Long Live the Baseball Tour

Long Live the Baseball Tour

Thursday, June 21st

First, an important announcement: Elaine Jarzabski ROCKS! You can tell her I said so.

In the three weeks that Spamalot is in Dallas, there is precisely one Texas Rangers home game that we could get to (without calling in "sick" and missing a show). That game was this afternoon; the aforementioned Texas Rangers hosting the Chicago Cubs at 1:05. Elaine (one third of our touring hair department), through some family connections, set us up with 6 comp seats, 10 rows from the field behind 3rd base. The only thing that makes an afternoon at the ballpark nicer is free seats. Awesome.

I went with Jeff Dumas (a life-long fan of those "lovable losers" from Chicago), Michael Siberry, Matt Allen, Mike Berg and Cuz. How else, besides a wacky national touring situation, do an Angels fan, Cardinals fan, Rockies fan, Cubs fan, Yankees fan, and a fan of cricket (Michael's from New Zealand - they play cricket there, right?) all get seated in a row at the Rangers' Ballpark in Arlington? (I will adopt the local custom and ignore that someone paid a lot of money to name it Ameriquest Field.) It was fun to hear us sing Take Me Out to the Ballgame: "For it's root, root, root for the (overlapping) Cubbies/Yankees/Cardinals/Home Team..." We missed seeing Sammy Sosa hit his 600th homer by about 18 hours - in fact, Sammy didn't set foot on the field today - but we had a great afternoon. (Fun fact: Sosa hit his first ever, big league homer on June 21st, 1989 in his debut as a major leaguer and a Texas Ranger. The pitcher: Roger Clemens. His 600th homer was 1 day short of 18 years later.)

It was cloudy and threatened rain all morning. It was not especially hot, for Texas, at 80 degrees at game time. The humidity, however, was plenty to keep us sweating. A pretty nice afternoon to sit outside; I'm glad the sun didn't ever, really get out from behind the clouds and cook us all.

The ballpark is nice. It's gi-normous in that way that all sports stadiums built in a field by the freeway can be. Without having to jam a ballpark into a city lot, they can make the outside of it completely square and shape the field however they want. No need for a Green Monster or a gap in right where a fan can watch the six train rattle by every couple of minutes. In fact, beyond the center field wall in Arlington, they built a four story office building right into the ballpark! The side facing the field is floor to ceiling windows with balconies. The top floor is the Rangers' executive offices, and the first floor is ticketing and other ballpark related stuff, but the second and third floor are offices for rent. I need to start some sort of Arlington based touring office or something! They tried hard to give the place some baseball character. They're very proud of their "home run porch" in right center. It's inspired by many of the old parks that we've torn down to make room for the era of luxury boxes (coming soon to New York - curse you Steinbrenner!!!!). That portion of the park reminded me a lot of Tiger Stadium.

An aerial view of the Rangers' Ballpark at Arlington. What's missing from this photo are the miles of parking lots in all directions. They're building the new stadium for the Cowboys on the other side of the parking fields. Six Flags over Texas is on the west side of the parking lots.

The inside of the ballpark. and the "home run porch" in right field.
You can read all about the ballpark at: http://texas.rangers.mlb.com/tex/ballpark/facts.jsp

In any event, it was a good game. The Rangers took an early lead, but the Cubbies fought their way back in the middle innings only to succumb to some good baserunning and hitting in the bottom of the ninth to lose 6-5. I think there were more Cubs fans in the park than Rangers fans. The "Let's go Cubbies" cheers were loud and proud.

Unlike Houston, we did get to see the Rangers' home run celebration. No trains in Arlington; the Rangers celebrate a home run with fireworks. They shoot out of a cut-out in the shape of the state of Texas above center field and out of the top of the light towers in left-center and right-center. Of course, with the humidity and not much breeze, the pyro smoke swirled in the stadium for a bit.

A nice afternoon in the sun with a good bunch of guys! Pictures coming soon.

I don't know what's up with baseball in Texas. At both parks I visited, the beer is cold, the peanuts are appropriately salty (though the vendor handed them to me today rather than the traditional toss), and I even sort of enjoyed singing Deep In the Heart of Texas, but the hot dogs SUCK. I will elaborate:

1) They're not hot dogs. This is my major objection. They're some kind of beef sausage. Tasty, but not a hot dog. Ballpark Franks, Hebrew National and (the shining example) Nathan's Famous: these are hot dogs. Pink, finely ground, unidentifiable meat: that is a hot dog. I enjoy sausage, but not when I've ordered a dog.

