Kansas City Royals: A Royals Fan In The Big Apple

San Francisco Giants third baseman Pablo Sandoval (bottom) celebrates with teammates after catching a pop out for the final out of game seven of the 2014 World Series – Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports

Chapter 2: Forgetting The (Recent) Past

Last year it took a last-minute flight and an afternoon on StubHub to make it to Game 7. Flash forward 24 hours and I was miserable and broke back in my NYC apartment trying to remember if the past month had even happened.

I wanted to avoid the above scenario, in more ways than one, and having up to three games here in New York, with the possibility of the series ending here, was a promising start. I figured if the Royals were leading the series coming out of KC, ticket prices would be more reasonable, and if the Mets were winning the series, I probably wouldn’t be looking to splurge anyway. So all things considered, I felt good.

With the series 2-0 after the Kansas City homestand, Mets fans were still quite ravenous to attend Game 3, and understandably so – at the time, the series was well within striking distance, and it had been 15 years since the scenario last occurred.

I figured if the Royals were leading the series coming out of KC, ticket prices would be more reasonable, and if the Mets were winning the series, I probably wouldn’t be looking to splurge anyway. So all things considered, I felt good.

For me, I shied away from Game 3 with ticket prices approaching four figures, and instead watched miserably in the confines of a friend’s apartment. My Friday night ended with two slices of 99 cent pizza, a pack of sour straws, and an Uber home with my head down, playing out every miserable scenario that the series was sure to take on in the coming days.

I sat up at night, unable to soothe myself with the typical medicine of a Seinfeld episode before bed; alas, Jerry had to take a backseat on the DVR for the week, lest I risk seeing him jovially parade through his apartment in a blue and orange cap.

So, my mind drifted miserably to the Mets taking Game 4 and (now the required) Game 5 at home; with a win tomorrow, the series would be even, and with New York’s momentum, from there I envisioned a repeat of 2014, with the requisite Games 6 and (let us pray) 7 back at Kauffman.

That might mean another plane ticket back to KC to head to the stadium with blurred vision from staring down StubHub for hours on end beforehand. I saw visions of my bank account being emptied directly onto the Kauffman grass, with Noah Syndergaard combing his hair with $100 bills as he glared up at me in the stands. To see a victory would be priceless; to fork it up for another dreadful finish to a magical year, not so much.

As fate would have it – as fate would have it for perhaps a dozen times during the post-season – the Mets did not even the series, and my extreme jubilation throughout the Royals triumphant eighth inning in Game 4 struck fear in the non-baseball-loving individuals at the Halloween party I was attending.

It turned out that many had not experienced a grown man in an apron and fake mustache repeatedly slap a spatula on a coffee table in delight before, as I did while witnessing Daniel Murphy’s Buckner-esque approach to fielding at the end of Game 4.

Next: Chapter 3: Preparing For (Maybe) The Finish