Thank you, Oakland A's – The Athletic

By now, most of the anger has dissipated. The reactions have cooled, the rage has been spat out, and all the jokes about the stupid owner who was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple have been told. The Oakland Athletics will soon be history, which means it's time to put the sadness of the funeral behind us and turn instead to a well-deserved celebration of life.

With that in mind, the following should be said: To the Oakland A's, thank you.

For 57 summers, Oakland had its own team. And by extension, so did every kid like me who would get much more out of baseball than just a nice diversion. This game brought me closer to feeling like I belonged.

Looking back, the tension that came with growing up between two cultures was completely understandable. My parents came to the East Bay from the Philippines in the 1970s, and each had different ideas about fitting in. My father seemed largely indifferent to the Americanization of his children, and his enjoyment of sports seemed to depend mostly on his ability to bet on the outcome. My mother, on the other hand, seemed intent on us maintaining some connection to our origins. We would eat the food and at least understand the language.

These are wonderful thoughts, and they are still very present in my mind, especially now that I have my own daughter and son. But back then, they made me feel like I didn't quite fit in. On TV, the families didn't look like mine, and they didn't eat the same food as my family. It all felt strange.

Then, when I was nine, an older cousin introduced me to baseball by showing me a newspaper page he had taped to the wall. The bright headline referred to the 40/40 Club, and the photo showed a man holding a base in a green and gold uniform. It was impossible to miss José Canseco.

There must have been something about it that fascinated me, because from that moment on, the A's became my gateway into a new world. They gave me something to look at after school and talk about the next day. I receive Baseball, and it felt so good that the other sports soon became compulsory as well. This was the late 80s and the Bash Brothers ruled the American League. Rickey Henderson could run. Dave Stewart fought his way through his opponents before dominating them. Mark McGwire hit the ball very, very far. And when Dennis Eckersley stepped onto the mound, the game was over after a barrage of pinpoint fastballs and nasty sliders. Baseball didn't require cultural competence – you didn't need translation to understand it.

I spent summers buying baseball cards and playing Bases Loaded on my Nintendo. I would call the plays myself and pepper them with phrases like “Holy Toledo!” because that was Bill King's job and everyone knew Bill King was the best. As my siblings got older, they started watching too and that only made it more fun. Years later, baseball gave us something else to share.

But more than anything, baseball gave me something to chase, and it was only later in life that I learned to appreciate this as a wonderful gift. It had not occurred to me that it was more common not know where the goal is. While playing was out of the question, writing about baseball at least seemed within reach. Soon the goal became to get into the press box. Thanks to a series of lucky rebounds, it actually happened.

Every fall, a Hall of Fame ballot lands in my mailbox. I was there when Derek Jeter hit his 3,000th hit. I was there when Dallas Braden gave Alex Rodriguez an impromptu lesson about boundaries in the workplace. I was there when the Chicago Cubs won their first World Series since 1908. And yes, I was there when Bartolo Colon hit a home run.

It probably sounds silly, but no matter what happens next, I will always be able to say that I know what it's like to touch a dream.

Without the Oakland A's this wouldn't have happened.

As I reflect on my blessings, I realize many of them are thanks to baseball. It remains a constant in my life. It is present in the background of so many conversations with my brother. It was there this summer during the big family camping trip when we mimicked the batting stances of the 1988 A's starting lineup, crouching like Rickey and swinging the bat like Carney Lansford. It was there 20 years ago when we lost one of my sisters far too soon and we did something we all knew she would have wanted to do. That's why she rests with the No. 3 jersey of her favorite A's player, Eric Chavez.

I think of my sister often, especially now, and wonder what she would think of how it all turned out. In journalism, you have to leave your fan base at the door of the press box, and my mood hasn't depended on the outcome of an A's game for years. But baseball has allowed me to meet my wife, who is a Yankees fan. I'm sure she took me to see Moneyball once so she could enjoy the heartache her team had inflicted on mine. It's worked out pretty well – our kids are growing up in a house where there's always a baseball game on, so at least we know we're getting that part right.

One morning, as I was reading a story about Shohei Ohtani – a story in which he was declared the game's best player – my daughter looked up from her breakfast with a smile. She is only six, but she has already shown the first signs of an extraordinary and loving personality, not unlike one of her namesakes, my sister.

“Excuse me,” she said. “What about Aaron Judge?”

My wife and I could only smile.

So, thank you Oakland A's. Thank you for being here. Thank you for 1989. Thank you for being so good at baseball (most of the time). Thank you for the Big Three. Thank you for 20 games in a row. Thank you for all those Sunday afternoons in right field with my brother and my best friend. Thank you for inspiring a very happy kid who grew up to be a very happy man who hopes very much that there is a kid somewhere in Sacramento or Las Vegas who can still be moved by something as wonderful as owning their own baseball team.

(Top photo of the Oakland A's celebrating after defeating the Giants in the 1989 World Series: MLB via Getty Images)