Flashback to September 26, 2004
Permit me to show how my dedication has turned a bit into madness. I spent all Saturday morning making a sign for the game. It said “Bill Mueller: Yankee Kueller.” A detail you can’t see is that instead of stars on the top hat in the Yankee logo, there are skulls and crossbones. Also, there’s a Royal Rooters shout out in the upper right.
I was absolutely determined to have Bill Mueller sign my creation. I left at 11:00 AM for a 2:05 PM game. I arrived at Fenway at 12, just in time for the opening of the gates. Usually the visiting team is taking batting practice as the first fans arrive. Today, however, it seems the Red Sox front office had the Sox take BP while fans were there.
I made my way to the seats behind home plate. I got there just as Mueller finished up his turn at the plate. He came by the stands to start signing autographs. There were two rows of people in front of me, but not many for clamoring for him to sign. Many were there mainly to be near the players. He saw my sign and autographed it for me. It didn’t seem he thought it funny or anything, and that disappointed me somewhat, but he signed it, and it was the last thing he signed before he went down to the clubhouse.
Beautiful day, great game.
The Red Sox were 3.5 games behind the Yankees after beating them 11-4. Derek Jeter made a throwing error in the second by airmailing it over Jorge Posada’s head, which prompted us to do the mocking “Jeee-ter! Jeee-ter!” chant.
Bill Mueller hit a home run in the fifth inning off of Esteban Loaiza, and Tom Werner ended up getting the ball since he was sitting in the bleachers where it landed. We gave Ellis Burks a standing ovation because the public address announcer stated that it was his last regular season game in a Red Sox uniform at Fenway Park. There were opportunities to have him pinch hit, and we chanted “We want Ellis! (clap, clap, clap clap clap)” at those times. He didn’t come into the game, however.
And “Yankee Kueller”? Prophetic.
Special thanks to Jere at A Red Sox Fan in Pinstripe Territory for the retro idea.
Comments
Good stuff Empy. For my flashback....I almost got killed by an errant baseball thrown by Gabe Kapler. He was all the way in left field long tossing to McCarty and Trot...the ball landed right in between my friend and I. My friend took the ball cuz it rolled towards her.....and she keeps calling Gabe Kapler "Dave Kapler" and was on her cell phoen all through warmups....WTF! *sighs* oh well
Good stuff anywho...glad to see you enjoyed the game :)
PTH ∙ 19 February 2005 ∙ 12:59 AM
GREAT sign! Leave it to you to come up with that one. In your picture, youcan see my 10-game plan seats! We've got literally the first seats in the bleachers on the other side of the gap, right about that far up. Had this this pic been taken the previous day, you might have seen me and Pat eating our pre-game pretzels right behind you. I looked back at my own blog and saw that at about the moment this pic must have been taken, I was writing my entry about the game I went to the day before. I like cosmic stuff like this.
Also note: with the Fenway gates being open 2 hours before game time since a few years ago (instead of 1 1/2), you always get to see the Sox batting pratcice, starting from around the Manny/Millar/Ortiz group. Between that and being able to go anywhere in the park during BP, Fenway rules, as opposed to the Bronx, with it's 1 1/2 hrs and roped off box seats.
Glad you had fun with "retro-post" technology! Everyone, share in the glory of RP!
Jere ∙ 19 February 2005 ∙ 1:03 PM