Why Rays baseball strikes out in Tampa

I thought baseball finally had a chance of inspiring the same mania as football in Tampa. Last Sunday, the Tampa Bay Rays were scheduled to face off with the Chicago White Sox for their third playoff game ever -- with a chance to sweep the five-game series -- while the Bucs were playing their fifth regular-season game against Denver, an out-of-conference opponent.

Clearly, the Rays were in far more crucial and compelling circumstances. But the scene I witnessed -- with the Rays and Bucs both scheduled for 4 p.m. -- reinforced my feeling that Tampans are largely incapable of embracing a team sport that doesn't routinely involve the high risk of bodily harm.

I picked up Buck at his Seminole Heights home Sunday and we cruised over to The Dugout Tavern, an old-school, working-class beer joint off Sligh, in between Armenia and Florida. There were no empty stools at the bar when we arrived shortly after 4. Both the big screen TVs were set to the Bucs game -- even the set that had a handwritten sign that read "Rays" taped under it. "Aren't they showing the Rays game?" I asked during a TV timeout. The 40-something man, who wore a Bucs hat backward, mumbled and pointed to a TV above a booth in the back of the bar. Buck and I took a seat beneath it.

"The Rays are on the smallest TV in this place, and no one is watching it but us," Buck said. "Which is kind of ironic, considering this place is called The Dugout."

A fella walked by with a T-shirt that read "Please tell your boobs to stop staring at my eyes." He gazed at the football game and at the NASCAR race, but made no effort to see if the Rays were on their way to advancing to the next round of the playoffs, the American League Championship Series.

"This is the smokiest bar I have ever been in," Buck griped, and I knew our time was limited; my eyes were irritated also. "Every time I inhale I feel my lungs are being polluted -- like I live in Beijing, China," he added.

How come no one in this place called The Dugout gave a damn about baseball, the great American pastime? I took a sip from my bottle of Bud and observed the crowd. Using the tavern patrons as a measuring stick, Tampans have a Kubrickian love of the old ultra-violence. You could have taken a time machine from the Dugout Tavern Sunday to a gladiator bout in ancient Rome and witnessed similar audience responses.

Every time a Denver Bronco carried the ball on Sunday, Dugout diehards clutched their respective coozy-covered beer bottles (and cans) while barking a beastly chorus of "Hit him! Hit him!! Hit that sumabitch!!! Hit that muuuuuutherfuuuuuucker!!!!" This was after every single play, folks. Not just third downs, where such outbursts are expected.

Everyone in the room would then celebrate or shake his or her head, take a long drag off a cigarette and exhale; this created a blinding tobacco fog that would just barely dissipate in time for the next snap. Buck and I didn't last long. In fact, we only stayed for one round of beers. But it's doubtful the crowd grew any less rowdy -- or more interested in watching baseball -- upon consuming greater amounts of alcohol.

Baseball is just too cerebral for most Tampans. There, I said it. And I'll give you another example.

Most Floridians -- especially, those oh-so-proud natives -- didn't know shit about two-line passes, icing or even wrist shots before the Tampa Bay Lightning came to town. But they had a pretty good idea that hockey involved violence: checking, cross-checking, elbowing, roughing, tripping, hooking, high-sticking, slashing, spearing and bare-knuckle fist-fighting that occasionally leads to bench-clearing brawls -- clashes capable of transforming the ice into a scene from an medieval battleground. That's why the Tampa Bay Lightning were outdrawing the Rays long before the Bolts ever started winning -- let alone brought home the Stanley Cup.

And then there's NASCAR. It's a more nuanced sport than critics would lead you to believe, but, well, deep down in the back of every enthusiast's mind is a depraved desire to witness a crash -- human life be damned. The racetrack has buried many of its greatest stars. And it's a far more popular sport in Tampa than baseball.

The only time I've seen a Tampa bar audience get revved up about a baseball game on TV was when the Rays engaged in a bench-clearing brawl against the Boston Red Sox in June. I happened to be at the Tiny Tap Tavern that afternoon. The place went ape-shit. But the reaction had nothing to do with balls and strikes.

Dugout Tavern, 6905 N. Orleans Ave., Tampa, 813-990-8883.