Recently in baseball Category

i'm not editing that last one
for the same reason
i'm not washing
this t-shirt

since the red sox seem to be
going out with a whimper
let me take this opportunity to
raise a friendly middle finger to the cavalcade of
national journalists to come
[i'm looking at you hat guy]
eager to dance on our graves
and tell us how wrong all of us
bandwagon red sox fans are
it's no stretch to say we're hated
more than yankee fans ever were now
[not the same as the sox being hated more mind you]
i've seen it firsthand
that's fine we can live with that

but a word to
you righteous
long suffering
tampa bay fans

congratulations
but
call us when you know more about your team than we do

went to a game at shea stadium on sunday
before they tear it down
seemed like a worthwhile thing to do
if only to see where game 6 happened

walking towards the park we were not too surprised to hear the pa
announce that it was a sold-out game
as it should have been

we already had tickets so no problem
but as the game time approached on a clear
beautiful day
the stands were still half-empty

the first
second
fourth innings came and
went
and still the stands were empty

where was this sold out crowd

by the 7th
the home team up 4-2
people left in droves

their bullpen blew the lead and they lost

so let me get this straight
your team's in a pennant race
you're bidding goodbye to your old stadium
and you no-show
your bullpen blows
and you leave early

and what about tampa bay
the biggest game of their history last night
and even with a hefty supply of red sox fans
they still don't sell out

it's not like we should be bemoaning the fate of these teams'
millionaire owners
they don't need our help

but at the same time it bespeaks a certain lack of civic pride
or something

or maybe we're just crazy
here in boston

road tripped with suz this past weekend
up to toronto

why

why not

not like i wanted to catch up on sleep or anything

even though we started at 0430 on saturday we were still
late [traffic]
for the beating the sox took that afternoon
but in time to take a great deal of
shit
from people who were die hard blue jay fans
at least that day
since they won
here's a hint kids
if you're going to harangue folks that made a nine-hour trip to your city
to see their team
you ought to at least be somewhat well-informed about the sport in question

happily since i was wearing my revs jersey we could at least greet
the subset of the subset
around the ballpark with high fives and impromptu singing

also met lots of nice toronto fc fans around the city
it's telling that you can walk around town and people will ask if you're
going to the game
it's an event and people know about it
and if they aren't going they seem like they'd like to be

amusingly we ran into another group on the subway
figured we'd follow them to their stadium rather than interpret directions we got earlier
bad idea
they nearly wound up following us instead
but they were friendly and knowledgeable

bmo field is cool
not much to the stadium itself
but the view is spectacular
the moreso with the carnival rides around it
and it's full and plainly the place to be on match night
they have 28oz sippy cups of carlsberg

the revs kept the home fans relatively quiet for most of the match
but they went uniformly apeshit when they finally took advantage of
a bad five minutes and
scored

later we repaired to a pub down the street
[didn't find the supporters' pub until the drive out of the city]
and continued to take good natured shit from the locals
walked must of the long way back to the hotel
then hopped the turnstile in a deserted subway to catch the last train

i don't think we ate inside once the whole weekend

the next day was a better one for the sox
got to watch the roof of the skydome open
and a variety of players flash their occasional power for the win
didn't take any crap from toronto fans that day

the extra innings were ill-timed however
meant that at 8pm we were staring at niagara falls
pretty
but a bad sign

the little dude doesn't much care for the crappy roads of the
thruway or ontario but other than that
he's game for road trips
although mileage appears to peak somewhere short of the 75mph
i'm accustomed to

got in at 3am

photos are here

doesn't mean it's not still fun to
rant against the yankees

specifically
captain intangibles himself

a frothy rant from the providence journal's
joe posnanski

enjoy it

fun night at the ballpark last night
standing room tickets are great if you're my height
and as an added benefit they took some of the chaos out of the experience at fenway
with white lines to demarcate where you can and can't stand and conscientious
ushers to shoo people away
the result
nobody spilling beer down the back of row ff and nobody setting up shop in front
of a hard-won place to stand

