Stadium Rant

So I mentioned stadiums in my last entry and I thought I’d expound on that a bit, just for fun. Here’s my personal rankings of those I’ve been to and my favorite memory from each one:

Camden Yards (Baltimore Orioles). This the one they all copy now. It’s a classic. I saw the Red Sox play the O’s here in 1992 – the opening year. Sox won handily, so I was really happy. It’s just a great park. So much history around it too.

Ameriquest Field (Texas Rangers). Just beautiful. I spent about a third of the game just walking around the stadium admiring the architecture and observing all the little intricacies of it. The one game I’ve seen there was a 14-7 pounding of the Mariners, just last Friday.

Fenway Park (Boston Red Sox). I can’t put it #1 for two reasons: there are some bad seats with obstructed views (and all of them are too small) and it costs you an arm and a leg to get in the building. But the history is great and no park has more personality: the Fisk pole, the Pesky pole, the Monster, the weird angle in center field, the hand-operated scoreboard, etc. I’ve seen many games here, but the best was in 1996. Yankees leading in the bottom of the 9th. Sox come back and win it, beating John Wetteland. Yanks go something like 86-1 when leading into the bottom of the 9th and eventually win the World Series, but I saw the one loss. And it was gorgeous.

Chase Field (Arizona Diamondbacks). It’s a spectacle. Huge, with a big retractable roof. I spent a lot of time just taking it all in. It isn’t a classic like Camden Yards and Ameriquest, but it’s like an amusement park it’s so big and there’s so much to do. I saw one game there in April 2005 and got autographs from Derek Lowe (who used to be a Red Sox player) and Eric Gagne (who used to be good). Don’t remember much about the game – it was an extra-inning slugfest I think.

Wrigley Field (Chicago Cubs). Another history lesson that gets high marks for its traditional bits – ivy on the walls, the scoreboard, et al. I’ve seen two games here. The one I remember best was April 2002. Cubs v. Mets. Jon Lieber pitched well, Cubs won 2-0. I didn’t see the end. I actually left early because it was so stinkin’ cold. Absolutely frigid. It gets bumped out of the top four for that reason alone.

Municipal Stadium (Cleveland Indians). This is NOT a typo. I liked the “mistake by the lake” for two reasons: 1) back in the early 90s you could walk right up on gameday and get cheap tickets anywhere in the park. 2) There was no one there, so it was really intimate and you had much more access to the players and game. The second time I was there the ticket lady told us players would be arriving soon and told us where to stand. I got the whole Indians team to sign my ball. Favorite game though: my first one there – Red Sox v. Indians (8/27/90). Ellis Burks hit two homers in the 4th inning, and the Sox won 12-4. That feat’s only been done about a dozen times -- OK, more like four dozen (I looked it up).

Veterans Stadium (Philadelphia Phillies). Essentially my home field. I grew up at this stadium, so even though it was giant concrete donut it gets props because of the memories there. I’ve seen at least a dozen games there, including a Greg Maddux five-hitter on opening day in 1992 (on his way to his first Cy Young). The best game though was the last game of the season in 1991. Phils had taken the first two from the Mets and the brooms were out. But David Cone went out and started mowing down Phillies. We started smelling history around the 7th when Dale Murphy came up. He went to 0-2 quickly and we were writing down the “K” on our scorecards – this is a guy who struck out 140 times a year after all. Well he popped up. We booed him! Dale Murphy – one of the classiest guys in the game - and we booed him. Of course Philly fans once booed Santa Clause too. Well Cone finished with 19 strikeouts, which tied Tom Seaver for the NL record (since broken by Kerry Wood). It was a three-hit shutout as well. A great and memorable pitching performance. Everyone in the stadium was rooting for Coney by the middle of the game.

The Metrodome (Minnesota Twins). Not a great stadium by any means, but there’s not much talent below this either. It gets higher marks though because it’s home to the little team that could – a small market, small budget team that wins consistently. It’s also here because my wife would be mad if it didn’t get a higher place. Best memory: my first game here. September 2002, Indians v. Twins. Sort of my first date with Naomi. She turns to me mid-game and says that the game is kind of boring. I tell her that it’ll get exciting in a second when Jim Thome hits a homerun. Period. Pause. Pitch. Swing. Contact. Gone. Naomi turns to me with her jaw hanging open. I do all I can not to laugh out loud. Just clap and smile slightly.

Dolphin Stadium (Florida Marlins). Another concrete donut. Bonus points for not having a roof in Florida. I like their guts. Also ranks high because it was a memorable game (in July this year). Red Sox thrashed the Marlins with two homers from both Manny and Papi and Lowell hit three doubles against his old team.

Riverfront Stadium (Cincinnati Reds). Concrete donut #3. Completely forgettable. Saw the Dodgers play the Reds around 1992/93, courtesy of my brother’s girlfriends parents, who owned most of Cincinnati I think. Or at least one of the big towers downtown. Our seats were good – I remember that.

