Dodger Baseball and Me

On the eve of the World Series I am reminded of what the big games and baseball and the Dodgers mean to me.  As a kid living in the shadow of Dodger Stadium I played one year of Little League, (I was on the Giants, sadly,) outside the Elysian Park entrance to Dodger Stadium at the fields across from the Police Academy.  I don’t think I was very good at the game.  It was my baptism really, into sports in general. 

I had a tumultuous childhood.  From birth until I was 12 I experienced moments of stability but where I lived and who I lived with was often in flux.  Melham Avenue in La Puente, Greycliff Avenue in La Puente, Ranlett Avenue in La Puente, Prichard Street in La Puente, N Taylor Avenue in Montebello, Sandia Avenue in West Covina, Melrose and Western in Hollywood, Eckerman Avenue in West Covina, Sunset Boulevard in downtown LA, Quinn Street in Bell Gardens, Santa Maria, Nipomo, Sandalwood in Nipomo, and a few others I have lost track of all gave way to teenage years spent on Calvados Avenue in Covina, California. 

I was staying with my Aunt and Uncle as I had at times before, in the Spring of 1975.  On Monday, April 14^th, I went with my Uncle to the Dodger’s home opener and sat high up in the reserved section on the 3^rd base line.  It was an electric night.  The Dodgers had lost the World Series the year before to a star-packed Oakland A’s team that included Reggie Jackson, Sal Bando, Gene Tenace, Joe Rudi, Bert Campaneris, Vida Blue, Catfish Hunter, Bill North, Ray Fosse and Rollie Fingers.  (A more colorful team is yet to be seen.)  The giveaway for the night was a National League Champions pennant and when Ron Cey hit a solo shot off of Jack Billingham the crowd pulsed with excitement.  In the 6^th inning however, with the outcome still very much in question, the Toy Cannon, Jimmy Wynn, came up and blasted one into the left field pavilion and the ravine erupted. 

Studies have been done on the excitement and mentality of crowds.  For me, not yet 10-years-old, I remember a certain ecstasy that had been otherwise foreign to me.  I remember the sound and the fury, the elation and the energy, as if it woke me from a somnambulant state life had been training me in.  It was magical and that Jimmy Wynn homerun stuck with me and carried me really for years.  It was of my happiest moments.  The positivity of life became real to me in the company of Dodger fans.

A few years later when my Aunt and Uncle had taken me in even though I was a Ward of the Court, (or a child of Los Angeles County,) my Uncle had connections to baseball.  First, his company had 8 of the best seats in the house at the Big A and so I got to go to quite a few games and sat in the front row, right behind the on deck circle for the visiting team.  My Uncle also had a coworker who was a scout for the Dodgers and so when the Dodgers returned to the World Series in 1977 and 1978 and 1981, I got to go to some of the games. 

Happy (Burt) Hooton was my favorite Dodger pitcher and he had pitched in many of the three World Series in five years between the Yankees and Dodgers.  For me the Dodger-Yankee World Series was expected and Burt Hooton’s knuckle-curve was virtually un-hittable.  The night of Game 6, I had left my seat in the left field pavilion to go to the restroom but then of course, I ended up at the back of the Dodgers bullpen trying to get Hooton’s attention.  I thought maybe I could get him to give me a ball.  I was 12.  Instead I remember a groan coming from the crowd as I strained to see, through the slight crack where the gate swung, what was happening on the field.  I could not see the players on the field but I did see a fly ball high in the night air and I had a sick feeling in my stomach.  I raced back to my seat to discover the dastardly Reggie Jackson had done it again, another homerun this time off Bob Welch. 

The Dodgers lost the World Series that night and my disappointment was profound.  I remember the drive home, feeling so crestfallen I did not know what I would do with myself.  That my Uncle who would become my Dad got Reggie Smith’s bat for me from his coworker took the edge off in subsequent days.  It went into the family trophy case where I admired it often.

