9/8/2006 - Winnipeg Goldeyes baseball

On Tuesday night Marilyn and I went to a baseball game. During the day I had brought up the word baseball, probably after a baseball item on the radio, and Marilyn suggested going to a game. The local team, the Winnipeg Goldeyes (a goldeye is a kind of salmon), who play in the independent Northern League,
hosted the Edmonton CrackerCats. Around 5 PM we got tickets at a CanadInns hotel and the game started at 7PM.

I don’t remember much of the actual game. The Goldeyes did jump to a 5-0 lead by the sixth inning, before the CrackerCats homered in 3 points. The ball went over the wall right before my eyes though, which was a memorable moment.

Most of my attention was caught by a group of Toronto Bluejays fans who were participating in Canada’s national rugby championship tournament. They had taken up the task of teaching Winnipeg fans a thing or two about what Toronto fans shout during games. They mostly targeted players over their names. A guy named Terrence McClain got it the most (Terrence & Phillip from the South Park animated series), but there was also a white player named Will Smith (”You’re not Will Smith! I know what Will Smith looks like!”), a guy named Fehlandt Lentini, and someone remembered that a certain Stubby Clapp had been in the Major Leagues for a few years (”You don’t forget a name like Stubby Clapp!”).

A thing that irritated me was the North American habit of singing the national anthem before baseball games (I’m glad there was no American team involved).

It really diminishes the importance of national anthems to play them before just any sports game... I know the Canadian anthem by heart in both French and English, but I can't bring myself to singing it before sports games of little international importance. I did join in the singing of Take Me out to the Ballgame, during the 7th inning stretch, though. I think that's a good, solid, baseball tradition.

Another thing I didn’t like, was that there was a woman constantly trying to get a Mexican wave started in our section (A). For the first two hours the wave never got past section D, sections running from A thru T in CanWest Global Park, and only as the game wound down we got the entire stadium along.

The woman also went up and down our section between innings throwing free stuff at the fans. I got a magnet with addresses where old motor oil can be brought to, and a thing that dispenses a flowery scent. A very funny moment was when two really small children (5 or so) finally got something, and it turned out to be dental floss.

At the end of the game there was a really great fireworks show, that lasted about five minutes. Imagine around two minuted from the Times Square fireworks, smeared out over five minutes.