Nos Amours are No more

Major league baseball performed euthanasia on the Montreal Expos Wednesday, confirming that the franchise will be relocated to Washington D. C. for the 2005 baseball season. With the deed done, 36 years of history and memories will come to a rather inglorious close.

There are many culprits in this horrid story, neglect by previous owners, indifference by a terribly run league and resignation by its fans all contributed to this final day, which had been expected for many years. Yes, it is true that a professional sports franchise surely cannot survive with only 4 to 5 thousand fans in a building, little or no media exposure and a marketing program that has no takers. But how did they get to here from there?

In 1969, Nos Amours as the Expos were known as in Montreal, were the talk of the town. They played in a tiny aluminum bleacher park called Jarry Park, located in the heart of a working class neighbourhood a fitting place for a decidedly working man kind of team. Night after night the place was rocking, I had the chance to take in more than a few games at Parc Jarry, when my Dad would take the two hour drive down to Montreal on a Saturday or Sunday, we’d get there early around 11 or so, find a place to park near the ball park and grab a bite to eat at some little restaurant. Around the noon hour we would then hike up to Jarry and take in the batting practice before an afternoon game.

The place was alive with chatter, new fans to baseball would trade quips with the age old veterans who had followed the Royals a for years in the minors. They will tell you today that Montreal didn’t know baseball, but I disagree the Montreal I went to knew its baseball. The names still bounce around in my head those first few years, John Bocc-a-bella, Le Grande Orange Rusty Staub, Mack Jones ( I loved sitting in Jonesville waiting for a toss of home run denied by Mack). They may not have won very much in those early years but there can be no doubt that Les Expos were the pride of the city, finally stepping up to the Big time.

Jarry Park was only a temporary stage, the Big Owe would be the place to call home. And for a while it worked fine, while there are only 5000 on a good night now, back then 40-50,000 fanatics would take the Metro to the far east end and follow their love. The Big O while a nice big stadium, didn’t have the same intimacy of Parc Jarry, but this was the seventies everything bigger was better, and you know while the team was a winner, while they didn’t sell off their players the fans went there too!

They never won a World Series though they came oh so close, I was in Montreal for game two of the series between the Dodgers and the Expos, a win if I remember correctly, far up on the third base side in a jam packed Big O, I cheered on my team and its step towards destiny. One of those special sporting moments you never forget.

Eventually things returned to Montreal for a game five showdown, as the ninth inning , moved along Steve Rogers gave up a two run homer to Rick Monday on a Blue Monday in October, ending the Expos dream of a shot at the World Series. Oh so close, yet so far, far away now! To this day baseball fans (and they’re still there in Montreal despite the opinion of Bud Selig) wonder why the Expos would turn the pivotal moment in a game over to a starter, instead of trusting the bull pen. Like many I was watching that heart breaking game on television, hoping against hope that the Expos would come back. Alas the ending not quite what we had hoped, the Dodgers forever earning my hatred by eliminating my team, denying it the destiny we all thought was ours. Dawson, Carter, yes even Rogers (we’ve long since forgiven the two run homer), long suffering and in our eyes deserving heroes, left to ponder what could have been.

Yet the fans continued to care about this team, though baseball strikes and tight fisted owners would eventually wear them down. The final blow was that strike of 1994, the Expos running away with the East would never get to put a powerful line-up into action in a NLCS or a World Series. The labour disruption which resulted in the cancellation of the World Series would spell the end of baseball in Montreal. The team may officially be dead today, but it long since expired on that black day for baseball in 94.

When the game returned to the field, the players on the Expos would find themselves in different uniforms, management having decided the new reality of baseball meant dealing away the heart of the team. The term fire sale became part of the Expo lexicon. Larry Walker would leave Canada for the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, a marketing dream for what used to be Canada’s Team now sent south like a side of beef, back when beef was allowed across the border.

The inevitable followed, fans frustrated with a game that showed them no respect, returned the favour. A few more half hearted tries at building a downtown stadium would be launched and then abandoned. Our final act in this miserable play, involves a carpet bagging owner that parlayed the Expos into a Miami franchise, taking most everything but the seats with him as he crossed the line. Leaving the Expos in the care of Major League baseball’s owners, if the Expos were a child someone would have phoned Family Services, for this was a near a case of child abandonment as you’ll ever find.

They struggled on for a few more years becoming a travelling side show, half the season on the road, the other half spent split between “home” in Puerto Rico and the other home the “true home” of Montreal. The announcement today handled with all the pomp and ceremony of a boarding call at the airport, which considering the recent history of this team seems almost appropriate.

Insult of all insults, they finish off their history in Montreal against the Florida Marlins, owned by Jeffrey Loria, the above mentioned schemer who ran one team into the ground so as to pick up another.

With the clock ticking down on the franchise the 30,000 fans who attended this wake began to make their feelings known. The game was disrupted a few times due to fan misbehaviour but overall, things remained calm as Florida finished off the Expos with a 9-1 victory. A quick Shower, hit the bus turn and out the lights, the era is over.

The Expos players now move on to a road trip and then re-location. They will move the team that once was the pride of Canada to Washington DC. A city that twice has had a major league franchise only to lose it both times. Think three times is the charm? Not the way Baseball runs its shop, how long before the Whatever's start to make noise about moving on again? If Montreal is a “bad” baseball city, one wonders just what special affinity Washington has with the game. Hello Minnesota, Hello Texas does anyone remember your team for its Washington roots? For those above the 49th there will be no great attachment to the DC Whatever’s. Like the Nordiques and Jets of hockey who also left for the south, the DC franchise will find little interest from fans up north.

They move the Expos to DC without an owner, a decrepit stadium and a possible confrontation with the owner of the Baltimore Orioles. While we wish the players well, a curse upon Bud Selig and his band of corporate weasels, may they continue to find nothing but troubles in what was once a worth while sport to watch.

Perhaps the two sides in the current hockey showdown can take a look at how Baseball never recovered from its 1994 labour dispute. Gary Bettman should need no further studies on how a disruption can have long term repercussions on the sport. For those that claim Montreal was not a baseball town, remember this, when the team was competitive and the game worth watching the Big O was a place to be, filled with patrons in love with their team. Sadly that relationship never recovered from the incompetence of the sports power brokers.

The heavy thinkers in the NHL and the NHLPA should take note, they may have seen a vision of their future, and its name was Nos Amours, Les Expos!

Thanks for the memories, there were far too many to count. There are baseball fans in Canada, bet on that Bud, but fans of Major League Baseball? There may not be near as many as there were a few weeks let alone years ago. But then Major League Baseball never really cared about its fans eh Bud, its all about greed. And frankly that’s a game we can do without. Paging Messrs. Bettman and Goodenow, anybody listening?