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*SDPads1 Note-Our good buddy the Avenger-in-Chief joined us on our trip to LA a few weeks back. Oh the times we had. I'd like to thank him for putting an end to our string of 40 straight posts of the Fro Times. If you haven't already checked out his blog yet, A) What's wrong with you & B) Go check it out now!! www.avengingjackmurphy.com*
In keeping with the Fro tradition of posting about events far after their passing, the Avenger-In-Chief* is here to recount what has become a very ancient tale from… the LAtrine.
A few Tuesdays ago seemed liked the perfect opportunity for a trip to Los Angeles to see the Padres wage Armageddon. With the Padres commanding first place, Mat Latos was to take the hill against a Dodgers team in freefall; what an enjoyable confluence of events.
Is there ever a good time to go to Los Angeles? I know a reasonable mother of two who works for the education industrial complex and she described her LA feelings to me as follows: “It is ok to teach our children to hate LA. They must know that the only reason we travel there is to reach places that exist to the north.” Succinct… reasonable… I am in wholehearted agreement.
With the ticket purchased and a free ride arranged by the Fro, there was no way I’d pass up an opportunity to go to the worse place on earth. The AIC enjoys such ease of travel even when it’s en route to Hell 2.0.
Our war party consisted of 8 Padre fans, 1 Padre/Angel sympathizer, and a lone Trolley Dodger decked out in an away Brian Jordan #33 jersey. Brian Jordan…so confused… did he play for LA longer than three seasons? The men were dressed in throwback gear. The women donned the current blue garb. This is not a fashion piece. Let us move on.
We pre-gamed at the ESPN Zone outside of the Staples Center. It was empty during happy hour. The AIC attributed the oddity of a sports bar being empty during happy hour to the following: it was overpriced and the décor was crappy Los Angeles teams. Who, with good conscience, could partake under those conditions? Even the Angelinos reject such allegiances. Nevertheless, we enthusiastically joined the throngs of silence. I was thirsty and ordered a fine summer brew: the Coors company’s Blue Moon.
The AIC immediately felt judged. Look, it comes with an orange slice hanging on the rim of the glass, but I removed it…didn’t I? Seriously! I drink faster than all of you…stop looking at me! This choice of beer promotes an interesting discussion: is Blue Moon an unmanly choice? Based on an informal inquiry, the jury appears as split as the first Tuesday of November each and every year. My take: if you have to make a case for your “manliness” you probably forfeit any claim to said “manliness” so I will not belabor the point. The AIC continued drinking Blue Moon.
My hamburger was late. I bided my time drinking the aforementioned, Blue Moon white Belgian brew. I mean this burger was really late. So late that nearly everyone had finished his or her meal before I had even begun scraping off the god-forsaken Thousand Island dressing the ESPN Zone saw fit to slather upon my burger. It mattered not. I enjoyed a few tall ones and yelled favorably at TV # 3 of 17, which showcased the failure of Alex Rodriguez to achieve the 600 HR milestone.
So where do all conversations go when baseball fans get together? Allow me to rephrase the question, counselor. Where do all conversations go when female baseball fans get together? These discussions naturally find their way to which ball players are the best looking. I don’t want to diminish the quality of these female Padre fans in any way… they knew their stuff, without question… but it is worth noting that they possessed firm opinions on the good looking of MLB. I cannot relate to such lines of discussion…I deal in ugly. The men casually shifted these discussions to the All Time Ugliest baseball players. There was consensus among all at the table that St. Louis Cardinals OF Willie McGee is the standard by which all ugly players shall be judged.
We made it to Chavez Latrine with little time to spare. Our seats were only outdone by the beautiful dropping of the Western sun as we readied ourselves for one of SD’s newest additions to stake the Padres to an early lead.
I stopped drinking Blue Moon. I began drinking Samuel Adams. Ugly pitcher talk resurfaced… once again there was unanimity in assessing another player for the All-Time Ugly Team. Pitcher Julian Tavarez runs a close second to Willie McGee. Poor Julian Tavarez can’t even fall back on a solid career like Willie McGee. I’d rather be ugly and good than just ugly.
