Roy, Where art Thou?

There I was, watching my baseball hero, my baseball idol, basically the reason why I love baseball, pitching in front of a great crowd in a critical postseason game. He was on the mound, soaking it all in. He lives for these games, and I lived, waiting five years, for one of these games. Just like he did so many times before, Roy Oswalt picked up the baseball, fired strikes, shut down the opposing team, and won a playoff game. All the while, I could not help thinking, "This is not how it was supposed to turn out." I expected to be enthralled watching Roy Oswalt pitch a gem in a postseason game, and I was, but I was nowhere near as excited as I thought I would be. If anything, seeing Roy Oswalt pitch his way to the headlines in another uniform was one of the harder experiences of my sports fan life.

Roy Oswalt is still a great pitcher, is still my favorite, and I hope to God that he wins the World Series this year, because he deserves it for being the most consistently great pitcher of the last decade. But he is no longer our great pitcher. He is the guy who got away. He was supposed to be an Astro for life. The Astros team that was one of the best in the NL from 2001-2006 was his team, built around him and pitching first. He was the frontman of the team, the image of the team. He was everything that we Astros' fans loved about the 2005 NL Pennant winning Astros. Tough, gritty, talented and most of all, resilient. That Astros team was our team. Every fan probably has that one year with their team that it all came together, that it all was perfect. As a Colts fan, that was the 2005 regular season, and the 2006 postseason. If they happened in the same year, that would have been great, but they happened 13 months apart, so it was fine. As an Astros fan, that was 2005. By then, I was a huge Astros fan, and more importantly a larger fan of Roy Oswalt, our young, talented, brilliant 20-game winner from 2004. The team was gutted at the start of 2005, starting the season 15-30 with Lance Berkman hobbling and Carlos Beltran weaseling his way to disappointing the Mets fans. That is when Roy became the guy.

The Astros finished the 2005 regular season on a 74-43 run, with Oswalt winning 20 games for the second straight year, and this time doing it with an ERA under 3.00. Oswalt was now a star, and he was headed for the great stage. In the 2005 NLCS, against the best team in the majors that year (the Cardinals, who went 101-61, and had the NL MVP and Cy Young Award Winner), Oswalt had two starts. Both came in a game following an Astros loss. Both were in St. Louis. Both were 7 inning, one run affairs. Game 2 was important to change the tone of the series, Game 6 was legendary.

Mitch Williams said at the top of FOX's broadcast that this game 2 of the 2010 NLCS was the biggest game of Roy Oswalt's career. This enraged me. Sure, the Astros are now a down-trodden, midget of a franchise, barely hanging on to any shred of dignity they may still have, but that doesn't mean that what Roy Oswalt did in Game 6 of the 2005 NLCS was any less impressive. That was my team, my pitcher, my game, and my greatest baseball memory. One game after Pujols' epic home run to steal Game 5 when the Astros were one out away from winning the NLCS, Oswalt toed the rubber in St. Louis. Bill Simmons called the series over, saying the Astros would never be able to recover from losing game 5. Roy Oswalt probably doesn't know who Bill Simmons is, and that is not the only reason I love him.

In the first inning, Oswalt faced Pujols, and quickly got to an 0-2 count. The next pitch effectively ended the series. Oswalt threw a 95 mph fastball up and in. Pujols swung, missed and fell over to his knees and struck out. Oswalt had won, beating the man that haunted the Astros, and breaking the spirit of the Cardinals. Oswalt threw 7 innings of 3 hit 8 strikeout ball to win the series for the Astros. He won the NLCS MVP in that series, with 14 innings, 8 hits, 15 strikeouts, and two wins in St. Louis against the NL's best offense. Yeah, Mitch Williams, I think he's pitched bigger games.

This is why I don't feel the same watching Oswalt pitch brilliantly in the spotlight again, because he's not on my team. We loved him. We appreciated the beauty of watching that man pitch even if the team was 45-57. The Phillies' fans see him as a rented hand, a mercenary brought on to win a ring. We saw him as a brother, a friend, a hero. Roy Oswalt was the best Astros pitcher maybe in team history (Nolan Ryan can probably dispute that). Roy Oswalt was our favorite pitcher. The Astros from 2006-2009 were not any good (the 2008 team was a smoke and mirrors 86-76), but we always felt that at least every fifth day, we had the best team, because we had Roy.

The only Roy getting credit is Halladay. Halladay is a great pitcher, and his no-hitter was great. But the sign of a truly great one is what Oswalt did in Game 2. After Halladay lost, leaving the Phillies in an unenviable position heading into game 2, Oswalt did what a true ace does. He stopped the bleeding. He came out and retired the first 14 batters of the game. He gave up three hits all night, and struck out nine. He had the whole crowd behind him. But it was the wrong crowd. It is the crowd that still loves Halladay more, and still loves Hamels more. Loving Hamels more is fine, since he's their Oswalt.

