6.2.04 LOS ANGELES
DODGERS vs MILWAUKEE BREWERS
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Bottom of the fifth, bench-guy Jason Grabowski leads off the inning pinch-hitting for young Edwin Jackson, who, in his first major-league start of the year, has done a fine job of holding the Brewers to one run off just three hits, staking the Dodgers to a 3-1 lead. Grabowski, not the sveltest guy in the world, hits a liner to right which gets hung up in the corner, allowing the big guy to make it all the way around to third. It’s the third triple we’ve seen tonight, my brother observes, and I can’t help but toss out the 2004 baseball cliché du jour: “The most exciting play in the game.”
It gets me thinking, though: what actually is the most exciting play in the game? Triple? Triple play? Game-winning grand slam? Milton Bradley going apeshit and throwing two dozen baseballs onto the field, as he did the night before? No, no, no, and (hesitatingly) no. In all the games I’ve attended, I’ve seen it only once. The most exciting play in the game is without a doubt the motherfuckin’ suicide squeeze.
One down now, Grabowski ponderously leaning off third, little Cesar Izturis at the plate. Izturis takes a pitch from Milwaukee starter Ben Hendrickson. And then it happens. Hendrickson goes into his windup, and here comes Grabowski, all six-foot-three and two-hundred-plus pounds of him, charging down the line. It’s one of those things that, when you see it, just seems wrong. It’s the same feeling you might get watching some drunk guy head obliviously down a freeway off-ramp as he gets onto the freeway. Your whole body just constricts with the anticipation of impending catastrophe; everything in you shouts AAAAAGGGGGHHHHH! Nooooooo!!!
Whereupon Izturis lays down the bunt with perfect nonchalance, dropping it just a few feet in front of the plate and casually stepping aside to let freight train Grabowski through before catcher Gary Bennett can even think about attempting to field the ball. Effin’ beautiful. What were we saying earlier? The most exciting play in baseball.
A Paul Lo Duca solo shot in the sixth and Eric Gagne’s seventy-sixth consecutive save rounded out a perfect night at Chavez Ravine. Likely my only visit this year, but I got everything I needed and then some.
FINAL SCORE: Dodgers 5, Brewers 2
Peter Hughes
