Chicks Dig the Long Ball

Random Observations from the Nationals-Pirates game, which I attended with several other family members on May 17 at Nationals Park in Washington, DC.

Customer Service With a Smile. My sister-in-law Lora and brothers Rich and Steve are standing outside the Will Call window at Nationals Park around 6:20 PM. Rich has already picked up our tickets and we are waiting for the arrival of nephew Sam and niece Paula Jo, her husband Matt and daughters Megan and Emma.  Standing outside the ropes to the Will Call, there was this Nats employee, a middle-aged woman with an attitude who confronted all the incoming customers queuing up at the Will Call, barking something about “Are you Goldstar Will Call? That is down the street!” The accompanying tone was aggressive, loud, and quite off-putting.

Now I understand that anyone dealing with the American public at large in a Customer Service role doesn’t have it easy and, who knows, there could have been some back story behind this. Perhaps there had been mass confusion surrounding the “Normal” Will Call vs. “Goldstar” Will Call that resulted in long delays for folks picking up their tickets. I guess the whole scene shouldn’t have bothered me as much as it did, but it just  felt like she was “moving the cattle along”. These are customers that have already given you their hard-earned money. Would it kill you to use a friendlier tone and in a more accommodating manner? Oh well, maybe she was just having a bad day.

I See What You Did There. Before we settled in our seats, I bought the first round of beverages for Rich, Lora, Sam, and myself: Two Coors Light Cans, a Cabernet Sauvignon, and a Bottled Water. Total came to like $28.50 and then Rich proclaims to his wife that “Joe just paid for his ticket with that round.” Well actually, I didn’t.  $8.50 of that $28.50 was a beer that I was going to drink and the face value of the ticket was $24.00. And of course Rich bought the next round a couple of innings later. And he and Lora provided the wonderful pre-and-post game spreads and brews at their house. And paid for the gas for the trip. And a nice breakfast the next morning. Do I need to continue?

Baseball Einsteins. Note to self: do some research to determine if there is any sort of correlation between loudness and ignorance. It sure seems that way to me – in all facets of life. The latest personal evidence behind my hypothesis took the form of a couple of Baseball Einsteins who sat a couple of rows behind us at the game . These guys were on a roll all game long. Here are the three favorite ones that I can recall.

The first episode was with Nats super-stud rookie Bryce (“Let’s go Bam-Bam!”) Harper batting in the middle innings. Harper lifted a foul ball off the third base line. Unlike the foul ball that Pedro Alvarez snagged near the stands with some smooth leather with one out and two on in the 9th inning, this ball was clearly going to land in the stands – there was no doubt about it. So, when Harper hits this foul ball, one of the Baseball Einsteins yells: “Get out! Get out!”. Dude, the foul ball was probably closer to you in the 300 level of Nationals Park than it was to being in play for any Pirate fielder. Definitely needs to work on the old depth perception.

(That reminded me of Hall-of-Fame announcer Milo Hamilton, who had the misfortune of having to follow/replace Bob Prince as the Pirate’s play-by-play announcer in the mid-70s. On a foul ball, Milo had this weird habit of trying to convey the actual row number in which a foul ball landed. “Here is the pitch to Al Oliver…swing and a foul ball behind the Pirate’s dugout…looks to be about 17 rows back.”)

In the second episode, Adam LaRoche came to the plate in the 6th inning after the Nats had broken James McDonald’s no-hitter and broken through for two runs to make the score 4-2 Pirates. At this point, one of those two guys behind us remarked: “Come on Adam, you’re overdue!”. Now, mind you, at this point, LaRoche was batting around .340 for the season, had basically single-handedly torched the Pirates the previous night with 3-4, and had chased Andrew McCutchen to the left-centerfield wall one inning earlier in this game. This LaRoche guy was completely dialed in, but apparently Baseball Einstein hadn’t been paying attention. (BTW, sure enough, LaRoche tripled against the wall in that AB, so I guess he isn’t overdue anymore.)

The third episode took place in the ninth inning when Pirate Clint Barmas singles, setting up a first and second for the Buccos. Showing his staying power, one of the Baseball Einsteins confidently proffers “Don’t worry about it Nats, we got the triple play setup.” Of course, since there is already one out in the inning, that triple play would be a bit difficult to pull off. Baseball. Math. Fail. I am sure there were some other good ones that I missed.

Usher Trash Talk Fail. Walking up the stairs from our seats to the concourse following the game, Rich apparently clapped once and looked far too happy for the Pirate victory we had just witnessed. So a Nationals usher (at the top of the steps) smirked and chirped: “Still in last place.” Asshole. Rich didn’t break stride and responded politely: “No, actually we are in fourth place in a six team division.” 

Somebody Plug That Thing In! Local flavor for the evening came in the form of an elderly African-American gentleman sitting in the front-row of the section to our immediate right. This guy was rocking a nice Nationals cap and home-jersey with the number “22” and “Lannan” (I believe) on the back. Had a salt beard and bore a passing resemblance to the Eddie character from Barbershop. He kept score of the game and kept this unplugged (maybe wireless?) microphone close by. Whenever there was any player changes (new pitchers, pinch hitters, etc), this guy would rise up out of his chair and make the announcement – I guess for the benefit of the folks sitting near him. He was on top of the game though and knew his shit. Actually, kind of blew me away in the later innings when he actually announced the insertion of Pirate Nate McClouth as a defensive replacement before the official PA guy did. Well done sir!

BP Can’t Catch a Break. I miss all of the fun. The previous evening another group of family members attended the first game of the series. During the traffic crawl going through DC to get to the park, apparently my kin witnessed not just one but two incidents involving drivers, stuck in that traffic, well, picking their noses. The episodes were referred to as BP I and BP II. When you think about it, that kind of sucks for British Petroleum. Since they are a dreaded oil company, they already have to overcome the Spawn of Satan label from the Left and of course those unfortunate environmental incidents at Prudhoe Bay and Deepwater Horizon are still fresh in everybody’s minds. Now they get to share an unfortunate acronym with Boogie Picking. Is there something in the air in DC that fosters this sort of behavior? (Recall my excellent blog post (Digging For Gold) highlighting my first-hand exposure to BP about 20 miles up the road in Montgomery County in 1985.)

The Long Ball – Not Just for Chicks Anymore. The game was enjoyable – any Pirates win is special for me. I suppose it is just mental conditioning after 20 years of losing, but, after LaRoche’s triple cut the Pirate’s lead to one in the sixth inning, I was almost sure that the Pirates would lose the game. Sure enough, the Nats had their chances in the last three innings, but the Bucs survived with some good bullpen work and three homeruns. Really like watching Andrew McCutchen play baseball. A lot of the flair and athleticism of The Cobra coupled with the humble nature of Pops. If he sticks around and we get some talent around him, I think his style will play very well with Pittsburgh fans.

A wonderful, pleasant evening in DC, surrounded by loved ones and three generations of Nedimyers, and a win for the Bucs. Tough to top that folks!

You feel bigger?