How Do You Enjoy the Post Season When Your Team Doesn’t Have a Post Season? + Really Josh Hamilton?
I answered one facet of this question in one of my very first blog posts, wherein I talked about choosing a team to adopt for the postseason. But that is only one aspect of the answer. For some folks the entire answer is a simple, you don’t. But that just doesn’t work for me. The stakes are too high, the players too good and the action too exciting to ignore…besides, this is the last small slice of baseball we get to enjoy before the cold lonely baseball-less months of late fall and winter begin.
So, how do you enjoy the post season when your team doesn’t have a post season? For me the answer is eagerly, excitedly and with a sense of fun, but also distractedly and with a sense of detachment. Witness, I am watching the games, as many as we can when so many of them start while we are at work, but our kitchen is clean. Our bills are filed. When the game is one the east coast and starts early for us, dinners are more elaborate than slapped together sandwiches. (Okay, we ate sandwiches for dinner this evening, but they involved left over pork loan, brie, sautéed apples and onions and a chipotle peach jelly. They were absolutely not slapped together. 😉 ) The laundry is not only folded but — gasp! — put away. Both my husband and I are more willing to pick up a few mid-week groceries on our way home from the office instead of trying to cram the trip into a lunch break while crossing our fingers that no one swipes them from the office fridge. For better or worse, these things are simply a lot less true during the regular season…even more so during an Angels post season.
So the answer is, you enjoy the post season much the same as you would otherwise, but with a passion that is purely generic in nature. Oh, many of the teams in the current post season excite me and there have been several truly great games so far to be sure. But I can tear my eyes away from the screen for a little while for even mundane chores…and I do. That would never happen with the Angels, but I can’t think of a single other team that would inspire adopted passion on the same magnitude. The only teams that come close for me are family teams.
If the Angels were out but the Dodgers, my childhood team and the team half my family roots for, were in? I know could summon a fair bit of passion. Not the same as for the Angels by any means but passion even so. When the Giants, the team whose orange and black colors the other half of my family bleeds, made the series, it wasn’t even the same as the Dodgers would have been, but it was in fact more special than the current post season’s offerings. That’s it…and those two teams still aren’t even close. So, I will continue to hoot and holler and enjoy, enjoy, enjoy, but I think the kitchen won’t have any problems staying clean.
Oh, and for the record, my answer to the “who am I rooting for part of the question” is not as cut and dried as it was last season. My favorite non-Angels teams heading into the post season were the D-Backs, the Brewers and the Rays… *sigh* I wanted badly for the Rays to be able to go further, but what they accomplished was nothing short of miraculous and a joy to behold. So, I have been rooting for the D-Backs (though I won’t mind if the Brewers win instead…I do like them too), the Rays, the Cards and the Tigers. I will narrow it down further, of course, after the ALDS and then again for the World Series.
I’d love the D-Backs to take it all, because I adore Joe Saunders — and I miss him even though I wholeheartedly approved of the Dan Haren trade — and because Kirk Gibson was a childhood hero whom I still admire. Ryan Roberts grand slam against the Dodgers, where he paid homage to Gibby’s famous homerun as a Dodger with arm pumps down the first base line? Chills. Absolute chills. But I could find myself happily rooting for one of the other teams I mentioned should the D-Backs not make it past Friday. Because when you’re strictly a for the month of October, adopted fan, switching allegiances based on who won and any number of other frivolous reasons is not only acceptable, it’s darned necessary. 🙂
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As several media sources reported, just before Tuesday’s game Josh Hamilton was asked about the success in a Rangers uniform of Vlad Guerrero last season and Mike Napoli this season. A leading question to be sure, but still…
Hamilton’s response? “I think we’re going to look at who we can get from the Angels next year.” Ouch. But whatever obnoxious truth there may be in that statement, nice Josh. Way to stay classy. Especially considering that the Rangers dropped Vlad like a hot potato the second they could no longer say ‘Who cares how much money we spend?! We’re filing for bankruptcy!’
Hey Josh, chances are Fernando Rodney is going to be available next season. Likely for a bargain price. Since the Rangers are so excellent at finding diamonds in the Angels rough, I suggest they dive on that grenade. With gusto!
This is a very simple game... 
