My compa Russell Contreras, New Mexico correspondent for the Associated Press, has a ridiculous theory: The Houston native insists his hometown is the “heart of Aztlán”— in other words, the capital of Mexican everything in the United States. No manches, the rest of the country says! Houston didn’t even have a sizable Mexican population until after the Mexican Revolution, by which point the Reconquista of Los Angeles was well underway.

Today, Houston markets itself as one of the most diverse metropolises in the US — another way of saying “We’re not as Mexican as L.A.” But that’s OK.

As an impartial observer who has lived in the shadow of the City of Angels his entire life and has traveled to H-Town dozens of times over the years, only I can objectively compare the two cities’ Mexican bona fides on the eve of the Dodgers and Astros facing off in this year’s World Series. Lineup, por favor: