Chasing the Blues

Houston Astros Going to the American League

My years as a Houston Astros fan will enter a new stage in a couple of years, when the 'Stros head into the American League. From reports, Major League Baseball bribed the new owner, whose name I don't recall presently, by greatly reducing the purchase price for the team, which might have been the worst in baseball history last year. As an Astros fan, I had the unpleasantness of watching former Astros players on almost every playoffs team this fall. Perhaps the new guy can use the payoff money from MLB to rebuild the franchise, just recently quite competitive.

I guess it won't make much difference to me seeing the Astros in the American League, although ever since I was a child I've thought of the Astros as a National League team. Long before the days of interleague play, which will become more common when the Astros leap to join the Texas Rangers in the A.L. West, the 'Stros played the Giants, the Dodgers, the Cardinals, the Braves. Now they'll be playing the Red Sox, the White Sox, the Yankees, etc. 

Gee, my first major league game was seeing the Cardinals play the then .Colt 45s, when the Astrodome was a rising skeleton seen from our seats in the brutally hot, open air Colt stadium. There I was with my late father, my late grandfather and a neighbor, Richard. We had made the trip from Baton Rouge to Houston on U.S. 90 through Jim Bowie and Cat Doucet's Opelousas and Lake Charles and Orange; I-10 had not yet beeen completed. The young Bob Gibson was on the mound for the Cardinals, and the aging Stan Musial in the dugout, although Stan the Man did play in the second game of the twi-night double header. While the Cards had Lou Brock, Bill White, Dick Groat, etc., the 'Stros had the likes of Turk Farrell, Bob Aspromonte (LA Dodgers farm club product) and the 19-year-old Rusty Staub, fresh out of Jesuit High in New Orleans. 

Over the years, I spent many a sultry night on a front porch in Baton Rouge, listening to the 'Stros, slowly shifting over the years from iced tea to beer to bourbon, back to iced tea. The names: the Rooster, Doug Rader; the Flea, Bob Lillis;  the Toy Cannon, Jimmy Winn. The 'Stros. Trading away Rusty Staub because owner Judge Hofeinz got pissed when Staub refused to play on Vietnam Moratorium Day. Trading away Joe Morgan. Trading away Mike Cuellar. Cesar Cedeno. The killer Bs. Roy Oswalt. Nolan Ryan. Fat Elvis, Lance Berkman. (Speaking of Fat Elvis, I once saw him perform in the Astrodome, but that's another story). Yes, the 'Stros had some great years, before wrecking the franchise again.

Well, once again, as with the college conference realignments, tradition goes by the wayside in the interests of money. The 'Stros in the American League. Sure, I'll buy it. 

LSU Outlasts Alabama

The smell of my victory cigar lingered Sunday morning as I turned back the clocks. All alone, I watched LSU overcome Alabama 9-6 in a game that reminded me of the brutal defensive fist-fights of my childhood, when Charley McClendon coached the Tigers. Some called the game a classic, but I'm not so sure. To me, the game had a ragged quality, with both teams apparently hampered by all of the hype that preceded it. Whether classic or not, the LSU win was sweet, and I drank red wine and lit up the cigar that I'd bought in Apalachicola on a trip to the beach. As LSU's longtime radio announcer, the sometimes verbally challenged Jim Hawthorne, said, "there's no doubt LSU is No. 1 in the land."

Watching the game, I thought of my long-dead father, who deeply hated Alabama and Bear Bryant, who beat LSU year after year, always receiving the benefit of questionable referees' calls. Over the last 20 years or so, LSU has joined Alabama at the top of the national football world, and played the Crimson Tide on a pretty much equal basis. In my father's day, LSU played Alabama in Birmingham's Legion Field, where such stars as Joe Namath, Kenny Stabler and Leroy Jordan would take the measure of ol Cholly Mac's teams. Back then, Southern teams were all-white, until the Bear himself saw that he could not compete nationally unless he recruited black players. It took Charlie Mac years to see the same lessson, leading to a decline in LSU football that continued until long after my father's death. Now, the big game was played in Tuscaloosa, and both teams had immense numbers of NFL-quality black players.

Unlike many Tiger fans, I still like Bama coach Nick Saban, who banished all of the ghosts that had haunted and crippled LSU football for years and took LSU to national football prominence, where they've remained under Les Miles. Saban receives adulation from the national media, but he's just as flawed a coach as anyone else, as shown in his team's puzzling struggle with substitutions in overtime, giving LSU a surprisingly easy victory. if Miles had botched the overtime as much, he'd be ridiculed endlessly. I'm sure Saban still will be considered an invincible genius.

As for Miles, I'm often amused by his verbal tics and goofy peronality. Yet, the man can coach. He has grown each year professionally, and is a fine representative of the university. He helps his players graduate, and treats them with respect, while Saban is known for abusing his. 

On this bright Sunday, I think about my father, who never lived to see his grandchildren or LSU return to football prominence. If you can hear me Daddy, there's no doubt today that LSU is No. 1 in all the land.