Why I Believe the Texas Rangers Should Sign Prince Fielder

Yesterday, the Texas Rangers signed Japanese pitching sensation Yu Darvish to a 6-year, $60 million dollar contract (that actually cost them closer to $120 million because of the fee they had to pay to Yu's Japanese team for the rights to negotiate). Because of those big bucks, the speculation is that now the Rangers cannot afford to sign left-handed hitting sensation Prince Fielder to be their new 1st Baseman / Designated Hitter. Especially if the money they would spend on Fielder means they have less money to re-sign current players that are near free agent eligibility in the coming years.

But I believe the Rangers should throw caution to the wind and sign Fielder anyway, and here is why:

Basically, it's because I believe the Rangers are running out of time to get a World Series championship. If anything, last year was THE YEAR to get it done, but they blew it TWICE in Game 6. They are on borrowed time at this point. I believe they are where the Dallas Cowboys were in 1995: a solid core of players who had only one shot left to win another Super Bowl. The previous year was THE YEAR to get it done, but the Cowboys blew it with an awful start in the NFC Championship. In 1995, they got it done, but only because they brought in a free-agent ringer in Deion Sanders, and even then they only barely scraped out a victory over the Steelers in the Super Bowl. They were criticized for "mortgaging their future" on that one year. But, seriously, would ANY Cowboys fan REALLY trade that 3rd Super Bowl ring in 4 years for a few more playoff appearances (but likely no more Super Bowl appearances) in the late 90s and early 2000s?

I'd gladly "mortgage the future" on one more World Series run - a 3rd appearance in 3 years, especially if it increased the likelihood of their actually winning the thing this time around. In this case, Prince plays the role of Deion, helping the Rangers get over that last hurdle. The Angels are like the 49ers, or the Packers, or the Rams, or the Steelers or the Patriots of the late 1990s/ early 2000s- waiting to be the next team to make multiple runs to the championship. They're getting better with each passing year. And the AL East teams and the Tigers aren't going to just roll over either. NOW is the time for the Rangers to make a big move to get the championship THIS YEAR. Worrying about the future just gives those other teams time to keep reloading and keep getting better. Yes, the Rangers will still have a core of excellent players, just like the Cowboys still had Aikman, Emmit, Irvin, and Darren Woodson. But even then the window was closing on the Cowboys in 1995. And it's probably closing on the Rangers in 2012. Sign Fielder, like the Cowboys signed Deion, and try to make that last run THIS YEAR.

Nolan Ryan is My President

Fearless Leader of the Ranger Nation

Perry Stays on Message: Attacks President Zero on Jobs, Economy; Romney Detracts from Message by Attacking Perry and Texas on Jobs

Just another reason why I will NEVER, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, EVER vote for that effete, liberal, establishmentarian, pro-abort, government-health-care-mandating piece of RINO $h!+, Mitt Romney.

Hey, Santorum, Call Your Bishop ...

... and ask him what he thinks about a border fence.

I have to laugh at all these candidates with ABSOLUTELY NO EXPERIENCE on actual immigration issues scoffing at the governor of a border state who knows how idiotic is the concept of a 2000-mile wall along the Mexican border from Brownsville to Tijuana. The two guys from Texas (Perry & Paul) know how unworkable it is, while a couple of Yankees from Pennsylvania and Massachusetts act like "experts" on the matter.

The Debate Answer I Long to Hear

[Laughs good-naturedly in response to question] Well, I may not have served in the Obama Administration or appeared in the pages of Vogue magazine, but I don't think those are necessarily valid measures of "sophistication" or "intelligence", either. [Looks gravely into the camera] Look, it's not a matter of "believes" or "doesn't believe" in a scientific theory that, quite honestly, a whole lot of people are skeptical about, and rightly so, given the fact that the earth has heated and cooled all on its own - without any help from humans - for millenia. What this is about is that, in one of the worst economies in our nation's history, with millions of folks unemployed and struggling to make ends meet, it just doesn't make sense to implement the sort of policy schemes supported by Ambassador Huntsman and President Obama that will devastate our already fragile economy, throw even more people out of work, and raise the costs of heating and cooling our homes and driving our cars beyond what people can afford.

