2004 Baseball

Phillies 4 Mets 2

Sunday Afternoon
Shea Stadium
With Sujan, Sophie (a kid from my class last year) and her parents.

What a complete snoozefest. This was Sophie’s first ever major league game and her only response was that she wanted to go to a Yankees game. I can’t blame her because who would want to subject themselves to this nonsense? The Mets sleptwalk through another loss. Glavine fell to 9-13. The Mets lost their 19th of their last 21 games and fell to 61-81 thus guaranteeing their third straight non-winning season. Lovely.

Red Sox 3 Yankees 2

Friday Night
Yankee Stadium
With Alex B.

What a glorious ending. The Red Sox moved to within 2 1/2 games of the Yankees and they did it by scoring two runs in the 9th against Rivera. Too bad I had left hours earlier. What? Me leave a big game in September early? Yes, well, it was supposed to rain all night. And when the second rain delay started in the 3rd inning, Alex and I thought we were making the right move to take off for Brooklyn. Unfortunately, the weather cleared and they were able to play.

When I got off the train at Atlantic Ave. to walk over to 4th Ave. and Atlantic to take the bus home, my sister who was visiting for the weekend pulled up to the corner to give me a ride. I might have missed a great game, but at least I got a ride home!

The game was very entertaining, even on TV. Manny Ramirez robbed Miguel Cairo of a homerun, but Cairo didn’t know and continued to run the bases. He celebrated demonstratively and the third base coach gave him an enthusiastic high five. It wasn’t until he got to the dugout that he found out the truth. As I watched on TV, I kept telling myself that I wouldn’t have had quite the fun view if I had seen it in person.

I kind of was hoping that the Yankees would blow the Red Sox out so I wouldn’t feel bad for leaving early. No such luck. But, how could I be unhappy with the result? I still can’t believe I left in the 3rd inning.

From Alex’s blog:

I do believe in beauty. I do wake up and feel exhilirated by the new dawn. I am an eternal optimist. But there are some things that really piss me off. Let me list the ways.
Going to Yankee Stadium annoys me, it just does. ($18)
Spending over an hour on the 4 train to get there when it should only take about 45 minutes.($2)
Pissing, miserable, soaking, demoralising rain.(free, it's rain you know)
Obnoxious Yankee fans on aforementioned 4 train.(also free yet still annoying)
Waiting for half an hour to get into the Death star in a crowd of annoying Yankee fans in the rain. (a combination of all of the above except the bit about the 4 train).
Seeing six Yankee fans turned away from the gate because they had arrived on Friday night with tickets for Sunday's game. (F*CKING PRICELESS!!!!).

Cubs 2 Mets 1, 10 innings

Friday Night
Shea Stadium
With Sujan

Glendon Rusch came back to Shea to show his old team how it is done. Kris Benson looked good as well. But like everything as else this season, the Mets came up short. Derrek Lee’s RBI single in the 10th proved to be the game winner.

Mets fans were in the minority on this night. Cubs fans were quite obnoxious. What happened to the lovable loser image of the Cubs? The fans were acting like Yankees’ fans. All full of cockiness and bombast. At least the Yankees win, these fans shouldn’t get so damn cocky because their team never ever wins. Between the fans at this game and the fans in the bleachers at the game we went to last July, my interest in seeing the Cubs win is rapidly dissipating. I was very happy that the Mets beat them the next two games. (And this started a freefall for Dusty’s teams that did keep them out of the playoffs.)

Sujan amused herself by coming up with new nicknames for the putrid Mets. Some examples?
Kaz Matsui became Spazz Matsui. Braden Looper became Braden Pooper. Mike Stanton became Mike Stankton. To listen to her giggle after each new name was definitely quite amusing.

The best heckle of the night was a simple one. One fan kept yelling at Cubs’ closer LaTroy Hawkins by referring to him as “LaToya.”

(La Troy Hawkins image deleted)
LaTroy

(LaToya Jackson image deleted)
LaToya

Bill