Despite the fact she thinks I am a right wing hit job artist, Mary Ellen is a very nice lady and an avid baseball fan. Greg is too ( uh, that is baseball fan, not a nice lady).
Both are Sox fans, ME the White Sox and Greg the Red Sox. I must admit that baseball is not my favorite, but I do enjoy going to the games in person. Watching one on TV is not as exciting, especially when there are 162 games in a season. But I do enjoy it during the playoffs and the Series, because every game is crucial at that point.
As a boy living in So Cal, I was always an Angels fan. For the longest time, I figured they would never win anything. Of course, they proved me wrong awhile back and I suppose that has regenerated my interest, in the game. I was mad at all of them in the 80s and 90s, because of the strikes and basically boycotted them for many years.
Although it is titled for ME and Greg, if you are a baseball fan, this thread is for you. I am busy for the biggest part of the day and may not be able to comment much, so have at it.
(If there are any ex-pat fans out there, this is your chance to talk up your favorite team.)
13 comments:
Wow! A baseball thread! This is great...I woke up this morning and heard the thunder and rain outside and the first thing I thought of was "Spring is here and that means baseball!".
Last night I was sitting with my husband and son and going through the schedule for this year's games. We have season tickets, but we sell off some of them because it's impossible to go to all the games. We were taking our favorite picks and trying to balance it out so we have about 5 games per month. It looks like with the start times this year we will be able to do a lot of tailgating.
Anyway...speaking of the Angels, LA, I was reading about our guy Erstad that we picked up from the Angels to play center field. I was a little concerned at first and was wondering what Kenny Williams was thinking, seeing that he's no spring chicken and he's just finished recuperating from ankle surgery, but from what I hear, he's tearing up the field in Spring practice.
I also heard that my favorite closer, Bobby Jenks, is having a bit of trouble. He says he is only feeling some tightness, I hope it's not more than that. He has a tendency to get out of shape in the off season, and if he doesn't have the control, he can kill a guy with that fast ball of his. During the games, I watch him just before he throws his pitch. He's totally concentrating, but you can see his hands shake a little. Anticipation or nerves? There's an awful lot of pressure put on that guy, and he's still so young.
This Saturday is the Cub/Sox pre-season game. I don't take it too seriously, but it's fun to sit and watch a game after being away from it all winter. Gives me that giddy "spring break" feeling I used to get when I was in school!
Thanks for the thread, LA!
Oh! Not baseball but Bears news...they FINALLY got a contract signed from Lovee. Geez, I don't know what they were waiting for, the guy deserves a great contract, he earned it. I was afraid they were going to blow it and we were going to lose him.
Wow...what happened to Greg?
Well, here's a joke that I think is appropriate considering yesterday's stock market crash.
The stock market really plummeted yesterday, but luckily there is a computer chip that is used to turn off the board if it gets too low.
The Cubs have the same chip in their scoreboard.
Hey - sorry I was out all day at a meeting.
M-E, I heard about Jenks this morning. That didn't sound good, but look on the bright side: you have a closer. The Red Sox have none. Fantastic starting rotation of Schilling, Beckett, Matsusaka, Papelbon and Wakefield. Then no one to finish off the game. We've seen this before, and the results are always bad. I'm expecting a very frustrating season.
Looks like the AL East is going to the Yankees for, what, the 10th straight year. Ugh.
Looking around the league, the White Sox and Tigers look strong again.
Anyway, I don't care too much if my team doesn't win it all. I just love watching baseball and living the sport for 6 months.
I'll also enjoy waiting to see if Bonds gets indicted for lying to the grand jury or for tax evasion. Hate that guy.
Hey Greg!
Glad they let you out of that meeting. Don't they know you have blogging to do? :-D
Hey, I heard there have been death threats against Bonds...Greg! You got some 'splainin to do! ;-)
It sounds to me like Ozzie is really gonna lean on these guys this spring. They know that they have to get back to small ball again, which is what I was screaming about all last season! Pods is back after surgery and from what I hear, he is going to be good to go pretty soon. Crede is 100% again. The only guy I would like to see them dump is Uribe. I heard he gained a ton of weight and that really pisses me off. That guy only tries when he knows his job is on the line. They should have dumped him two years ago. I have no patience with lazy players.
We've got some new, young pitchers and I can't wait to check them out (to see how they play...not how they look). Although, I must admit that one of my favorite times of the games is when I have my trusty pair of binoculars that I use to watch the guys do their stretching before the game. Drives my son nuts when I do that! :-D
Well, looks like you two are the only ones that give a damn about baseball. :(
Anyway, I agree with ME (doesn't happen very often, so mark it down) small ball wins championships. But beyond that, I wonder who the surprise team of the year will be. Last year it was the Tigers.
