Family Adventures: My Wife's Ordering Prowess

Photo via iStock

We went for lunch at the Asian Bistro on Sunday.  My Wife ordered the Maki Combo: California, yellowtail and tuna rolls.  In an effort to outsmart the system, I ordered my preferred combination a la carte - California, tuna and cucumber - for 50 cents less.  Well, I was feeling pretty clever until the waitress brought My Wife her soup and salad.  Mine didn't come with soup and salad.  I had to order my salad separately.  Foiled again!

Our kickball playoffs were on Saturday.  We played very well on a sweltering day but lost in the second round to the top seed and eventual champs.  Our fielding, especially, was very smooth.  Mock insists (arm-twist) that I mention both of our starring moments.  He scored our winning, walkoff run in the first game with a spectacular slide.  He earned a decent raspberry burn on his knee for his troubles.  In the second game, I had a game-saving catch in right field at the end of the fifth (usually final) inning to send it to extras.  I rescued a line drive bobbled by our first baseman.  There was much rejoicing.

Mock's heroics inspired a discussion about walkoff hits/runs/home runs/wins/etc.  He and I went out to a Lake Monsters game last night and hashed it out further.  I promised to do some research on when the term first came into use for baseball.  I couldn't find that but I did find out when the game rules changed to allow such an occurrence.  I have a wonderful book called A Game of Inches by Peter Morris which is stuffed to the gills with such vital information.

Before 1880, teams were expected to play out all nine innings, regardless if the batting team had the lead in the bottom half of the ninth.  The rule was changed in December of 1879 and was put into immediate use on Opening Day 1880 when the Chicago White Stockings came from behind to defeat the Cincinnati Reds, 4-3.  Morris has no reference as to when the word walkoff itself came into use.  The Oxford English Dictionary was also surprisingly unhelpful.  Mock, through his own research, found that ESPN popularized the term.

Kickball was a lot of fun, a far more relaxed and sociable atmosphere than we have for broomball.  As I said before, our team fielding is pretty good but we need to do some work at the plate - I as much as anyone.  I went 0-for-2 on the day with one effective sacrifice bunt thrown in to salvage my pride.  Our best kicker is a soccer player and has offered to run a clinic for us - a fine idea, I think.  Others seem resistant to the idea of "practice" but we'll work on that.  Even with sub-par offense, we were a far better team by the end of the season than we were at the beginning.  We should be able to improve on our eighth seed finish next year.

Last night's baseball game was a fun one, a 4-3 victory over the Batavia Muckdogs of the Cardinals organization.  Whenever we've gone to games with a big group, I've left regretting that Mock and I didn't have more time to chat.  So, for this game, I suggested we go just the two of us.  I'm glad we did.  We covered a lot of ground beyond the walkoff discussion. 

Social sports and minor league baseball - that really is what sports should be all about.  Watching the Olympics, I can't deny that the nationalistic expressions occasionally make me uncomfortable.  Shouldn't we be able to appreciate all of the athletes at the Games, not just the ones playing under our own flag?  The regionalism expressed in our own professional and scholastic leagues isn't much better.  Minor league baseball keeps things in perspective.  I want the Lake Monsters to win but...

Wait, you're a Muckdogs fan?  I hate you.  I'm going to set your car on fire!!!

Sound ridiculous?  My point exactly.

An evening out with a good friend watching a game we both love at a reasonable price.  Watching athletes who are exponentially better at the sport than we could ever be but still just young men trying to extend their dreams of playing professionally for as long as they can.  They are not gods.  Just people.  The past year has shown us the worst of what can happen when sports figures are deified.  Minor league baseball brings us far closer to where we should be.

As for kickball, a game played with friends.  Win or lose, we can be proud of playing well and enjoy each other's company.  In the end, I prefer J.R.R. Tolkien's worldview to Vince Lombardi's.

Thorin Oakenshield's final words to Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit:

"There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West.  Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure.  If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."

