Today I did something I haven't done in a long time. I clicked on the espn website, clicked on the mariners-angels live cast, put the satellite radio onto the game, put my Griffey jersey on and listened as the mariners won the final game of the season. As I've said in the past it's been hard to be a mariners fan. A decade of pain and agony has harden me into a fatalist when it comes to mariner baseball. Going to games in New York and watching us get our ass's whipped by the Yankees does that to a person.
But this season was different. For the first time in a long time I let myself care. I am a quiet fan meaning I don't let my emotions get involved in sports because I've been hurt so damn much. I've been let down a lot. It's better not to get involved then to let yourself get hurt.
You try to be a realist. You hope for something and expect the worst. After as crying as much as I did as a kid I play my cards close. I don't watch many games because I am used to pain. I'll check the standings but thats as far as I'll let myself go.
Yeah I know heartbreak all to well.
This season was different. Maybe it was the signing of Robbie Cano. Or the Seattle times series that showed how idiotic the ownership was. Maybe it was the death of the owner and the feeling that maybe the Japanese owners who had never been to a game would let us run the show. Maybe it was Griffeys speech last season where he compared the 95 mariners to this squad. But I think the biggest impact was Pete Carroll and the Hawks winning the Super Bowl.
When the hawks won it was surreal. As I said in another post it was like the scene in A Christmas Story where Ralphie takes out all of his anger on the bully. All of those years of losing,of taking shit from everybody, of pain,of not getting the respect we deserve ended in one full cathartic moment. The Super Bowl was an exorcism on Seattle sports fans. It didn't matter where you were you felt it. If you saw another Seattle fan you stopped and talked to them. It was well indescribable the camaraderie you felt.
I think the Mariners this season felt that. I went to the second game of the season at Angels stadium. We won and this team that played was different then the one I had watched back in New York. In New York they were awful. I understood that a lot of them were young and just figuring it all out but they sucked. But the team I saw this year played like a bunch of pros. Of course being surrounded by a bunch of angels fans I wasn't able to properly show my enthusiasm. So as I've done every year I followed the team but at an emotional distance.
I as always expected the midsession collapse that has become our modus operanda the last couple seasons. But it didn't happen. They stayed in the chase for the final wild card spot( baseball purist I know you hate it but wait till your team wins it then we'll talk). They kept on fighting till the very last game of the season. For the first time in years it wasn't just super Seattle sports fan Zach Nordwell following the M's it was everybody. I thought we were done a week ago, but somehow we stayed in the chase. Refuse to Lose was back.
So Sunday I turned on the game. I knew that even if we won we could still lose. There is just certain things you cannot control. All I wanted was the one game playoff. I knew there wasn't going to be a World Series year. Sure I dream and hope but as I said I understand baseball ain't Angels in the Outfield, it's Bull Durham meets a Greek tragedy. But still as I listened to the game, and for the first time whether we won or lost I felt proud to be a Mariners fan.
Seattle fans are different in that even if you lose as long as you gave it everything you had we'll love you. I know that seems stupid and cliched and not cool in a society where winning is everything and anything else in the words of my boston compatriot is for "Losers". But the fact that in a season devoted to Derek Jeter a team with two stars and a bunch of kids was able to fight till the very end yeah it made me proud. We didn't get to the playoffs but to quote Casablanca " this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship".