So, the question is not whether I quote/unquote "believe" in science the way some folks around here seem to treat it like some sort of religion, but rather why Ambassador Huntsman and President Obama and those like them, who seek to impose their catastrophic tax and cap regulatory schemes that will only further devastate our economy, seem so unconcerned about the working families of this country on whom their policies will most heavily fall. I'm for putting America BACK to work, not breaking our backs economically to futher some environmentalist dogma.

Rick Perry's "Army of God"

Patrick Archbold notes the collective conniption the left and their media cohorts are having over Rick Perry and the very notion that he might ... gasp! ... take his religious faith seriously:

... Obama has often mentioned Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount (including at Georgetown University) to make the case for his economic policies. In fact, the Politico ran a piece entitled "Barack Obama invokes Jesus more than George W. Bush."

So why is there no worry about Obama infusing religion into his politics? Ah, that's easy. Because the media believes that Obama's Christianity is only used to advance his politics while they fear that Perry's politics are actually informed by his Christianity. In short, he means it. And that scares the heck out of them.

[More]

G.T.T.

We wish our old friend the Regular Guy the best as he leaves his home state of Illinois today to embark upon the next segment of his and his family's life down in Texas. Paul has taken a job in my old stomping grounds in the DFW Metroplex, and is driving down there as I type this.

He's picked the wrong time of year to move down there, however. I wouldn't want to be unloading and unpacking moving boxes in the summer heat and humidity of Northeast Texas. In fact, I wouldn't want to be in the summer heat and humidity of Northeast Texas at all (still trying to figure out how we made it through 2-a-day football practices in that stuff back in high school).

At any rate, the Midwest will miss you, Paul. Give my best to all the good folks deep in the heart of the Lone Star State. Take in a Rangers game or two for me. Good luck and Godspeed.

At Long Last, A Championship and Vindication

Congratulations to my Dallas Mavericks for winning the 2011 NBA Championship:

World Champions? Dallas Mavericks?

Yes - They - Did.

Surely, to fully understand how far-fetched that concept was before last night, you had to sit through some sad nights at Reunion Arena before Mark Cuban bought the franchise. You had to hang in there over the course of 10 consecutive playoff endings that included disappointment and the wonder of whether next year would ever really be the year.

[...]

And across the arena, a large part of the entire narrative involved their opponent. And the Mavericks feeding off of it. Whether it was Miami being the winner in 2006 or Miami putting a giant and unnecessary target on their chests back in July. The Heat were the perfect opponent for Dallas in the NBA Finals for all sorts of reasons of symmetry. This is the team that Nowitzki and Terry wanted another shot at. It took 5 long years of quietly hearing everything that was said and allowing it to fuel them through long training sessions all year long. There was no guarantee that they would ever get another shot at Dwyane Wade and the Heat. Wade had called out Dirk's ability to close back then. So, when they did get a chance to settle it on the court, you could see that Dirk and Jet were not going to let that chance get away if they could help it.

And they could.

To make matters more theatrical, the principles in Miami thought they would mock Dirk back in Dallas by questioning whether he was really sick in Game 4. At certain points, you actually wondered if Miami wanted to be the villain. Until you saw on their faces - one in particular - how they certainly were not cut out to be villains. The weight of the world was crushing. And when the smoke cleared, James and Wade looked like they really didn't understand why the neutral observer was cheering for their defeat. They just didn't get it. But, something tells me that this experience might demonstrate to them that championship rallies should never precede a championship.

