2 Days @ Big Phone Park

There are not many things in this world that annoy me more than people from Boston. Fenway Park, however historic and charming, houses some of the more rude and obnoxious fans I have ever encountered. That's not even mentioning EPSN, "east-coast bias", words like wicked and pissah, or those charming fair weather fans. I am, therefore, greatly chagrined to be living, however reluctantly, among them. I am an atypical "reluctant east-coaster."

When the opportunity to travel to the Bay Area fell into my lap, I was overjoyed. I was really looking forward to finally getting to see my Giants live for the first time in far too many years. I went to the games on Sunday April 19th, and Wednesday April 22nd - and witnessed two Giants wins. I saw a few interesting things, and thought that some might enjoy hearing them:

Game 1

Sidled up casually to a scalper (as casually as I could) - hoping to get a deal. He wanted me to pay $30 for an upper-deck seat. Feeling intimidated, I decided to move on. At the box office, they were selling front row Arcade seats for a little less that $30, which sounded pretty good to me. Only as I was walking on the ramp did I realize that, printed in all capital letters was the message "LIMITED VIEW" right on the front of the ticket. Crap. I trudged out to right field, my anticipatory misery only heightened by the fact that they were offering free wiffle balls and bats to kids 14 and under - and not enterprising adults who thought they could throw their voice pretty well. To my surprise, I was a full seat to the left of the foul pole, and it only ended up being a problem once (when Pablo hit a triple into the gap). We all know that the Giants ended up winning the game 2-0 over the D-Bags, but some of the best entertainment came in the form of the people sitting around me.

What follows is an actual conversation - a 20-something bro trying to impress his girlfriend.

BRO: Damn, Randy Johnson is looking good this year...

GF: Yeah...

BRO: It's pretty awesome that he's doing this when he's over fifty, y'know...?

GF: Really?

BRO: Yeah...he's been playing for ages...He played for the Rangers for a really long time...and I think the Cubs...

GF: Wow.

(Guy sitting on the other side of him and myself exchange indignant glance condemning his erroneous attempt at baseball knowledge)

(Star Trek night announcement comes up on screen)

BRO: Ah, sick! I heard that shit is supposed to be tight!

GF: (laughs) You like that stuff?

BRO: Uh....uh....I...just think it's kinda funny, you know?

GF: What?

BRO: (Desperately trying to extricate himself from situation) Pshh, I wonder what Kirk and Spock did during their college days? They probably had a gay experience, you know?

GF: (laughs inordinately hard at crappy homophobic joke)

Shortly afterwards, the people whose seats had been taken by the couple returned and put me and the guy on the other side out of our misery.

I may have cursed Randy, because when I went to the bathroom was when Ojeda got the only hit of the entire game, and broke up the no-no. I apologize.

There was an odd infestation of ladybugs near the foul pole, but besides that, everything was rosy. It was a really nice, sunny day and the usher that was going around even gave me sunblock. All in all, a great experience.

Game 2

This was the better of the two games. Seeing Zito pitch so well, having Molina come through in the clutch yet again, and watching Torres be a spark-plug were just delights. At the time, I had no idea that Sanchez was being skipped in the rotation, so seeing him come out and throw in the bullpen 3 or 4 times was a little strange. Oh boy, was Affeldt dirty. He struck out Giles and Gonzalez on a pair of absolutely filthy curveballs - and was way pumped up. Wilson looked a little shaky, but took care of business in the 9th and 10th. When I initially saw Molina's double, I thought it was going to be caught for sure. It was a bad swing, as he was lunging for a low pitch that he didn't even square up well. I guess it just traveled really well or the left-fielder took a bad route. The crowed absolutely erupted, and Torres, as per usual, was practically already touching the plate by the time the ball cleared the fence on a hop.

On the humous side, it was Earth Day at Big Phone Park. Subsequently, there were a number of unintentionally hilarious messages from players about the environment on the big screen. Burriss, Affeldt, and Hinshaw were the main "actors".

Burriss was actually pretty good. He hammed it up quite effectively, and was doing a lot of smiling.

Affeldt was terrible. Seeing his merkin in HD was frightening, and he positively glowered at the camera while reading from the teleprompter in a monotone. He was pretty intimidating, for what it's worth.

Hinshaw, as he does on the mound, looked lost. Perhaps stoned is a better word for it, but his flat brim was getting in the way of his reading, and he was doing a lot of squinting.

The ushers came around with plastic bags in the 8th inning - for the purpose of recycling bottles and cans. Manny had put me in the spirit, so I reached over to the aisle, dropped my water bottles in the bag - and promptly set into a chain of unfortunate events.

1. I missed with one of the bottles, (from point-blank range), and reached down to pick it up, embarrassed.

2. My left leg collided with a beer.

3. My right leg collided with another, different, beer.

4. Both the beers spilled (only partially, thank god).

5. A chorus of "boo" and "come on" showered me.

The people sitting around me were actually much more upset about it than the two guys whose beers I had spilled - they were pretty chill. Needless to say, it could have ended up much worse and it was my own damn fault.

On the plane back to Boston, I realized how much better everything was out by the bay. I leaned back, sighed to myself and then something occurred to me:

At least I have MCC.

via farm4.static.flickr.com