KC Royals Distraction

I think a lot about being a sports fan in Kansas City. Not just a KC sports fan, but a KC sports fan in the post-80’s era. It doesn’t take much to get me going on a subject and something happened on Thursday.*

*I believe I’ve mentioned that I randomly get really frustrated after some Royals’ losses. Therefore, I feel that it behooves me to write about something other than tonight’s game.

I’ve said this often, but my family is very much into going to garage-sales and my dad is the wizard of garage-sale deals. The freaking Gandalf of outdoor-purchasing get-togethers. He always comes up with amazing finds with an “aw-shucks” attitude that cracks me up. I’m always excited when he’s been out and about.

Today, I got home and my dad said, “Hey I found something for you today. It’s not much, but I thought you might like it.”

Whenever he says that, It’s. Always. Awesome.

And it was. Game five of the 1985 World Series on DVD. Still in the packaging.

I love watching old sporting events. ESPN Classic is amazing. And watching the 1985 world series is of course, one of my favorite things to do.

As awesome as it was and is, it got me to thinking about how little winning I’ve experienced as a Kansas City sports fan. I’m not trying to start a “woe is me” campaign about how no understands Royals fans even though we are the best fans ever. A good baseball fan is a good baseball fan, regardless of team. But this doesn’t change the fact that when Cubs fans or Red Sox fans might talk about their championship droughts, it’s hard for me to feel pity for them because they’ve at least been competitive and/or in the playoffs a couple of times in the last ten years. I’ve had nothing but awful baseball to watch in that time frame.

It’s things like this that make me start daydreaming about what it will be like when the Royals are competing. I daydream about the day that the Chiefs become a franchise to be feared once again as well, but if push came to shove, I’d choose the Royals. Just thinking about how electric a playoff atmosphere would be at Kauffman makes me salivate. That’s weird….but it’s true.

After games like tonight, I’ve got to think about something else and this is where my mind goes.

I’m about to pop Game 5 into the DVD player and reminisce about a time when the Royals were great. A time before I was born…..sigh.