Identifying the Kansas City - St. Louis Cultural Divide

But if cardinals fans were being honest with themselves, I doubt they would say that. So many of my chance encounters with the best fans in baseball results in them bashing the current royals, me making comments about interleague (I’ve seen many games where the royals just owned them…though this was also during the Teahen era so take that as you will) and then they bring up Denkinger.

I get it, its a tough loss on a bad call. But as I’ve always said, even with that call, the cards didn’t show up to game seven. End of story. Be as bitter as you want, but your team didn’t man up when it counted. Sorry. And while I’m at it, they have won in the playoffs since 85. They have been a team in contention in the nl central for years now. I can understand why the front office of the royals as a whole is stuck in the 80s, but cards fans? C’mon. If they truly were the best fans in baseball as they so lovingly call themselves, I think they would have put a bad call that happened almost 3 decades ago behind them.

to annoy Royals fans is Cardinals fans insisting their team was so bad in 2006. For obvious reasons, this doesn’t go over well with Royals fans.

I think both urban cores have the traditional big labor/minority bloc that keeps things blue, while the suburbs (Overland Park, Clayton) are more moderate conservative (fiscally conservative, socially liberal) and the exurbs are conservative (Olathe, Wentsville).

Also, are we Springfield or are we Shelbyville in this rivalry?

Unlike, say, Rangers-Astros, which is just a group of Texans arguing about which gigantic sprawling sweltering Sun Belt metroplex is more “hell yea Texas, baby!” than the other

Seriously, ravioli????

I have mentioned in the “best fans” article that I grew up predisposed to becoming a fan of the Cardinals without actually being exposed to what the fan base embodied. It is simple: my father was alive before the Royals existed, so he thus witnessed Bob Gibson and his amazing talents and thus rooted for his “in-state” team, although he grew up in the northwest corner of Missouri, five or more hours from St. Louis. My father became a bigger Royals fan over the years due to proximity and that he had a close friend that went to the infamous baseball school with Frank White, but he still preached that St. Louis was “in-state” and that it was “okay” to root for them. In the mean time, I was watching WGN in my basement, enjoying Harry’s drunken Cubs broadcasts. And once the “Bo knows” craze came and went, I remained in awe of the Athletic’s athleticism of Canseco, Henderson, and McGwire.

So years later I attended the University of Missouri in Columbia and realized what it all meant: the Cardinals history of being the strongest Midwestern team, Denkinger, and the likes. My closest friend became a guy who we all called “Chicago” and together we were thrust into Cardinals’ territory and interacted with the fans first hand in the belly of the beast. What I am trying to say is that my revelations were experienced first hand without prior knowledge to these “cultural differences”; therefore, I feel they are validated.

So over the years I witnessed LaRussa coach an A’s team full of ’roiders that did astronomically well, putting the Royals fantastic finishes in 2nd place (no wild card then folks), and we all damn well know that there is a decent chance he knew exactly what his players were doing behind the scenes. Then he comes to St. Louis and brings McGwire with him at just the time that I am arriving at college. Added to this was that I was watching Cubs games a lot with my buddy and guffawing at the fine theatrics of Fernando Vina. And then came the interaction with the Cardinals fans on our dorm floor. Some of whom would hang Denkinger articles on their room door.

So the stereotypical Cardinals trends were growing during that era: taking washed up player x and turning him into a serviceable player, taking a utility man and turning him into an everyday player, using old school baseball moves like bunting and suicide squeezes to score runs, and using the entire bullpen in a 9 inning game in which the starter went 7 innings just to get the right “matchups”. The thing that bothers me about these Cardinals trends is that so many of them seemed like luck. No other teams could execute those strategies with that much success, so I am challenged as to why or how they did it. Was it that they employed expert strategies, or that they were just lucky? Did they really have great players, and the medias browbeating of the old style tactics obscured this? Anyhow, what happened was that grumpy old lawyer of a coach LaRussa took all the credit.

So LaRussa implanted himself as the hard-assed coach who “did things right” who has over the years contradicted himself on so many levels that I am confused as to how he isn’t a public whipping boy by this time. He was arrested for a DUI without too much concern, and then months later a Cardinal pitcher was killed in a car crash while intoxicated. The Cardinals won a World Series with a freaking 83 win team, in a series in which Tigers pitchers committed a comedic amount of errors. All the while, the Steroid Era was raging, and LaRussa was catching little flack for the amount of players he had coached who had enhanced their performance. When the smoke cleared, LaRussa was gifted a player who may yet become the greatest player of all time. A player that is constantly referred to as a gentlemanly, clean player. Should I also mention that LaRussa’s daughter is a Raiderette?

