"People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do, I stare out the window and wait for spring." - Rogers Hornsby

:: Saturday, April 24, 2004 ::

Shut Up, Phil

So it's the top of the 9th and the Cubs appear well on their way to their fifth straight win and first shutout of the season and all of a sudden Phil pipes up:

"Hey, if we win tomorrow we'll be 12-6, the best start since when? 1969?"

In unison we all yelled:

"Shut up, Phil!"

Are we superstitious or what? Hey, I was just glad that the Cubs won anyway today despite my Super Big Gulp not being kicked over. In fact, some of the other season ticket holders waiting with me outside went out of their way to help me carefully get it inside. Thanks especially to Tim and Jonathan for holding it while I was getting my ticket out and having my backpack inspected.

The Cubs did indeed win their fifth straight, 3-0 over the Mets today, and Dave was very disparaging, and rightfully so, to the Mets' starting lineup today. He said they have only one legitimate major league player in the starting eight, Mike Piazza, and that's true. Piazza, for his part, looks about as graceful at 1B as Dave Kingman, though with a markedly better attitude. And while Kazuo Matsui was great in Japan, he's been decidedly average so far in the USA, and the rest of the team can be summed up thus: the Mets decided to go out and get some former Yankees, since the Yankees have been very successful.

Unfortunately, they got the wrong ones. Shane Spencer's made a career out of the 27-game, 67-at bat, 10 HR, .371 performance he had in 1998 (he got a ring, but had only 3 at-bats in the World Series); he's never come close to that since and is now 32. And Karim Garcia had a great half-season with the Yankees last year, but is perhaps best known for his and Jeff Nelson's leap into the Fenway Park bullpen during the ALCS.

For a while I thought Garcia might try to leap the 12-foot bleacher wall, as some of the drunks in the first few rows were baiting him pretty good, and he made some not-repeatable gestures back. Sometimes players do this and laugh, but I think Garcia was serious.

Despite a decent forecast, the game-time temperature was 50, 11 degrees colder than yesterday, and with fading sun and wind howling in off the lake, it felt a lot colder than that. Howard had the good sense to call me before he came in and I told him to dress warm, which now has gotten me the tab of "Sartorial Consultant" as well as being "Al-Master". Mike, however, didn't call and he wasn't really dressed for the weather, not having his warmer coat or gloves, and at one point he gave up scoring temporarily, catching up on the half-inning.

Actually, we can't complain too much. There have been nine home dates and the weather has been good or great on seven of them -- only today and Opening Day have been cold, and that's pretty good for April, and it hasn't rained at all on a game day. There is a forecast of rain overnight tonight, but it's supposed to clear out by gametime tomorrow.

It appears that whoever is running the new message boards learned a few things during the week. The out-of-town scores on the "mini-Tron" boards under the upper deck returned today (complete with NBA playoff scores, in which "NEW" beat "MIA" 77-71. Yes, I know that's New Orleans, but isn't the common abbreviation for that city "NO"?). The side message boards gave pitch counts -- although not when we really could have used them, when Kerry Wood was over 100 pitches. He wound up with 111 in 7 innings, which on a per-inning basis is even more than last Saturday, when he was at 112 through eight innings. And, the board in CF is now showing what players have done during the game, rather than just at-bats, though when Derrek Lee batted in the 8th, it said:

"1 for 3: 2B, Groundout, F"

Well, I personally thought Lee had a better day than "F"; it was at least a B-minus. Maybe they'll fix this by tomorrow. At least they're trying.

A few more things about the game: Wood looked like he had his "A" game on today; he struck out nine and walked only two, and as Mike said, he's never going to be the kind of guy who has an economy of pitches. Nolan Ryan was a pitcher like this and Wood has been, and I think correctly, compared to Ryan in terms of his style of pitching.

Mike and I have also discussed this at length in the past: the fixation Dusty Baker (and other managers too) have with platoon advantages. Kent Mercker came in to throw the 8th, and he struck out the first two batters he faced, on a total of ten pitches.