I stayed a baseball fan.  I am a true blue Dodger fan and an Angels fan.  The Angel’s 2002 World Series championship is one of my favorite victories by any of my teams.  I stayed a fan of baseball even through the period of rampant cheating, (guys using PEDs to gain an unfair advantage over those who did not use illegal drugs, or worse, artificially keeping players from even making the big leagues and realizing that big pay day.)  I am well versed on the history of the game.  I think Sandy Koufax is likely the most dominant pitcher ever, though I have only seen old film of him. 

I collected cards too, when I was a teenager.  In the end I sold them to fuel my severe Asteroids habit but I had some great cards.  I remember Topps informing me on the greats of the game, from Pie Traynor to Christy Mathewson to Rogers Hornsby, and the great Cy Young himself.  I remember a Brewer named Kurt Bevacqua had won a bubble gum biggest bubble contest and had the human head sized bubble immortalized on card stock.  I had outsized cards I got at Dodger Stadium of Frank Howard and Ken Boyer.  I loved the nicknames.  Mick the Quick.  The Penguin, (Ron Cey who I just met a couple of weeks ago.  I stood in line with all the autograph seekers then told him when I got to him I just wanted to shake his hand and that when I was a kid he was The Man.  And he was…)  Mr. Clean.  The Express.  Mr. October.  (I embraced him as an Angel.)  Disco Dan.  Game Over.  And of course, Happy, a name given Burt Hooton because of his implacable lack of facial expressions.  Baseball irony. 

Those World Series games along with a couple of unforgettable playoff games, (seeing a ball go under Garry Maddox’s glove in the bottom of the 9^th to win a 5-game series against the Phillies from almost directly behind him in the left field pavilion,) was absolutely amazeballs.  Watching the game from way up in the left field reserve section of Dodger Stadium, nearly at the top, to see Jerry Reuss beat the Astros in a 1-game playoff was similarly charged.

I came to love the nuance of the game.  The evolution brought about by advanced metrics puts all that nuance on center stage.  How will Kershaw pitch to JD Martinez?  Same as ever?  How will all these lefties fare: Sale, Price, Kershaw and Ryu, in the first two games?  Will Matt Kemp come up big?  Will the Dodgers get to the Boston bullpen?  Who will the designated hitter benefit the most?  Which team’s pitchers can the other team steal on?  Will the New England fans cheer Dave Roberts?  Will Dodger fans remember Alex Cora?  

I do.  In the late ‘90s and early '00s my company had four season seats 19 rows behind the visiting dugout.  For a couple of years I was lucky enough to receive those tickets about 10 times each year.  (How I still love my bosses all those years ago at Sparkletts Water.)  Welcome to the Jungle, indeed.  As disappointing as those Piazza and Karros years were and as shameful it was to have been linked to steroids, when Eric Gagne came into the game I would always watch the top of the visiting dugout.  Without fail every player would come to the front edge to stand and watch this guy throw 99 mph with a downward screw on the ball that was practically unhittable.  It was exciting.  One mid-season night, Sparkletts Water night in fact, guess who got to throw out the first pitch in a mid-season game against the Astros.  That’s right, the kid who became the old man who can still imitate the batting stances of all the starters from those 1978, 1979 and 1981 teams, to say nothing of the pitching motion of one Burt Carlton Hooton.  

I don’t know if baseball would have caught fire with me had I not attended those big games when I was a youngster.  I am not sure I would have played through high school and beyond including some high level fast and slow pitch softball right through my 20s and 30s.  It would not have been the end of the world either if I did not become a fan of America’s pastime.  However, it has been exceedingly positive for me.  I’m so, so thankful.

And here we are again.  The Dodgers are in the World Series and now I am a father and my children are 14 and 11.  We were at a Dodger-Angel game earlier this season, (interleague play,) and the kids were given free Mike Trout jerseys and my daughter, who is the sportier of the two, really embraced the Angels and Trout throughout the game.  She liked Ohtani’s deep homerun to center field and relished being the contrarian in the group as the rest of us seemed to represent the Dodgers.  Just a few weeks prior to that we were at a Los Angeles Galaxy game and I saw her adopt the ardor of her friends for the Galaxy and specifically for Zlatan Ibrahimovic.  She asked me if she could go ask Zlatan to autograph her shoes post game.  These are examples of her first real interest.  As if in concert her own soccer game has taken off of late.  In my humble opinion she may have become the best player on her team in the course of the current season, when at the outset maybe she was 4^th or 5^th.  As for my son we will see.  So far he remains more interested in the concessions and souvenirs.  

