How I became a Tigers fan

Why am I a Detroit Tigers fan?  Well, that part is simple.  My dad was a Detroit Tigers fan and he was the coolest guy on my planet.  I wanted to be just like him.  Why is my dad a Detroit Tigers fan?  That part is more complicated, full of intrigue, and riddled with legends that have been passed down to me over the years.   Some of it I might have made up myself, or just dreamt up over the years.  One contention is that Dad’s Little League team was named the Tigers, and so the Big League version became his team by extension.  I also heard that he went to spend a summer with an uncle who lived in Detroit, and he developed his affinity then.  I have a vague remembrance of him telling me that he could get Tigers games on the radio, even in New York, and listened to Ernie Harwell’s calls as a kid.  I totally could have made that up. 

The most interesting rendition has less to do with the Tigers and more to do with the Yankees.  If there was anything that took precedence over loving the Tigers in my household, it was our complete and utter disdain for the Yankees.  The legend goes that my father attended a Yankees game as a boy when the great Mickey Mantle walked by on the warning track near the stands.  My grandfather said to the Mick, “Hey, Mick!  Sign an autograph for my son Johnny?”  The greatest switch hitter of all-time turned and sneered, “I ain’t got time.” 

Listen, I don’t know how much of any of that is true.  And I really don’t care.  I like to think that Mickey Mantle was rude to my father when my father was just a wide-eyed youth looking to get an autograph from the hero of every 1950’s kid in New York.  It supports my narrative.  I could ask my Dad to explain it to me again, as he probably has dozens of times over the years (generally after I’ve had one too many beers and the fog between reality and mythology further complicates my ability to sort fact from fiction).  We hate the Yankees and love the Tigers in my family.  I don’t feel the need to legitimize it.  It just is.