I’m just going to repeat what every Facebook status last Friday night said through various combinations of all caps and exclamation points: It’s an exciting time to be a Rangers fan.
For those of us who have watched disappointing seasons on end, waiting for the Rangers to stop worrying about home runs and get a bullpen, Lee and Wilson are a godsend. And for those new fans who don’t remember the heydays of Gonzalez, Greer and Pudge, the Rangers’ success is at least thrilling insomuch as it distracts us from certain other Dallas-based sports teams.
However, I have witnessed on many occasions a growing divide between these two communities. New fans give a shout out to the Rangers, whether by writing a quick status update or buying a jersey, and are the immediate subject of criticism. “How long has she been a fan?” or, “Does he even know who’s pitching tomorrow?” loyal fans protest. This growing conflict seems to be based around the important question: “Have you earned the right to be a Rangers fan?”
The veterans of the game who pose this question seem to think that because they yelled and screamed at the TV for decades at every backwards K, fielding error and unearned run allowed by the Rangers that this season is to reward their loyalty. Meanwhile, new fans just want a share of the excitement. For myself, a fan of about three years who is somewhere between these two groups, I for the life of me don’t care how big the bandwagon gets: There’s always room for more Rangers fans.
This team can and should appeal to anyone who admires the story of the underdog, first and foremost because of our franchise history. For those new to the team, these are some of the facts that make this already outstanding season at least 10 times cooler. Before this year, the Rangers were one of three teams to never appear in a World Series game, accompanied by the Washington Nationals and Seattle Mariners, and amongst those three they’re the team that has been around the longest (and by inference, losing the longest). Furthermore, in their only three seasons of postseason play (’96, ’98 and ’99), they had one victory in nine games.
The underdog story continued into the 2009-2010 seasons with two separate, substance-abuse-related incidents: first in August of 2009 when Josh Hamilton, the Rangers’ champion slugger, admitted a relapse after years of being clean, and second in February of 2010, when Manager Ron Washington admitted to using crack. In each case, the Rangers stuck behind their leaders and emerged stronger than before. Hamilton is a probable for AL MVP and Washington, who took the team from .463 win percentage in 2007 to .556 in 2010, is now a heavy contender for Coach of the Year.
And finally, nothing speaks more volumes about the Rangers’ defying incredible odds than the financial facts: They did it with less money than anyone else. All too often, people forget that in this same season the Rangers organization declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. While the Rangers were battling it out on the field, potential owners Mark Cuban and Nolan Ryan were battling it out in the courts. The fact that this didn’t interfere with their ability to play the game is truly astounding.
Everyone needs to remember that the Rangers have one of the lowest budgets in baseball. Ranked 27th out of 30 teams, Rangers payroll ($55 million) pales in comparison to baseball cities like Philadelphia ($142 million), New York ($206 million for the Yankees), and San Francisco ($98 million), all of which sent teams to the playoffs this year.
After all of this, you are left with a team without a history of victory (and therefore little fan support) that was able to move past major incidents amongst its key members, ignore courtroom politics and make it to the World Series—all with a smaller budget. You can’t make this stuff up.
In light of these facts, the question that veterans ask, “have you earned the right to be a Rangers fan?” has the issue reversed. The real question is, “have the Rangers earned your fandom?” and the answer to this question is undoubtedly yes. So my basic pleas are as follows: to the die-hard Rangers fans out there, when you see some guy throw up the antlers when Murphy catches a fly ball or someone tells you that they’re excited that Feliz is catching tomorrow, don’t freak out. This is how baseball dynasties are made. And for the new fans, don’t let this newfound passion for all things Rangers fizzle out if things don’t go well in the coming weeks. After all, as the new motto goes, “these are my Rangers,” and yours, and yours, and yours.
Alex Ehmke is a junior political science, public policy and economics triple major. He can be reached for comments and questions at [email protected].
