I guess I should call attention to the fact that someone from my hometown (in fact, we’re both alumni of the same high school) was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame this past weekend. The Tampa Tribune was apparently giving Wade Boggs saturation coverage all last week. And his plaque mentions the Devil Rays!
Levi (or Toby): any Carmi connections to the Hall of Fame?
The only real comment I have about watching the Devil Rays-Blue Jays game on TV tonight is that when Levi and I saw the Jays at SkyDome last year, the artificial turf was a brilliant shade of bright green; now that the building is known as Rogers Centre, they’ve switched to the modern-day artificial turf that more closely matches the color of real grass, yet somehow manages to look much worse on TV than real grass does.
Since that wasn’t quite substantial enough for a post, I’ll also provide a baseball-related excerpt from Bennett Cerf’s 1956 collection of jokes and anecdotes “The Life of the Party”…
Two rooters at a ball game were so engrossed in the contest that neither wanted to take time out to march back to the refreshment bar for hot dogs — and there wasn’t a vendor in sight. They finally bribed a kid nearby to go for them, giving him forty-five cents and saying, “Buy a dog for yourself at the same time.”
The kid came back with thirty cents change for them, explaining, “They only had my hot dog left.”
Actually, this one is slightly more typical of a Bennett Cerf collection of jokes and anecdotes…
Milton Berle discovered Tallulah Bankhead rooted to a radio in her dressing room one day, screaming her head off for the New York Giants. “Gosh,” exclaimed Miltie, “I didn’t realize you were so interested in the national pastime.” “Darling,” snapped Tallulah, “I am the national pastime.”
Incidentally, Tallulah wanted some new recipes for her chef to try. She called her favorite bookseller and ordered two copies of Fanny Farmer’s Boston Red Sox Cookbook!
Here’s an article from the Tampa Tribune about the Devil Rays and why they’re going to be playing in Tropicana Field for the foreseeable future.
I didn’t realize it, but apparently, yesterday was Throwback Uniform Day throughout the major leagues. I was tipped off by my father, who I called for Father’s Day today; he had gone to see the Devil Rays play the Cardinals Saturday night, and reported that the Cardinals were wearing their 1982 powder blue road uniforms — from back when we as a nation decided gray didn’t look good enough on TV — and the Devil Rays were wearing early 1960s uniforms from the University of Tampa, i.e., Lou Piniella’s old college baseball uniform. Unfortunately, this is the best picture I could find showing the front of the Rays’ uniforms.
First of all, on last night’s “Simpsons,” astrology was described as “the Tampa Bay Devil Rays of the sciences.” True enough.
Now, then, a while back, someone asked about baseball trips this summer. Sorry to say Levi and I aren’t doing a big baseball road trip this year like we did last year. But — unless gas goes above $4.00 a gallon — Jason and I have a Western trip planned for July, involving fewer games than the trip last year…
Thursday, July 7: St. Louis at Arizona
Friday, July 8: Memphis at Albuquerque (Pacific Coast League, class AAA)
Saturday, July 9: Salt Lake City at Colorado Springs (another PCL game)
Sunday, July 10: San Diego at Colorado
We’d have done a slightly longer trip, but the baseball schedules didn’t permit (for one thing, that’s leading into the All-Star break for both MLB and the PCL).
Now, I also happen to know that Levi and Stacey are visiting New York next month with friends from the U.K.; I assume either the Yankees or the Mets will be in town, but their schedule might be filled with other plans. (The two minor-league teams in NYC won’t be playing yet, since they’re short-season Class A.)
And I have also suggested a fair number of potential itineraries to Levi and Stacey that would work if they wanted to visit southern California and see the Dodgers, Angels, and Padres. Now, Levi’s predictable enough that I know his top choice would be the last weekend in July, when the Cardinals are in town to play the Dodgers, but he hasn’t made a decision yet on whether or not he can make it then (or ever).
