a passing and nostalgic interest. It’s sad, really.
During my time in SoCal, I developed a sweet spot for the Dodgers. Though the Angels were technically my hometown (at least home county) team, Dodger blue became my color. I watched many of their games, knew their entire lineup, and became fond of their longtime play-by-play announcer, Vin Scully. My visits to Dodger Stadium were few and far between, but I loved them. The Dodgers’ hometown fan base is crazy loyal and gritty, as one unfortunate Giants fan discovered firsthand on Opening Day. I grew accustomed to living in the same television market as a favorite baseball team, but, alas, I am now two thousand miles away. The only Dodgers games I will catch in the Midwest are those on ESPN (like last Thursday) or when they play the Cubs.
Don’t get me wrong: I still like the Dodgers. However, I will be unable to follow them as easily. My writing sessions set to the soundtrack of Scully’s metered and entrancing commentary are long gone; much like in long distance relationships, the intimacy and affection will slowly fade. As the years pass and the players change, I assume my feelings for Los Dodgers will develop into the same kind of sentimental appeal I feel for the Red Sox; they will forever be linked to my time in California, just as they are for my mom.
That brings me to my dilemma: which team’s colors will I be wearing now?
Though Iowa famously does not have any professional teams of its own, it lies within the gravitational tug of 18 franchises in neighboring states, including six MLB teams: Twins, Brewers, Cubs, White Sox, Cardinals, and Royals. Though there is a light salt and peppering of White Sox fans, almost everybody is a Cubs or Cardinals fan in eastern Iowa. (The Twins and Brewers have a very small minority of followers, and I would be surprised if there are any Royals fans outside of Kansas City.)
Despite my bevy of choices, and the admonishments of Bobblehead, a closet gopher, I have decided to concentrate my favoritism on the Cubs. This is also in spite of the fact I was an ardent Cubs hater for years. My hatred of the North Siders was founded 20 years ago when their day games pre-empted an after school video game show on WGN. It was cemented during the 2003 post-season when every Chicagoland suburbanite at the UI suddenly became the biggest Cubs fan in the world. (They were the same people who wore White Sox black and white two years later when the South Siders won the World Series. Their fair weather favoritism, a complete contrast to the diehard faith of older Cubs fans, disgusted me.) However, I started warming to the Cubs while living in SoCal. I realized how ingrained the Cubs and their hard-luck history was in my native portion of the Midwest. Cubs fans invaded NL West stadiums when the team made its west coast swings, and I could not help feeling a regional kinship with them; many, I was sure, were transplants like myself. Last spring I started watching weekend Cubs games on WGN.
I started a tentative dive into Cubs fandom last summer. Though I was mostly adjusting to life back in IC and transitioning the journals, I sometimes listened to games on the radio while working and watched games on TV on the weekend. Part of the Cubs appeal is their media presence. None of the other regional teams get anywhere near the kind of coverage the Cubs get. A local Fox affiliate broadcasts Cardinals games once in a blue moon, and the White Sox have a similar kind of television deal with WGN and Comcast SportsNet, but every other previously mentioned team is nonexistent on normal cable and radio in the IC area. If I want a team I can follow closely no matter what media I have access to, it is the Cubs.
However, that doesn’t mean I will be closing my search for a new favorite team. Perhaps the Brewers or Twins will pluck my heartstrings this summer. I plan to attend a Twins game with Bobblehead and his Missus, and the Brewers have one kickass namesake. But for now I need to put my Cubs hat to use.
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