The Worst Day Fishing
(Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)
Have you ever seen the bumpersticker that says “The worst day fishing is better than the best day working”? Replace the word “fishing” with “at the ballpark” and you will have the perfect description of my experience yesterday at Ballpark By the Bay (officially known as AT&T Park) in San Francisco as the Diamondbacks dropped the first game of their series to the Giants 5-4.
I fell in a parking lot, tripping over something I could not see and ended up with bruises on my left knee, right arm and stomach. I am on prescription blood thinners and so now I bruise easily. Chad Tracy, I feel your pain! No way you can play while taking blood thinners. Then I lost the Diamondbacks sign I kept from last September. Don’t know how it disappeared but it did. I hadn’t even gotten into the park yet. That was a harbinger of things to come.
The Diamondbacks then helped turn into the truth one of the signs my friend, Tigger, a staunch Barry Bonds supporter, drew up. “The only life form lower than a Dodger is a federal prosecutor.” The Giants got out of the cellar due to last night’s victory. So the Dodgers are now the lowest life form in the NL West. But are we supposed to be losing to the basement bunch?
Hell No. But hell it was yesterday. (Like Zandru’s frozen hell in Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Darkover novels). The wind was the overwhelming consideration long before the sun set. Whoever decided that a ballpark WITHOUT A DOME should be built right next to a bay in a windy town should be executed by being tied naked to a foul pole until he/she/they die of exposure. This was the coldest day, bar none, I have ever experienced at a ball park. Even colder than August 22, 2006, when I left after 6 innings because Byrnesie had been pulled in a double switch and I was freezing.
It was so cold, I broke down and spent $6.50 on some chicken noodle soup at the Safeway concession stand–it was good, but would have been better at $3.50–and this morning I have a singed tongue to show for it. It was so cold, I was shivering, and had to wrap myself in Tigger’s Giants blanket, much to the delight of Lucas, a regular in section 139 of the bleachers. He’s the one guy there who usually razzes me about showing up in my Diamondbacks gear. Last night, he solicitously wrapped the blanket around me to make sure I was warm and not showing any Diamondbacks insignia. And indeed, not even the snake on my cap was showing because it was so windy I tied a bandana around the cap to make sure it wouldn’t blow away. After all, Byrnesie signed it last year. It’s a snug fit, but I wouldn’t take the chance.
It was so cold that it was not a good day for either starting pitcher. But Randy Johnson, starting for the first time since July of last year, 44 years old and recovering from his second back surgery in two years, put in a creditable performance under the circumstances. And he left after 5 with a 4-3 lead! But for the second day in a row, the bullpen could not hold.
It was not a great day for Giants starter, the younger healthier Jonathan Sanchez either. Conor Jackson drove in three of the four runs against him, two with a home run early that got me to thinking that we might have another slugfest. But their bullpen was better than hours, and their defense though not sterling, was better than ours. Stephen Drew was charged with an error after dropping a pop fly he went into left field to get. Robbie Hammock made a very high throw attempting to cut down a base stealer. Orlando Hudson made a good leaping catch to save it from going into center field. But had the throw not been high the runner would have been out. Justin Upton tried to make a diving catch in right and he missed. Mark Reynolds made a valiant effort to go after pop foul, but someone forgot to tell him that there is a big drop on the other side of the dugout barrier. After a few minutes, he got up and, gamer that he is, stayed in. But I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that he is even more bruised than I am today.
As for Eric Byrnes, who is the only person in the world I’d freeze for, I did get to see him when he came in. He asked me how I was and I said, “Better, now that you’re hitting.” He laughed and said, “It’s a long season.” He is indeed growing what Chris Young has called the worst moustache in the league. He looks like he’s got Morgellon’s Disease, that strange ailment that people say makes fibers grow out of their bodies. Tigger gave him grief over that and over the fact that he skipped back to his position after a break in the action during which he had gone to center to talk to Chris Young. But I loved it. I say that a man who can skip in public is secure in his masculinity and Byrnesie has fun in a game like no one else.
During batting practice, he gave Tigger’s “heckle bat” its inaugural autograph. This bat is for opposing players that Tigger is particularly fond of heckling and who are not likely to want to hit her with it. Byrnesie gets a lot of grief from sections 138 and 139 in left field, a sign of respect in a sense, because the fans are aware of the damage he can do.
But not this night. He did line a single to left to extend his hitting streak to ten games. But he made the final out of the game with a high infield popup caught either by the pitcher or the first baseman. (From out in left field, I couldn’t tell). It was his worst at-bat and came at the worst possible time because he was the potential tying run. In his two other AB’s, he flied out to center. The second time, he backed Aaron Rowand to the wall.
In weather such as last night’s, most high flies get knocked down. At first, it looked like Byrnesie’s ball was going out, but then it came down sharply and only would have hit the wall, not gone over it, if Rowand hadn’t picked it off. (Hey, Aaron, I’ll bet you like that nice padded wall better than that fence you kissed a while back!)
Byrnesie, towering flies look dramatic only when they go over the fence. But unless you are vintage David Ortiz, that doesn’t happen in a gale. Line drives please. (He did hit one that the shortstop caught). The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.
Speaking of which, it is time for me to make a straight line back to the ball park for Game Two. This time it’s a day game, which means I will probably bake. But I can take layers off in that case. And as Eric has said, “when it’s day game after a night game, Advantage Byrnes.” It sure was that way last time.
Byrnesblogger1
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Posted by ByrnesBlogger1
Kellia Ramares is a freelance journalist, poet and baseball blogger from Oakland, CA. Kellia writes (and does some audio work) about baseball, especially the Arizona Diamondbacks, on her blog, Down The Left Field Line: Life, Baseball & Eric Byrnes. (http://byrnesblog.azsportshub.com), under the name ByrnesBlogger1. She expects to expand her sports journalism from baseball fandom to stories on social issues in a sports context in a website she is building in the fourth quarter of 2007 to be an annex to the "Byrnesblog".
Contact: ByrnesBlogger1[at]azsportshub.com
http://byrnesblog.azsportshub.com
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