I'm sure the Chicago based bartenders will be giving you recaps of the Chicago/Chicago series, so I'll do my due diligence as the "Rogue Dodgers Correspondent" and cover The Freeway Series: Los Angeles at California of Los Angeles of Anaheim.I broke my weak ban on attending games at the Big A last night because of the promise of a free ticket. Oddly enough, this is what always ends my ban on going to that park. I won't pay for games there anymore, but god damn it, I'll attend for free. For a face value of $9, they really weren't bad seats.
LA lost, which was not really a shock considering we had Mark "Lurch" Hendrickson going against Jered "Spicoli" Weaver, but what I really want to impart to you is the experience of going to a game in my decaying birthplace of Anaheim.
Anaheim Stadium...er, I mean Edison International Field of Anaheim - Oh, Edison was disgraced and doesn't own the naming rights anymore you say? OK, Angels Stadium of Anaheim - where its always 2002. 2002 is when the beat the Giants in the World Series and all the "lifelong" Angels fans that were living under rocks came out with rally monkey and those annoying thundersticks in tow.
Before Arte Moreno, the place sat empty. The Angels were drawing 18,000 die hards a game. He buys the team and that continued until about August of 2002 when they got hot. Thats when everyone loved their Halos! To be fair, I rooted for them in the playoffs because they are local and I don't buy the artificial rivalry created by Bud Selig's biggest blunder: interleague play.
The 18,000 die hards are still there, but they're joined by another 20,000+ bandwagoners. Even when its full, their milquetoast fans can't get the place rockin. Cheers for the Dodgers last night easily drowned out the Angels "faithful".
Beer at The Big A is priced based on alcohol content. The Michelob my friend got was smaller than my Bud Light because it has a higher % of alcohol. Where the hell did this idea come from? While I was in the beer line, there were two grisly lesbians in front of me who seemed to be representing Riverside (SoCal readers will understand the reference). They were loud and obnoxious, and frankly, one kind of looked like Sam Kinison. The other had a major muffin-top going on.
When Hendrickson is bounced from the game, disco music starts blaring for a couple minutes while Chin-hui Tsao gets ready. Disco? With Tsao in the game, some Taiwanese fans bust out their flags to show support for their brother from the renegade province. Did they bring flags just on the off chance Tsao would get in the game? Apparently so. As quickly as Tsao vanished (he pitched one third of an inning), so did the Taiwanese fans.
Mercifully the game ends at 8:30. I don't know what song they play when Anaheim wins (I couldn't make it out), but its not as good as LA's "I Love LA" by Randy "left foot, right foot" Newman. No Doubt's Tragic Kingdom would seem appropriate here, but no such luck. I get to the car and try to leave...literally 45 minutes later, I'm finally out of the stadium parking lot. Thank god for the ipod or I would have gone insane.
There you have it, a confusing and rambling recap, just the way Gene Autry would have wanted it.
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