Birth of a Rivalry

Nothing in sports quite compares to the combination of excitement and loyalty that a great rivalry creates. Rivalry is where sports passion reaches to the core of both the fan and (maybe more so) the athlete. I think we might be witnessing the birth of another fine baseball rivalry, between the playoff-veteran, storied-team Boston Red Sox and the young upstart, expansion-team Tampa Bay Rays. They will meet in the American League Championship Series, starting Friday, after spending the last few weeks of the season jockeying for the AL East division title. The Rays finally won the division, a franchise first, the Sox took the AL Wild Card spot.

The Rays have turned their team around in the past few seasons, going from a joke (the double-A's) to being four wins away from the World series. To say that no one outside of Tampa Bay ever believed this would happen--ever--is to understate the general assessment of the Rays before 2008. Yet here is a strong team with lots of passion, if not legions of fans. The thing to watch in this upcoming ALCS is whether those fans will materialize with a series win and a trip to the big show, or more interestingly, with a miserable loss to the division's new powerhouse Sox.

Will we more likely see a surge of fandom in Tampa Bay with the achievement of their team's wild dream, or with that opportunity denied? And how would the Red Sox fans react to being beaten by the once-oh-so-lowly Rays?

This upcoming American League Championship has the power to create a new great baseball rivalry. It will be a lot of fun to watch.