I may be calling radio stations this week.  The lowest cost for tickets I have seen is $700 per.  I can’t afford to take my kids at that price and that’s okay.  If nothing else we’ll go to the Boat in San Gabriel so we can be around Dodger fans and hear some yelling and cheering as we watch the game.  The other night we watched game 7 at Shakey’s and every time the Dodgers scored a run I gave Mark the green light to do a loud impersonation of Nelson from the Simpsons.  His impression is spot on and hilarious and so, when he did it out loud at the pizza joint, it seemed my friend David and I cracked up but so did some others from around us, which pleased Mark and got him more into the game. 

I’d love them to have an experience similar to my own.  I’d love to find a way to take them to the World Series.  In lieu of such an outcome we are going to enjoy these baseball games like nobody’s business.  In the end I hope the Dodgers prevail.  I want that because I love the Dodgers and it has been too long. The Dodgers have the best and most loyal fan base in sports.  More, they deserve a big win after having endured the bad ownership groups that were Fox and the Mc Courts.  Also, Boston.  Frank Mc Court is from there and Red Sox fans largely suck.  

Most of all I want the Dodgers to win for Clayton Kershaw.  He has surpassed Nolan Ryan and Frank Tanana and Fernando Valenzuela and yes, Happy, as the best pitcher I have seen in my lifetime and I want the Dodgers to win one with him and for him and I want him to be relevant when that happens, which is now. 

Let’s Go, Dodgers!

Kings - Stanley Cup Champions

it's no longer spring so it makes sense that a big procrastinater like me is finally doing some deep cleaning.  i'm in the kid's room, throwing out what doesn't fit and toys of bygone years, rearranging virtually everything and cleaning deep in the carpet, windows and sills and all the cracks and corners.  since terra had a last day of school party and so did not go to the parade with me i got her a souvenir pennant commemorating the kings championship and today i put it up on a wall in her room.  afterwards, i stood back and admired the pennant and for a split second a wave of emotion welled up in me.

why?  do i care this much about a sports team?  if so, that is beyond silly.  that is not it, however.  i stopped and thought about it and i realized i feel something deep because i remember what the championships of my teams meant to me when i was a kid. 

in 1977 when the raiders beat the vikings in superbowl xi at the rose bowl, i was 11 and it was the greatest thing in the world.  i remember fred biletnikoff's sliding catch at the viking one that set up a touchdown like it was yesterday.  i remember the raider's first touchdown so vividly because i was impressed like nobody's business.

the raiders set up in a goal line set at the vike's one yard line.  of course mark van eeghen or clarence davis were about to pound through the middle of the line for a score, i assumed in great anticipation.  the vikings figured the same thing but stabler and john madden had another idea.  stabler took the snap and turned to his running backs who filed towards him as if to take the hand-off and vault into the end zone.  the snake faked the give and tucked the ball into his abdomen as slyly as his nickname suggests and acted as if trotting away from the handoff but suddenly, he pulled up and turned towards the left side of his line where he saw dave casper springing free from a tepid, almost fake, block and look up over his left shoulder.  i remember the sun.  the crown city, my city, was awash with golden hues of brightness and stabler pulled the ball up to his left shoulder and tossed it like a nerf basketball over the top of the pile of humanity clustered in front of him at the goal line.  i could see the ball spinning with stabler's trademark counter-clockwise rotation, sunshine guiding it over outstretched claws of hands and sparkling off the brown leather as it reached casper, "the ghost," who caught it like a firefighter catching a baby, two hands under the oblong treasure, cradling into his gut to put the raiders up 9-0.  (what casper did next is not what a firefighter would do with a baby after the catch, by the way.) 