Ok, so here we are. Am I jealous? I will say no. I want to say that my beef is that LaRussa, while embodying all these elements of the mythical “old school” coach, is really nothing more than a guy that has been gifted fantastic players with a fantastic pitching coach that seems to have won championships due to either massive PED use, or, dare I say, luck? I am in no way trying to take away from those 90s and 00s Cardinals teams. If you win, you win, point taken. Tons of players did PEDs, I don’t really have an opinion one way or another on that. I am just confused as to why LaRussa gets a hall pass, and others are ridiculed. It adds to this whole dualism that the Cardinals represent. And furthermore, I am constantly annoyed by the media/fans putting LaRussa and the Cardinals on a pedestal as if they do everything right, while the same media/fans take high offense to any criticisms or pot shots.

I am getting my licks in the office as of today.. I’m already hearing the AAA team from KC hosting the redbirds bit.. I can respect how old and historic the cardinals franchise is plus the old stl browns.. But Thier fans I absolutely loathe.. It will be nice to see how they conduct themselves post Pujols.. And for those whomever are getting ragged on and want to have a new retort for obnoxious cards fan use the following.

Didn’t we sweep you guys last year?

 Coming from south central Kansas I grew up a Royals fan. Everyone fought for the right to wear the coveted #5 in little league.Some were OK with #20, #6, #56 or even #1 (Buddy Biancalana was Our Pecota). There was one kid that moved to town from Odessa, Missouri who was a Cardinal fan. He’d catch hell from everyone in the league. I’ll admit, I plunked him more than once pitching in the sandlot. After the 85 WS he didn’t speak to anyone on the diamond for the whole 86 season. I almost felt bad about it as an adult until about 6 years ago when I moved to Mid-Missouri.

 That’s when I met Mama Bear. Her whole family is absolutely INSANE about the Cardinals (well, except for one sister that’s a Cubs fan…we all hate her). We’d go places in town with me sporting my Royals gear. I might as well have worn an “I Love Osama and Obama” T-shirt. Most of the ribbing was good-natured until the interleague games started. Even Baby Bear was giving be a bad time about it.

 I’d have my moments…such as last year watching the Cards play the Cubs I believe. Fatass Reyes came in to relieve the Cards pitcher. I told Mama Bear to brace herself for an epic homer to cost StL the game. Two pitches later she was ready to walk out on me because I was right. Those moments of redemption have been few and far between.

 Last year we went to the middle game of the Cards series at the “K”. Of course it was the game the Royals dropped. Sitting amongst the sea of red wasn’t pleasant that day…until CrownVision played the highlight reel from GAME 6. I had 4 free tickets to the Sunday game, but we had to miss it to pick up Baby Bear at the Big Bad Wolf’s house (it was dad’s weekend). On the way we listened to the Royals beat StL like a drum on the radio. Just to be an ass I switched the station to the KC broadcast for some “impartial” commentary. Later I sent Mama Bear a text to let her know the Royals signed Pujols to a contract…Not telling her it was in the 80’s when Luis Pujols played 6 games as a backup catcher. You would have thought an asteroid was going to destroy the earth by her reaction. Just a little payback for all of the “the Royals look good this year…what are they, 15-20 games out of first” comments over the years.

I often wonder why they make the trip across the state and support the Kansas City economy so much if it’s not a rivalry to them. Some people travel to road games with their favorite team, but not that many people. They clearly care about it more than they’ll ever admit.

Those red-clad wussies whine about barely making the playoffs. WTF? Your team is in the playoffs every freaking year! I don’t give a rip if it’s a wildcard or not…IT’S THE FRIGGIN PLAYOFFS!!!

I lived in Nevada, Mo for almost 2 years and almost everyone down there is a Cards fan. Coincidentally, almost no one knowss anything about baseball either, and couldn’t name any players on “their favorite team” besides Pujols.

Also, StL is a nasty city and I wish the flood would have knocked that big stupid arch down. If you’ve ever played Oregon Trail, you know the trip to the west started in Independence.

