Rockies vs. Connor

In October of 2021, my grandmother died.

I’m not sure how much I would love sports if it weren’t for her. She was one of the most fun loving sports fans I’ll ever know. Disappointed, but never sad when her team lost. Excited, but not jubilant when they won. Some of my strongest early memories are watching the Broncos 1997 Super Bowl video tape with her or talking about how she knew Herb Brooks in high school in St. Paul. I think I can recall attending dozens of Broncos or Rockies games with her, I can remember the opponent for some, but not all. I remember the game result for just a few. It really wasn’t about that was it.

As you grow up, sports become a very different relationship. When you’re young, these are superheroes on the field. Large adult men who do things that make people cheer. There is something amazing in that. Winning, losing, it doesn’t really matter. This is just a thing you’re a part of.

Not as much when you’re older. You learn the business, you learn how results matter. You get upset when they do stupid things. The team owes you something. Or maybe it doesn’t. You’re constantly torn between the idea that this is just entertainment and the idea that your money should be worthwhile. You wouldn’t go to local plays or art museums if they were shitty, why should you watch a bad baseball team?

My grandmother seemed to balance these two worlds so perfectly. Especially with the Rockies. In 2021, which ended up being the final season she ever watched, she never really gave up on them. Even after I had. We spoke on the phone a few times that season, she complained and I complained, but I wasn’t watching. She was. She was frustrated by how stupid they were, how bad the players they signed were playing, how disappointing the losses had become. But she was watching. She loved Charlie Blackmon and hoped he did well, she liked Kyle Freeland, she loved Bud Black. She loved baseball. Through all the stupidity, frustration, and losses, there were things she liked. Things she cared about. Things that kept her watching even after so many others couldn’t do it anymore. I admired that even then. I was so jaded by the departure of Nolan Arenado, so annoyed with the handling of Trevor Story and Jon Gray, I couldn’t give these idiots any more of my time. But I respected anyone who still did, I guess.

The Rockies are a very bad baseball team with a very bad strategy and very stupid ideas of what makes a good baseball team. Their team this year is a collection of role players and glue guys that could add up to 80 wins if everything goes their way. This isn’t a team that has a shot at the playoffs and I would expect them to flirt with 95 losses. Worst of it, they don’t think this is a bad team. By most respects, they see any bad seasons as bad luck. They just didn’t quite get the bounces other teams got. Dick Monfort thinks this team has 90 wins if it breaks their way.

The Rockies are Ocean’s 11 if Steven Soderbergh made the entire cast Taylor Kitsch. They are a bunch of guys who are fine. There’s no personal insult in this roster like you’d find in Baltimore or Pittsburgh the past 5 or so seasons. No player that has no business being on a major league roster. Just 22 or so guys that should be alright and a couple guys that could go either way. It’s almost even more frustrating than a team trying to lose.

Yet, despite that, here I am. Writing about them. Ready to watch them. Reading articles and tweets about them. I am not gone. I was jaded and frustrated, but so was my grandma. She was still there too. I guess what I’m saying is, the minute the Rockies have some good players again (which will happen by nature of how American sports work) where will we be? Right back in front of our TVs, right back on the Party Deck.

I’m not saying don’t complain or that fans who do that and still watch are hypocrites. The opposite, really. Fans should demand their teams be good, they should have expectations of dominance at all times. The bare minimum expectation for a public entertainment product (like the sports owners claim that they are) is that they are entertaining, so fans should always be demanding that and checking out if they are not. You owe billionaires nothing, not even your attention. You shouldn’t force yourself to watch any bad sports team.

But I am saying that perhaps we get a little dramatic about teams that are bad. That maybe we can be frustrated, jaded, and demanding while also saying to ourselves “ah well shit I still love some things”.

For a long time, I’ve experienced sports through a lens of emotion. I still do. Teams winning does give me a nice little rush of happiness chemicals and a loss make me frustrated. It should! But maybe being jaded about the Rockies wasn’t an ideal situation. Maybe my grandma had the right idea. Maybe Rockies vs. Connor isn’t the way to go.

In the 2022 Baseball Prospectus Annual, I dedicated my piece to my grandmother saying she taught me that loving sports can be beautiful too. Because it can be. Because it is. For all the reasons that you might think, for the Rob Neyer/Tom Verducci reasons about how hope springs eternal or how the crack of the bat reminds us of our childhood, for the basic kid reason that watching people do cool stuff and cheering is fun, for the more adult reason that winning is fun. Sports fandom is packed with toxicity and cynicism, littered with moral failings. But it can be beautiful if you force it to be. It can be beautiful if you remember to find the things to love about it. It is, at the end of the day, a shared community experience. Something we all put ourselves into and hope for the best with zero control on the outcome. I cried when I watched Argentinians celebrate the World Cup with each other. I think about how many times they probably got mad watching sports, too. But there they are, families and friends, cheering together. That is beautiful, community is something to love.

I miss my grandma and her complaints, I miss her watching the games long after they became pointless to watch. I don’t know if the Rockies will ever be good again, they certainly won’t be this year. But I know she wouldn’t care that much, I know she’d find some reasons to love the game. There is a reason I don’t remember all the results of the games we watched, or even the opponents of some. They don’t really matter, do they? All that matters in those memories is my grandma and I. Us loving sports together.

I’m not as jaded anymore. I’ve found things to love about the really stupid bad moronic baseball team I’ll choose to watch. I’m retiring the Vs. I might not watch every game, I might still give up and be mad about them. But I will still find the things to love. Rest in Peace, Carol. The Rockies are still going to suck this year, but I’ll think of you when I watch.