October 20, 2005
Party Time!
Houston fans had a good time downtown last night.
When the final out was recorded, fans hugged each other in the street and revelers ran from bars shouting, leaping and cheering.
"I love it so much!" screamed a beaming Larry Benavidez.
Cars packed with screaming Astros fans clogged downtown streets soon after the game. Drivers inched forward and held their hands out their windows, high-fiving pedestrians milling in the streets. People stood up through the sunroofs and hung out the side windows of their vehicles, waving Astros banners, flags, towels and the occasional brassiere as others marched on the sidewalks chanting "Astros, Astros, Astros."
"It's our turn now," screamed Andy Martinez, 44. "I've waited 35 years to see this. It's a lifetime dream. Now I can take my son and grandson to a World Series game. I never thought I would be able to do that."
This World Series will be a lot like 2002, when a wild card that never played for a championship played an historic franchise that hadn't won the title in years. That turned out to be a very good series.
I'm not sure if I'd rather be there or in Boston over the last couple years.
On the one hand, sounds like they had a good time... and they managed to do it without flipping cars and doing other stupid shit like people do in Boston.
On the other hand, I can't imagine the atmosphere there was half as intensely fun as even the Sox beating the A's in the 2003 playoffs.
Fan intensity in Boston is kind of a different level than just about any other U.S. city...it seems more consistent with the levels of insanity you see from football fans in Europe. Yet U.S. fans are different from the rest of the world in a bizarre, and perhaps revealing fashion: in the rest of the world, it is typically the fans of the LOSING team that sets things on fire/damages property, etc. Here, it's the opposite. I have never understood the orgy of violence that follows a fan's team WINNING here in the U.S.
Anyway...congrats, Houston fans...you celebrated a great and well-deserved LCS win with dignity. I've always been impressed by Houston's baseball fans...they seem to have great knowledge of the game, and give terrific support to their team, even when they're down. That said, so do St. Louis fans, widely and correctly recognized as some of the best fans in the game. It was a fun NLCS...the WS looks to be a lot of fun, too. Pitching, Pitching, Pitching!
yeah, it really WAS insane here. our idea of celebrating means thousands of people waiting in line for HOURS after 10:30 pm to BUY, not steal or burn or destroy, astros stuff from the academy and champs stores
there wasn't any violence, looting or any of that horse****
i don't like the "orgy of violence" after winning neither, and there is NO excuse for it.
and the st. louis fans, giving our guys and roy-o a standing o after we clinched the pennant, well all i can say is that was a true class act.
and i am glad to see a WS with pitching and defense instead of barely ok starters and a bunch of sluggers
GO STROS!!!!!