Honestly I don’t even think they’re trying for that or care about it. I’ve known A LOT of people from St Louis (went to college at Missouri in an all-St Louis fraternity, and have had family there all my life), and none of them so much as read books or go see local music.

In fact, there is no music scene there to speak of. Decent venues are few and far between. I used to be a roadie on little Midwest tours for an indie rock band, and the St Louis leg of the tour was ALWAYS by far the worst, despie the fact that we knew more people there than any other stop.

I’m a serious chess player and some philanthropist who plays chess built a really expensive chess center there that hosts the US championship. I’ve been there and it’s really nice.

Chess in KC is nearly dead because all the people who run tournaments just fight each other.

I hate hate hate St.Louis and everything about it.
It sucks, my hatred isn’t so much unreasoning as it is purely vehement.
They can all eat a candy bar out of my ass.

We will be dominating you over the next decade in MLB & NFL bitches, get ready for it.

me vs STL is a daily battle. Always looked down at because I am wearing my royals hat, people saying that prospects never work and “when is the last time the cardinals used prospects”. I even heard one fan saw LaRussas DUI was “bullshit” because “do you know how little you have to drink to be over the limit” and “the cop was obviously just doing it because it was a celebrity, he wouldnt do it to a regular person because of the paperwork”. This same kid made fun of Brady Morningstars DUI, if you think one is legit, both have to be.

cause this place is like the “wanna-be” little St. Louis. They have their Springfield Cardinals, everyone is starting to put their high school name stickers on their cars just like in St. Louis, and everyone raves about “Imo’s Pizza” cause its from St. Louis and soooo gooooood. Bullshit.
Before I left this area to join the Marines this area was pretty much neutral. I mean there were more Cardinal games broadcasted on the radio, but the typical citizen said they liked both St. Louis and Kansas City. Well now that the Springfield Cardinals are here everyone is a Cardinals fan, everyone.
Recently I went to a local sportsbar, dressed in Royals gear, looked around to see if the pre-game was on and found it was not. So I pulled up to the bar, ordered a Boulevard and asked the bartender if he could throw the Royals game on. He half-ass glances at my jersey, gives a little smirk then proceedes to put the Royals game on the smallest television in the bar, now mind you this is a typical midwestern sportsbar probably 40+ televisions out there and seriously he puts in on the smallest fucking one. After serving another couple people their drinks, he goes back over to the control center where he changes the TV’s and proceeds to put the Cardinals game on the other 39 TV’s and cranks the volume skyhigh. At this point it was a war.
I didn’t get up and head home, I just sat there and pacing myself knowing its a 9 inning game, drank about two more tall boys down all the while, the same bartender clown, who must have finished his shift, was welcoming in all his Card’s buddies and they started to get rowdy and drunk. At one point one said to me, even though I was minding my own business “Hey LaRussa has an extra hat for you if you wanna switch sides!” I calmly replied “No thanks, I’d rather not get his shingles.” and the dude turned to his buddies and said “What, LaRussa has shingles?” Out of the six or seven “diehard” fans they portrayed themselves to be, only one guy finally said “yeah he hasn’t managed in a couple of days.”
I don’t know what the point of that story was, just thought I would tell someone, but Im usually out and about in Springfield wearing Royals gear, and hardly ever run into another Royals fan.

I feel cheated by not being an active part of this rivalry. If I take a trip to St. Lou, are they going to make fun of me because I’m a Royals fan? Or because I’m from the land of lobster, potatoes and marrying cousins?

For me, it was my time spent living in Springfield that caused my disdain for all things St. Louis. Springfield is Cardinals country and the fans are beyond arrogant. It’s not just their arrogance, but how vicious and ignorant they are about it. The whole best fans in baseball thing gets overplayed, but comes about from the fans at the park [purportedly] being knowledgeable and cordial, cheer for good plays made by the opposition, etc.

The Springfield fans took that best fans in baseball stuff (which they didn’t earn because they had never left greene county) to an extent of ridiculous sense of entitlement. “Because I arbitrarily choose to root for a team that is five hours from where I live instead of one that is two hours from where I live, I am a superior human to you.” Just drove me insane.