Family Adventures: Father's Day and Other Man Matters

Happy Father's Day to everyone a few days late!  The ladies gave me a lovely day.  My Wife uses the occasion to buy matching T-shirts for Our Girl and me - a Little Red Riding Hood motif this year.  We had a celebratory trip to bookstore and went out for lunch.  As much as I believe in independent stores, there are times when nothing but Barnes & Noble will do.  The comic/graphic novel section at our nearest is excellent.  Lunch at Sukho Thai - our second meal out this weekend as we'd done Friday dinner at Bridge Street.  It was a wonderfully relaxing weekend.

Big news:  our kickball team had its first victory.  We won by a touchdown, 12-5.  My own contributions were modest but I did play the final inning at first and got the last two putouts.

Playing team sports with grown-ups is a bit of an adventure.  Though our team is much bigger - 18 at full strength - many of the same issues that came up with broomball hold true now.  Some are serious about winning.  Some like to win but are mostly there for the social benefits.  I'm really fine with either but it's tricky when people on the same team aren't always on the same page.  We've got a very regular crowd, though, and I'm hoping we can recruit a few for broomball in the fall.

We had our first boys night in a long time last night: a minor league baseball game in Burlington.  The Vermont Lake Monsters have just begun their short season A-league campaign.  Mock's cousin found great seats - second row on the third base side.  It was a great angle for appreciating the distances of the infield and how easily both the shortstop and the third baseman make those long throws across the diamond. 

Due largely to an adventurous fifth inning including, among other things, two throwing errors on the same play, the home team won, 7-1.  The team invested a million dollars in the stadium during the off-season.  I don't know if they're yet up to a standard to assure their A-ball status in the long term but they definitely spruced up, including a snazzy new outfield scoreboard.

School's only been out for a week so much of the conversation was shop talk - all part of clearing the toxins in time to begin fresh next year.  I'm hoping we'll make more games this season.  It's the perfect way to simultaneously enjoy baseball, good company and a beautiful Vermont summer.

Field Trip: Scrappers Scrapped

It was Boys' Night at the Ballpark for Lake Monsters vs. the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, a Cleveland Indians affiliate. Our guys won 7-6 and remain in first place in their division. I have to admit, though, that the game was a bit of an afterthought this evening. We all head back to work next week: in-service starts Wednesday, students come back September 1st. So, there was lots of gossip to catch up on before we head back to the mines. Summer's slipping away. Sigh...


Image via Vermont Living Magazine

This was probably my last Monsters game for the year. Games at the park have definitely added a lot to what has really been an excellent summer all-around. I'm looking forward to more next year.

Field Trip: Jammers Jammed

I went to a Lake Monsters game last night with Mock and one of his cousins. Mock has several cousins and this is the second mention for this one so he needs a pseudonym. We shall call him The Carpenter, because he is one. The game was delayed about an hour due to rain. The reserved section is under the roof so it wasn't so bad once we found our seats - plenty of time to eat, grab a beer, settle in, etc. The visitors were the Jamestown Jammers, a Florida Marlins affiliate.


Image via Brent Powers LHP

I did try to keep a scorecard, as I did for our previous Monsters' game, and actually made it deeper into the game this time. I think it's time to discuss the value of the scorecard exercise. In the current information age, keeping one's own scorecard certainly isn't necessary. Even minor league Websites provide detailed play-by-play game summaries. But the main benefit is that keeping score forces you to pay attention. For watching a game on television, it's wonderful. I find I have a much better sense of a game's big picture and pick up on more of the finer details as well. When the boys asked me last night how many walks there had been (quite a lot compared to base hits at that point), I had the answer right in front of me.

On the other hand, the main drawback is that it obligates you to pay attention. I might even go so far as to call it anti-social. I lost the thread of the game last night when I got caught up in conversation in the late innings - which is, after all, the whole point of going to a game with other people. I also find the scorecard provided in the typical game program is inadequate - not enough room for substitutions. I prefer the form I've been using at home. Regardless, I don't think I'll try to keep score at live games anymore.

Which is not to say that the program isn't worth the 50 cents I paid for it. The inserts with lineups, stats and general team updates are excellent. Besides, who can't use a free pencil?