As far as I know, my first major-league game attendance this year is going to be two weeks from tonight, to see the first-place Dodgers play, that’s right, the first-place Washington Nationals on May 2nd. Well, maybe they won’t be in first place in two weeks, but whatever. The post-Opening Day column in the L.A. Times about how horrible the Dodgers were going to be this year is now but a distant memory.
Levi: I just this morning purchased several tickets in a terrible, distant-from-the-plate (maybe not even in Queens!) section of the upper deck of Shea Stadium to see the Cardinals play the Mets on May 14th.
Jim: From what I know about Shea Stadium, sounds like you’ll have a very good view of the underside of airplanes.
As you may recall from a post here a few weeks ago, I wanted to hate the new movie “Fever Pitch.” You can’t truly hate what you don’t know, so I went to the theater today, grumbling through the euphemistically-named “pre-show countdown,” grumbling through the trailer for a Hilary Duff movie, grumbling through the trailer for a movie about girls sharing pants, really grumbling through the trailer for “Titanic” in space, and returning to a normal level of grumbling during the unexplained and unexplainable short promoting “American Dad.” Then the actual movie started.
Oh, wow, it’s just so downright charming, it’s impossible to hate. And it’s about baseball! Johnny Damon is in several scenes! The words “Devil Rays” come out of Jimmy Fallon’s mouth! I didn’t even mind Tim McCarver’s brief appearance! It made me forget all about that other movie called “Fever Pitch” with Colin what’s-his-name.
Seriously, Levi, I highly recommend that you and Stacey see it. If nothing else, it made me want to go see another game at Fenway Park, or fall in love with Drew Barrymore (or someone similarly cute), or preferably both.
All is forgiven, Stephen King: “The hapless Devil Rays will be more hapless still if Ivan, third and worst hurricane to menace Florida in the last thirty days, blows away their JuiceDome down there in Tampa; like a certain unlucky Jew, they may be doomed to simply wander, dragging their dusty equipment bags behind them, playing everywhere and always batting in the top of the first. ‘We once had a home,’ they’ll tell those who will listen. ‘It wasn’t very full, and most of the folks who showed up were old, many equipped with shunts and pee bags, but by God it was ours.’“
At the end of the book, it’s fairly obvious that the day after the Sox won the World Series, the publisher was screaming at Stephen King and Stewart O’Nan on the phone: “Just get us the manuscript now so we can get the book out before Christmas!”
I set the TiVo to record the MLB Extra Innings feed of this morning’s game. If I’d been 100% sure it would be showing up for free, I might have woken up earlier to watch it; as it was, I had to fast-forward through major portions of the game, which turned out to be a good thing. It was the Yankees’ YES Network coverage, and it looked like they had dug up a lot of old films of teams and players visiting Japan in the past, including Mickey Mantle celebrating his 24th birthday while the Yankees were on a barnstorming tour of Asia. (Actually, maybe ESPN showed the same footage yesterday morning, but I wouldn’t know.) Also, there will be a suitable-for-framing 8×10 photo of a Yankee great inside the Sunday Daily News every week.
Anyway, now that we know I’ll be getting MLB Extra Innings free for the first week of the season, Levi, you’re invited to my nameless apartment for the real Opening Day on Monday. It kicks off with Tigers at Blue Jays at 10:00 A.M. (And then the question is, since this morning’s game was the first one in the Extra Innings package, will they define “first week” as lasting only until next Wednesday, or all the way through Sunday the 11th?)
Future hanger-on Luke Seemann pointed out a photo in the Chicago Tribune yesterday, store taken at the Tokyo Dome at the Yankees/Devil Rays game. Luke characterizes it as the best sign ever. I think I might have to agree. It said, pilule “Hi, Derek. I hope you achieve more and more!”
In case you were sleeping: The Tampa Bay Devil Rays are in first place!
Jim: you’d better put down your subscription copy of Red Eye and start making World Series plans!