My Father, seconds after Nefty caught Arod looking

We’d been coming to Rangers games since Arlington Stadium days. My Father and I. The closest we’d come to baseball nirvana was a single postseason win in 96. The 2010 season caught everybody by surprise, with the Rangers going 90-72 then winning their first postseason series against the Rays. But the World Series?

Come on, man. That was for the Yankees and The Red Sox, not your little-red-shoed Rangers. But somehow, there we were. One strike away from beating the Yankees in the ALCS and earning our first trip to baseball’s biggest stage. It was up to Neftali Feliz, who got the closer job in May after Frank Francisco kept shitting the bed. He worked quickly and got Arod to 1-2 then froze him with a wicked curveball and that was it.

The roar at the Temple, my God. The release of emotion after so many seasons in hell. I looked at my Father, standing beside me pumping the October air with his fists. Most of life is forgotten. The days blur by and before you know it, twenty years have passed then your whole life. But this day, this moment of pure joy, will never leave me.