But, back to the 2011 NBA Champions, they completed their mission. They woke up this morning (assuming they slept) with no further opponents to vanquish. It is just the players and their trophy. They had done something that took these athletes their entire career and this franchise 31 years. Dallas is a city that had sports failures in Miami so many times - Super Bowl V, Super Bowl X, Super Bowl XIII, and the '06 NBA Finals - but, this time, they fly back to Dallas with that coveted title, a shiny gold basketball, and a spot in the annals of basketball history that can not be erased.

Only on this day will the last of their doubters finally concede. And for those of you who suffered for years following a franchise that never looked like they would get to the top of the mountain, well, this is your year. Congratulations to you.

[...]

This is your day. Enjoy it for all it is worth. LeBron James reminds you that your life will still contain many of the same circumstances and he will still have his. Well, good for him. He is arrogant to the end.

But, the Mavericks have the Championship. And, the loyalty to your home team pays off.

Enjoy it. And finally, plan your parade. It is well earned.

As a Texan and long-suffering fan of the Mavs, I am thrilled with this victory, and that it came against the team that denied them this opportunity 5 years ago. As a current resident of the Cleveland area, I am especially happy to see this victory also deprive a certain someone of a championship ring for which he attempted to take a shortcut to get.

Deguello de Crockett

Recommended Music:
"The Alamo" Soundtrack by Carter Burwell

Davy Crockett's Fiddle by Dean Shostak

Davy Crockett Plays On: Live in the Alamo (Fathers of Texas Series) by K.R. Woods

Texian Thermopylae: "We Will Sell Our Lives Dearly"

Happy 175th Birthday, Texas

175 years ago today - 2 March 1836, 59 representatives of the various colonies in the Mexican province of Texas, meeting at Washington-on-the-Brazos, signed the Texas Declaration of Independence, declaring Texas to be a free and sovereign Republic.

Although the signers were overwhelmingly of Anglo-American stock (probably Scotch-Irish would be more precise), there were among the founding fathers of Texas participating in the signing such Tejanos as José Antonio Navarro, José Francisco Ruiz, and Lorenzo de Zavala. Also signing the Declaration was General Sam Houston, who would lead the Texas army to victory over Santa Anna a month-and-a-half later at San Jacinto, thus preserving Texas' independence. Houston would later that same year become the first President of the Republic of Texas.

The Republic of Texas they created that March day - though it would be shaken in the coming days by the twin slaughters of the Texan garrisons at the Alamo and Goliad - would be a sovereign nation for almost a decade.




For more information on this topic, I recommend:

Texas Independence, an interactive website that "brings the struggle, compromise and sacrifice of the Convention of 1836 and the men who founded that new nation to a new generation and takes Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site into every classroom in Texas."

The Texas Revolution (Fred H. and Ella Mae Moore Texas History Reprint Series) by William C. Binkley

Lone Star Rising: The Revolutionary Birth of the Texas Republic by William C. Davis

Lone Star Nation: The Epic Story of the Battle for Texas Independence by H.W. Brands

Texian Iliad: A Military History of the Texas Revolution by Stephen L. Hardin and Gary S. Zaboly

The Raven: A Biography of Sam Houston by Marquis James

Stephen F. Austin: Empresario of Texas by Gregg Cantrell

March is Texas History Month - 175th Anniversay of Texas Independence

March is Texas History Month. And this March, folks in the Lone Star State are commemorating the 175th anniversary of Texas' independence.



Tomorrow, March 2, is Texas Independence Day - the day 59 representatives meeting at Washington-on-the-Brazos signed the Texas Declaration of Independence, declaring Texas to be a free and sovereign Republic. More on that tomorrow.



This coming Sunday, March 6, marks the 175th anniversary of the fall of the Texian garrison at the Alamo. More on that later this week. In a little over 2 weeks, commemorations of the massacre of Goliad will be held. And next month will mark the 175th anniversary of the "Waterloo" of the so-called "Napolean of the West" - the Battle of San Jacinto, where Texas independence was won.



