Ark of the Lost Angels

The Mets Stadium just before the Rain _{(Credit: Lex McKee)}

The New York Mets’ current playoff run exemplifies humanity’s love of an underdog.

The Major League Baseball playoffs are currently underway, with the New York Yankees and the Cleveland Guardians competing in the American League Championship Series, and the New York Mets taking on the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Championship Series. The Dodgers and Yankees are both the top seeds in their respective leagues, and the Guardians are the number two seed in the American League. The Mets, however, barely scraped into the MLB playoffs. Tied with the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Atlanta Braves, the Mets and Braves both held the tiebreakers with the Diamondbacks, so the Braves and Mets faced off in a doubleheader the day before the Wild Card games began. If they split the games, then both would advance to the playoffs. If one team swept, the loser would be knocked out and the Diamondbacks would eke into the playoffs by the skin of their teeth.

The Mets got into the playoffs and then some. The number six seed, who were mathematically improbable to make the playoffs at the beginning of the season started a postseason fire which carried them through the Wild Card series against the Miluwakee Brewers to face down a division rival in the Divisional series. The Mets triumphed over the Philadelphia Phillies and now are facing off against the best team in the National League, the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Many baseball fans are cheering for the Mets to go all the way to the World Series and win it. They are the Cinderella story of this year’s MLB postseason because they were so heavily favored to lose earlier.

So why do people love rooting for the underdog?

America was built off the underdog story. The American Revolution – which is really more a war of secession than an actual revolution – had the Continental Army, which started as a ragtag group of territorial militias and volunteer fighters, face off against the greatest military on the face of the earth at the time. The British Empire ruled the seas, and had an army seasoned from the Seven Years’ War which ended only twelve years before the American Revolution began. The British Empire stretched across the globe.

Yet, with the help of some valuable allies such as France, the Continental Army transformed itself into a formidable fighting force and won a hard fought independence. That attitude permeates the American experience and influences so much of our culture.

The underdog story in sports is no new thing. The step further for sports to influence on politics makes sense in the global world. The Olympics became a battlefield during the Cold War, since the tensions between United States and the Soviet Union could not be settled conventionally. In the spirit of the underdog, the Miracle on Ice at the Lake Placid Winter Games in 1980 saw a team of American amateur hockey players faced down and defeated the Soviet team of seasoned professionals who had taken the gold four times in a row.

There are several psychological theories as to why people root for the underdogs.  

In many cases, a group that is too dominant for too long and is expected to perform well will inspire people to root for the underdog as a way of defiance, or simply to keep one group from dominating too long. Humans have a preference towards fairness, hence why so many of the hierarchical power structures built in human society were built and maintained by force.

More than that, however, rooting for the underdog exemplifies the natural hope that’s a hallmark of the human experience. To believe that the unfavorite can win against the odds encapsulates the sense of defiance against the “proper” order of things which is the largest marker of human progress. There were those who believed powered flight could not be done, much less landing a man on the moon. Yet, humans found ways to rebel against gravity itself merely to prove they could.

Sometimes, our reasons for wanting the underdogs to win is more spiteful. Sometimes, it’s more enjoyable to watch the favorites or the dominant group fall apart, and rooting for the underdogs is more about rooting against their opponent. Part of that may be the desire for fairness, but there’s an underlying bitterness in humanity that we love to see the scrappy underdog win but we also love to see champions lose. Perhaps it’s a sober reminder to all of us that our positions are precarious, and past victories don’t ensure future triumphs. Perhaps it’s a way to feel better about our situations, that even the greats fail. Perhaps it’s just plain spite, and we like to see successful things stop being successful. Or maybe the truth lies somewhere in the middle, in different positions for each person.

In this year’s baseball playoffs, there may be elements of all of them at play. The New York Yankees have been perennial favorites for decades. They have the coffers to pay out winning lineups year after year, and the name recognition of being the Yankees. They are one of the oldest, most storied teams in baseball, and lots of players leap at the chance to play for the Bronx Bombers. The Cleveland Guardians have been reliably making the playoffs and holding winning records for several years now. They sit as the number two seed in the American League to the Yankees, and both teams are currently duking it out in the American League Championship Series.

On the National League side, The Los Angeles Dodgers are one of the best teams in baseball, and with the biggest baseball contract ever keeping baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani in the City of Angels for another nine years after this season concludes, they are firmly in the position of the favorite. Yet, the Mets are still alive, currently tied 1-1 in the National League Championship Series. The team from Queens has been the second team of New York and have lived in the Yankees’ shadow for many years. In recent years, their output on the field has been nothing to write home about. Even as late as mid-August, they were predicted to miss the playoffs. Yet here they are, fighting tooth and nail to make it to the World Series and hopefully win it all.

Personally, I think the idea of a Cinderella story encapsulates the hope and indomitable spirit at the heart of both humanity and America. I want the Mets to go all the way and win the World Series because I like seeing teams who have struggled for so long get their moment to shine. Remembering when the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl on a year we got lucky and hit a hot streak at the right time, I want to see that same feeling hit the Mets fans who will be the first to admit the struggles and troublesome nature of supporting their team. Being a Baltimore Orioles fan has left me with a deep appreciation and measure of sympathy for those who stand by their teams even in the dark times.

Only time will tell if the Mets can fell the two Goliaths which stand between them and glory. But I’d like to think there are a lot of baseball fans out there who are like me and want to see them go the distance.