Are There Angels in Baseball?

Star Date 08.14.2025

A long time ago, in another lifetime, we lived in the San Diego area before fully becoming Iowans. One thing that will never leave us is our love for the San Diego Padres—a team with an age-old slogan I will forever cherish: Keep the Faith.

A good friend of mine, who hails from the city where I was born, once summed up fatherhood to me like this:
"The only thing I care about is that my son never comes home telling me he’s a Dodgers fan."
Ouch. In San Diego, the Dodgers are public enemy number one—unless you’re from Japan, where they’re practically treated like baseball gods. As a marketer, I understand the power of building a brand that resonates far beyond local borders.

Those of us who cheer for the Padres know one thing deep down: we need all the faith we can get. And that’s where the angels come in.

Nonbelievers may point to our long history of disappointments as proof that God doesn’t really care about those friars from SoCal. I beg to differ. I have proof of real-life angels.

Yesterday, all of Japan was watching their favorite team face off against the Los Angeles Angels in a freeway rivalry that doesn’t mean much unless you live near Disneyland. There’s this guy—part man, part legend—who often appears superhuman. He’s even more famous than my friend Wilson from Castaway, at least according to my readers in Japan.

The bases were loaded, and Superman himself was at the plate, facing the only team that had beaten the world champion Dodgers every single time this year. What happened next was nothing short of divine intervention: a triple play.

That play helped our beloved Padres move into a tie for first place for the first time all season. My friends in Japan probably stuck around to watch their hero hit a home run later in the game, but it wasn’t enough. The Angels still pulled off the win in extra innings, 6-5.  Even the pope, a die hard White Sox fan, gave two thumbs up declaring you can hang a star on that play.

Someone once said, "There’s no crying in baseball." Clearly, they never lived in San Diego. We’ve had our hearts broken more times than we can count. But maybe—just maybe—this will be the year when our friends from Japan put away their Dodgers gear and don a new world champion jersey.

Stick around. It’s getting interesting.

Keep the Faith.

"Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful." – Hebrews 10:23