Like every other Tigers fan, I'm feeling pretty dismal about the team's historic collapse this year. Watching last night's stab through the heart felt like watching a long slow train wreck. I don't think there was a single Tigers fan who really thought they could do it. This team held the longest divisional lead ever of teams which did not win the divisional title, blowing a seven-game lead with two weeks to play. They had a two game lead with three games to play, and had to get swept by the Royals in the last week of the season and drop to out of three at home to the White Sox in order to drop even with the Evil Twinkies. And that would send them to the dreaded Metrodome and a one-game playoff: game 163.

And how did the Tigers do? Not only did they crater, but one oftheir best players completely let the team and the city down in amanner reminiscent of the Goose Loonies scandal involving Bob Probert and Petr Klima back in 1988.

Given the Tigers' history in the Metrodome, I would think the team would have done everything possible to avoid a return to that dreadful spot. The Metrodome has been a boon to the Twins, who were a perennial also-ran prior to the dome's opening in 1982. Even in the weak American League West of the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Twins were unable to muster even a divisional championship since 1970. But when they faced Detroit in 1987, the world was shocked by the truly audacious level of noise the Minnesota fans could produce inside that awful stadium with the bright lights, incredible decibels, and baseball-colored roof.

Good riddance, you dastardly dome!

How awful, the conclusion to that 1987 season! That was much worse than this year's loss. That year, it had been the Toronto Blue Jays who had cratered at the end of the season, blowing a five-game lead with six games to go. The Tigers swept the Jays in the last series of the season, prompting my brother to remark that the Jays "would never win a World Series."

Well, the Jays would end up winning a World Series, but the Tigers still haven't since 1984. In 1987, after clinching the American League East with that great comeback against the Jays, they got "sucker punched" (another quote from my brother) by the Twins and lost the ALCS 4-1.

Anyone who was a Tigers fan in 1987 will still curl up in a fetal position and sob when reminded of the 1987 ALCS. We were just three years removed from the magical championship in 1984! We'd made that great comeback, the spirit of '84 was back! And then, with the great victory over Toronto, the Tigers seemed unbeatable. Until that freaking dome appeared.

Well, the Twins are getting rid of the dome, opening up Target Field next year. Hooray! Thank you, city of Minnesota and the villainous Twins, for unilaterally doing away with the most horrendous and awe-inspiring home field advantage in all of baseball and, arguably, all of sports. I'm sure you'll miss it in the years to come.

Anyway, I'm trying to be philosophical, telling myself that at the very least the Tigers got us to football season. As a lifelong fan of the Detroit Lions, I've learned to count my blessings even when we do come up short.

But for now I'm just happy that I'll never have to watch a Tigers game in the dome again.