Oswalt was the homegrown guy, the prospect and then the rookie we saw grow up, mature and dominate. The 2005 Astros had two other aces, in Clemens and Pettitte, but Oswalt was the "ace", and the hometown favorite because he was with us from the start. He wasn't brought in here when the going was good, and he was going to stay when the going was bad, unlike Pettitte who fled back to his mommy in the Bronx. When Oswalt finally, quietly asked for a trade, we all defended him, and agreed with him, because all of us wanted a trade from the Astros too. Roy got his wish, and we got our wish, to watch him pitch great in the biggest of games again. We got to see him pitch in front of a crowd and raise the energy of a ballpark again, we just all wish it was our ballpark.

The Great Divorce

I first heard it on Friday. It was news that I had been expecting for sometime, but even then, it caught me off guard. It killed me, it pained me, it made me more distraught than anything else had in sports in years. Just three months after my team lost a heartbreak of a Super Bowl, my sports year and turned even worse. Roy Oswalt was demanding a trade, divorcing himself from the Astros, which considering they suck is quite understandable, but more than that, divorcing himself from me. Roy Oswalt does not know me, and probably never will, but I know him, I cheered for him and I love him, and I don't know what to do.

First, I should say that I do not blame Roy at all. He was the Astros best pitcher of the last 10 years, and in all honesty, was probably the best pitcher in the NL for the entirety of his run here. He battled and bled for the Stros, and now he deserves a better fate than to tirelessly pitch to a team that struggles to score but one run for him. Roy was amazing for the Astros, and now that he gave his life to help this team to its first World Series ever, they should give be a lifesaver and ship him off to a team where he can win games. But this is not about Roy and his connection to the team, this is about my connection with Roy.

Baseball is a funny sport. It is not about entertainment and fun, it is about love. Purely and simply love. It fosters a deeper more human relationship between a fan and a team. There is a personal attachment to a baseball team because each season is eternal. The baseball offseason offers the cold detachment of a separation. The spring training is like a yearly honeymoon, where the possibilities of this love seem endless. The season is a long, marathon and the vows of marriage are renewed each year. Unlike the Colts and Raiders, who are just my teams, the Astros are my partner. In many ways my relationship with the Astros are much more volatile. I love them to death, but honestly I need marriage counseling. They are a horrible organization right now, with little direction and an aging, moderately talented roster. They are a laughingstock, but I married them, and I am not ready to divorce them, yet. But pushing the one and only redeeming part of the Astros, and the part that made me love them in the first place out of town, might just end it.

I first married the Astros in 2001. I did it because of Roy. It was unexplainable really what made him so appealing. His demeanor, his look, his 'screw-you' attitude, and his talent all mixed together to provide a potent sum. Oswalt was a bull-dog in style but simply a great pitcher in substance. He was the perfect underdog, short and stocky from Weir, Mississippi, a town with a population of 314. Bursting onto the scene with a 14-3, 2.73 ERA season in 2001, he finished second to Albert Pujols in the Rookie of the Year Voting. One 19-9 season later, Oswalt was a top-10 pitcher, something he would be for the rest of his Houston career. Oswalt was the most appealing part of the Astros for me, and I attached myself to him and the team, and went along for quite the tumultous marriage.

Roy Oswalt was the man that gave me my happiest non-football sports memory ever, with his brilliant performance in Game 6 of the 2005 NLCS against St. Louis. Two days after Albert Pujols' infamous home run off Brad Lidge, Oswalt toed the rubber with the Astros still in a state of shock. He, however, was not, and I watched Oswalt pitch one of the greatest games of his life. For seven breathtaking innings, he shut down the NL's best team in their own ballpark. Under a dark, mystifying night in St. Louis, the gateway to the West, Oswalt was the gateway to the World Series. The Astros were finally playing in a world series, and Oswalt, the NLCS MVP, was given a 400,000$ tractor as a MVP gift, and a new 6-year contract. Drayton McLane, the Astros owner, was standing in front of a champion locker room and put his arms around Oswalt, the man he said would be an Astro for life. I had the same feeling. He was the king of baseball for that one night, he was the star, and the marriage could not have been better.

Five years later, the marriage has hit rock bottom. The Astros are floundering, the Astros are a disorganized mess. The Astros have cheated on me by not rebuilding, not restocking the farm system. They have dominated me by having an owner blind to anything but the bottom line. I am ready to divorce them, but I have to deal with Oswalt first.

He was my hero, my guide, my partner. He was the man that kept me interested in the Astros during the last five dark years. He was the man that made me love pitching. He was the man that made me watch baseball tonight in awe of the beauty of the lovable game. Roy Oswalt will probably be dealt to some other team, some contender where he can actually go better than 2-6 with that 2.66 ERA. And that will leave me with a horrible decision. Do I divorce the Astros and follow Roy? Leave my spurned lover that spurned me, or stay faithful to the abusive partner. That is the question, but all I know is that for nine years, the Astros gave me wonderful memories, and moreso did Roy. You cannot explain true love, and really I cannot explain why I feel this nagging connection to a team that does not do anything redeeming at all, but it is still there. For Oswalt, though, there has been no turmoil, no devastation, and no abuse. Oswalt was the perfect partner, and he deserves one as well, a team that can provide for him what he provided the Astros. I however, need him more than ever.