i remember just being amazed.  i looked at the tv with my jaw open like a flytrap.  i was ecstatic and i admired that play because it was just so much bigger than life.  i did not expect that play.  neither did bud grant and the vikings who were losing their fourth superbowl.  i had never seen anything like that.  when the raiders were beating the patriots and the steelers en route to that superbowl glory i had not seen a play like that.  they had been an awesome team, especially in the passing game and in sheer moxie, but this play surprised me and made me feel something deep inside.  the world was large and there was much more to it, than i had dreamt of in my philosophy.

in october of 1981 the dodgers won the world series.  for the third time in five years they played the yankees in that series after having lost the previous two times.  thhe dodgers lost both of the first two games in yankee stadium then came home and won three in a row at dodger stadium, (all buy one run.)  then they walloped the yanks in game 6 back in new york.  what a thrill that entire post season was.  i attended the one game playoff against the astros at dodger stadium to settle the playoff participant after each time won a half of the strike split season.  jerry reuss was brilliant that day.

i had attended several world series games in 1977 and 1978 when the dodgers lost to the yankess and reggie jackson so revenge was especially sweet.  jay johnstone had a big pinch hit home run i'll never forget.  when you are 16 and a pinch hitter comes up for your team you are always thinking home run, (which reminds me of how i thought the same thing in the playoffs in 1988 when mike scioscia came up against the mets.)  the dodgers were bigger than life that year.  ron cey got hit in the head, pedro guerrero hit a monster homer to rub it in near the end of game 6, steve yeager had clutch hits and fernando, burt hooten, jerry reuss and the rest of the dodger pitching staff mowed down yankees like a jefferson davis dream sequence.  (dave winfield 1-22 on the series?!)

those were big moments for me.  later as an adult i enjoyed seeng the angels beat the san francisco giants in the 2002 world series.  at that time i thought of myself as more of an angel fan than a dodger fan but i go back and forth, (to the horror of many.)  at that time the angels had darin erstad,who was my favorite player, and they were a homegrown, ragtag unit that was not expected to win it.  and now the kings have won the cup.  wow.

there is still a little kid inside me.  noam chomsky says sports are a diversion that distract and pacify people who are in many ways being taken advantage of or at least in a democracy, not being represented properly, and he is not wrong.  still, what a diversion.  sports represent the vary nature of life.  there is a great deal of human drama therein.  the games are relateable.  we know what it is like to succeed and to fail and so we cling to our teams and we live and die with them. 

i have lived and died with the kings for 20 years.  (i was a fan much further back but really latched on in the wayne gretzky era, even naming my first cat "gretzky."  i remember marcel dionne and the triple crown line and i have a signed team canada card rogie vachon once gave me.)  it was in the early '90s when i decided the kings were my favorite of all teams.  i fell in love with hockey and was dismayed at never having played the game, (though i did play quite a bit of floor hockey, as it was called, in college.)  hockey was new to me and i loved the combination of athleticism and toughness.  i was becoming more politically aware in those days and may have even felt guilty for being such a jock and avid follower of my teams.  so, i remained loyal to the lakers, raiders, dodgers and angels, but the kings were something of a powerhouse with wayne gretzky and luc robataille and company and so, i latched on to them.  a funny thing happened however.  the king's owner bruce mcnall had his empire come crashing down in a barrage of tax evasion charges and the no longer flush kings hit the skids.  from 1994 through 2011 the kings won one playoff series and missed the playoffs 8-10 seasons in a row to begin the new millenium. 

so what?  i remember that series they won like it was yesterday.  i remember adam deadmarsh's overtime game winner against the vaunted detroit redwings in overtime as he fell to the ice and shot the puck at the same time.  i also remember all those in between years.  hell, i remember the years of vitaly yachmenev, yanick perreault and alexander frolov.  these were some poor teams.  each year i would see the bright spots but each year by the midway point in the season it was obvious the kings were going nowhere.  i despised their ownership, too. 