I will always like the Angels, but my wife lived in Atlanta for 20 years and I am required to root for them when they do not play the Angels, which is almost never. (They did play in interleague once, I think.)
I know Rocket likes the Reds. I have seen a game at the new stadium there, had to finance the concessions. (When they were in Riverfront and owned by Marge Schott, they were the best value in baseball.)
Anyway, I tried. I know that AC likes baseball, maybe he will weigh in at some point.
At one time I had collected something like 53 batting practice balls from (tears) Candlestick Park. Also, I think I might still be the only one ever to have reached 19th avenue from the softball field. However, I was born a Mets fan so those two share a place in my heart for ever and ever. I love baseball. They have a team out here in Brest that is actually pretty good but I don't live in Brest, so there you go.
Hi BeingHad
What's with your website? I can't get it, just a blank page.
Anyway, speaking of baseball in the US, what bothers me the most is that the prices are so high to attend a game, the average kid, or poor kids can't attend the games. America's favorite past time has been taken away from a whole generation of kids because of the greed of the players and the organization has caused the ticket prices to go so high.
You don't see kids in the US playing ball in the street anymore. They are either in a league or do it through school. It seems the fun has been taken out of the game for the average kids who can't afford to join the leagues. Now, it's all about the competition, not about the fun.
My fondest memories were playing ball in the street or in an open lot with my brothers and the other neighborhood kids. We usually played softball because that way we wouldn't hit the ball so far that it would go through a neighbors window. Those were the days of the lazy, hazy summers. Sigh.
Sorry Mary Ellen. The only thing that I have heard about this, and this is the second time, is that you must be using firebox. I built the thing on IE7 and I am using frames, so if you get nothing, this is why. Actually, I have no idea how to fix it so if you have any suggestions, let me know. I don't know why Firefox can't read a simple frameset…
And though I miss baseball too, I can go in the summer and pay maybe 75 cents to see the town soccer team play. Movies are about $1.50 I think, you can buy a dvd for about $7 or rent it and bring it back for $1- and sometimes pirate movies can be had pretty cheap. Pretty decent black rye bread is about 50 cents a loaf; anti-biotics are over-the-counter and cost about a quarter for a pack of ten and two packs is a full course. And what else? I don't know. Not everything is like this, but these are some of the "bargains". Belarusians work for something like a nickel-a-century so I guess it is still kind of relative. Used to be much better and the prices are going up.
I watch the stats go by on GameDay sometimes and I follow some players, but it is getting away from me. But hey, I can quote you chapter and verse on the biathlon standings!
BeingHad
I'm not a computer expert by any means, so I can only chalk up the problem to very mean, miniature troll-like creatures who do everything in their power to annoy the daylights out of me daily on the computer. Other than that...can't help you.
Man, I can't believe you guys can get prescriptions drugs over the counter! That would be a dream come true for Rush Limbaugh! :-D
Mmmmm....dark rye bread. My favorite.
I'll tell ya what, I'll keep you up on the baseball stats. As far as soccer goes, it's getting bigger in the US, but I haven't gotten into that much. I do wish I could find out how to see some Rugby games, though. That sounds right up my alley.
You were the second person who told me that they couldn't see the www.beinghad.com site so last night I looked into it and found the problem. It was simply something in the codes where Firefox had a problem but Internet Explorer did not. I wrote the site on IE and so I never noticed. It took about an hour to find the problem. You can probably see it now.
Not all prescription drugs are over the counter but anti-biotics of various classes are and this makes dealing with health problems much easier and cheaper. And of course medicine in general here is completely subsidized. Again, this is no panacea, but in certain places it can be comfortable.
And about the rugby, try these two as recommended by yahoo:
http://www.mediazone.com/channel/new_homepage/main.jsp
http://www.rugby.com.au/
White Sox beat the Cubs 12-2 in their first pre-season game today. Yikes! Must suck to be a Cubs fan today! Actually, it must suck to be a Cubs fan any day.
It was beginning to look like the Home-Run Derby there for awhile. At least for the Sox it did. For the Cubs it looked more like Little League.
ME,
The Cubs get one real good team about once every 15-20 years. Then, the next year, they are always back to being the Cubs. We always used to laugh about how they would start off in first place, but by the All-Star game they were near, or in, the cellar.
LA
One of the funniest quotes I heard today was from Lou Piniella, "Listen, I'm glad it was only spring training...Our pitchers aren't pitching very well and our hitters aren't hitting very well. Outside of that, we're OK."
I'll bet the Cub fans are happy with the results of the $300 million they spent to improve their team,eh?
Today the Yanks beat Detroit in their pre-game. Ugh...I was all happy because the Yanks were losing in the ninth, then they hit a two run homer. That deflated my mood. I hate the Yanks about as much as I hate the Cubs.
Post a Comment