And what does he get for this accomplishment? Why, a pat on the butt and turn the ball over to LaTroy Hawkins. Nothing against Hawkins, who's given up absolutely nothing this year so far, but why disrupt the rhythm of the game, just so you can have a righty throw against Todd Zeile, who at this stage of his career just isn't all that dangerous?

To seemingly prove our point, Hawkins walked Zeile, and only got out of the inning because Aramis Ramirez made a fine play on a sharp grounder by Piazza. Ramirez, by the way, has turned himself into a fine third baseman, and I think his hard work in spring training on fielding is paying off. It's not just the presence of Derrek Lee at first, either. I think Ramirez has a lot of confidence in his own abilities to field balls cleanly. The Ramirez/Lofton deal may turn out to be one of the best in Cub history.

Anyway, none of this mattered since Hawkins shut down the Mets easily in the ninth for his first save of the year. But really, I wish managers wouldn't do this.

And just to show you that I can get it wrong, I had just finished saying to Mike, "I don't think anyone can hit it out of here today", when Sammy Sosa smashed his 544th career HR to left. He needs four more to tie Mike Schmidt for ninth place on the all-time list.

The Mets, despite coming into town with a 7-9 record (now 7-11), appear to be a really bad team. Four of those wins were over the Expos, who appear to be an even worse team than the Mets. Thus, this is a sweepable series, despite Al Leiter, the Mets' best pitcher, going tomorrow. Carlos Zambrano will oppose him, and Zambrano's been terrific too.

So while I hope Phil is right about what he said, I'm going to shut up myself, and wait for tomorrow.

:: posted by Al at 5:35 PM [+] ::
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I Really Have To Go!

This morning's Chicago Sun-Times had an interesting article about the restrooms at the new Soldier Field.

Seems that they decided to equalize men's rooms and women's rooms there, but didn't take into account that Bears crowds are between 60 and 75 percent male, resulting in men waiting in long lines for the restroom. They are now thinking about reassigning some of the women's rooms, at least during Bears games.

What does this have to do with today's efficient 3-1 Cub win over the Mets?

Well, nothing, really, except that I spent the last five innings really having to go bad because the line for the men's room was halfway up the ramp, something I have never seen before. I went down there twice, in the fourth and then the fifth inning, but nothing doing. Not wanting to miss a couple of innings, I just went back and sat down and waited till the game was over. Luckily, it was a quick two hours and twenty-two minutes. In fairness, the line for the women's room was almost as long.

This says one of two things: either there were more people drinking today than usual (gee, and wouldn't that be a surprise?) or, they have oversold the bleachers by more than the usual. Either could be true.

Actually, I shouldn't have had to go at all, as my Super Big Gulp was kicked over again even before the gates opened, this time by someone who just walked up to the bleacher entrance, didn't watch his feet, kicked it over and then walked away. I should have learned by now. Anyway, Howard was nice enough to bring me another one, but since by the time he got there, I didn't finish drinking the replacement until almost game time, that's why I suddenly had to go around the fourth inning.

OK, enough of this, only to remark that once again, a kicked-over Big Gulp resulted in a Cub win. I will take anything for the team.

Greg Maddux finally looked like the guy the Cubs paid $8 million for three seasons. Though the strike zone was almost ridiculously small, Maddux did adjust, walking only one, giving up only one run (a solo homer by Mike Cameron) and playing good defense, starting a 1-2-3 double play and also spearing a ball off the bat of Mets pitcher Jae Weong Seo in the fifth. His ERA dropped more than two runs, from 8.62 to 6.35, and it was win number 290 for his career.

I was a bit puzzled, due to the dearth of runs today, why Maddux was allowed to bat for himself in the seventh with a runner on first and one out. He attempted a sacrifice which resulted in a force play, and then was lifted anyway in favor of Kyle Farnsworth, who threw yet another good inning in a setup role. But with one out, if you're going to take Maddux out (and he had thrown only 86 pitches), why not send up Todd Hollandsworth, yes, even against the lefty Mike Stanton?