then something even funnier happened.  the kings got good.  dustin brown and anze kopitar grew up.  they seemed to take something from each of the several coaches they had in their careers and got better.  the kings finally got a goalie; jonathan quick.  most importantly, the kings committed to winning, (from the same ownership group i had formerly detested.)  deam lombardi took over as general manager and brought in a host of old, eastern and northern, hockey people including first terry murray then of course, daryl sutter.  the commitment to winning manifested itself in the kings acquiring depth.  they got mike richards from philadelphia last off season, which was when i knew lombardi and company believed they had a real contender.  i believed too.  the timing seemed right for kopitar and brown in particular. 

the kings won the stanley cup because of their defense and their physicality.  throughout the playoffs it was easy to see that other teams did not want to hit as much as the kings.  they would for a spell then they would drop off and the kings would take a lead.   then the other team would try to match the kings physical play in one big hit and would end up taking a penalty, which the kings took advantage of even when they did not score on the resulting power plays.  it was willie mitchell and matt greene and alex martinez and slava voynov and drew doughty who anchored this team. 

what a glorious run, too.  in 1993 and 1999 i loved playoff hockey because of its edge-of-your-seat nature.  overtime games in particular, make for great theatre.  this year was not like that.  the kings dominated every round.  they started against the team with the best record in hockey, president's trophy winning vancouver canucks and they won the first two games in vancouver and never looked back.  when they lost game four it just seemed like they took their foot of the gas a little bit.  in game five they accelerated anew right into the second round where they met the st louis blues; the second best team in hockey on the regular season.  the kings swept them and there was never a worrisome moment for yours truly.  in the third round the kings faced the phoenix coyotes, a tough team who had a great second half of the season, just like the kings.  the kings won the first two games in phoenix and repeated the pattern they had established against vancouver of dropping the fourth game before winning the series. 

in the finals the kings met the new jersey devils.  the kings won the first two games on the road for the fourth straight series.  true to form they lost the fourth game at home and had to return to new jersey where this time, they lost game 5 as well.  i was worried, finally.  that said at the start of game 6 i predicted the kings would win the game 6-1.  i felt like new jersey had just been hanging with the kings and that the kings would breakout and with the nature of big games being that teams behind will often take more chances when they are on the ultimate precipice of defeat, (as evidenced by a host of superbowls with lopsided scores...or that dodger game six they won 9-2 in yankee stadium in 1981.) the kings went up 3-0 early on a five minute major penalty resulting from an unfortunate boarding hit on rob scuderi that required 30 stitches to sew his face back together.  dustin brown scored on a redirection of a drew doughty shot, the brown scored again on a hard shot from right between the circles which devil's goalie martin brodeur got a piece of but which deflected up the length of his torso and into the net and then terevor lewis scored one more time with about two seconds left in the penalty from in close on a rebound.  the kings never looked back.  (here's a season recap.  this one got me too, boo-hoo.)

it was an amazing run and so satisfying to a longsuffering fan like myself.  i love the lakers but the lakers are perpetual greatness.  they do as good a job as any sports team on the planet of putting the best product possible on the court game after game, season after season.  i hope the laker under the buss family ownership and with mitch kupchak as general manager continue this practice for many more years.  if they are able to do that they will never please me like the kings just did.  there is something about remaining loyal to a team for a long time and finally being rewarded. 

in the intermission between periods two and three of game 6 i went outside with the smokers at the bar just to stretch my legs a bit.  one king fan there assured me if the kings won he would cry.  i laughed a little, understanding the emotion at same time.  my friend, felix, explained that he too would probably shed a tear.  he said this with a smile on his face and cigarette in his mouth and i wondered if i was going to see a bunch of gronw men sobbing. 