RFK Stadium (Washington Nationals). Hideous. Doesn’t rank last only because the access from the highway is phenomenal. The parking lot empties right out onto a major interstate. No lie. It took us about a minute and a half to get from our parking space to the highway. The game (July 2005) was against the Astros, but that’s all I can tell you. Oh, I got a nice umbrella though, which I’ve used a few times.

Tropicana Field (Tampa Bay Devil Rays). It’s newer than many above it, and that’s why it’s down here at the bottom. With all these other great ballparks that have come out lately (see Camden Yards, et al.) is this the best they could come up with? Honestly. It’s ugly, graceless, boring and has speakers and catwalks that can (and have) interfered with balls in play. I’ve also seen the Sox lose here far too many times, including an opening day walk-off homer in 2003 that spoiled a great game from Pedro. High point: a Sox win in 2004 during which Manny hit a gargantuan home run. I think it was estimated at 483 feet.

So that's it until I get to some more parks. Any thoughts from the peanut gallery?

Debrief, Texas, Ballparks and States

Last week eighty-seven students returned from summer trips that took them to unreached people groups around the world. My church's worship band led the morning and evening worship times -- and did a fantastic job. It was some of the best worship I've had in a while, certainly in part because of how the week went. I taught two sessions (which I had good feedback on), took part in two team debriefs (one great, one hard) and two individual debriefs (a great one and one that started hard but ended well). It was just a great week hearing their stories and seeing their excitement, but also helping one team work through some conflict and one particular person make some significant relational progress.

I left the week early though to go out to Dallas, Texas for a day and a half with the folks at RightNow (www.rightnow.org). They're a missions mobilization organization. I went out to learn from them, particularly in the area of contact follow-up. It was really great to spend time with people who do similar work to me and be able to compare notes. I'm glad I'm not in a business where competition prevents us from being able to help each other do what we do better. This was my first time in Texas. Good food, people were nice, but what's with the toll roads? Worse than Orlando ... and about five times the size. And hot. Way hot.

But their ballpark there is gorgeous. I've now been to twelve stadiums. I aspire to go to all of them, but the people in Cleveland, Cincinnati and Philly have replaced theirs since I was there. So I have quite a few still to see. I think Camden Yards (Baltimore) and Ameriquest Field (Dallas) are the two best. I like Fenway for the history, but I think it's overrated as a place to see a game and too dang expensive. How about you? What's your favorite stadium?

Texas was my 40th state too. I've got ten more to see: LA, OK, NM, KS, ND, MT, ID, OR, WA and AK (Alaska -- I think it's AK). I'll get to ND later this month. The others might be a while. But I don't think I'm missing much. (Yes, that comment was meant to elicit responses!)

Random Thoughts From the Wrong Side of the Bed

I woke up grumpy this morning. Probably because I got lost in a computer version of Sudoku last night and didn't get to bed until after 12:30am. While I can now get away with only 7 hours of sleep (which I couldn't do six years ago), that sleep needs to begin before midnight, which also wasn't true six years ago.

So I was watching the news this morning and got annoyed by two things:

1. I think we would have lost World War II if we had the type of media coverage then that we do now. Every single morning on TV and in the newspaper, there's the body count from Iraq, with as many details as they can (almost) justifiably print about the deceased. Now I don't want to demean the loss of any loved one by anybody in this country, but this much collective attention to the losses only weakens our resolve. We've lost about 2600 soldiers in Iraq. U.S. casualties in WWII were almost 300,000. We are hit in the face every single day with how much this war is costing us. And the American way has become to not want it to cost us anything. I think racism is involved here too. I think we're more willing to sacrifice sons (and daughters) to protect Britons and, yes, even the French, but not Kurds or Iraqis. They are far too different from us and anonymous for most Americans to care. I realize there are some fundamental differences in these two wars, and perhaps I'll address that another time, but I don't feel that those differences are as substantial as the difference in how we, as a nation, are reacting to what it's costing us. If we'd been counting our losses so carefully in 1942 and 1943, we probably would have packed up and gone home and today we might all speak German.

2. Joe Lieberman is getting hammered up in Connecticut and from what little I've seen about it, he's getting beaten solely because he supports the war in Iraq and his opponent is against it. I think it's a travesty that anyone should get elected to a government position based primarily on what he is AGAINST. I'm against sensational journalism that capitalizes on peoples' fears, but that doesn't mean I should be the editor of the New York Times. Tell me why you should get the job, not why the other person shouldn't.

Lastly, I happened to see the other day that Nicolas Cage is starring in a remake of a semi-famous 70's suspense/horror film called "The Wicker Man". Somehow that reminded me of a recent movie with Josh Hartnett called "Wicker Park" and that led me to wonder, what's the deal with wicker getting a bad rep? Is it just because it's one letter off from "wicked"? Seriously, I've seen some very nice wicker furniture. I think someone needs to take a stand against this kind of treatment for an otherwise fine word. So I think I'll run for Senate in New Hampshire on the platform "wicker is good".