But the Rangers can get Scott Kazmir right now! LOL. I would like to think Joshy was being humorous. Still, I can see how it’d bite (‘cuz it’s true?). Napoli. Wow. What a surprise he’s been. As for your playoff teams to root for, do whatchalike, but please, on Friday, ROOT HARD FOR DEM REDBIRDS! I don’t have a cardiologist, but after this series, I might need one.
–Jeff
That is an excellent point Jeff. They should go talk to him right now. I’m sure Hamilton was joking around. He seems to be mostly a good natured sort these days. But I had to snark back. And absolutely. In fact the “Friday Night Ritual” is going to feature some Red Birds rooting this evening along with a big spicy Syrah, I’m thinking.
— Kristen
The playoffs just aren’t the same without your team in it. Right when the Rays were knocked out, the postseason seemed way less appealing. I think it’s pretty cool how many bloggers were pulling for the Rays in the playoffs, thanks for your support!
The Rays Rant- http://yossif.mlblogs.com/
No they certainly are not Yossif, but they can stil be some fun. You’re welcome! The Rays were everything baseball should be this season. They only way I wouldn’t have been pulling for them is if the Angels had somehow finagled a playoff berth.
— Kristen
I love all of the post season. Of course, I’m not rooting for the Cards though. With my wife’s family allegiance to the Yankees, I must admit I would like to see them win another world series. However, I’m just going to enjoy the games I get to watch and hope to see some October memories.
Ron
If you were rooting for the Cards Ron, I think they’d be scrounging for a Sears catalog in Hell to check out the price of parkas, LOL. I totally get family allegiance when it comes to these things and so far there have been some great October memories. Three match-ups going all the way to game 5? Wow!
— Kristen
I’m kind of leaning towards the Brewers or the Tigers. I don’t know why but it would be interesting. Even more so if the two teams face off against each other in the World Series.
-Wayne
I could really get in to that World Series match-up Wayne. With the D-Backs out of it, I’m probably pulling for the Brewers in the NL myself, depending on this evening’s outcome, of course. The Brewers have been the epitome of the joy of baseball this season, all smiles and goofiness, all the time, while kicking more than a bit of ass.
— Kristen
Hope this means you’re rooting for the Tigs out of the AL? Lots of great baseball so fare this post-season, I think. I like the Brewers, too, so hoping for a Tigs-Brewers maybe, but another Tigs-Cards re-match would be great (just as long as the Tigers make it!). Enjoy all the baseball you can, before it’s gone along with the sunshine and decent weather (not all of us live in Cali, ya know…)
–Mike
‘Minoring In Baseball’
I am absoutely rooting for the Tigers out of the AL. Sorry Texas – I can’t root for another team from the AL-West when we’re out of it and I’m sure a lot of fans of the other AL-West teams would/do feel the same. Tigers/Brewers or Tigers/Cards would be fun…in fact I haven’t fully decided who I’m rooting for in the NL come tomorrow. I like both teams and both have a great story this season. It has been a fun post season so far, lots of action, surprises and close hard fought games. Hey, it rains and gets cold in Cali too…you know, like an Upper Peninsula Michigan late April without the snow. 😉
— Kristen
Kristen,
I got to know Josh a bit hanging around the Rays complex during his time here and he is one of those sly comment artists. I think his rationale was more to the fact if they “steal” a great player, possibly they can relax a bit more than stress in September. It was a backhanded compliment that might have angered the sleeping dog. I have a feeling more than a few Angels faithful want to take a bite out of Josh right now…..hope he’s had his shots.
http://raysrenegade.mlblogs.com
I’m certain he was goofing around Rays. I just bristled at the comment, for obvious reasons, like it being true, and posted my first reaction. Rather than Angels fans taking a bite out of Josh, I hope Angels players stew over it all winter, among other things, and post it in the clubhouse for Spring Training. 2012 is high time to set the AL West back to rights.
— Kristen
Time to get yer Rally Squirrels out for a Game Two battle against the Brew Crew, Kristen! We’re gonna need as much support as we can get!
–Jeff
The Rally Squirrel cracks me up. I love these random occurrences that take on a life of their own. And yeah, I’m rooting for your birds tonight. Should be a good game.
— Kristen