with under a minute to play in the game, the 6-1 score all set to confirm my prophetic abilities, the large bar i was in grew cacophonous.  almost everyone in the joint stood, staring at tv screens, mouths agape, clapping hands, hooting and hollering.  cameras snapped, cheers went up, and as the clocked ticked zero the bar manager bear hugged me from behind and said in my ear, "can you believe it-your team won?!"  (tony became an avid kings fan during this post season so he was careful not to call them his team just yet, though i felt different.  as far as i'm concerned, welcome to the fold, tony.)  i was a little shocked but more i was just ecstatic.  i jumped up and down and high-fived david and felix and roy and tony the bar manager and the guy next to roy and the man behind me who assured me jonathan quick would win the conn-smythe tropy for mvp of the playoffs and the two guys in kings gear in the middle of the bar who had joined us in making the entire place a loud uproarious kings bar.  i also looked over at that tall, 20-something kid who said he would cry, his face on the table in the crook of his arms, crying like a baby by himself.  i high-fived his friends.  i looked over at felix who had then sat down and who also had a tear in his eye.  he was not cobbing or anything but his eyes were moist and when he saw me look at him he seemed to laugh a little in spite of himself.  the older man who owned the towing company and who had been at the same bar with me through most of these playoffs came over an caught me sitting and put a hand on my left shoulder from behind and patted me about five times real quick in on the belly.  "how about that," he asked jubilantly?!  i just leaned back in exhaustion and grasped his hand and shook it fervently a few times.  "i'm going to the parade," i said, and he assured me he would be there as well.

next came shots.  too many shots.  tony got my kings jersey off the mannequin from behind the bar and told me to put it back on which i did.  monday night karaoke started and those two guys who never stopped dancing got up and sang 'we are the champions.'  sweet. 

three days later i took my son to the parade and since my daughter could not go, i got her a pennant commemorating this historic victory.  the parade was great, 200,000 fans lining figueroa downtown and the kings rolling by on the tops of buses with lord stanley's cup in tow.  mark kept calling it the piston cup, which tickled me to no end. 

so here i was a week or so later putting the pennant up in terra's room when it all caught up to me for a moment.  i was so happy the kings had won.  i wished the kids were a little older to enjoy this as i had with the raiders and the dodgers and magic johnson's lakers of the early '80s.  throughout the playoffs i had engaged the kings with the games as much as possible.   they watched much of the phoenix series with me and when i erupted in cheering and clapping because the kings scored a goal, the kids would erupt as well or come running back into the room to find out what had happened.  "was it kopitar," mark would ask?  (several times it was kopi.)  as i stared at that pennant on the wall i recalled the last month of hockey, terra and mark, the bygone championships of other teams and the many years of falling short for the kings. i remembered the frustration of all the playoff defeats of all my teams and how they could, at times, (ridiculously,) ruin my mood.  i remembered my childhood, kareem abdul-jabbar, ron cey, mike haynes, orel, garret anderson, shaq, reggie smith's bat from the 1978 world series my dad got for me from a friend of his who was a dodger scout, gail goodrich, mickey hatcher, robert horry, jerry west, ted hendricks, frankie rodriguez, robbie keane, rick monday, wilt chamberlain, john lackey, jim plunkett and now justin williams and dustin penner and these glorious kings.  i remembered where i was when many of  those championships were won, even on the side of the freeway getting a speeding ticket when kirk gibson launched one into the right field pavilion. 

i didn't cry.  i could have.  i felt it from deep within me.  i paused looking at that pennant and felt satisfied.  i hoped my kids would remember this one just as i remember the lakers of 1973, barely.  the kings are the stanley cup champions, which consequently makes me feel like a champ too.

welcome to dodger stadium!

i took the family to dodger stadium on thursday night.

yes, we got the matt kemp action figures and the manny ramirez figures too. my kids played with the kemp dolls throughout the game since i liberated two of them from their boxes. at the end of the evening matt kemp and mark raced back to the car with the loser having to ride home in the bed of the truck. luckily mark edged kemp at the last second and touched the truck first. at that very moment kemp hit a solo homer in the bottom of the 6th. yes, we left early. our tix sucked and the kids got antsy, (read: faith got antsy,) and so we took off but heard the roar of the crowd. i jumped in the car and flipped on the radio to discover it was matt's big night all the way around, (save for the lonely ride home in the trunk.)

