You Mean I Can Actually Go to Games?

Yesterday I took a trip to my first (and probably only) Major League Baseball game this season. The journey was a hassle. It took an hour and a half to get to Wrigley Field on the ‘l’ and the trip home was no more fun, but the sweet game in the center was all I could hope for, though a little long. I love baseball but let’s get home quicker than 3 and a half hours.

I don’t have a camera, so there are no pictures from this great event, but let’s just say it was as perfect as a day comes weather-wise. 80 degrees and sunny, a nice breeze, blowing out of course, and a seat in the shade. I was a little bit late to the game, but I sat down in my upper deck seat, along the right field line just in time to see Derrek Lee belt a home run to center as the crowd erupted. Good timing. I was initially excited when I saw Carlos Zambrano pitching for the Cubs, because I thought it was going to be Carlos Silva. As it turned out, Silva may have been the better pick.

But it really didn’t matter because everyone looked the same. It was Jackie Robinson Day and everyone was wearing no. 42. There was mass confusion on every substitution, and after I had moved down behind the Cubs bullpen, every time someone would start warming up, my brother and I would have this exchange.

Him: Who’s that warming up?
Me: I don’t know; who’s number 42?
Him: (very annoyed)

After Derrek Lee was ejected – for what I have no idea – it took us three innings to figure out who was playing first base. I love Jackie Robinson, and I just wrote a few weeks ago about the importance of his number, but there’s got to be a better way to honor the man than to totally bamboozle the fans.

Anyway, the highlight of the game was undoubtedly the baby that was sitting in the row ahead of me for the lat few innings. I’ve never seen anybody so happy to be at a ballgame. This kid couldn’t have been more than a year old, but he had a perpetual smile on his face. And why not? He got to spend an afternoon at Wrigley Field AND see the Cubs lose! (The Brewers took the game 8-6) It doesn’t get much better than that, does it?

Like the baby, I left the park smiling. I actually would have preferred to see the Chicago team win, but really, no matter the outcome, you can’t beat fun at the old ballgame.

Build Me a Statue!

The Brewers announced this week that they will be erecting a 7 ft. tall monument to Bud Selig at Miller Park, to be unveiled August 24. Yes, Bud Selig, the man who has almost single-handedly killed my interest in Major League Baseball. If somebody is willing to build a statue for the man who instituted the Wild Card, started interleague play, tried to contract the Expos and Twins, ruined the All-Star Game and World Series in one shot back in ’03, abolished the American and National League offices, allowed the 1994 strike that called off the World Series for the first time in 90 years, watched steroids rule the game for the next decade and has just been generally incompetent for the last 20 years, then I’ve got to think I can come up with a list of guys who deserve statues in Milwaukee too. Just off the top of my head:

• Paul Moliter
• Eddie Matthews
• Bob Uecker
• Charlie Grimm
• Ben Sheets
• Cal Eldred
• Dave Nilsson
• Dan Plesac
• Gorman Thomas
• Jerry Royster
• Arthur Fonzarelli (Wait, this one actually already exists)
• Oprah Winfrey (Who couldn’t use an Oprah statue?)
• Adonis Terry (I just really like his name)
• Joseph Schlitz

I look forward to hearing the completion dates of these.