Some Thoughts on Fandom
And oh yeah, the World Series
My son, who is in 4th grade, is not particularly big into baseball. Or any sports. I figure it’s some combination of personality, of the fact that I’m not around all that much for a good chunk of the year (and the entire baseball season) and that his mom isn’t exactly much of a sports fan. Baseball is also, of course—as he often lets me know—the thing that keeps me away from home for weeks on end. So I get it.
All of this is to say I was pleasantly surprised when he took a seemingly out of nowhere interest in the playoffs this year. Not so much the Padres, mind you. He had an awareness of the Cubs series and what was on the line, but I didn’t hear too much about it. But somewhere between then and now he started getting super interested in…the Mariners.
As I would learn, this had nothing to do with Cal Raleigh or Julio Rodriguez (and in fact, he seems to think the “Big Dumper” nickname is mean lol).
It has to do with the fact that one of his best friends at school, as well as our new-ish next door neighbors are from Seattle. And they’re all super into it. And the excitement has rubbed off on him and he’s become invested.
This, it seems to me, is about as pure an expression of fandom as exists. He saw his friends, who he cares about, get excited about something…and for their sake, went all in. Proud dad.
We know how this ended, of course. When the Jays beat the M’s in Game 7 of the ALCS, he experienced his first sports heartbreak and let me tell you—he was sad. Like legit sad.
The sports fan part of me was weirdly1 thrilled—he had his “welcome to the Big Leagues” moment—but of course the dad in me wanted to make him feel better. My mind and my mouth met somewhere in the middle and I explained to him that hey, this is pretty much the deal with sports. Most teams lose most years. It’s the journey and the experiences along the way that are so valuable. Think about how much fun you had talking about it with your friends this week, I told him, and how you felt even more connected to them.
He kind of nodded his head and then asked “why would anyone do this to themselves?”
I told him he was now officially a sports fan.
Season Over…
I suppose there’s a part of me that feels an obligation to reference the Padres’ defeat in the Wild Card round as well as the subsequent retirement of Mike Shildt as the team’s skipper. But also, like, you guys know all that, so I’m not going to go too crazy breaking anything down.
The one angle I want to hop on is the fact that Game 3 at Wrigley already feels like YEARS ago to me and boy is that a great reminder of how long the postseason is these days.
The World Series begins tonight and I figure the Dodgers can barely remember their Wild Card against the Reds.
I think we’re all still sort of calibrating our minds when it comes to this postseason format and the Dodgers are in the process of making quite a point about the regular season vs. October.
Ya know how load management came to the NBA? There’s perhaps a mental/emotional version of that on display here. I don’t want to make too big a thing of it, and I want to spend some more time thinking about it, but the fact that they’ve openly talked about lack of focus (for lack of a better term) in the regular season but have steamrolled in the playoffs (so far!) is something we’re going to have to unpack at some point.
Of course, they’ve also been getting unbelievable starting pitching, which is and has forever been the simplest way to a title.
We’ll see how this thing goes…I am tempted to tell you all to enjoy it, but since I know 99.9% of you are Padres fans, I know that’s probably not the right word.
So Many Stars!
As most of you know, thanks to Hall-of-Famer Jerry Coleman, there’s a longstanding tradition in Padres Land to hang a star for a stellar defensive play at home. As some of you know, Tony and Dave and I decided to formally track the star hangings for the very first time in 2025.
I had a bit on the broadcast the last few years about how there had been exactly X number of stars hung over the years and that so-and-so was the franchise leader, but that was all in tongue-in-cheek, so this year we figured we might as well do the thing.
Those of you who know me know that I’m not a half-effort kind of guy, so the resulting Excel spreadsheet was absurdly detailed. You can get a peek at it in this great newsletter piece by AJ Cassavel of MLB.com (which also explains the history of the thing, if you’re not aware).
And now the results you’ve all been waiting for, the official tally of Stars for 2025:
Certainly no surprise that Fernando led the way—his glove will once again be gold (and potentially platinum) heading into next year2.
Thank You 🤎
I posted this on social media a day or two after the Padres were eliminated, but a most sincere thanks to everyone who tuned in this year. And of course to all of you who subscribe to this little side project.
The love that I feel in this town goes out 10 times harder than it comes in and the fact that I get to live out my dream in this place, at this time, is something I will never, ever take for granted.
I have no idea what comes next and there’s obviously a lot to figure—a managerial hire, some critical free agent decisions, presumably an AJ Special or two in the trade department at some point—but I do know that even with the frustration of a Wild Card loss early this month that we’ll all be gathered around the hot stove together excitedly watching as we rev back up for Spring Training (and the WBC!) in no time.
So again, thank you and we’ll talk again soon..
jesse
Is it weird?
How about Ramon Laureano collecting 3 stars in just 26 home games. Impressive! Also, shout out to Bryan Hoeing for being the only pitcher on the list.