There were plenty of base runners in the game: eight hits, eight walks and two errors. But there were only 3 total runs, the Monsters winning 2-1. The low-scoring affair prompted a question which I put to you as well, dear reader: what makes for a good baseball game? With other sports, my usual answer is that both teams play well and it's a shame one has to lose. A late-game mistake can ruin a great game for me and baseball nearly always hinges on a mistake - perhaps a small one - by somebody. Do extra innings make for a great game? They can help. A close score is certainly essential, ideally keeping within three runs for the entire game to my mind. We agreed that no-hitters qualify as great games. I'd say the ultimate is when both pitchers are working no-hitters late into a contest. Any thoughts out there?

In my experience, an individual baseball game can't quite compare in atmospheric electricity to a close basketball game, for instance. I remember basketball games at my high school where the entire crowd stood for the whole game. Baseball games aren't like that. The aesthetic of the sport is different, and that's okay - wonderful, in fact.

Field Trip: The Vermont Lake Monsters

Image via Brent Powers LHP

The Vermont Lake Monsters are our local minor league baseball team, based in Burlington. They play in the Short Season Class A New York-Penn League. The Lake Monsters have a new Major League affiliation this year. After many years with the Montreal Expos/Washington Nationals organization, Vermont is now hitched to the Oakland A's.

All three of us went to this afternoon's game against the Aberdeen IronBirds, an Orioles affiliate. We met Mock, his cousin and both of their families for an afternoon at the ballpark. We used to live right down the road from Centennial Field but hadn't been to a game since we moved out to the country. The stadium opened in 1906 and is probably going to have to make some improvements in order to continue hosting minor league ball. But it is still small, charming and accessible for a family day out.


Photo via Lake Champlain International

I adore minor league baseball. As I've written before, I first went with my grandfather to an Omaha Royals game back in the early '80s. Frederick Keys games were a frequent entertainment option in high school. Tickets are cheap. The seats are close to the action. The players are relatively human.

We offered to buy Our Girl a baseball cap but she wasn't interested in any of the options. She took full advantage of the snack opportunities, though: a snow cone, cotton candy and ice cream in the form of Dippin' Dots. The beer selection for the grownups was impressive for a baseball game. We both had UFO Hefeweizens, a product of Harpoon Brewery, our preferred brand.

Mock got his head shaved as part of a cancer benefit. I chickened out. As My Wife said, "I know you're comfortable with the fact that he's a better person than you are."

Oh right, the game! The Lake Monsters are off to a great start this season, leading their division by four games. The IronBirds, on the other hand, have been terrible, now 14 games behind the pace in theirs. I realized with the first at-bat that I had no problem rooting for the home team, despite the visitors' association with my big league team. While I would certainly pull for the O's over the A's, I have a much stronger allegiance to Burlington, where we lived for three years, than I have to Aberdeen, which I've only driven past on the highway.

The IronBirds began the affair with a four-run first inning and never looked back, taking the victory 9-4. The Lake Monsters' best player on the day was also the "Featured Player" in the program. Xavier Macklin (RF) had a great game: 3-for-4 plus a walk, driving in two of the team's four runs. According to the program, he likes spaghetti but hates corn (?). He fears roller coasters but likes the Yankees (??!!). As this is Vermont, we obviously have to know his favorite flavor of Ben & Jerry's ice cream: Cinnamon Buns.

Now, to don my Orioles fan hat. The Birds' top prospect in Aberdeen is middle infielder Mychal Givens. A 2009, second round draftee, Givens filled the DH slot today. He had an average game: 1-for-4. Mock's cousin made a few Robin Givens jokes but as far as I can tell, they're not related. I was more impressed by the Dutch-born Dudley Leonora (2B): 3-for-4 with a double, a walk and one RBI.

We only made it through the eighth inning. By then, pretty much all children involved had lost their patience. I'm eager to go again sometime, perhaps a boys night outing.

Here's one for the road. Mock told us the story of this Evan Longoria video and was kind enough to share the link with me. Enjoy: