Johnson's Journey: Jays vs. Rangers

This post is really 3 separate stories that intersect. Growing up in Dallas, Katherine and I have lived and died with the Texas Rangers. We've cheered them on in the playoffs. I saw Nolan Ryan throw his 5000th strikeout and Kenny Rogers throwing a perfect game watching on T.V. I remember going to the division series against the Yankees in '99 with amazing seats behind the Yankees dugout listening to some drunk guy yell various obscenities at all the Yankees when they came out of the dugout. I also remember losing my mind in '90 when they missed the postseason after having a 13 game lead going into the last month or when they were literally one strike away from winning the World Series and blew it in 2011.

As anyone who has read these posts knows, we've moved around quite a bit while I have been in school and training. One of Katherine's friends from high school, Scott Cunningham, has visited us in each locale. Scott also happens to be one the most die-hard, faithful Rangers fans I've ever met. So when Scott emailed Katherine to say he would be in Toronto to see the Blue Jays and Rangers series the weekend of June 7th, it was a no-brainer that we meet up.

To make things even sweeter, Campbell and Mackenzie had not yet been to a baseball game, and we thought it would be the perfect opportunity to take them. Better yet, Saturday games at the Rogers Centre are kids' days where any kid can run the bases after the game. We were so excited-first baseball game and Cman and Mack could run the bases-too perfect. We decided to let the kids take a nap and get to the game a little late so we would be sure to make it through the whole game. We casually rolled in at the bottom of the 4th and met up with Scott at our seats. We were having a great time. Campbell got used to the cheering, of which there was a lot because it was a really good game. The Rangers were down most of the game but came back late to force extra innings. By the bottom of the 14th inning, we admitted defeat and packed it in. The Jays ulimately won the game in the bottom of the 18th-just our luck. It was the longest game in team history on a day that we just wanted to take our two toddlers to run the bases for a photo-op! We still had a great time seeing Scott and watching some baseball. Hopefully we will be able to entice Scott with a minor league Cardinals game in Springfield.