In addition to posts on the topics I've listed above, I plan to commemorate Texas' 175th with some posts on my ancestral ties to the Lone Star State, and the contributions to the heritage of my home state by some of the more prominent members of the Anderson family of East Texas.

We'll begin with a post next week on American Revolutionary War veteran and frontiersman Bailey Anderson (my 6th great-grandfather), who, after the American Revolution, moved his family to Kentucky, then to Indiana, then to Indian Territory (present-day Arkansas), before finally settling in East Texas (before the Spanish had even opened Texas up to Anglo-American immigration, making him an illegal immigrant into Mexico). Additional family portraits of Bailey's descendants will follow.

So bear with me. I know we Texans tend to be insufferable when we go on and on about such things. It's a Texian thang - I hope y'all will understand.

Texas Rangers Music: "I Like Texas" by Pat Green

Played after a Texas Rangers home win. I'm hoping we'll hear this a lot over the coming days.

It's Less Than a Week Away from November ...

... and the Texas Rangers are still playing baseball !!!

Tonight is Game 1 of the World Series.

GO RANGERS !!!









Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
It's Time !

Been There, Seen That

Oh Yeah! Texas Rangers Moving On to the ALCS

The Feel-Good Sports Story of the Year

It's Time !

Sportswriter Jim Reeves of ESPN Dallas and the Fort Worth Star Telegram writes that "Rangers fans must savor every last drop" of the American League Championship Series, noting that the "added drama only enchances incredible flavor, intoxicating aroma of what's at stake":

Fred Koenig, the one-time Rangers first base coach who now hits his fungoes in the highest league of all, taught me how to drink beer. Well, what he really taught me was how to appreciate good beer. To Fred, beer drinking, done right, was an art form.

Now I know that some of you believe that makes you at least a Picasso, if not a Michelangelo, and you have the beer belly to prove it. But quality, not quantity, is what Fred had on his mind that long ago night in Milwaukee.

I think it was his German roots talking. Fred believed that a good draft beer should arrive, cold and fresh, at the table with a full head bubbling at the top, maybe even spilling over the sides. If it didn't, he might well roll up a napkin and stir it around in his beer until the foam arose two, three inches thick. As Fred explained, that foam meant a full release of the flavors and the heady aromas of a good beer.

[...]

Koenig would have long ago warned the Rangers and all of us that this wouldn't be easy, that the clinching game is the toughest game to play in all of sports, but especially baseball. This is the Rangers' first time there, remember. All of this is uncharted territory.

It won't be easy Friday night to put the Yankees away, either. They have talent, they have history and even more, they have pinstriped pride. That all counts for something. The Yankees rarely give anything away. If you want their title, if you want that ticket to the World Series, you have to earn it; you have to take it. They're not likely to hand it to you on an engraved silver platter.

[...]

As for the rest of us, this is what Fred would say: Enjoy the moment. Savor it. Remember it.

Somebody stuck a rolled up napkin in this cold beer of a playoff series, stirred it up, and now we're getting the full taste sensation, the anticipation, the tension, the drama, the amazing high of something we've never felt before with this baseball team.

Sip it slowly. Savor the moment. Let it go to your head and open up all your senses.

Rangers fans, this one's for you.

Yes, savor it, Texas Rangers fans. Win or lose, tonight at the Ballpark, (and, if necessary, Saturday at the Ballpark) savor the atmosphere, savor the excitement, savor what it all means for the Rangers to be playing to go to the World Series.

Think about that for a moment. The World Frickin' Series !!! The Rangers !!! The Texas Frickin' Rangers playing for the opportunity to play in the World Frickin' Series !!! That's awesome. Savor that !!!

I know I will be. But I I wish I could be down there in Texas for it. If not at the Ballpark itself, at least in some bar with some of my oldest friends. Drinking Shiner beer, eating nachos, and watching the Rangers.

Watching the Texas Frickin' Rangers play for the opportunity to play in the World Frickin' Series.