in a very special episode of fire joe morgan they tackle just what it means to be a gamer
we all know who's on that list, but the counterexamples are what really prove to be
so bad as to make your eyes bleed

i complained about it last year and i know they won the world series and all
but this year's red sox team is already more fun to watch than last year's
i don't know if we'll ever see a more entertaining season of baseball than 2003
but it sure has started off that way

turmoil and frustration of one kind or another has certainly given me
thoughts of picking up and moving somewhere else recently
it's something i think about every now and then just because the
idea of starting fresh someplace new and different does have its allure
every once and a while i just get to feeling like
complicated things would be simplified by a clean start
seems less likely that that's going to happen now
and that's a good thing too
there are ways to clean and simplify things without throwing them all away
after all.

and i would miss some stuff naturally
like fenway
lucked into tickets for last night's game
as ever the bleachers are a boundless source for entertainments of all kinds
mostly having little to do with baseball
last night we were backed by a row of screaming drunk girls from saugus
whose fondest wish early in the game was for the seventh to roll around so
they could sing along to sweet caroline
(which of course happens in the eighth)
but they passed the time instead by describing in great and
immodest detail the kind of things they'd do with and to one of the ballplayers
in the unlikely event they were interested in
the skanky type
as the evening wore on they spilled beer on me
and drank it too
by the end they were shrieking in tongues
people got thrown out
a montreal canadiens fan gleefully solicited insults from the crowd
and a strange girl brought a yellow plastic 'caution wet floor' sign
and danced and cheered with it all night long
typical night at the old ballyard

this morning i ran five miles
up over the hill into the city with a cool breeze
pushing me on
i felt great
like a finely tuned engine
that runs on beer and junkfood

kinda like what james is working on
but entirely different

my movable type was broken
now its fixed

very busy at work but not going in this weekend

if you like new order and modern descendants such as the killers or she wants revenge
you might want to try cut copy
pitchfork likes it
but it's still good

this is awesome and more people should do it

i have found a wii and it is coming

excellent starcraft nerdery to whet your
appetite for starcraft ii

hope my two readers enjoy my continuing efforts toward making this site harder to read
smaller fonts coming soon

over the winter, particularly this one, it can be easy to forget how much the red sox mean to people around here, but on this, yet another opening day, but the only one that matters, you can see everybody in a good mood, wearing hats, t-shirts, or whatever, and know that nothing’s changed.

the cafeteria took advantage of this by selling ‘fenway franks’. which turned out to be some other kind of hot dog, served on firm, not soggy, side-split (horror!) buns, a small pile of chips, and on a lark, a bag of cracker jacks. all this cost me $9, to boot. it’s not that i care about the money, more that i’m struck by the irony that the real thing would have been cheaper. but i’ve got to wait two weeks more for that.

of course, they still have to win or else this good mood will be short-lived.

more than a few words have been spent lamenting the extent to which fenway park has gotten quieter, less rowdy, and more corporate over the past ten years. the best example i can think of is this year’s alcs against cleveland, where there was this sinking feeling during game two (even before eric gagne came into the game), and a palpable malaise, none of the ability to rise to a roar with two strikes or three balls, or with a man on, threatening to steal. it was easier to notice in retrospect after the sox survived the trip to cleveland, and returned for game six with the old ballyard in a full-throated roar.

the causes are obvious. tickets are scarcer, more expensive, or both, and different people are at the games. so it was really interesting to read this bbc article about how the same kind of thing is happening to premiership soccer. since i’m planning a trip to see some games, i note how hard it is to get tickets, how you have to have a membership to even have a chance to buy tickets for some clubs, and i can see the red sox becoming the same way.

it’s almost as if we’re loving them to death.

dear flying spaghetti monster, noodly be thy appendage.

it’s been a shitty week amongst many in a shitty year.

things need to turn around sometime, so may i humbly request that you help me out and shepherd me from the wilds of the virtual waiting room to the promised land of a seat in the bleachers for a handful of golden summer nights next year.

thanks.