Saturday At The Stadium

It was a fairly quiet weekend around these parts, because as Matt mentioned yesterday, he's in SoCal and I had the esteemed pleasure of filling up a 14' U-Haul truck with the contents of a 5th floor apartment only accessible by a very narrow staircase. You never realize all the shit you've accumulated until you have to drag it down the 5 flights of stairs one trip at a time.

As foreshadowed in Saturday's preview, Big Willie Style and I were in attendance during that day's game. We went up to the Stadium with the intention of scalping some cheap seats. We got there during the second inning and were looking to get in the Stadium as cheaply as possible. The best we could do were two separate $40 tickets in the 200 level. We kept searching and but ended up gave up our quest for the cheapies before settling for two seats in Sec 103 for $50 each. It was more than we wanted to spend, but the seats were pretty sweet; just underneath the right side of the bleachers and next to the home bullpen. Unlike our old Saturday package seats in Section 7 of the Old Stadium, these were subject to the full wrath of the sun. It was in the low 80's but felt much hotter.

During the 7th inning meltdown, Will and I met up with our pal Jason from IIATM,S for the first time in person. It was his first trip to the Stadium (which he chronicled beautifully over here) and it will likely be our last for a little while, so it was cool that our paths crossed as such. It's funny getting to know people over these here global webernets. You can exchange countless emails with someone, but you don't feel like you actually know them until you see them in person. We didn't talk to Jason's son, who was also at the game with him, but since Will and I were double-fisting Bud Heavys out of our souvenir cups, it was probably better that way. We're not great role models.

Anyhow, there was some saving grace after Aceves left that 0-2 pitch out over the plate to Landon Powell. After meeting up with Jason, we went back to our seats and drowned our sorrows while watching Mark Melancon warm up in the pen. Sec 103 is in pretty prime HR territory, so it was certainly in the back of our minds that one could come our way. Lo and behold, the illustrious Derek Sanderson Jeter ripped a two run shot into the first few rows of our section in the top of the 8th.

That would be us, circled in red. We had no chance of catching it, but there's nothing cooler than watching a ball travel and quickly figuring out that it's coming right towards you. Especially when said ball is coming off the bat of a player from your own team and you are sitting in home run territory.

As a cool side benefit, after Jeter hit that HR, Mo started warming up in the bullpen. Nearly everyone who was still there and within 15 seats or so started working their way over to catch a glimpse of the man in action. After a few minutes, the usher came down and started clearing the aisle and was met with a chorus of "Awww..."s, to which she replied "Hey, I don't make the rules." I go, "Right, you just selectively enforce them".

The Yanks threatened again in the 9th after starting off with back to back walks to bring the winning run to the plate but Jorge Posada hit into a rally-killing double play and that was that. We sat in the stands, a little stunned that it was already over in under three hours despite the long 7th and 8th innings.

The last bright spot was this character to the right, dwelling outside of the Stadium, presumably with the intention of luring unsuspecting children away from their parents. Yes, friends, that would be a grown man in a Spiderman costume playing the saxophone. What else could posess an adult to thrown on a full body costume on a hot summer day and play an instrument outside of a sporting venue?

So, all in all it was it was a good time, despite the final score. We were okay with attending the only loss of homestand. We're team players like that.