I wish I could go back to the beginning of the season and put some money on the Rangers. Maybe the Rangers were shy of a 100 to one shot, but still, I do enjoy currency.
And like I did 12 and 13 years ago, I jumped on this bandwagon hard. Back in the olden days, my coworkers and I would shuffle up our postseason credentials for whomever wanted to attend a given night. I even still have mine from that simpler time.
We’ve all been longing for simpler times… Astros fans, for instance, who’d had enough during Game 7 of the ALCS and decided to leave early because they were no longer entertained.
I had just moved here when the Rangers won the two pennants and started thinking it’d be fun to attend the World Series every year. They went a different direction for a while.
Loyal Scaiaholics know I’m not a lifelong Rangers fan. But they made so many changes this year to bring back memories of when everything made sense. Here’s a collection of fans agreeing with me:
During this playoff run as more and more of us have jumped on the bandwagon, I’ve sent this clip of David Puddy to no fewer than four associates this week on why we should rally behind the Rangers.
Sen. Ted Cruz is an Astros fan. His reaction after Game 7 of the ALCS was more nuanced.
But his next tweet, even though it showed good sportsmanship, also drew the attention of no fewer than 53 commenters pointing out the Rangers don’t play in Dallas.
After the game, John Smoltz said he was looking forward to going to Six Flags in Dallas. In Dallas.
“But Scaia,” you’re softly murmuring at the computer. “This shouldn’t come as a surprise, given that he is part of the team that fraudulently claims 14 straight division titles even though they trailed the Montreal Expos by 6 games in 1994.”
“Even the New York Post is catching on,” you continued, somehow injecting links into your speech.
I discussed this issue with the mayor of Arlington who also had a more nuanced response, explaining they play in Arlington, but this is the team for all of North Texas.
I live in Fort Worth now, but when I first moved here, I lived in Arlington and always considered it the li’l baby town between Dallas and Fort Worth. When I arrived, I learned it’s bigger than Cincinnati.
Ross said people are starting to learn about Arlington and even Taylor Swift helped out when she came for those shows in the spring.
He says Swift did a lot of community work when she was here, too, so he laments she connected with a Kansas City Chief.
Us bandwagon Rangers fans have a dim view of Game Sixes. But during Game 6 of the ALCS, Tim Kurkjian explained Adolis Garcia became the first player to hit a grand slam and earn the golden sombrero in the same playoff game. As a young’n, I was really into the science of the game and would have reflected on a statistic like that for a while.
Now, I just like to drink beer and watch, which I feel like is a good message for kids: try to dial back the thinkin’. But still keep a scorecard because we’re not barbarians.
