For the first time in 20 years, I’ll be rooting for an AL team in the World Series. The last time I rooted for an AL team was 1988 when Tony LaRussa’s Oakland A’s squared off against the Los Angeles Dodgers. (For my recollection of Kirk Gibson’s dramatic walk off homer in Game 1, click here.) Since then, I’ve been a staunch rooter of the National League in the annual Fall Classic (with the caveat that I could never, under any circumstance, root for the Cubs in the Series. Which, thankfully, never happens.)

But that changes tonight.

Tonight I’ll be switching allegiances, at least for this Series, and I’ll be vigorously cheering for the Tampa Bay Rays to complete what has been a true Cinderella season. The Rays worst-to-first run has been the story of the 2008 season. Playing in the AL East — baseball’s version of the SEC — the Rays have played the perennial doormats for MLB’s glamour teams, the Yankees and the Red Sox. After posting the worst record in the majors last season, the ’08 Rays rode a formula of pitching, speed, and defense to win the AL East and the pennant.

All season long, the naysayers (myself included) expected them to fade. When they stumbled just before the All Star break, we all said, “These are the real Rays. The second half will be different.” But the only thing different about the second half was that the Rays replaced the Yankees as the team duking it out with Boston for the division title. Joe Maddon has masterfully handled this young squad and now has them poised for their first world championship in the club’s 11 year history, which has to be salt in the wound of many a Cub fan.

Tonight, I’ll be rooting for this club to complete the ascension from worst to first. Cowbells notwithstanding.

And, no, Matt…I won’t be using a TV tray tonight.

That’s only when I watch the Dukes of Hazard.