Sunday, April 18, 2004
The Happy Sundays
Hard to be happier than I already him, but this graf below does it:
"It feels good, but we still have a long way to go," said Ramirez, [ in the powder blue leather coat and Allen Iverson cap and] Iverson wristband to honor his favorite NBA player. "We're going to see those guys again in September, and then we'll see where we're at (Hohler, Globe).
Makes me chuckle to hear that Manny, a superstar in his own right, acts like any other fan in sporting the regalia of the Iverson brand.
And Manny is sagacious, of courses, in his caveat to enjoy these wins, but not let it go to our heads this soon.
Two recent comments from readers need additional focus, the first is this wonderful bit of symmetry:
Annette writes:
Here's an odd little fact (found in the bottom of this MSNBC article):
Schilling signed his first pro contract with Boston scout Ray Boone in 1986. Boone is the grandfather of Aaron Boone.
And Joe in Philly observes,
People at the game-but not watching the game has become an unhealthy obsession of mine. At the Baltimore/Sox game on 4/6 I was going crazy as people streamed up and down the aisle, regardless of what was going on in the game. Sure there's going to be people moving about, but this was an endless stream. What ever happened to sitting in your seat, or waiting at the top of the section, while the game is in progress. Then, at the end of the inning or a reasonable break in the action, taking your seat? Is anyone watching the game besides me? Hello, ushers.
This has always been one of my biggest fan pet peeves, and after attending the game in Baltimore on 4/6 as well, it seems to have gotten much worse since the last year even. And seeing it happen at Fenway of all places as Joe points out is particularly nauseating.
What happened to simply watching the game with near 100% focus? And it's not like we're talking about kids or even Gen Xers who supposedly have been "ruined" by MTV, video games, Q Tarentino et al and are culturally ADD. No, I'm seeing this same ants in the pants behavior from people who are in the 40+ demographic as well.
At the game I attended on the 6th at Camden, to the right of me, two fellows, both of them in somehow involved with news reporting and journalism, yacked the entire game about their inner office politics and their career progress thus far and plans for the future. I felt like I was at a job fair. The game was a mere backdrop, visual Muzak. And get this, at one point, one of these guys gets on his cell (with the headphones thingy) and starts going point by point with someone on the other end over suggested copy edits in some document of which he had a copy in his hand. Man, if you can't leave work for a few hours, don't bother going to the game.
Meanwhile, the guys on my left, in Red Sox caps all, were lawyers, and spent the majority of their time engaged in similar all work all the time chit chat about coming cases, judges, legal interpretations and so on.
Ironically, of all the people in my section, the ones besides myself who were most into the game, were the two guys I ended up having the fracas with at the game's end.
Finally today, if you take any sort of pleasure in seeing a vaunted member of the Boston Sports media verbally eviscerated, read Jonathan Yardley's review of Leigh Montvill's recently published biography of Ted Williams. Go ahead, read it. I don't even want to grab any pull quotes just so you can follow along and enjoy fully Yardley's metaphorical kick in the nuts. Ouch.