Win or lose, I'm going to savor it.

Been There, Seen That

Mitch Williams, the original "Wild Thing".
As a life-long fan of the Texas Rangers (I was 5 years old when the former Washington Senators moved to Arlington, Texas to become the Rangers), I've seen a LOT of bad times and very few good times (only 4 playoff appearances in their 39-year history). So bad have the Rangers been throughout their history, that the nickname "Strangers" has stuck.

So, this hilarious piece by ESPN baseball writer Tim Kurkjian brought back a lot of bad, but nevertheless priceless, memories:

The Texas Rangers are at the highest point in their 39-year history, making their first trip to the American League Championship Series as the last current franchise to win a postseason series. To appreciate where they are, we must understand from where they have come, the depth from which they have emerged, as told by a guy who was there every night from 1982-85.

I should have known what I was getting into that first spring training as the new Rangers beat writer in 1982. Two weeks after having met me, Rangers center fielder Mickey Rivers asked if he could borrow $2,000, not knowing, of course, that The Dallas Morning News was paying me approximately $14,000 a year, and Mickey was making closer to $300,000. That began an interesting relationship with The Mick, easily the most amusing player I've been around in 30 years of covering baseball.

It was Mickey who said one freezing day in Milwaukee, "The wind was blowing 63 degrees today. I felt like the Lost Mohican out there." (The Lost Mohican?) It was Mickey who would walk through the clubhouse, shirt off, flexing his muscles like Arnold Schwarzenegger, screaming, "I am Cohan the Barbarian,'' instead of "Conan the Barbarian.''

That first spring I pulled out the map in my rental car in an attempt to find the Rangers' spring training facility in Pompano Beach, Fla., and there it was in the lower right-hand corner: "Municipal Stadium, home of the Washington Senators,'' who had moved to Texas 10 years earlier. The spring training home of the Rangers wasn't a complex, it was one full field -- it looked more like my high school field -- and one half-field, on which one day, Rangers reliever Dan Boitano announced during a drill, "I'm going to wheel, throw, and hit that seagull.'' And to the astonishment of everyone, including Boitano, he went to make a pickoff throw to second base, instead threw the ball straight up in the air, hit a seagull in the head, and it came crashing to the earth, dead on the infield dirt. It was horrible.

"But that's what you get,'' pitcher Charlie Hough said, "for not wearing a helmet.

[...]

In spring training 1985, the Rangers introduced pitcher Mitch Williams, who had been acquired in the Rule V draft from the Padres. Williams threw so hard and was so unbelievably wild that no one wanted to hit against him. As he warmed up for his first live batting practice that spring, he threw one pitch that missed the cage entirely. The ball hit a tire on the side of the batting cage. At that point, veterans Buddy Bell and Larry Parrish announced that they would not be hitting against Williams, who would say later that day, "That's OK. I didn't want to kill any of my teammates on my first day of spring training.''

[Read the whole thing]

Mickey Rivers was the StRangers' center fielder in the early-to-mid 80s.
Nicknamed "Mick the Quick", I assume for his running abilities
as opposed to his mental capabilities.

My Comments:
I know the movie "Major League" features the Cleveland Indians as the story's protagonists, but I would swear that it's really about the Texas StRangers circa 1980-1985 (except, of course, that the StRangers never actually won their division during that time period - they didn't make their first playoff appearance until 1996).


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Oh Yeah! Texas Rangers Moving On to the ALCS

The Feel-Good Sports Story of the Year

Oh Yeah! Texas Rangers Moving On to the ALCS

The Texas Rangers win a playoff series for the first time in their history! (Until tonight, they were the ONLY team in Major League Baseball never to have won a post-season series.)

Bring on the Yankees!!!


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
The Feel-Good Sports Story of the Year

Deep-Fried Beer Invented in Texas [UPDATED]

A Texas chef has created the world's first recipe for deep-fried beer:

The beer is placed inside a pocket of salty, pretzel-like dough and then dunked in oil at 375 degrees for about 20 seconds, a short enough time for the confection to remain alcoholic.

