31 Days of Lessons Learned: It’s Hard Being a Tigers Fan Lately

31 Days of Lessons Learned:  Day Twenty Seven

It’s Hard Being a Tigers Fan Lately

With the line-up this year’s Detroit Tigers have, they should have easily won the division and coasted into the post-season.  Instead, watching them this year was like riding a roller coaster:  filled with amazing highs and unbearable lows.  Through it all though, they figured out a way to win and make it to the World Series.

I’m extremely happy about this, but man is it hard to watch them right now.  It almost feels like whatever momentum they had during their pennant chase and whatever run they’ve been on while they got past the A’s and swept the Yankees is completely over.

Their pitching has been absolutely amazing (save for JV’s Game 1 egg) and the hitting just isn’t there.  The bats aren’t just cold, they’re frozen.  Now they’re down three games and on the brink of elimination.

I’m extremely frustrated and very critical about the performance the Detroit Tigers have had this World Series…but I’m still a fan.

So, while it’s hard and frustrating to be their fan right now, it’s something I am.

Rally Caps on folks.

Rally Caps On!

31 Days of Lessons Learned: Overconfidence can jump up and bite you

31 Days of Lessons Learned:  Day Twenty Four

Overconfidence can jump up and bite you

All day yesterday, I walked around with a bit of swag.  Why?  Because the Detroit Tigers were opening the World Series with Justin Verlander vs. Barry Zito.  It was in the bag, right?  All of America thought so…even in California (according to ESPN SportsNation that is).  The poll was overwhelmingly skewed in Detroit’s favor.  It made sense…the Tigers just finished sweeping the Yankees and the Giants just finished a grueling series with the Cardinals.  Everyone in my neck of the woods was looking for a huge victory by the Detroit Tigers.  We all had our Olde English Ds displayed with pride and just knew JV was going to get things rolling.  I was even thinking about taking a day off to go down to the celebration parade.  Hell, people were also making cute pictures like this one…

Saw this shared all over Facebook – I will credit the original creator if you let me know who you are…

What a difference a day makes.  Now I, along with Tiger Nation are sitting around in disbelief after watching the monumental World Series collapse of our beloved Detroit Tigers.  America seems to have changed their opinions as well.  A majority of the country now things San Fran will win the Series in 5 or 6 games based on the latest poll at ESPN SportsNation (only Michigan seems to think Detroit will pull it out).  It was almost like they reverted back to their frustrating selves from the regular season…no hitting, bad fielding, mediocre pitching.  It looks like the rest was not a good thing for the team after all.  I just hope we don’t have a repeat of the 2006 World Series.  That was a brutal series to watch.

Watching the San Francisco Giants dismantle the Detroit Tigers re-taught me a lesson…overconfidence can be a dangerous thing.  Sometimes it helps, but most times it just knocks you on your butt and makes you question yourself.  I’ve had that happen on more than one occasion in my life.  Thankfully, I’ve become gun shy in the process.  I’d rather be over confident than have no confidence at all.

Also, you’ll notice that I’m a day behind right now.  I was pretty deflated after the World Series game, so I wanted to sleep on it before I posted my lesson.  You’ll get another lesson from me later today.

31 Days of Lessons Learned: October Baseball is the best Baseball

31 Days of Lessons Learned:  Day Eleven

October Baseball is the Best Baseball

Aside from it being 10/11/12 today, it’s also a do or die game 5 for my Detroit Tigers.  Sorry for the short post tonight, but I’m cheering my boys on.  Go Tigers!

31 Days of Halloween Hijinks: Detroit Tigers pumpkin stencils

Day Eight:  Detroit Tigers pumpkin stencils

I’m sitting here watching my Detroit Tigers take on the Texas Rangers for the right to represent the American League in this year’s World Series.  In fast, aside from Halloween, October is also one of my favorite months because of the MLB postseason.

I’m not going to lie, today got past me a little bit.  I usually have my daily post up by now, but this is my first time at the computer.  As I was thinking about things to post about, I remembered back when the Detroit Pistons were a good team.  Around October, they offered free stencils for your pumpkins featuring different player’s faces.  That year, I ended up carving a Chauncey Billups and a Tayshaun Prince pumpkin.

Since the NBA offered stencils to their fans, surely the MLB would too, right?  I went a searching and sure enough, I found Detroit Tigers pumpkin stencils.  They’re glorious and I want to go buy eight pumpkins right now so I can carve them all and put them on my porch.  I won’t though because I need to go back to the game and coach my team!

Enjoy these stencils folks – and since I’m a nice guy, I’m also including links to the Texas Rangers, St. Louis Cardinals, and Milwaukee Brewers as well…even though my support is fully with Detroit.

Click on the pumpkin below to get to the Detroit stencils:

31 Days of Halloween Hijinks

As you can see by the above image, I’m getting ready for my 31 Day Challenge.  As extra motivation, I’m linking up with a collection of blogs filled with folks who are also doing other types of 31 Day Challenges.  Check out The Nesting Place linked over on the right in my blogroll (or click here – )

As you look to follow along my 31 day journey, use this page as your one-stop shop for everything.  While I’ll be adding each day of the challenge to my blog, I’ll also be direct linking all 31 Days to the bottom of this original post to make sure there’s an easy way to keep track of everything.

Based on my poll results, it looks like my readers want everything but book recommendations (too bad, I’m a bookseller, so you’re getting some of those too….), so expect a very diverse month of posts inspired by the Halloween season.  You’ll get everything from reviews, recommendations, recipes, craft ideas, costume ideas, interviews, and posts about all things that go bump in the night (among other things).

I’m very excited about this undertaking.  Thanks for supporting me in my efforts to make this October a spooktacular one.

Also, if you like what you see and want to link up with me on your blog, feel free to use the image below -Happy Horror…Happy Haunting…Happy Halloween!