satisfied
laurel to the Twins game today. The friend I went with yesterday had a family thing to do today and other folks I tried this morning either weren't available or had other things going. I knew Laurel would be at home from her posting yesterday so I gave a call and invited her along. She was thrilled to be going and hustled herself downtown. We met up outside the dome and went inside, stopping by section 220 to wave to her dad and bumping into her mom in the concourse on the way over to section 222, row 17, seats 29 and 30.The crowd was subdued. Not nearly the ovations of yesterday's game and things were postively quiet at times. Jack Morris, winning pitcher from game 7 of the 1991 series and candidate for one of the "MasterCard Memorable Moments" to be revealed at the World Series, threw out the first pitch and appeared to be genuinely moved by the sustained ovation that he received. His 1991 teammate and 2002 third base coach, Al Newman, caught the ball and the two exchanged hugs on his way back to the clubhouse.
The Twins played solid ball and the A's fell apart. In a wild 4th inning, the A's commited two errors, had two wild pitches, a hit batsman, four hits and gave up seven unearned runs. That was all the Twins needed to win, but it added to two runs they'd earned earlier and they tacked on two later to win 11-2.
I ended up annoying some of the folks sitting behind me in the third inning. At the top of the inning, Eric Milton gave up a two-run homer to Miguel Tejada, the A's shortstop and MVP candidate. When the Twins came up in the bottom of the third, A. J. Pierzynski started the inning with a single. That was enough for me. I was on my feet for the remainder of the inning. If the Twins were going to lose this game, it wasn't going to be because I wasn't cheering enough. After Louis Rivas struck out, the calls of "Down in front!" started coming from behind me. I ignored them for the most part but turned around to call "Up in back!" to them. Then Jacque Jones hit a ground-rule double, sending Pierzynski to third. Suddenly everyone was on their feet and cheering. Hypocrites. Guzman scored Pierzynski with a grounder to short and David Ortiz scored Jones with another double. I felt vindicated and claimed these runs as my own. The Twins had tied the game, getting back two runs for their pitcher and I was part of it. No thanks to the grumpy gus-es who wanted a comfortable, quiet seat to watch the game. That's what couches at home are for. When you're at the dome for a playoff game, part of your job is cheer your ass off to help the team. I didn't pay $20 a seat to watch a tennis match.
My shoulder is still store from clapping and waving my homer hankie. It feels like victory.
