A little muse here from Federal Baseball, a Washington Nationals blog, on why the current franchise is apt to ignore its Canadian past, which in turn sadly ignores the history of Expos greats like Andre Dawson and Tim Raines.
This is written in response to a mailbag question/answer on MLB.com. From a reader in Florida:
“Do you realize that Washington fans don’t care about Andre Dawson and Tim Raines? They never played for the Washington Nationals. You’ll never see their names on the Washington “Ring of Fame.”
And the reply from MLB.com’s Bill Ladson:
“Yes, I realize that Dawson and Raines never played in Washington, but the Nationals came from Montreal, so it’s fitting that these players are featured on the Nationals site.”
Kind of an interesting question. I can remember as a kid, seeing Chritsy Matthewson’s name on the wall at Candlestick Park with the old New York Giants logo, and thinking that it kind of made sense even though it was on the other side of the country.
Did any DC fans become Minnesota Twins fans the first time the Senators left? How about the second time, when the Senators became the Texas Rangers? I know a few Montreal fans remain from the 1,500 strong or so I used to see at the Stade Olympique who are still wearing Expos caps at Nationals’ games leaguewide and in DC. Should these fans, who have become Nationals’ fans, be deprived of the history with which they’ve grown up?
The Nationals themselves have made no attempt to recognize the franchise’s days in Montreal, while fully embracing DC’s baseball history. If Washington doesn’t recognize the “Montreal years” of the franchise, will the Expos’ players and their accomplishments be relegated solely to the record books?
But the most important question…Why all the hate for Montreal, Quebec, Canada?
Personally, my guess is that it soley has to do with the marketing of the team, and that part of that includes the fact that the team was from Canada. Toward the end the Expos were such a terribly run franchise, playing games in San Juan and to 2,000 fans in the most nationalistic corner of North America. I can see why the Nationals wouldn’t want to pretend as though there was any continuity.
That said, ignoring the careers of these two great players is terrible. I wouldn’t be surprised to see this changed down the road once the Nationals franchise is firmly in place. If Dawson makes the Hall of Fame in the near future I bet the Nationals will be falling over themselves to acknowledge it.
2 responses so far ↓
1 Simon Currie // Jan 17, 2008 at 11:23 am
As a former resident of Ottawa (which lost it’s AAA team too, but Canadian NHL franchises are now doing fantastic financially), I wish Washington would acknowledge its past more. But I fully agree with the logic in your comment. The last few years of the Expos was a disaster because it was a league owned team, so none of them wanted the ‘Spos to improve, of course. Which tied at least one of Minaya’s arms behind his back and forced firesales, which in turn accelerated the negative spiral of fans leaving the club that didn’t care about its fans.
2 Th'Plawker // Jan 17, 2008 at 11:53 am
I used to live in D.C. during the time that the Expos moved and I felt at the time there was a conserted effort to make the Nationals a team without a past. I wondered about it at the time and I think there’s a sense of entitlement, maybe because the city had lost teams in the past. There was this “ok, our team is back” kind of feel. As the name might indicate.
I think it’s too bad. But I don’t think people there think all that much about it. But I agree that someday they will do something about it. Probably after they feel they’ve totally dissed a piece of history.
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