to be completely honest, the game was a mixed bag. i kept thinking about how much i would like to tell frank mccourt about my experience with horrible seats, terribly designed seating, a bad usher, no straws, a ridiculously long line to get the free action figures, (it did move fast however,) confusing tickets, (again, just poorly designed seating,) more bad seating as the dust of my cracked peanuts kept flying into the hair of the people in front of me because of a breeze that passed through a wire, mesh fence underneath and behind my seat that should have been a solid fence...and then there was the really bad part. parking at dodger stadium used to be a breeze. (didn't frank mccourt formerly own parking lots? you would think he'd be better at this.) one knew there were two loops going opposite directions. one had choices. i came in at stadium way off the 110 and was funneled right into a lot to the right. i had to walk all the way up 3-4 flights of stairs, (with a 3-year-old in my arms,) to will call at right field reserved only to enter and walk all the way around to my seats in left field reserved.

because i was watching a game on the weekend and saw a commercial for $17 reserved seats for matt kemp action figure night and thought, "gee, bad seats but cheap. "my kids are little. "it'll be fun." (what a moron.) i felt penalized for not sticking to my usual standard of just not really going to baseball games in person unless i have some kind of a line on decent seats, typically on the field level, occasionally loge or club. the $17 ticket price became $22.75 per by the time the ticketmaster surcharges were paid. (it is both collusion and a monopoly-i am pretty sure. i am not a lawyer but i feel certain.) what sounded like $68 on the commercial bounced right up to $91. okay, big deal i can handle giving away an extra $23. fuck it. but to then have to deal with a parking situation that used to be par excellence but now is strictly a convenience for the organization? (i believe it must result in getting people off the property more quickly than in the past. that is the only rationale I can come up with. geezus chrimus i miss the o'malleys.)

from our seats in left field, (the first seats in the top row of the reserved section, my wife and myself along with my 3 & 5-year-old kids,) we could see my car on the opposite side of the ravine. "look kids, it's the bug truck! See it?!" "yep."

with lapfuls of hot dogs, cokes, licorice, action figures, and peanuts on our persons, we were booted from those really bad seats. a lady approached from my right and said to me, "you're in my seats."

"wtf," i thought?! "you mean these effed up seats, the single worst location i have ever sat in at any event ever are not even the right seats?!??"

how could that be possible. it was reserved. it was section 17. it was row jj. why there was an 'm,' in front of the seat number '10,' i had no idea but i thought i was in the right place. well, i guessed we were probably slightly further down the left field line in the same last or top, row, but a section over so like a reasonable person i took my family down a few rows and plopped down in the first available seats i found. they were better than that crowded, inaccessible back row.

for the next two innings we enjoyed the game, playing with our matt kemps, eating peanuts, posting pix to facebook, you know, all that night at the game kind of stuff. then came the couple who were supposed to be in the seats we were in. i asked them if we were in their seats before they could tell me and they confirmed my suspicion. i asked faith if we should move down a row and she asked them if they wanted to sit in the seats in front of us to which they agreed. cool. we would spend another inning right there as takahashi and kuroda battled like two samurai on a diamond-shaped war ground.

next came a mysterious kid with a ticket. he approached the couple in front of us, ticket in hand, (matt kemp in his other hand,) and said, "you're in my seat. "i'm only one." he was only one?! he was 11. how is he only one? despite 3 or 4 empty seats further in next to the couple they turned and looked at me. i looked at faith who could not have been more inconvenienced said, (matter of factly,) "we have to move."

i grabbed my 3-year-old and his sprite, put a matt kemp in my pocket and urged faith and terra to get out of the row we were in. they did and down we went. at the exit faith turned as if to
leave the stadium. i grabbed terra and pulled her back in my direction and went down to better seats, to a huge section of 30 or 40 seats that had been empty all night. i went down four rows, turned and went out into the middle of that mass of unoccupied seats where i sat myself and my kids down. faith joined us but notified me if it happened again we would be leaving. we were still in the 4th inning.