It's all moot because the Cubs won, but we were all wondering about that. Joe Borowski threw what Dave called a "real confidence-builder" in getting through the ninth without allowing a baserunner, and striking out Joe McEwing to end the game. Borowski's velocity is down and Dave thinks it might be because he threw so many innings in key situations last year, that maybe something's wrong with his arm and he doesn't want to say so because he wants to live up to the multi-year deal he signed in the off-season, and who could blame him for that?

If Borowski can throw strikes and keep the movement on his pitches that made him so successful last year, a couple MPH off his velocity won't matter. Today, he had that movement.

So, that's four wins in a row (and the fourth straight game in which Cub pitching has given up exactly one run) and with Kerry Wood going tomorrow, the Cubs have a real chance of sweeping the series, that is, if the weather on Sunday will cooperate, and you know they'll try everything they can to get the game in, since this is the Mets' only visit to Wrigley Field this year. Actually, the weather today, for the 7th time in the eight home games, was comfortable. I came with three layers -- medium-weight coat, sweatshirt, t-shirt, but spent the entire day till about the 7th inning in the t-shirt.

Tonight, I am off to my son Mark's first ballgame of the year, played under the lights at Sosa Field. For once, he's been put on a team that I don't totally hate -- the Diamondbacks. So let's go Baby Snakes!

:: posted by Al at 5:49 PM [+] ::
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Rainout Theater... Movie Review: "The Alamo"

The Cubs were rained out at Pittsburgh today. This echoes last year, when they had a rainout at PNC Park in their first visit there, though in 2003 it was in May, a game made up in a September DH the Cubs wound up splitting.

Tonight's postponement will be made up on Friday, May 28, as a doubleheader in the Cubs' next visit to Pittsburgh. It will also shift around the Cub rotation a bit; Kerry Wood, who was slated to pitch tonight, gets two extra days off and will go on Saturday, with Greg Maddux staying on rotation and going tomorrow afternoon against the Mets.

This is a good thing; Wood was stretched out to 131 pitches in his last start and this gives him extra recovery time, and with the early rainout, the Cubs get back in town at a reasonable hour tonight, awaiting tomorrow's day game.

And so, this gives me a chance to tell you a little bit about "The Alamo", which I saw this afternoon.

As a piece of historical fiction, this one's pretty accurate. The siege of the Alamo, part of the battle for a then-independent Texas, has been filmed before, but this time they got the history right -- though a mugging Billy Bob Thornton, playing Davy ("he prefers David", according to another character) Crockett, was a little over the top.

The basic story is that of the history: how a ragged band of "Texians" (as they called themselves at the time) held out at what was originally a Spanish mission, later made into a makeshift fort, for 12 days while the army of General Santa Anna besieged them, eventually killing nearly everyone there. They were rebelling against Santa Anna's dictatorial rule, after he had reneged on promises to give special privileges to people residing in Texas, which had enticed many Americans to move there, hoping to make their fortunes.

Dennis Quaid plays Sam Houston, who was not only the first President of the Republic of Texas (and who the city of Houston was named after), but also the general of their ragtag army. Quaid plays him with a perpetual scowl on his face, though he's about the only one who really has any idea of how to defeat Santa Anna's army, which he finally does with an inspired bit of military thought, based on how Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo. (The film's captions point out, correctly, that once Houston figured this out, Santa Anna's army was defeated in eighteen minutes.)

There's quite a bit of blood and shooting in this film, so if that kind of thing isn't your cup of tea, don't bother seeing it. Otherwise I liked the way it was photographed, in color but it almost felt sepia-toned. The Texians were portrayed oddly -- I got the feeling they were all just pretty much a bunch of drunks who you couldn't even root for against a superior army, except the Mexican army was portrayed in even worse terms, as men who acted superior in the officer ranks, while the ordinary soldier appeared as if he'd rather be just about anywhere else than slogging through the deserts and swamps of Texas.

