Hockey Anyone?

By Polo Ascencio

Growing up on the south side of the Mexico-United States border in Tijuana, as I did, you benefit from the best of two very different worlds.

Living in a town that borders San Diego, Tijuana residents have the very unique experience of living the “American life” more than even other Mexican border towns like Juarez and Matamoros.

That short drive from San Diego, put me in close contact with the best sports leagues in the world: Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association and National Football League. There was one major American sport I just didn’t understand: hockey.

I never imagined how much I was missing, as I’ve learned while becoming a fan of the St. Louis Blues.

The closest I came to an ice sport growing up was buying dry ice from El Paletero, the man who sold the delicious Mexican popsicles that are packed with real fruit. I would enjoy watching the dry ice evaporate in a bucket of water.

Actually, we once found two hockey sticks and formed our own “league.” My uncle Manuel, a bunch of neighborhood kids and I would play our version of hockey.

It was more about trying to hit a tennis ball to put it in the “net,” which actually was just a worn out bucket we turned over. Despite the makeshift nets, we celebrated in style, yelling “Goal!” with the same passion we had for soccer goals.

Our version was more dirt-and-rock hockey. In other words, it had nothing to do with ice.

Once I moved to the United States in 1995 and then eventually watching the “Mighty Ducks” movies, I tried to get into the Los Angeles Kings. I couldn’t strike much passion for the Kings, though, not even when they won a couple of Stanley Cups earlier this decade.

If multiple Stanley Cup titles in your adopted hometown can’t make you a fan, what can? Did somebody scream, “Let’s go, Blues! Let’s go, Blues!”

How about an invitation to a hockey game from a future baseball Hall of Famer by the name of Yadier Molina?

Being a Spanish broadcaster for the St. Louis Cardinals goes beyond calling games or representing the organization with dignity and respect. It also means being in contact with some of the best athletes in the world and, of course, a very special one in El Capitán Yadi.

To say he is an icon in St. Louis is an understatement. So when he invites you to a hockey game between the St. Louis Blues and the Philadelphia Flyers you cancel dinner with friends and pretend to like hockey.

It’s not easy to attend a hockey game when the MLB and NHL hockey seasons overlap, so you cherish it when you get a chance to watch the Blues. That opportunity is even more precious when the legendary Molina invites you to join his family and a few teammates to join him in a suite.

That one invitation turned into a second invitation since I enjoyed it very much. Then I garnered another.

Little by little those invitations from Yadi helped educate me on hockey with Yadi’s son Yanuel essentially being a masterful personal hockey teacher.

Then my good friend Celina gave me my very own St. Louis Blues sweater. Let’s go, Blues!

Now as I write this, I’m an avid St. Louis Blues fan who is living and dying with every goal during the Western Conference Finals against the San Jose Sharks.

I even dragged my daughter Bianca to a bar packed with at least 1,000 fans to watch Game 7 of the second round playoffs against the Dallas Stars.

After three periods, two overtimes and many up and downs later, the Blues won it and moved on to the Western Conference Finals. One step closer on returning to the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time since 1970 and looking to lift the Cup for the first time in franchise history.

Since that first invitation at the end of the 2019 NHL regular season, many things have transpired.

I’ve learned the names of most of the Blues players. I also know what icing, tripping and offsides mean in hockey terms. One of the craziest and most humbling points of my new Blues fandom was a request I received.

I was asked to record a video that was played inside the arena cheering on the Blues prior to Game 1 of the playoffs alongside my Cardenales radio booth partner and Capitán Molina’s older brother, Bengie Molina.

The video of the two of us cheering on the Blues was recorded from the field at Busch Stadium with both of us wearing those awesome Blues sweaters we received as gifts.

What started as an out-of-the-blue invitation to a game is now slowly developing in to a passion for a sport I never knew I was going to enjoy.

Somehow being in the same suite as Yadi, Adam Wainwright, Dexter Fowler, Michael Wacha and many of the Molinas’ friends singing “Country Roads” at the end of second period gave me hockey fan clout with everyone in St. Louis, and I will gladly take it.

That comes with the responsibility of learning the game and now representing not only the Cardinals but also the Blues with dignity and respect everywhere I wear my Blues wear now.

Like many things in my life, something that started in the dusty canyons of Tijuana is now my way of living. It’s my way of life. I can assure you my appreciation for hockey is real.

The excitement I feel is real, yelling at the TV in my house 2,000 miles away in Carpinteria, Calif., is very real. I’m still learning the game. Maybe one day I will call a hockey game in Spanish. Yes, I know that is a crazy thought.

Then again, 10 years ago when I was cleaning offices, I would have dismissed the thought if someone would have told me I was going to be calling Cardinals games on the radio. If you had predicted my journey to Busch Stadium, I would have probably said, “Yeah, right, and in that future you mention I like hockey too?”

Never stop believing, though. Even the most unlikely dreams come true.

Let’s go, Blues!

Well, after reading this by now you know the answer to that. Now I can say, I like hockey, I can feel the Let’s Go Blues chant and play Gloria every time we win!!!

Featured Image: Courtesy Polo Ascencio