Roar

22 years ago, I was an avid Tigers fan, as was almost everyone in Michigan. The team got off to a 35-5 start and eventually won the World Series in 5 games. They were easy to love, though I'd rooted for them for a long time before then, through good seasons and (usually) bad ones.

I'm a Tigers fan now, as is almost everyone in Michigan, yet I really hadn't followed them since the magical season of 84. After I got to college, I drifted into other interests. I'd never been much of a spectator sports fan anyway, and for the most part I'm not one now. I wasn't watching the Tigers at the beginning of the season, but sometime around the beginning of June, I heard they'd racked up the best record in baseball, so I tuned into a few games to investigate. Even with my very rusty sense of the game, I could tell they were playing some amazing baseball. So during the rest of the summer I kept tabs on them, watching the occasional game on TV, and always following the scores and game synopses in the Free Press. I almost gave up on them during their late season slump, but since they've gone on their post-season tear, ripping the Yankees apart in the division title series, and sweeping the A's to win the AL pennant last night, I'm fixated again, infused with a 1984-esque Tiger mania.

Yes, I'm a fair weather fan. The point is, I am a fan. And I'm enjoying it to a degree that suprises me.

Watching the Tiges this year, has returned me to a part of my past, one that reaches back well beyond 1984. I used to become engrossed by baseball games. Baseball (and sometimes, hockey) is the only spectator sport that reliably claimed my attention. People write off the game as slow, and while the game has its pauses, they are rarely empty ones. And at times, as in both sides of the 9th inning of last night's game, they are positively gravid, with chaos, with reversal, with elation and despair. In the space of one swing, or one throw, the universe of a game can turn on its head. Or implode. Baseball is a game of subtle drama. Some games do drag, and I will turn off a few well before the end, even if they are going well for the Tigers. But there are times when I count the hours until a game begins.

So the 2006 Tigers have hung, or restored, some fine furnishings in my mental living space. These nicely complement the images of leaping brook trout and flushing grouse, and the dusty rows of books. They bring a new but familiar energy into that room, very welcome when most of my other passions are on hold. I guess it's fitting to say, for the first time in more than two decads, "Bless you, Boys."

Tags: Life; Detroit Tigers; Baseball