What remains of our Z’Amours?

20 years ago today, the Montreal Expos played the last game in their history in front of their fans. A resounding 9-1 defeat at the expense of the Florida Marlins. It definitely didn’t have to end well, that would have hurt even more.

If the Canadian’s nickname is Les Glorieux, a name deserved thanks to the team’s overwhelming domination of the hockey world in the mid-20th century^e century (between 1953 and 1979, the Habs won the Stanley Cup 16 times, 16 times in 26 years, these are truly glorious feats), the nickname of the Expos is Nos Z’Amours. Not our Champions. Not our Warriors. Not our Bombers. Our Z’Amours. It sounds like the name of an early childhood center or a brand of footed pajamas. Yet that’s what a bunch of big men playing professional baseball were called.

Our Z’Amours came first and foremost from the connection we had with baseball.

Hockey is serious. It’s ours. It’s our sport. It’s winter. This is our way of getting through it. It takes results, victories. This is what gives us value. Big pressure.

Baseball is fun. It’s the sport we borrow from our neighbor. It’s summer. This is one way to take advantage of it. It takes popcorn and a mascot. This is what changes our minds. Draft is for beer.

It was in 1968 that we knew that we would have a Major League Baseball team in 1969. At that time, there was no fooling around with the ball. It didn’t take 22 market studies to find colors and a logo. Our club was going to be called Expos. For others, Expo didn’t mean anything, but for us, it was the most beautiful word. Expo 67 had changed Montreal. For the space of a summer, all the Montrealers had traveled around the world, going to their islands. We had a starry sky in our eyes. Calling our baseball team the Expos was like reviving, every summer, the best summer of our existence.

The first Expos players arrived in a euphoric city. During their first season, they had 52 wins and 110 losses. One hundred and ten! Nevermind ! For us, they were the most beautiful, the best. For us, Mack Jones, Coco Laboy, Rusty Staub, they were idols, giants. That’s love! Patrick Dempsey is objectively sexier than your boyfriend, but your boyfriend is the prettier one, because he’s your boyfriend.

The Expos could well lose two games out of three, for us there was nothing more pleasant than going to see them play, because they were our own little guys, coming from everywhere. Because they were called the Montreal Expos.

Going to baseball means going to the park. It’s distracting. It relaxes. There’s no clock, there’s just time. Talk to those who lived through the early years of the Expos, what they will tell you first is not a particular game, a game-winning home run or an acrobatic defensive play, it’s the joy of sitting at Jarry Park. To see the players warming up in their beautiful uniforms. To hear the sound of the bullet entering the leather of the mitt. To smell the grass and the warm dogs. To see the night shine thanks to the immense reflectors.

This is why the survival of our club required an open-air stadium. For the experience to be worth the joy, in a concrete cage, they had to be champions. Otherwise we would go elsewhere, see where the summer was going.

Of course, the great years were 1981, the championship of our section, Carter, Dawson, Raines, the Black Mondayand 1994, the dream year which ended in nightmare, because of the strike. Two coitus interruptuses to make you regret the carelessness of the beginning. The kisses, despite the 110 matches lost. The Expos existed for 35 years. They haven’t existed for 20 years now.

What remains of our Z’amours?

In addition to the memories evoked, in addition to the nostalgia felt, the Expos will have contributed to our openness to diversity. In 1969, the posters in the rooms of the majority of young Quebecers were Béliveau, Cournoyer, Savard, then suddenly Jones, Staub, Carter, Dawson appeared alongside them. Heroes from elsewhere wearing the name of Montreal on the sweater, with a fleur-de-lys as an acute accent.

That could also be Montreal. The opening to the world, launched by the Expo, the Expos have continued. It also remains a huge disappointment. The disappointment of no longer having our place. Our place with the big guys. We underestimate the importance of being able to participate in events that create excitement. Which make you want to come together.

It is argued that there are more pressing problems in which to invest. It’s not because we didn’t help the Nordics that things are better in the hospitals. The priority is life. But not having a boring life is also a priority.

The Expos were part of the activities that made Montreal more sparkling. I know, not everyone likes baseball. But there are many. Few shows managed to attract so many people. During the best years, 2 million people were willing to pay to go, in the worst, 700,000. Add to that all those who followed their team on TV and radio.

The benefits of celebration are often overlooked. The repercussions are not only calculated in dollars, they are calculated above all in smiles, in pleasure.

In 35 years, the Expos have attracted 50 million people to their local games. That’s a lot of smiles gone.

Wishing us such exciting new loves! Thank you, Expos!