Jim Bowie, who carried around a really large knife most of the time, almost to hit us over the head with the fact that the Bowie knife was named after him, was played by Jason Patric as not only a drunk, but someone who had tuberculosis, and spent about half the film lying in bed, dying. There's a sub-story here that isn't clear, as a woman who's never really identified, says she's staying with him because Bowie's ... well, that's not clear either. Wife? Lover? was her sister. And so they all die, including Bowie, who is murdered in cold blood, while a locket with this woman's picture is just out of his grasp. It's meant to convey great emotion, but this scene just confused me.

The history is true, the battle scenes well-done, but this isn't a great film, just a good one.

AYRating: ***

:: posted by Al at 8:27 PM [+] ::
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Never Again

The title of today's post has nothing to do with the title of yesterday's post.

Instead, it refers to what we should do in remembering one of the worst things in human history, the Holocaust. I mention this because Rachel's school choir sang today as part of the city of Chicago's Holocaust Remembrance Day program, at which the mayor (I'll refrain from my usual criticism of him today) and other dignitaries spoke, and the keynote speech was from a 79-year-old woman who is a survivor of Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen.

It was very moving, and as this woman and her children and grandchildren were introduced, I thought, "At least there are small victories from all that suffering."

Never again, indeed.

I did, however, in searching for some web links for this event, find on the city of Chicago's website a really old picture of the mayor, one that must be 15 years old or more. C'mon, Mayor Daley. Admit how old you really are (62 years old this Saturday, in case you are interested).

All of this really has nothing to do with tonight's Cub 12-1 demolition of the Pirates in Pittsburgh, a game that was over before most of the again sparse crowd was even in their seats.

The first eight Cubs reached base. And the first eight Cubs all scored, and it might have been more, except the ninth Cub to bat was pitcher Sergio Mitre, and with nobody out he laid down a nice sacrifice bunt. Josh Fogg, who has owned the Cubs before this year, has now been blown out twice by them in the last week (in the two starts: 4 IP, 12 H, 14 ER, 5 BB, 5 SO; ERA vs. Cubs: 31.50, ERA vs. league: 17.00), and left after the first six batters reached.

The Pirates' first baseman (and I use the term loosely), Craig Wilson (who is no relation to a Craig Wilson who played for the White Sox in the late '90s, or another Craig Wilson who played for the Cardinals and Royals in the early '90s, and can't we introduce a rule saying that you have to put at least 30 years between guys like this who have the same name, like the two Frank Thomases?) helped out by making an error, and then a real bad fielding decision (and there must be Hollywood actresses wondering who his hairstylist is, with blond curls reaching to his shoulders), when he threw home on a contact play, badly (when he could have taken an easy out at the base), allowing Alex Gonzalez to score. Fogg will thank Wilson, anyway: that made one of the runs charged to him unearned.

Sorry. I know there were too many parentheses in that last paragraph.

After that it was just fun, and Mitre threw six shutout innings on the way to his first major league win. Mike Wuertz, Francis Beltran and Joe Borowski finished up the win in garbage time, though Borowski got touched up for a run on three solidly-hit balls, and I still worry a bit about him. He hasn't thrown a decent inning all season.

This Cub team seems to enjoy hitting, and after yesterday's homer barrage, today's fifteen-hit attack included no home runs, just 11 singles and four doubles, and that shows how versatile this offense can be. Corey Patterson had the biggest day, with 5-for-6 including two doubles, and both the hot-hitting Moises Alou and Derrek Lee had three RBI.

Frankly, I wouldn't hurry Mark Grudzielanek back because Todd Walker is doing an absolutely fantastic job as a leadoff man, living up to his name, with today's 2-for-4 with two walks raising his BA to .333 and his OBA to .529. Yeah, he's a butcher in the field. So what? This is looking like the best free-agent signing of the entire offseason.

Also, continue to ignore all the Mark Prior scare stories. He threw off a mound again today at PNC Park, and next week when the Cubs travel to Arizona, he'll stay there and probably throw a game or two in extended spring training and then go to a minor league rehab assignment. The danger there isn't injury, it's the inevitable media circus that will follow him.