So much of it was ignorant and inaccurate. “The Royals are just a farm club for the Yankees.” Really? What member of the Yankees team has ever played for the Royals, aside from none of them? Talking shit based on the exploits of players WHO ARE NO LONGER ON THE TEAM.

The icing on the cake was that they were all Chiefs fans too – definitive proof that they’re terrible, terrible fans. The ‘best fans’ are going to be true fans no matter what, not just pick the teams that happen to be good at a particular moment. I’m curious what Springfield was like during the 2000 Rams/Kurt Warner type heyday. Or if the cards lose Pujols and lose 100 games while the Royals run away with the AL Central, if the dynamics of the town change.

Prior to living in Springfield I never really cared much one way or the other about St. Louis. Part of it was that I didn’t encounter many Cardinals fans, but I really think it was those people from Springfield, who somehow envision their shit-hole town as being a suburb of the Loo, who permanently turned me against the murder capital.

Mellinger adds some fuel to the fire.

http://www.kansascity.com/2011/05/19/2888582/how-kansas-city-and-st-louis-compare.html

Get ready, Kansas City: Here come the Cardinals. And more annoyingly, the self-appointed Best Fans In Baseball.

For instance, neither of us had an NHL playoff team this year, and neither will have Albert Pujols next year.

Let's just trust the process.

KC and STL are pretty much the same city (ask anyone from Seattle or somewhere). Objectively, STL is a little bigger, has a little more history, cultural institutions, restaurants, sports teams, etc.

Lots of KC natives claim to hate STL the city, which makes no sense. It’s almost exactly like KC, just a little bigger. KC has better bbq but STL has a hockey team. Whatevs. KC is more of a cowtown. Whatevs. STL residents may look down on KC a little, but rightly so because KC is smaller. Chicago rightly looks down on STL.

Go Royals.

http://www.kansascity.com/2011/05/19/2888582/how-kansas-city-and-st-louis-compare.html

Too funny!

I go to school in Rolla, about an hour and a half from St. Louis. They immediately judge based on high school, yadda yadda yadda.

I was also called a bandwagon fan because, yes I am a Red Sox fan as well. I started liking the Red Sox in the early 90s when I was 5 or 6 because my mom is from the New England area. I was a fan long before they were the lovable losers turned World Champions.

Bring on the Cardinals because I hate St. Louis.

Just turned 65. Grew up in KC, went to college at Wash. U in the ‘60s. I might as well have been from Podunk Junction, Arkansas as far as all the St. L and Chicago students (most of the population) were concerned. Nothing mean, just a disdain for the hicks. I wonder if it’s still the same.

I think the condescension factor is pretty big. More than one of us have related becoming very pissed at Cardinals fans who tried to convince us they had a bad team in 06, and not understood why we got upset. The arrogance thing reminds me of KU basketball (and I’m a huge KU basketball fan and alumnus, but I’ll admit that many KU basketball fans don’t make us look good).

Why do people in St Louis call Illinois residents “hoosiers” ?

Aren’t Hoosiers from Indiana?

I’ve been to KC A LOT more than StL and lived in Mulvane (just outside of Wichita) for about 15 months in 1990 and ‘91. That being said, as an outsider with a lean towards KC, the cities don’t seem that different to me (BBQ notwithstanding).

Again, I’m coming at this from the outside, but it seems like neither city has that much of what I personally look for in a city. I definitely gravitate more towards the slightly more blue collar nature that KC has going for it, but from where I stand, St. Louis doesn’t strike me as being particularly white collar.

Part of my tepid feelings about KC (outside of my cursed fandom of these two godforsaken franchises) may be colored by the fact that my dad definitely has mixed feelings about the city, as they were poor as hell growing up (my did finished high school at Paseo and was the first in his family to have gone to college), so the KC he knew was probably a little rougher than he’d have wanted his kids to experience. In all of my travels there, the only BBQ I’ve ever had was at Arthur Bryant’s on my own trip there last summer.

I’d love for someone to show me the better things that Kansas City has to offer, but honestly, both feel like pretty similar cities.

I will admit to having been irritated the handful of times I’ve run across a Cardinals fan, and the first thing they bring up is Denkinger.

Without the corruption of KC in the 30’s, one of our greatest presidents, Harry Truman, would be only a minor footnote in WIKI today, if that. though, somehow, I think the Daniels clan would have still produced a national leader.

