There's really no reason we can't be reasonable about this.

Then again, there's no real reason why we can, either.

I'm understanding, to a point. Who isn't? The fact that recent events are neither surprising or unique is rather depressing enough.

Even now, I am willing to accept some perspective. Shea was born in a sinful combination of the flight of National League baseball to the West Coast, impregnated in the lustful dreams of Robert Moses, a primary architect of said flight. No place can survive such a birth untouched. One would like to believe that alone caused the events of recent years, the last grasping claws of a primordial original sin, clawing and scraping as it is dragged off to a hell of non-existence.

But I suppose we know better.

One year is all you get, because I deserve better than this. Better than knowing that the last game wasn't even worth watching. Knowing that the only thing that is saving me from current incarceration for attempted murder is that a last game ticket was given to another instead of me.

You have at least one man among you. Follow him.

Assuming the whole of the country does not collapse under its own ridiculous weight by next summer, I will see the rest of what baseball has to offer. I will even set foot in your new domicile. But nothing less than success will be enough.

Because nothing can erase what has transpired here. Winning the league by 30 games, going undefeated in the postseason, and sleeping with the other team's wives on national television won't remove this stain from you. Ever. It is yours.

And a man can only take so much.