Ah, the first week at the new job down and I can finally relax a little bit. It is already early/mid afternoon here in sunny Mississauga and I have only been awake a matter of hours. After riding buses all week and getting up shortly after 6 a.m. it was time for a big lie-in. Boy did I need it. This has been a busy week and made fun thanks to two trips downtown to catch two Blue Jay baseball games. They won one, lost one and were officially eliminated with any chance of making the post-season.

Of course those of us who have been following them with great interest lately knew they weren’t likely to make the playoffs for a while now. Once their 10-game winning streak came to an end and they started to roll back into that win one, lose one mode it was clear to see the season was over. Didn’t stop us going along and parting with our hard earned money though to enjoy a few match-ups. That is the great thing about baseball. There are games every day and even if your team is out of contention it still provides great entertainment as players look to boost personal stats in order to win bigger contracts. Baseball has more statistics related to it than maybe any other sport I have ever followed but that can be a good thing because the players take note of their own stats and so play hard.

Anyway, I headed down twice after work on the subway to Union station to meet up for the game. On the first night two of Kim’s friends were in town so we decided to meet them and go to the game and then last night I travelled down to go with just Kim. Night one was against Baltimore in what was probably the best ball game I have ever been too and night two was against Boston in a game they came close to winning but in the end lost.

The Baltimore game had it all in a baseball game. The crowd might have been small since it was against the worst team in the division but it was far from boring. We got seats in the outfield front row right behind the Orioles bull-pen. The Orioles shot out into the lead while some enermously heavy Orioles fan screamed encouragement beside us for his team and for the pitchers not playing and watching in the bull-pen. Two kids of about 12 years of age also sat near by shouting abuse at the pitchers below and when they got bored they moved off to another section of the mainly empty stadium. In fact we later seen them on the jumboton screen and then again in an outfield seat catching a foul ball. Not a bad night all in for them cheeky little shits.

As for us in our noisy and atmospheric section with Orioles and Jays fans the Jays began to rally. They brought the game back from 5-0 down to tie it up and then take the lead much to the dismay of that Orioles fan. The Jays fans started to get on him a little bit as the home runs began to fly. Then occurred that moment that never fails to entertain us all at any sporting event: The Streaker.

Yep from right field emerged a guy (unfortunately) who in his drunken state with one of them big foam finger things held over his privates started sprinting his way across the outfield. Players stood back, fans cheered and laughed while security ran after him around the field until he began to tire and was rugby tackled to the ground. I hope the night in jail was worth it for him but if entertainment was his goal then he won the day.

Once he was cleared off the field the next swing of the bat seen the Jays move ahead with a deep home run. The Orioles would later tie it up only for the Jays to move ahead yet again but stay ahead this time and win the game. The Orioles obsessed fan sitting near us went quietly into the night considering how loud he had been before.

So that was the week in review in terms of sporting events attended. With NHL training camps starting up this week, the CFL and MLS still on going, with the Buffalo Bills of the NFL coming for a regular season game in Toronto later in the year and with Baseball still a few weeks from being done there will be plenty of high end sports in town to talk about and maybe attend.

For now though it is off to pick up my bike from the service I left it in for last week.

~ Richard Blayney

Category: My Journal » Baseball, Toronto Blue Jays |

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