Yesterday I was driving through Beverly Hills when the final score of the Orioles game dinged on my phone.
It was a 9-5 win. My phone started ringing, and I pulled over.
The game was important in and of itself, as the O's are chasing a division title and a sweep at the hands of the A's would have been very detrimental to the cause.
It was far more important, however, on a symbolic level; for the first time since I was 10, my beloved baseball team would win more games than it lost.
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A lot has happened in these 14 years. I have grown from a child in to a (sometimes) adult. I was living in Knoxville, Tennessee, the last time the Orioles were any good. I have since attended high school in Wisconsin, college in Florida and my first salaried, full time job in Los Angeles.
I have watched Cal Ripken retire and Mike Mussina leave in free agency. I have watched David Segui, Albert Belle and Javy Lopez arrive in free agency; I have watched Bernie Williams, Alex Rodriguez and Mark Texeira (or however it is spelled) never arrive.
I watched Brady Anderson get ejected for arguing balls and strikes on the second pitch of a game.
I watched Todd Williams try to intentionally walk Miguel Cabrera with the winning run in scoring position...and give up the game winning hit anyway.
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| Exciting times in Baltimore. |
I watched Belle try to prove all of the worst stereotypes about professional athletes.
I watched the Baltimore fans, at one time the proudest, most loyal in baseball, stage a walkout to try and prove a point to the dreaded ownership.
I have watched Adam Loewen and Sidney Ponson and Jerry Hairston and Matt Riley and dozens of other Top Prospects fizzle.
I, in short, have watched a lot of bullshit.
And so did my father, the proudest Orioles fan I know. A man who is nicknamed after the long-forgotten Gus Triandos, and whose man cave is complete with the newspaper covers from each Orioles World Series win.
And up until this summer, we had both lost hope.
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The one thing baseball has left going for it, that perhaps no other sport can touch, is its ability to unite fathers and sons.
Why am I, a kid who has never lived anywhere NEAR Baltimore, a fan of a team that has been irrelevant for essentially my entire lifetime?
Because that is who my dad roots on. He grew up going to Orioles games and watching the Robinson Boys and Jim Palmer and Earl Weaver and everyone else.
They won a lot.
My dad left Baltimore, but the Orioles never left him.
My dad taught me the game, and it became my favorite. For a while I was pretty good at it. Then, just like everyone else, I wasn't so good anymore, and I became strictly a fan / occasional softball player.
Who did I pretend to be while we were in the yard, playing Pepper? Cal Ripken, of course.
He was the ultimate Oriole. He kept his head down and did his job; he was most famous for the very underrated skill of showing up every day to do his job.
Everything about Cal was utilitarian. His swing was not pretty; it was essentially him throwing the head of the bat at the ball. It was, however, constantly evolving as Ripken tweaked it seemingly daily; it was the perfect thing to show a kid who could not hit for power in a day and age when everyone wanted to be Mark McGwire or Sammy Sosa.
"You want to be good? Put the ball in play. If it is good enough for Cal, it is good enough for you."
Those were times when I was convinced Larry Bigbie and Hairston and Brian Roberts could lead us to the next championship.
Those were great days, and I saw the Orioles as my dad once had...with excitement.
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Over the years, that excitement went away.
I became jaded by the Orioles, and then baseball in general. There was no hope. I kept waiting on the summer when we would make a run, and it never came. I tried to become more interested in other things. The old man and I went in to a denial of sorts; there would be entire summers when the Orioles never came up in conversation.
Why care when the organization doesn't seem to?
The excitement was gone.
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It was my dad calling when I was driving through Beverly Hills. I stopped, like some hayseed, to talk to the old man about a baseball game.
We talked and talked and talked. We couldn't believe that Buck Showalter had just ended the streak with a team featuring Nate McClouth, Chris Davis and Robert Andino.
We must have sounded like kids to anyone listening; me in my car, him on his porch.
Like I said, baseball brings together fathers and sons.
These past few weeks have been amazing. I love football to death, and no single sporting event can challenge a college football Saturday.
But there is no day-in and day-out experience like following your team on a pennant run.
For the first time since I was 10, I truly LIKE the players on the team. Everyone. I wake up every day excited for that night's game.
I honestly don't know how to act...I have never experienced this as an adult.
I do know this, however. This season, the Orioles are winners.
And you can bet your ass I am excited about it.
Ain't the beer cold!
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