There was actually a game played. We witnessed Miguel Tejada’s first HR as a Padre. This was special because it occurred in the 1st inning and immediately silenced the rabble of Los Angelinos who arrived late to the park. Adrian Gonzalez also singled. Little did we know, another Padre hit would not arrive until the 9th. Curse you Ted Lilly! Padres 1-0.
You know who else is ugly? I say Dodgers’ second baseman, Jamie Carroll. He looks odd more so than ugly. Like an alien. SDPads1 agreed.
So Latos comes out for the 2nd and walks two of the first three batters (Kemp and Blake) he faces… For the love of Scott Brosius!!! The bane of my existence, not to mention pitching coaches across the land, is the walk. Walks always score! Always! Always… and when Chris Denorfia makes an ill-advised dive, both Kemp and Blake race around to score on what becomes a Russell Martin double. Denorfia would redeem himself 8 pitches later when he threw out Martin at the plate, which also led to the Dodgers’ catcher tearing something below the waist. There were reports that it was his vagina. Nevertheless, Denorfia’s assist was a good way to end both the 2nd inning and Russell Martin’s season.
You know what’s overrated? Farmer John’s hot dogs are overrated. They are completely overrated. The Dogs at Wrigley, Comiskey, Fenway and… wait for it… Petco Park are all solid! Don’t we sell Weinerschnitzel at Petco? Whatever, they’re good. Now, when was the last time you physically went to a Weinerschnitzel? Yea… me neither.
Not too much happening in the game so SDPads1 and the AIC went for a beer and a meeting with fellow Padres fan, @matthewverygood. Together we relished the number of Padre fans we saw in attendance, drank our Not-Blue-Moons, and reluctantly said our goodbyes. At that point we took advantage of the complete lack of usher presence and grabbed some nice seats behind home plate… well not exactly right behind home.
You know what’s awesome about Dodger Stadium? All of the seats are yellow. It feels as though it was constructed with retro Padre fans in mind. Thanks, Los Angeles. Speaking of seats… Dodger Stadium has 56,000 of them, of which, 18,000 were not in use… during the summer… of a pennant race… with a young phenom on the hill…opposing a recent deadline pick-up… and there’s like a population of 18 million in the LA metro area. Feel free to connect the dots…
After the 2nd inning there was no scoring to be had and we briskly arrived to the 9th inning in 2 hours and change. The Padres managed 1 more hit in the 9th to finish with 3 on the night and Ted Lilly’s post-trade-deadline debut was a resounding Dodger success story (how’s that working out for you now, Dodger fan?).
Despite getting shutdown, we Padre fans stayed until the very end. I only point this out because Dodger fan doesn’t see fit to stay ‘til the end…even in a 2-1 game. LAme.
So the game ended in similar fashion to the other Padre losses of ‘10; with the boys battling to the very end. They had a chance but in the end it was not to be as Jonathan Broxton wiggled his sizeable ass out of a major league jam. He induced Ryan Ludwick to hit into the old 6-4-3, kick in the nuts, how the hell do I get out of this sh*thole Latrine, rally killing, game ending, double play. At least a game in which the Padres mustered a mere 3 hits ended with some level of excitement.
So how does one get out of the legendary Los Angeles shithole known as Chavez Ravine? Don’t ask us. We walked out the same way we came in and managed an inconceivable 45-minute trek before we reconvened with our Fro-partisans. Circles can be tricky… especially when they’re the size of Chavez Ravine… write that down.
*I don’t ordinarily speak in the third person despite an overwhelming desire to be Ricky Henderson. You will, however, come across intermittent references to myself in the third person. I believe it works for this piece because it gives me an aura of detachment, which works well when narrating… and also because I was drinking… which led to a literal detachment from the events in question.
**(Unrelated/Unattached Asterisk) I probably didn’t do this trip justice with my account of the tale. Sorry. I was drinking. Thanks to Rick, Beau, and Marshall for inviting me along for the ride. |
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