HOW COME THE GAME STILL HURTS AFTER ALL THESE YEARS?
This month is the closest I’ve ever come to feeling like a Yankees fan. And that counts the six months I lived in New York.
And it’s not because they lost, I was rooting for the Dodgers all the way. I’m not crazy. No, it’s because on a Saturday earlier in October, Tarik Skubal gave up a grand slam to Lane Thomas in game 5 of the American League Division Series, assuring the Cleveland Guardians would win and advance over my beloved Detroit Tigers. I believe the first text I sent after this was, “I hate baseball.” A friend in a group chat wrote back to my pain, “I’m sorry but the last time I check, the game ain’t over till it’s over.”
I replied as only I knew how “Don’t try to give me hope. This is baseball.”
Now, I am a relatively well-adjusted person. I have multiple retirement savings accounts, I’ve never run out of gas while driving, and I even sort my recycling for the most part. But there’s something about sports, particularly baseball, that brings out the irrational. One minute you're adjusting your 401k investment strategy on Fidelity, the next you're cursing the name of a right fielder younger than you.
I can’t say I follow the sport as closely as I once did. There was a time when I could name every team’s starting rotation and lineup. Now, it’s hard to follow the Tigers for a full 162 games. But I followed it closely enough to know the Tigers weren’t supposed to hurt me this year. But they messed around and went 36-16 down the stretch to sneak into the playoffs. They went from sellers at the trade deadline, to spoilers of the Houston Astros, a team everyone loves, and everyone definitely wanted to see win another legit, honest World Series.
I’m not alone in falling away from the game. Some more qualified people have tried and failed to answer the question of baseball’s dimming cultural light. I don't know if it's lagging attention spans, baseball's poor TV broadcasting, or a lack of star power, but the game has fallen. The economics of broadcasting aren’t what they used to be, but I can’t believe there isn’t a network out there that can’t sell ads on a 3-hour baseball game, every day, over a 6-month season. Natural male enhancement supplements and MyPillows are just begging for that kind of publicity.
So why did it hurt so much to see my team lose? I’m now older than most of the roster. But these kids playing a game still threw my Saturday off so much I had to sit in the dark for 20 minutes nursing a bottle of Labatt replaying every scenario where a runner was left on base. The stakes on Tuesday are much higher, and I am confident I won’t react as strongly to the results that day. Sure, I might vomit blood when I see the first exit polls out of Erie, Pennsylvania but that’s just part of living in the greatest country on Earth in the year 2024.
Maybe my falling out with baseball has less to do with how I receive it, and more to do with the passing of time. Before this season, the last time the Tigers made the playoffs was in 2014. I was 19, a sophomore in college. A lot has happened in the intervening decade. I moved across the country and back again. I traveled the world and had my heart broken, there was a pandemic or so they tell me. After all the life I've lived, there's still a part of me embarrassed that I can't name every pitcher who came out of the Tigers' bullpen this year.
Baseball was the thing I fell in love with when I was 11. And it will remain the thing I’ll always love because I fell in love with it when I was 11. You can replace baseball with any number of things for just about everyone. The Beatles, Gilmore Girls, “Call of Duty”. Our cultural tastes are set at an impressionable age. Sure, they evolve. We might change how we dress, talk, watch or read. But those early memories latch on. If you know what I mean, give me an “oy with the poodles already.”
I don’t want to speak for others, but I’ll speak for baseball fans. This game of sounds and smells, of history, nostalgia, and of fathers and sons, does more to bring out the inner child than anything else. It’s a common language you speak with the people who know you best. Even if you only communicate with them by recalling box scores or speculating who will be on the bump in game 4. Sometimes that’s all there is to say.
Baseball gives us back who we are, who we dreamed of being, and who we dream we can still be. I’ll never hit a walk-off home run in the World Series. I’ve mostly accepted this now as a man pushing 30 who stopped playing the game at 16. I mean, I couldn’t hit a curve ball back then, I doubt I could now.
But now and then, the game gives back, even to fans who have strayed. And I think that’s why last Saturday hurt so good. English soccer fans will say it’s the hope that kills you. Maybe the Brits are right. But if they are, I’d rather be dead than hopeless. Because for a brief moment in October, for that one-half inning, the Tigers had the lead, I was 11 again. Would I want that forever? No, the acne was bad enough the first time around. But, I’ll try to remember to slather on the pine tar of nostalgia and let it stick, just for a bit.