2) They don't come through the stands with them. You have to leave your seat to get them. Stupid. Many of you may know that I am convinced that a hot dog brought to you by the hot dog man at Yankee Stadium tastes better even than the same dog purchased at the concession stand. There are two reasons for the better dog: (a) they brought it to you and you missed none of the game (b) it was floating around in the crack-infused water of the carrier not rolling on a 7-11 style hot dog warmer in the concession stand. The man (it's always men carrying the heavy steaming hot dog pots) should ideally spear it with a long fork. I also believe that they get better as the game goes on and the water gets more hot doggy.

3) They want to put a bunch of extra crap on the "hot dog". Cheese sauce, grilled onions, chili: while these are all fine condiments, they don't belong on a ballpark dog. Your condiment choices should be limited: ketchup and mustard (if they bring it to you) one packet of each - or maybe sauerkraut and relish if you go wait in line like a fool.

4) They want you to use a knife and fork. This is outrageous. This is also because they want to serve you the footlong version. (In Houston, my regular size "hot dog" was a special order. I had to wait for it to be made. There were tons of giant Astro Dogs ready to go, but no human-scaled "hot dogs".) A proper dog comes swaddled in a napkin with the mustard and ketchup tucked into the bun, self-contained, not on a plate overflowing with cheese-wiz.

5) The buns are wrong. Ball park dogs come in those split top rolls that are baked together in great sheets. They have to be pulled apart. (Hopefully the man uses the same fork to separate the buns, open the slit and then stab the dog. This is an art form.) The bun should never be round and brown on all sides. This isn't a picnic, it's a baseball game.

Rant over, but it had to be mentioned.

I miss Yankee Stadium.

Things are looking up for the baseball tour in the coming weeks. There are a couple of minor league teams in the Dallas metro area that I need to compare schedules with, but I've been sated in my lust for Texas baseball (and did I mention that the hot dogs are terrible?). The Tulsa Drillers (AA Texas League affiliate of the Rockies) play only night games while we're in town, but the Iowa Cubs (AAA Pacific League affiliate of the, guess who, Cubs) play a Monday night game on the night we arrive in Des Moines. Then, in St. Paul, we hit baseball gold: Monday, June 30th v. Kansas City; Thursday, August 2nd v. Kansas City; & Monday, August 6th v. Cleveland. Kansas City hosts the hated Blue Jays (VERNON, YOU SUCK!) on Monday, August 13th at their park with the waterfall in center. In Portland, the Beavers (AAA, San Diego) host the Las Vegas 51s (Dodgers) on Monday, August 20th and Tuesday the 21st (opening night in Portland is Wednesday, so I can catch a game on Tuesday!). The Salt Lake Bees (AAA, Angels) will host their final game of the season against the Las Vegas 51s on Monday, September 3rd at 2:05 PM and if I take the crew flight, I just might make it to town in time... There's a 2:05 game at Coors Field on Thursday, September 20th (Rockies v. Dodgers) to wrap up the season (provided there's no Thursday rehearsal). It seems unlikely that even if the Rockies or the Mariners made the post-season that there would be any tickets or any afternoon games, but a boy can dream of more baseball...

Wow, re-reading that last paragraph, it's clear that I've gotten a little obsessive about this project. Still and all, that's at least one possible baseball game in every city except Tulsa. The sad part about all this, however, is that the Yankees (or even their affiliates: AAA Scranton, AA Trenton, High-A Tampa, Low-A Charleston & Staten Island - the Columbus Clippers "ring your bell" now belong to the Nationals) don't appear anywhere on the schedule. I will have missed an entire season of in-person Yankee baseball. Sad Face. Thank heaven there's satellite radio. Not only do they bring me John Sterling's wacky antics ("A thrilla from Godzilla!") but I can even hear Bob Sheppard on the Yankee Stadium P.A. ("Number Two-o-o, Derek Jee-tah."). A moment of respect, please, for Bob Sheppard: public address announcer for the New York Yankees since 1951, 22 world series and more than 4,500 games. (Fun fact, in his first game, Yankees v. BoSox, Shepard introduced a total of 8 future hall of famers: Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Johnny Mize, Yogi Berra, Phil Rizzuto and Jerry Coleman for the Yankees along with Ted Williams & Lou Boudreau for the Boston.)

Bob Sheppard. He has the best job in the world. After Mr. Sheppard missed opening day in 2006 with a broken hip, Derek Jeter asked the Yankees to record Bob's voice saying his name for use in any future such emergencies.

OK, enough baseball. I better go find something to eat!

JV