I went to the Comcast Sportsnet baseball kickoff luncheon yesterday, and I thought I'd have a lot of juicy tidbits for you. Who doesn't like a good tidbit? Pinkos, that's who. Unfortunately, the two best tidbits were scooped by Jeff Fletcher and Henry Schulman. Now, I'm going out on a limb here, but I'm guessing they were able to get the scoop because they had "iPhones" or "Blackberries", and not "AT&T Pre-Paid GoPhones." I'll have an intern look into that.
Duane Kuiper went up to the podium after lunch, and said he was pleased to be the one to announce that "the Giants have stolen Manny from the Dodgers." I'm thinking wildly -- do I call my wife, and walk her through posting instructions on the phone? How complicated would that be? Would she inject her own sense of humor?
I was freaking out for 1/10th of a second. Then Kuiper clarified that he was talking about Manny Mota for Spanish-language broadcasting. Dammit. He got me.
I met the aforementioned Fletcher, who was very cordial, and Dave Flemming, at whom I tossed a word salad. In front of a keyboard, I like to pretend I'm the bastard child of Truman Capote and Leonard Koppett; in person, I'm just a giggling fanboy.
There were several opportunities for me to introduce myself to Brian Sabean, but that would have led to one of two outcomes:
a) He's heard of me. I sure as hell wouldn't want that. "Oh, yeah. McCovey Chronicles. You're the guy who writes all of those critiques of me and my decisions. Here, let me poke you in your nerd eye, nerd." Or,
b) He hasn't heard of me, and thinks I'm some kid with a Geocities site. Which isn't far from the truth, but I doubt that would score me an interview.
So nuts to that.
At no point during the luncheon did I feel like I belonged there. That had nothing to do with how anyone acted toward me. Everyone whom I met was very nice, polite, and gracious. But there was no way I felt comfortable walking up to a circle of beat writers and columnists and introducing myself.
My dad is always asking me when I'm going to ask for a press pass, clubhouse access, and all those sorts of things. Man, even if someone thought that I deserve those things, which I certainly don't, that's the last thing I'd want to do. The only thing I have going for me is that I don't have those things. It allows me to write things like this without having to face the music. And for once in my life I'm given access to something that's kinda sorta "behind the curtain," and what do I turn it into? Seven hundred words about myself. That's half because I know that I'm the most interesting person you've ever read about, and half because my job is to be a fan. So I'm trying to relate to you what you might have felt if you were there. I know that the tidbits are best left to the professionals.
Enough of me talking about me. Let's get a comment starter going so you can talk about me: Do you think this site would be improved if I had the rosin bag to ask people like Bill Neukom and Brian Sabean for interviews and generally push for more access, or is there something to my "distance is good"-theory? I think that in the right hands, more access would make for a heck of a Giants blog. If yesterday was any indication, those hands do not belong to me at all. I mingle like Neifi hits.