Here's mine:
I'm born in HK, came here when I was 8 in 1988. I never followed professional sports in Hong Kong. Immediately, I started being a fan of the Lakers, Suns, 49ers, Leafs and the Jays. Can't blame a kid for following winning teams, right? But, baseball was an alien sport. It took me a few years before I understood what a force out was, why runners were hovering off the base before the pitch, what R, H, and E stood for, etc. The spitting too, why so much spitting?
1989 came, and the Jays played Oakland for the ALCS. I still remember Canseco's moonshot in Skydome, and how much I hated the As. The player I hated most was Eck and his stache. He looked scary AND evil. During 1990, 1991, I started to understand the game better. Collecting baseball cards obviously helped. Upper Deck Rookie Cards of Mo Vaughn, Todd Van Poppel, Steve Karsay, Ben McDonald, Frank Thomas, Chipper Jones, and even Michael Jordan hooked me in from 91. Somewhere in between was the Alomar and Carter deal. I had no idea who Alomar and Carter was until I checked my card collection. It was my version of "Google" back then.
Then came 92. The Alomar home run in Oakland in the ALCS vs Eck (!!!). Ed Sprague's home run in gm 2 of the World Series. The Catch. Missed triple play. Morris crapping the joint when the entire city was ready for the series clincher. Then finally, in extra innings, Winfield collected his first extra base hit to drive in the game winning run. The final out came from Timlin to Carter with Carter jumping for joy. We all remembered where we were at that moment. Elation.
Rinse and repeat for 93, insert some WAMCO, Olerud flirting with the DiMaggio's 56 game hitting streak, and William's .400 BA, and the season capped off with a walk off home run by Joe Carter.
Four years into being a fan of the Jays, and I already tasted the joys of two championships. Talk about being spoiled.
From 94 until now, it's been filled with disappointments, and few triumphs. If only the two WS wins could be spread out during that time period. Toronto went from being a big market team to a small market, then back to a big market team. Regardless, I've followed them every year, some more closely than others.
And now, with so much optimism coming from this offseason's moves, and with the Jays being one of the favourites to reach the playoffs, I can't wait for spring to come. No person chooses to pick their time as to when they start being fans of a team. It could be a player, a moment, or simply just location. If some fans' interests coincide with the Jays' good fortunes starting next season, maybe they'll have the same fan storyline as me, but hopefully with fewer disappointments along the way
