An aside: Being a Blue Jays Fan

I always liked the idea of baseball, although being English and living in England it was never regularly shown on TV, occasionally Channel 5 would show live games in the middle of the night but it wasn't watchable...

Living in Toronto, a 2 minute walk from the Rogers Centre, has meant I can indulge my desire to be a fan. Last season I went to lots of games with an American, this gave me the opportunity to learn the subtleties of the game, when to arrive - after the first inning via a bar for beer - which snacks are best - peanuts, sunflower seeds, hot dogs and so on. Last year was also Jose Bautista's first season with the Blue Jays and included a season best 54 home runs...

This year the Jays have gone from strength to strength offensively and are playing great Baseball, Jose is leading the league in all offensive stats and we are going to more and more games, often sitting in the 500's to keep the price down.

Wednesday was a lesson in what being a Jays fan means. They were playing the best team in the league, the Cleveland Indians, and after they scored 4 runs in the first and 8 in the third inning we were 12-0 down and making errors all over the pitch. Most teams fans would leave but Jays fans are fully aware of the offensive animal that sleeps within their team...

After an inning where the jays scored 3 runs with three back to back triples (where the batter makes it round three bases) we were off, this was possible, yes we were still 12-3 down but... Next inning we held them to zero and yet again 3 runs batted in, already there was talk of winning 15-12 if we kept up this pace, next inning we only scored one and felt cheated. The Indians scored again but we clawed back the deficit and by the end of the ninth were 13-9 down.

Now with 2 men out and 2 strikes most people would leave, but Jays fans stayed and cheered, even backed into a corner we thought we could win, we know we have a team who can do this. We have one plenty of games in the last inning and this would be one of the greatest baseball games in history...

Unfortunately the strike came and they were all out but I like being a part of such a positive, balls out, no holds barred team, a team who can win at the wire.

I love baseball...
I love the Blue Jays...