When diners take a bite the hot beer mixes with the dough in what is claimed to be a delicious taste sensation.

Inventor Mark Zable said it had taken him three years to come up with the cooking method and a patent for the process is pending. He declined to say whether any special ingredients were involved.

His deep-fried beer will be officially unveiled in a fried food competition at the Texas state fair later this month.

[Read the whole thing]

My Comments:
Living out of state for so long means that it's been years since I attended the Texas State Fair. I think I'm going to miss it even more acutely this year.


UPDATE
Big Tex had a post on this topic at The pALEocon just a few days ago.

College Football Saved from Itself ... For Now

I can't believe I'm actually going to have to admit that the University of Texas just saved college football from devouring itself.

Or maybe it's the good folks down in College Station that should get the credit, at least according to this speculation. (Hat tip: Big Tex)

At any rate, my undergraduate alma mater is breathing a huge sigh of relief right about now.

Democrat Mickey Kaus Asks "What's Texas's Secret?"

Ohio and Michigan, pay attention to this one:

Why is the state of Texas doing relatively well in this recession--losing jobs later, and recovering jobs earlier--than California is? ... Texas has a relatively low rate of unionization--about a third of California's. That means a) fewer rigidities in the labor market, allowing it to adjust to the market more quickly--tiny quick wage cuts for a lot of people, for eample, mean employers don't have to lay people off as quickly b) fewer rigidities in organization structure--they don't have UAW-style work rules at Dell; and c) the absence of the public sector union "death-grip on state and local government" and politics and finances, which has helped produce near-bankruptcy at the state level (and actual bankruptcy in Vallejo). ... When Texas creates green jobs, maybe it's not just a power play by the union representing DWP workers to grab another stream of taxpayer funding, or by the Teamsters to monopolize employment at the port of LA. Maybe they are actual green jobs! ...

___________________________

Outgoing SEIU union President Andy Stern tells WaPo's Ezra Klein that unions are

the greatest middle-class, job-creating mechanism that we have ever had in America that doesn't cost tax payers a dime.

Needless to say, under Klein's probing questioning Stern had to admit the idiocy of his remark. ... Oh wait. This is Ezra Klein we are talking about. There was no probing questioning. It was left to Klein's colleague Charles Lane to show the idiocy of Stern's remark:

Really? Aren’t unions the main defenders of the Davis-Bacon Act, a certifiable waster of tax dollars and destroyer of jobs? Unions share the blame for the downfall of General Motors and Chrysler, too, don’t they? Last I checked, their bailouts had cost taxpayers more than a dime.

I have also heard that the untouchable pensions and other benefits of public sector unions, including Stern’s SEIU, are pushing California into fiscal and economic disaster. I’m just back from Los Angeles, where the mayor, trying to close a $400 million-plus budget gap, has announced layoffs and service cuts, which can only be avoided if city employee unions accept wage cuts and contribute more to their own pensions. So far, the unions say no. Their counterproposal calls on the city to raise dog license fees and pass out more parking tickets, among other gimmicks and stopgaps.

Not to mention the more basic point that when GM's unions won wage increases, back in the 1960s and 1970s when the industry had the closed, oligopoly structure unions prefer, it was GM's customers who paid the resulting increased prices. And GM's customers were by and large poorer than GM's workers. The fact that they suffered the loss as consumers and not "tax payers" may not have been much consolation.

Stern's soundbite is the sort of BS a leader can only get away with when he is surrounded by yes-men (and yes-journalists). Otherwise somebody would have called him on it long before his "exit interview." ... This insularity helps explain why Stern was such a stunningly ineffective spokesman for his pet let-unions-avoid-the-secret-ballot ("card check") plan, which even Klein admits is now dead --though, of course, Barbara Boxer is still a "strong supporter." ...