I’ve always thought the Cardinals were looking for a way to lose that series. Strange attitude for professionals, but they just didn’t seem to be as enthusiastic about the chance of getting that next title as KC was about getting their first (only) one.

Almost like the Cardinal organization down to the bat boy felt sorry for KC and their heart wasn’t quite in it. They had won the title that was meaningful to them, in that they beat the teams with whom they were true rivals. The WS was a comedown. Who wants to play KC anyway?

if it weren’t for Cardinal fans swarming the stadium once a year, it’d be a lot less of a sorespot for Royals fans. Especially with the Royals PR trying to play to the “load our stadium with Royals fans” talk then selling Cardinals stuff anyways.

Then again, the Cardinals PR were getting the word out via e-mail about tickets to this series before the Royals did also.

Both cities (KC and StL) are liberal and appear pretentious. Don’t worry though, the most pretentious group in Missouri are Mizzou fans, but that’s a different topic. The point is, both seem quite “elitist” from where I’m sitting, but yet I still like both cities. KC people tend to try and paint us as hicks and Southerners while we in fact are a rapidly expanding city that very much so has a Midwestern attitude. StL, on the other hand, seems to think Springfield is like it’s mini-me, the cute third wheel bestowed upon the third largest city. Yes, it may seem odd and “arbitrary” (as somebody said earlier) that Springfield is dominated by Cardinals fans who are also Chiefs fans (although I’m actually a Colts fan, I used to live in Indiana). However, it makes a lot of sense. The Cardinals are, whether you like it or not, the team that has won more. Outside of the teams’ cities themselves, the team that wins more is naturally going to be more popular. Springfield therefore naturally gravitated to Cardinals domination. On the other hand, the Rams still are relatively new to Missouri and when they showed up the Chiefs were already ingrained in Springfield’s sports culture. It’s not arbitrarily choosing the most successful teams and being bandwagon fans, it’s just how it turned out.

I am, as a Cardinals fan, admittedly inclined to prefer St. Louis, but I think that just because St. Louis fans see the Royals as more of a friendly in-state sparring than a serious rivalry doesn’t mean that Cardinals fans don’t take the Royals serious as a team. All it comes down to is that Cards-Royals games don’t tend to have any impact or essential role in the division race, so a rivalry really hasn’t had a chance to develop. In fact, I’ve always kinda liked the Royals, although I could be accused of looking down on them at times. The new K is beautiful, I like their uniforms, and they always seemed to be classy club. It wasn’t until a few years back when I started college that I even realized there was serious animosity that KC fans had towards StL. All of a sudden there were a bunch of KC fans that are my friends that continuously go out of their way to pick at any negative thing about the Cardinals they can find and boast about the smallest accomplishments the Royals achieved. This can be quite annoying, especially when students from KC (I go to Missouri State) were surprised that Springfield was so saturated with Cardinals fans and were almost resentful about it. So I hope you can understand why, to a Springfieldian such as myself, it seems like KC, as well, is pretentious just like StL. I don’t figure a lot of you here will like me saying that, but it really is how it appears.

I have lived in Rochester NY all my life and became a Royals fans in the early 70’s thanks to a Yankees hatred and a man crush on George Brett. My wife wants us to take a trip to KC in the near future. So I can see the ballpark etc. I really have enjoyed reading this blog. I now know that if we do come it will have to be during inter league play.

What stinks is unless I go to a bar I basically get to see one Royals game a year. I get to know the roster by mid-May by checking box scores. That the Royals season is usually over by mid-May.

The good news is the bright future of the team Hosmer etc. So I look forward to coming to KC and meeting all of you at a game. LOL

P.S. I once wore my KC batting helmet to a game in Yankees stadium and it happened to be the pine tar game. I also had the stub signed by Billy Martin and George Brett.

http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/05/19/051911-opinions-history-hegelians-howley-1-3/

Somewhat interesting info about St. Louis and its aspiration to be Chicago, but not be Chicago.

As a cards fan from st louis i’ve never understood it as a rivalry really because we are never in direct competition like we are with the reds, astros or cubs. The royals teams went usually very good (no offense guys) and i actually like the royals and wish them well.
it certainly is more than playing seattle however but its not like playing the cubs.

I also don’t get the thinking that ic is a cowtown coming from stl (because we get that a lot ourselves)

The thread is just full of childish comments