I think back on the 45 years of divisional play in baseball and remember only a handful of the teams that came up short. The 1970's KC Royals come to mind, because for 3 straight years they found different ways to come up short against the "Evil Empire". Seeing Freddie Patek crying in the dugout left an indelible mark on an 11 year old kid who watched that full series on TV from his home in Brooklyn. Watching a grown man cry from losing a baseball game really put thing into perspective. Baseball mirrors life and vice versa.
This season we will have 28 teams competing for the ultimate goal of winning a KOD
championship. My interest level has really peaked this year since I had the good, maybe bad, fortune of seeing each of these teams play live, since they all played during my lifetime. Divisional baseball might have lessened the regular season a bit (more so after the Wild Card), but to have gotten to the post season and to have come up short made these teams just a bit tragic in their own way. Some fan bases were probably ecstatic to have gotten there. Compare and contrast the 1980 Astros and Yankees. Both are represented in KOD21. Astros fans were ecstatic to have reached their first post season after 18 years of being just another expansion team mired in mediocrity. Yankee fans, on the other hand, had a veteran team that won 3 pennants and 2 championships just a few years back. After winning 103 games in 1980, and getting swept by the Royals in he LCS (see there is redemption...KC fans), the Yankees fired their manager (the late Dick Howser).
Can't wait until March for 1st pitch. Good luck to all !!!
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