As I noted yesterday, after the big win there was a real chance that the Cubs could sweep the series, and even with Kip Wells, the Pirates' one real quality pitcher, going tomorrow, the Cubs counter with Kerry Wood. A sweep would be really sweet coming home to face the Mets on Friday, and count on the Cubs to want to do it in swift fashion, considering they play at night tomorrow in Pittsburgh (6:05 CT), and then have a 2:20 CT day game on Friday at home, one of only two times this year (June 17-18 is the other) that MLB's schedulers force them to work a short-turnaround shift.

:: posted by Al at 8:57 PM [+] ::
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Never!

This week is TV Turnoff Week.

Now c'mon, this just isn't realistic for me. For one thing, I work in the TV biz, so I wind up watching (well, not watching, directing) several hours worth of TV a day.

But do you really think I could give up watching the game and just listen to the radio? Or follow the ESPN GameCast or MLB GameDay?

Sorry, no way. The kids are really into it, though Mark had to steal a few looks at the game while he was writing a school essay on the computer, and Rachel was in the other room reading, all the while the Cubs were dismantling the Pirates 9-1 in front of what appeared to be a rather disinterested, small gathering at PNC Park in Pittsburgh.

I spent the day trying to catch up with, well, stuff. I had forgotten how far behind I wind up getting on everyday stuff during homestands. One day last week, and I don't know where, my Costco card, my Best Buy Reward Zone card, and my Jewel (local grocery store chain) preferred shopper card fell out of my wallet. Not a big deal, really: if someone truly wants to get me points by shopping at Best Buy, they can be my guest.

So I went and got these three replaced today, though I have to say, it took me less time to drive to Costco and get a new card and drive home, than it did to try to persuade the low-paid phone person at Best Buy to send me one in the mail. Every time I call a customer service line these days, I wonder if I'm talking to someone in India. I got one of those a few weeks ago and I literally had to hang up on him because I could not understand what he was saying, all the while he was trying to tell me, "I will speak better English!"

Ladies and gentlemen, American life in the 21st Century. Welcome to it.

I finished up reading some magazines that had been sitting around for a couple of weeks and sat down to watch the game.

At one point FSN put up a graphic comparing the Cubs after 13 games in 2003 and 2004. The clubs are remarkably similar -- identical 7-6 records, identical .355 OBP's, but a higher batting average this year, and though I knew the Cubs had hit quite a few homers this year, I had not remembered they hit only seven homers through the first 13 games last year, and twenty-six through yesterday.

They made that total an even 30 tonight with Corey Patterson (first inning), Todd Walker (fourth, and his first Cub homer), Alex Gonzalez (fifth), and Michael Barrett (eighth, and he is hitting the way Jim Hendry hoped he would, in the first two weeks). I missed the last one because I fell asleep on the couch, only to be awakened as I saw Barrett rounding the bases, by a tornado warning that had been issued for southern Cook County (luckily, nowhere near here).

Meanwhile, Carlos Zambrano threw masterfully, and who'd have thought he'd be the Cubs' most consistent starter so far this year? He had a great spring and has continued through the regular season, and threw 111 pitches through his eight innings, allowing only a single run when Tike Redman tripled and Jack Wilson singled him in. Francis Beltran (I almost typed "Carlos Beltran" there, wishful thinking, that) threw an efficient ninth inning to finish up.

I should give kudos here to my friend Mike from L.A., who decided not to be in our fantasy league this year, and so I asked him to pick my team when we all drafted yesterday (I thought it would have been insane to try to do it via cellphone from the skybox), and among others he chose Barrett, Zambrano, and even, yes, the Pirates' Wilson, who's not one of my favorite players but is hitting nearly .400 in the first two weeks. I also got Kerry Wood, but most of the other good Cub hitters went far too quickly for me to grab them.

So, it's a nice start to this mini-road trip of three games, and I especially like them when they're quick, two hours and twenty-five minutes, and I can post here and get to bed at a reasonable hour to get up for work at 3:30 am.

:: posted by Al at 8:31 PM [+] ::
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Stuff I Forgot Yesterday

* Jeff didn't come to yesterday's game as he had to work. But in the 7th inning we turned around and saw a guy who looked like his evil twin, standing against the fence. I mean, the resemblance was scary, even down to the guy holding a scorecard.

