the distance fan

i love the minnesota twins. i always have. a lot of people love them now, especially since they just took a 1.5 game lead on the white sox for the wild card lead. but my love affair with the twins has not always sailed such smooth waters. i was a die-hard fan during the days of pedro munoz and jeff reboulet - i have signed cards from both of them to prove it, too. i also consider myself one of the few people who know that one be-goggled alex cole caught the last out of scott erickson's no-hitter. rich becker and matt walbeck were in the starting lineup that day. shows you what a difference 12 years can make.


the picture you see here was taken at the last game i attended - july 2005, against the angels of southern california/san andreas (or whatever their name happens to be now). i think we won. by the way, yes, those are fish dancing in the infield waiting for a lucky contestant to catch them. anyway, as you all surely know, i live in japan now, and i can't just drive down I-94 to catch a twins game. i have to work a little harder.

being in japan has taught me how to be a distance fan. someone who follows the team desperately despite a 15-hour time difference and no access to televised games. i'll tell you my routine. every day i wake up late (since i haven't started school yet) and check the status of the game on my cell phone. i then start up my computer as fast as i can and try to see if mlb.tv will give me access to the game. nine times out of ten it's blacked out (international licensing problem), but i still try. if i can't watch it live, i turn on mlb.com gameday, which lets me visualize the game in my head by giving me the pictures of the current batter and pitcher, approximate location of each pitch, the result of each pitch, and vivid descriptions like "joe mauer singles on a line drive to center fielder brian anderson" or "rondell white strikes out on a meatball right down broadway." okay, not the last one. finally i consellate all the information in my head and try to imagine what the game really looks like. i try, and i try, and i try, but it doesn't work. but in this futile attempt i realize something: this is what being a sports fan is all about.

to me, it's not about knowing the OPS of each left handed national league first baseman in order of shoe size. it's about loving a team, living with their weaknesses and celebrating their strengths. it's about sacrificing potentially useful time from the day to read blog after blog after blog recapping the game, to go to espn.com and see if the twins made the front page, to wait on mntwins.com for the video highlights to be put up, to talk about the twins every time you call your parents halfway around the world. people here really don't get me. i tell my girlfriend "the twins won today," trying to sound nonchalant, trying to conceal all the enthusiasm i want to share with her. she doesn't care, though. why should she? the twins aren't special to her. she's got her own team, after all. everyone does. that's the beauty of it all.

i'll go on being a distance fan even if the twins can't keep a lid on the pale hose. i'll take comfort in the fact that i know there are more distance fans out there, living and dying with their beloved teams, lurking on hometown blogs and dreaming of that distant day when fan and team are finally reunited.