{"id":108,"date":"2012-10-10T13:24:03","date_gmt":"2012-10-10T17:24:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wallyword.com\/?p=108"},"modified":"2012-10-10T18:54:14","modified_gmt":"2012-10-10T22:54:14","slug":"flippin-the-birds-first-visit-to-camden-yards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/wallyword.com\/?p=108","title":{"rendered":"Flippin\u2019 the Birds \u2013 first visit to Camden Yards!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Those who have spent any time with our family are well aware of our serial love of baseball, with exception of our daughter the hockey nut (for another blog post). Yes, we\u2019ll watch games every night if we have to, and believe me, we have to.<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0 Even while watching other network shows, there\u2019s a constant flipping back to the game when at \u00a0commercials to check the score (my apologies to my clients in the advertising business).<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an obsession, and we\u2019re prepared to live with it. Interventions haven\u2019t worked; neither have the ADHD actions of one chocolate lab vying for attention over Jeter or Cano.<\/p>\n

Yes, you guessed it – we\u2019re Yankee fans!<\/p>\n

Before some of you readers sneer the typical \u201cof course you are, the Yankees always win\u201d, just know that I became a Yankee fan starting in 1967 (my first game) when the Yankees finished 9th<\/sup> place in the American League.\u00a0 Mantle, Gibbs, Pepitone, Stottlemyre\u2026great players, one lousy year!<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve only been to a handful of fields outside of Yankee Stadium before, and its fun to attend other parks during a regular season game to soak up both stadium feng shui and fan insanity.\u00a0 Just recently I was able to re-live the excitement of my first game while attending the opening game of the AL Division Series in Baltimore at Camden Yards on October 7th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

Kicking off the excitement was my oldest son \u201cfalling into\u201d the tickets via one of his business connections late on Friday. We reshuffled the schedule a bit, quickly rented a hotel room in Baltimore for Sunday night, apologized to my wife for deserting her (she gets it), and off we went. A few key elements which made this a real adventure; a several hour drive for all of us on Sunday; a light, but steady rain in Baltimore starting at 5pm before the 6pm game extending the start time a couple of hours; and it was the first time we\u2019d been to a playoff game rooting for the Yankees in a visiting ballpark.\u00a0 In hindsight, a flack jacket might have made sense!<\/p>\n

Departing the hotel, we chatted excitedly walking in the rain several blocks, until we saw Camden Yards and then went silent. All lit up, even in the rain, it was majestic.\u00a0 Great history, player names, it was neat to see it live.\u00a0 As die-hard fans, the four of us of course were all clad in some sort of Yankee get-up, with me the most dressed in my Jeter pinstripe jersey. This was anything but camouflage gear.<\/p>\n

Typically a regular season Oriole\/Yankee game is about 60\/40 O\u2019s fans to Yankee fans.\u00a0 Not the case that night \u2013 probably 95\/5.\u00a0 While in the ticket line, I was reminded of the movie Elephant Man<\/em><\/strong> as the Baltimore crowd glared at us with deathly stares.\u00a0 My guess is that if we uttered a version of that famous line \u201cI am not a Birds fan! I am not an animal! I am a human being! I … am … a … Yankee fan!” it still wouldn\u2019t \u00a0 do much to endear us to this crowd.<\/p>\n

Once inside the gate we continued to marvel at how great even a wet Camden Yards can be. If this wasn\u2019t a Yankee game I could actually see rooting for the Orioles, especially against the Red Sox. It\u2019s a great open stadium, and nice layout with the backdrop of the brick-building in right field. It\u2019s the B&O Warehouse, which has been hit on the fly only once, by Ken Griffey, Jr. during the Home Run Derby of the 1993 MLB All-Star Game, and has bars and restaurants and a plaza where fans can congregate to enjoy a beer and argue stats.<\/p>\n

We grabbed some beers ($10 for a 24-ouncer is a steal to this NY\u2019er) and stood in the plaza to enjoy the view. As we slowly got drenched internally and externally, we enjoyed the stares, sneers and playful jibes of Oriole fans. Once the rain got too heavy, we ventured under the stadium into a sea of orange humanity.\u00a0 Picture the 1966 movie Fantastic Voyage<\/em><\/strong> where the medical team is shrunken down and injected into the blood stream of a dying diplomat. There\u2019s a scene in that movie where anti-bodies surround one of the miniature scientists and kill him as he was a foreign substance to the body.\u00a0 You get my drift, similarly, we were surrounded by orange anti-bodies, and I can tell you none of them looked like Raquel Welch.<\/p>\n

Welcoming calls during our trip through the orange crowd included a few \u201cYankees suck\u201d, \u201cJeter, you suck\u201d and an elbow nudge here & there. Once finding a small area to stand, we passed the time with the occasional high-five to complete strangers in Yankee garb and an entertaining chat with an older couple regaling the time they wore Baltimore Ravens garb to Heinz Field in Pittsburgh\u2013 not a fun time.\u00a0 We get it, we\u2019re Steelers fans too!<\/p>\n

Hallelujah! The tarp finally came off after 2 \u00bd hours (yes, we ate something) and we headed to our seats.\u00a0 It was pretty chilly considering we were already soaked. The four of us split up \u2013 two seats were in prime territory behind home plate and the other two were in the third row from the top where we could almost touch the Goodyear Blimp.\u00a0 To be fair though, the view from the high seats was pretty great as well.<\/p>\n

My youngest son and I went up to the high seats first; a veritable hornet\u2019s nest of Oriole fans – who really do hate the Yankees by the way, each and every one! The name calling \u2013 A-Roid, Jeter sucks, Martin\u2019s a thug, and some stuff about Teixiera I shouldn\u2019t print (he\u2019s a Maryland boy the O\u2019s wanted to sign in 2009, and he bailed to the Yanks). \u00a0They calmed a bit when the Yanks scored in the top of the first; but were re-energized when the Birds went ahead 2-1 in the 3rd<\/sup>. The Yanks tied the game in the top of the 4th<\/sup>, and so it remained 2-2 for the next several innings where both teams threatened to score, but didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

After the 5th<\/sup>inning, we switched up the seats with my oldest and his buddy, and literally life changed as we knew it. Right behind home plate,\u00a0best seats ever<\/span><\/strong>\u00a0as they say, of course still surrounded by O\u2019s fans.\u00a0 If you watched the game, you know it remained tied until the top of the 9th<\/sup> when the O\u2019s brought in their star closer \u2013 Jim Johnson.\u00a0 He promptly gave up a home run to Russell Martin and the Yanks got the lead. Instantly, a good flock of Birds fans flew the coop. The Yanks continued to score and it looked liked the swallows of Capistrano checking out-of-town as they are known to do in late October. We of course stayed until the last pitch operating under the family rule \u201cnever leave the stadium until the game is over.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yanks win 7-2. Great game \u2013 if you were a Yankee fan!<\/p>\n

Here are a few highlights from the evening which completed the Camden Yards adventure:<\/p>\n