Then the Cubs had their 5-run inning and he was gone.

We must figure out a way to do this more often.

* Adam Dunn of the Reds must have thought he was being really clever when Aramis Ramirez' drive in the 8th inning got lodged in the leafless ivy. He held his hands up, hoping to get the "ground-rule-double" ruling from the umpires.

For about the only time in the series, the umpires made the right call. The ball was clearly visible, so the fielder has to go and get it. If they'd have waited a bit longer, Ramirez might have had the weirdest inside-the-park HR in Cub history; he had to settle for a triple.

:: posted by Al at 9:31 AM [+] ::
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Haz-Matt

In the TV news biz, and in police and fire lingo, a "hazmat" is when some sort of chemical spill, or other "hazardous materials", cause shutdowns or evacuations.

And in the first inning, when Matt Clement was pitching hazardously, and struggling, and allowing an early run to the Reds, Howard immediately dubbed him "Haz-Matt".

Luckily, Haz-Matt turned into Good Matt, as Clement settled down, at one point retiring 11 in a row, and pitched into the seventh with a total of 107 pitches (38 in the first two innings), and the Cub bats exploded for a 5-run seventh, blowing open a close game into a satisfying 8-1 win over the Reds, splitting the four-game series and concluding a winning homestand with a 4-3 record, though it probably should have been 5-2.

We were all back in our bleacher perch today, and as such I turned back into Al-Master. Both Brian and Phil were looking for tickets and called me not long after I got there. I couldn't find anything, but Phil managed to find a couple, and held on to one for Brian (who, incidentally, was late in coming because he was at his graduation from the Chicago Fire Academy today) -- but only after coming upstairs and letting us know that he couldn't remember which one he had scanned, and now that they are not ripping anything but season tickets, he had to go back down with both tickets and explain what happened to security. Why they don't tear all tickets, given the scalping problem, is puzzling to me.

I will give kudos to security again today, though. Four obviously drunk young women came in, with fake ID's (though it's scary -- I got a good look at one of the fake ID's and it looked pretty legit) and tried to not only buy beer for themselves, but tried to buy one of the security people a drink. Very bad move, and one that got them immediately ejected and probably arrested, too.

This seems to be an epidemic these days, based on this article about an underage drinking party arranged off-campus by parents of some lacrosse players at Glenbrook South High School, the other half of the school district that got national infamy last May for the hazing of some junior girls.

At a contentious school board meeting last night, the board was apparently bullied by parents and students into letting the kids, who were going to be expelled, off.

This quote from the article absolutely amazes me:

"What you are establishing here is a dangerous precedent," said Art Wolf, a former school board member. "You have already intruded into people's homes and basements -- what's next, the bedroom?"

No, Art, that isn't the point. At the risk of sounding like a conservative old fart, I'm going to go out on a limb and say that clearly, adults in this community think it's OK for high school students to have a party where they drink alcohol. This is illegal. If parents won't teach morality, who will?

So the lesson learned here, which I see all the time at the ballpark, is that no one has to obey the law which says you have to be 21 to drink -- because adults say it's OK. I said to Howard when the four girls, who appeared to be high school kids, were kicked out: "Those are the future mothers of underage drinkers."

OK, sermon over.

I brought about three changes of clothes to wear, because the day started out sunny and in the 70's. But it was cooling off by the time I got there and I opted to not wear the shorts, and while the sun was out, a T-shirt and jeans were fine. The pullover I had came in handy while it was cloudy, which was most of the time, though I did wind up pulling it on and off about four times. Still, this day's weather was probably better than 90% of April days at the ballpark.

The wind was howling out to RF, right in our faces (WHOOPS! I originally posted LF, which of course was the last two days, not today), about 25 MPH, so if I'd have been Dusty Baker, I'd have stacked the lineup with left-handed hitters, including Paul Bako, who kills Reds pitching. As it turned out, only two homers were hit today, both by right-handed hitters -- Aramis Ramirez with a solo shot in the fifth, and Derrek Lee's grand slam in the 5-run seventh off Ryan Wagner, a #1 pick of the Reds last year who clearly needs more minor league time. The wind didn't seem all that tricky today either. Let's hope this helps get Lee out of the slump he's been in for almost the entire season so far.

Corey Patterson had a nice at-bat today, driving in the first two runs with a line single to right after fouling off a couple of changeups off Jimmy Haynes, he got the fastball he was looking for and pulled it nicely. Dave, always critical of Patterson, agreed with me, and did say that no matter what he's said before, at least Patterson does play hard while he's on the field.

In addition to Clement's good outing, Todd Wellemeyer threw two very good innings to finish, and he's rapidly coming up the ladder as a possible setup man. Mike Wuertz did warm up, but didn't get into the game. I'd expect a roster move to be made before tomorrow, perhaps sending Francis Beltran down and bringing up a lefty, either Glendon Rusch or Jimmy Anderson (I'd choose Rusch).

Finally, an attendance record was set this afternoon. The 4-game series drew 159,461, a new record for a four-game series, breaking the record set last year vs. the Astros.

It will likely be broken again when the Cardinals are here in June, and then again when the Astros are here in August.

Average attendance is now 39,765, which is 100.7% of capacity -- that means all tickets sold, plus some standing room, on average, for every game.

:: posted by Al at 5:33 PM [+] ::
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And Now For Something Completely Different

(title changed from "Well, That Was Different" due to the Monty Python-esque nature of the game)

Not today's game, but where we all watched the game. Brian's bachelor party continued this afternoon... in Skybox (or properly, Mezzanine Suite) #62 along the RF line. So Brian, his dad Dave, his brothers Jake & Kevin (who were the hosts), and Mike, Phil, Jeff, Howard and I, gave up our bleacher perch today to sit with about 20 other friends of Brian's, and see the game from a different angle.

On the way out I said to Mike, "Well, they lost. Now we can't come back up here again."

Once again, I'm starting at the end of a hugely disappointing 10-inning loss to the Reds, as they paid us back for Friday (more on that later), 11-10.

First, naturally, Jake was late showing up with the tickets, so we were standing on the corner waiting for him, catching a bit of the 76-degree sunshine, and then the five of us (me, Mike, Jeff, Howard and Phil) walked in through gate F, directly opposite where we usually go in, at Clark & Addison.

We were like five little kids who were in a new candy store, standing behind the field box seats, just looking around. It's probably been three or four years since I'd been over there, and Phil said the last time he was on the other side of the park was the 1989 playoffs.

From the bleachers, you can't really see the plexiglas shields they have put on either side of the screen in front of the new dugout seats. Also, the angle of the wall there, next to the dugout, looks completely different up close -- from the bleachers it appears to be almost a 90-degree angle, but when you walk up near it and look, the angle is much more gentle.

Other differences: they've replaced several thousand seats in the last few years, with new-style seat number plates; we walked over to the foul line and were standing again behind the field boxes when an usher actually asked us if we wanted to go stand by the wall. A bit surprised, we did go down there, though all everyone was doing was trying to get the autograph of the Reds' Phil Norton.

Having seen all we wanted to, we trooped up the ramps to the skybox level. Mike said it looked like the hotel corridor where we stayed in Miami. I agreed, only to add, "but it has nicer carpeting."

The food is catered by Levy Restaurants, which also does the United Center suites and the food at the Ravinia festival, and though there was ballpark fare like hot dogs, there was also a large deli sandwich sliced into about a dozen pieces, and then a dessert cart came by. OK, I shouldn't have, but I indulged in a chocolate chip cookie. Special occasion, you know.

The seats are... well, they're awfully close together. This box is called the "Double Play" box, twice as large as most, and it has 30 seats in 3 rows, but there's hardly any knee room, and though they are nice and padded, we all felt kind of scrunched in. Phil, of course, sat there trying to rebuild the ballpark's architecture.

