Tag Brian McTaggart

This is a no-brainer…so it’s perfect for this blog

Pat Ryan 5 Comments

My Houston Astros kicked off their American League existence Sunday night with a big exciting win over the Texas Rangers, and Monday I thought I should write something nice for the blog about the entire event. You see how far I got with that.

Tuesday night my Houston Astros nearly got perfect-gamed for the second time in less than a year, just the kind of thing that the doomsayers who’ve predicted a third 100+ loss season for the Astros needed to be able to say “I told you so.” Yeah, well, you didn’t count on Marwin Gonzalez, did you? (Yes, Marwin Gonzalez. I know.)

This morning I found a post on Awful Announcing that combines the comfort and excitement of Opening Day with the sense of disorientation that we Astros fans are working through as we get acquainted with our new team and league: major league players performing bits of “Who’s on First?”

And that made me think, I want to see the original in all it’s glory…and I’m betting, so do you!

We can’t all start thinking for ourselves, of course…but Wowie!

Pat Ryan 7 Comments

My my my: how rare and brave are the new owners of the Houston Astros, standing right up to all-powerful Major League Baseball and everything!

After all, it’s so obviously clear that having Houston’s baseball players wear these shirts for two whole games this year would spark a wave of colts45-3912gun violence unprecedented in scope and depravity that there should be no question but that forbidding them from doing so was the only responsible option for the right-thinking people who direct what all other people should and shouldn’t do and think.  Even if, as is likely, the team will only be seen by upwards of hundreds of fans on those days—including kids, I tell ya; think of the KIDS!—they-who-pass-judgment chose not to tempt fate and were super-duper-diligent in expressing their directions to the rest of us.

But the Houston Astros did not meekly accepted the dictats of our overcautious society; oh no.  After exercising the temerity to consider the merits of a situation (but only after having received permission to do so, of course), team management expressed a considered and independent opinion:

“We made this decision for a number of reasons,” Astros owner Jim Crane said in a statement. “We listened to our fans, who were almost unanimously in favor of wearing the original jersey. We wanted to honor all of our past uniforms during this special 50th anniversary season, and we felt it was important to be true to the tradition of the franchise.”

Oh.  My.  God.  They did what their fans wanted?!  The team did what it felt was right?!!  A bold move, unquestionably…but where will we all be if that sort of behavior were to catch on?