8.14.01 ROCHESTER RED WINGS vs PAWTUCKET RED SOX
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There was a kitten loose in the stands. I was sitting one row up from the home dugout when there suddenly arose a commotion in the next section over, and everyone strained to look under their feet. The terrified little guy could be seen darting from row to row, pausing briefly at each new station to catch his breath, or perhaps just wonder how he’d gotten himself into this. He ended up a few feet away from me, whereupon a guy a few seats down apparently decided that it had fallen upon him to save the day. He confidently brushed past his friends and past me and stood above the cowering kitten, and just as assuredly thrust his hands through the opening in the chair to secure his prey. Only then did it become evident that he’d never picked up a cat before in his life. He didn’t go for the scruff; instead he wrapped both meaty hands around its trembling body as if he were looking to strangle it. Unsurprisingly, the kitten reacted by biting and clawing the living shit out of his unsavvy attacker, who in turn reacted by crying out in pain and, of course, tightening his grip. By this time stadium security had arrived, so boy genius yanked his quarry up through the seat and turned it over to the authorities. Grimacing, he held his bleeding hand out in front of him as he was escorted away, while the cat, being carried out by his armpits, sprayed the whole row of seats beneath him with a panicked stream of piss.
Moral of the story: If you’re gonna be a hero, at least have some idea what the hell you’re doing. Dumbass.
What a game, though! Shocking as this sounds, the Red Wings and the PawSox are locked in a heated battle for divisional futility. You heard me right: somebody is challenging the Wings for last place. And the Red Wings, bless their hearts, actually seem eager to turn over that mantle.
Meet Keith Reed. Just arrived from Double-A Bowie last night, 22 years old, tall, skinny, with his hair in a spiky afro and pants tucked in at the knee and bare hands spread apart on the bat he looks for all the world like he just walked out of a sepia-tone Negro Leagues photograph from the 1930s. Prefer a more contemporary point of reference? Try Vladimir Guerrero. I already love this guy.
After a tightly contested game, the Red Wings went into the bottom of the ninth trailing 2–1. Pawtucket closer Jin Ho Cho made short work of Jose Leon and Brian Rust, which brought young Mr. Reed to the plate with two down and the game on the line. Reed, who’d singled earlier, reached out across the plate and lined a wayward slider right back at the pitcher, ricocheting off Cho’s hand and toward the Red Wings dugout.
Reed was safe at first and the PawSox’s stopper was hurt. After a couple half-hearted attempts at throwing the ball, Cho left the game to polite applause and was replaced, not by “Woo Hoo Foo” as a spectator behind me suggested—has nobody east of the Mississippi ever seen an Asian before?—but by Sang Lee.
Two down, one on now, and Tim Raines, Jr. at the plate. Raines fisted a fly ball to shallow center that fell easily, putting runners at the corner for Eddy Martinez, who in the sixth had accounted for the Red Wings’ only run. Martinez fouled off a couple pitches and was sitting 2-and-2 when he got a piece of a Lee fastball. The ball was over the head of first baseman Juan Diaz and tailing toward foul ground out of reach of the charging right fielder Izzy Alcantara. Reed brought the tying run home and waited with hands on knees as Raines—whose four-time stolen-base-title-winning dad is no longer willing to race him for fear of being embarrassed—running on contact, barrelled around the bases flat-out and slid head-first across the plate just as the ball dropped, fair. Wow!
And man, did those guys look happy, Reed especially. League home run leader Alcantara, who’d earlier pasted RBI leader Calvin Pickering in a pregame home run derby, even made a point of walking across the infield to congratulate the Wings. Nice work, fellas!
FINAL SCORE: RED WINGS 3, PAWSOX 2
FOOD CONSUMED: The old reliable greasy chicken fingers and fries. Which reminds me, I was talking to someone the other day about the food at Dicky’s, which is all made from scratch, right down to the croutons on the salads. “Have you ever had the chicken fingers?” my friend asked. I hadn’t. “Oh man, you gotta try ’em,” he said earnestly. “They’re real chicken fingers.” Now wait a minute….