The view's nice, although it's hard for me to pick up pitches since I'm so used to looking at them from a different angle. It's also easy to see how everyone on that side of the park thinks every fly ball is a home run. The place looks much smaller from that perspective.

And they really do cut off TV replays of what might be controversial plays on the monitors in the box. There were some close plays shown, but not the real iffy ones, and there was at least one that was blatantly missed by C. B. Bucknor at second base today.

Was it fun? Sure. Would I do it again? Probably not, not even if I could afford my own box. I like the bleachers, the sunshine (naturally, it was the warmest day of the year so far, 25 degrees above normal), and my friends out there.

They all shared this frustrating loss with me, and of course, part of the day was caused by the wind, though I don't think any of the seven homers were wind-aided. Greg Maddux has got to start throwing strikes -- that's always been the hallmark of his career, and in three starts he's been uncharacteristically wild, hitting another batter today, though he only walked two, he was constantly behind hitters, not something he usually does.

Sammy Sosa, as you probably know, broke Ernie Banks' club record for homers with his 513th as a Cub, in the first, then extended the record in the third. Mike, who has known Dave for 30 years, asked him if he ever thought Banks' record would be broken, and he said no. Dave doesn't stand up and applaud very often, but he did so for this record.

But Dave was also very critical of Corey Patterson's play today; even though Patterson had two hits, he had four really bad at-bats and wasn't very selective at the plate today, and didn't play Juan Castro's triple very well off the wall.

Moises Alou, still on fire, got three-fourths of the cycle, missing only the single, and had two chances to get it, lining to right in the 8th and reaching on a dropped third strike in the 10th.

But the worst thing about today's game was what I thought was a terrible baserunning choice by Todd Hollandsworth, who had reached on a pinch-hit single in the bottom of the 9th. Jose Macias followed with a bloop single to left, and with the play right in front of him, Hollandsworth tried to take third, and was thrown out easily. So instead of having runners on first and second with one out, there was only a runner on second with two out.

I also quibble with Dusty Baker's choice of pinch-hitters. Instead of pinch-hitting Hollandsworth leading off the inning for Kyle Farnsworth, he pinch-hit Jose Macias. Macias made an easy out, and even though Hollandsworth did get a hit batting for Paul Bako, that forced Baker to use Michael Barrett, and of course the Reds started running on him in the 10th. Besides that, Bako had two hits today (his first hits of the season), and hits the Reds like crazy (he hit .381 against them last year and is 22-for-65 against them since 2001, including today). In fact, I'd start Bako again tomorrow.

It's only one game, I keep telling myself. There have been twelve games played, and look what a pretty good team like the Mariners have started out with -- a 3-8 record.

I'm going to end this post with an e-mail I got from Carole, which bore the subject line "boooooooooooooooooooooooboooooooooooooooobooooooooooo":

Well you sure got your money's worth in the skybox today. Too bad it didn't come out the right way.

I can't take a year's worth of these games. In August I let myself start thinking about the possibilities. In Sept. I start to believe & then these games make me crazy.

But, dammit, I believe NOW & will lose my mind or have to move to Alaska if it is like this all year.

I'm not worried, yet. It was a good sign the way Farnsworth pitched today. Let's hope he's tracked.

I still stand by what I said about Maddux. He is a concern. I'm more worried about Borowski but at least we have Hawkins. Come back soon Remlinger.

They had a cute stat before the game yesterday.

They called it 'Freaky Fridays.' They compared the last 2 Friday games:

Hollandsworth pinch hit homer: check
Trailing after 8 inn.: check
game tying homer: check
Cubs victory: check

I though it was cute anyway. For a Chip thing especially. Dork. "Look, I'm
in the dictionary -- d-o-r-k." Duh, that's right Chipper.

I know that someone at WGN must have read my post from Friday and stole the heading for that graphic. It's OK. I hope next Friday is a more calm and ordinary game, anyway.

Sight seen (on the TV monitor in the skybox): A very large man, shirtless, who had "I ATE BARTMAN" painted on his chest.

Stupid, but give him points for originality.

:: posted by Al at 5:37 PM [+] ::
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