at that point the cotton candy guy arrived and i shelled out $3 for about 10-cents worth of sugar and pink food coloring. james loney got thrown out attempting to steal 2nd base and i booed heartily after which terra and mark booed too. with bases loaded in the top of the 5th and two outs kuroda faced his counterpart and I yelled out, "strike out the bumb!" (i think they heard me down in the loge section.) mark mimicked me and repeated the phrase. now this was why i came to the park. i told terra matt kemp's licorice was in fact a freeze ray and just one of many
superpowers kemp had in addition to hitting baseballs out of the park and throwing runners out from miles away.

all went well for a couple of innings. the dodgers held their slight advantage and the family maintained our grip on our latest seats of choice. unfortunately, a bad odor soon became noticeable. no, it wasn't dodger stadium sewage. it was mark. my three-year-old had gas, which of course means only one thing, he would soon need to go number two. i had to do something and fast. briefly i imagined the dodger stadium restroom. i imagined getting mark into a stall and having to wipe down all manner of disgusting human byproduct. i turned to faith and informed her mark had passed gas no less than 10 times in about the last 90 seconds and suggested we leave, which we did.

we made our way from left field to right field, exited the stadium, walked down three or four flights of stairs, traversed the parking lot from the right field bleachers nearly to the exit, at which point mark won his race against the matt kemp action figure. as soon as we got home mark went directly to the restroom to do his business. mission accomplished. i turned on the game and saw kuo get the last three outs of the dodger victory. (goodbye six game losing streak.) i am just not going to bother with those bad seats in the future.

dodgers win!

the dodgers swept the cubs last night to advance to the national league championship series. they also swept away 20 years of utter futility. they brushed aside the ghosts of piazza and karros along with those of fox ownership and their own playoff series losses by sweep.

manny batted .500 with two homers. russell martin hit in the high .300s and was a catalyst all over the field. james loney led the team in rbi.

when martin and matt kemp went into the stands after the game to spray champagne and celebrate with the dodger faithful, it was as if 1988 was yesterday. the long suffering fans who had once become accustomed to post-season heroics seemed to pick up right where they left off.

i watched the end of the game in the loudest bar blaring 80s dance hits in all of pasadena; wokcano. it was odd but interesting and the place did acknowledge the victory when it occurred with just a few hoots and hollers. shortly thereafter a few friends who were out for a drink in honor of my wife's birthday ambled over to the 35er where 50% of the bar was wearing some piece of dodger gear. downstairs over hefeweizens and foozball, i talked to a guy who was wearing a dodger blue shirt that said, "doyers," across the chest. (it was a gift so he could not tell me where to pick one up.) he had come from the game and related how great it was to be in the ravine.

i shared with him and his wife what it was like to be there when jerry reuss beat the astros in a one-game playoff. i talked about trying to get burt hooten's attention through a crack in the bullpen while reggie jackson was notching another world series home run off of don sutton.

i described how it felt to be 13-years-old, watching the deciding game of a playoff series against the phillies, (those of larry bowa and gary mathews and "the bull," greg luzinski,) when in the bottom of the tenth, with two outs, ron cey walked. dusty baker got on when garry maddox misplayed a fly ball setting up bill russell who hit a single up the middle. i told my new friends how maddox charged the ball but realized it was for naught as cey was scoring easily. he pulled his glove up and began walking to the dugout as i stood there in the pavilion, my mouth agape, watching that ball roll through the grass signalling the dodgers destiny to challenge the yankees again in the world series for retribution. my dad charged to the edge of the wall and turned to me as fans poured onto the field to cut little squares of grass and earth to save as souvenirs of the momentous occasion. he asked me if i wanted to jump out onto the field and i screamed out yes. as my dad contemplated a jumping off point, he changed his mind and we stayed put, yelling and screaming all the same.

there was a great sense of camaraderie among the true blue dodger fans out and about last night. gone are the days of lopes, garvey, reggie smith and dusty baker. instead we have man-ram, kemp, lowe and nomar. these phillies will not have the bull nor bake mcbride nor steve carlton. we will have to contend with rollins and howard and utley. still, it should be fun.