Best game attended in person?

[Chibi]

Re: Best game attended in person?

This is the best in terms of craziness, but very disappointing...

Cubs were leading the Brewers 8-6 in Milwaukee in the 9th. Sosa had already hit HRs 64 and 65 (I realize he cheated, but let's all be honest, 1998 was a very fun year to watch baseball because of Sosa and McGwire) and Rod Beck had come in to close the 9th. With 2 outs and the bases loaded he got a routine fly ball to left field (this is in a playoff race, mind you) and Brant Brown flat out misses it. Everyone comes around to score and the Brewers win 9-8.

God it sucked, but is probably the most memorable game I've been to.

Wow, the Brant Brown game at County Stadium. I don't know what I would have done if I'd been there. Brant Brown was crying, my 13-year-old self was crying, and the Cubs' playoff hopes were doomed... at least, that's how it seemed at the time. Before 2003, that was the worst day I'd ever had watching baseball.

[windseer90]

Re: Best game attended in person?

http://www.baseball-almanac.com/box-scores/boxscore.php?boxid=200607080HOU

Roy Oswalt comes in to pitch in the 10th and Pujols leads off with a home run. Very entertaining game.

[Beantown]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Probably Pedro's final complete game as a Red Sox pitcher against the Devil Rays. My sister and I were behind home plate...it was amazing.

[Sedihawk2K5]

Re: Best game attended in person?

1995 ALDS, Game 5. Edgar Martinez strokes a double down the line, Griffey scores from first, and the M's come back from 2-0 to beat the Yanks in 5 in an amazing series. That game had everything - Yanks with a big early lead, Junior hit a bomb in the 8th to get it close, Doug Strange of all people drawing a bases-loaded walk off a gassed David Cone to tie the game, Randy Johnson coming in from the bullpen in extra innings and pitching on fumes. Just amazing. I'll never forget that they kept playing the John Belushi scene from Animal House between innings on the big screen, with the famous "did America quit when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?"

Even better, that game and that series saved the Mariners in Seattle. They had a public vote in September for Safeco Field but the vote narrowly failed. After the playoffs the momentum among the community was overwhelming. The state had an emergency legislative session and passed the bill to create the tax to build Safeco Field.

[Sandman42]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Game 1 of the 2004 ALCS. That was the first time the Yankees and Sox met after Pedro's infamous "the Yankees are my daddy" interview. Constant chants of "Who's your Daddy!" all night. Mussina had a no hitter through 6, but then got shelled in the 7th and the Sox almost pulled out a huge comeback, but Mo shut the door in the 8th and 9th.

[theaub]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Awesome question, because when I had a blog a couple years ago I had a nice post on this, which conveniently is in a Word document for copy/pasting excellence. Although it is much longer than any other post here heh. Actually this is like an essay. I'm shocked how long this is. Extreme tl;dr warning (and if no one responds to this I wouldn't even be surprised)

When I was 4, my parents had Blue Jays seasons. Back then of course, the Jays were huge, and even though they had tickets in the 500 level, they cost $18 a seat (comparative to my season ticket plan which you have probably seen in the other topic where I pay $95 for the whole season). Anyhow, they managed to get to the World Series that year, and I was able to attend one game.

By fate (and I'm not sure if it was good or bad), that happened to be Game 6. AKA this game (new vid added since old one got taken off lol)

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Now, in theory, this should've easily been the crowning moment of my sporting life. I mean, how many people have seen a live walkoff homer to win the World Series? Probably something like 100,000, which makes it one of the rarer things in the world. But up to then, my entire baseball life had consisted of the Jays winning the World Series or being really competitive. I mean I started being aware of baseball in early '91, and the Jays won the division that year, and then the two World Series. So sadly, I didn't really appreciate the moment as I should've.

I've also seen a lot of random feats in Blue Jays history. I was sitting right over the Blue Jays bullpen when Roy Halladay's no hitter in his second major league start was broken up (if the ball was 3 feet higher I'd have it sitting in my house today...instead it bounced off the railing in front of me and was caught by Dave Stieb, which is about the biggest coincidence ever). I saw Jeff Frye hit for the cycle, Roger Clemens get his 3000th strikeout, Carlos Delgado hit 4 homers, but the overriding theme of all those years was the inability for the Jays to make the playoffs. Up until last year, the Jays were never in contention.

And that's why, even though it probably makes no logical sense, say that the July 20, 2006 game between the Blue Jays and Yankees was the best game I've ever seen, trumping the World Series walkoff. Sounds crazy, but here's the boxscore link. Some notes on this game.

1) This was the first year since 2000 where the Jays were really in contention in July. Only five games out of first, it looked like a four game set with New York could propel us into playoff contention.

2) Two days before, Shea Hillenbrand had wrote "the ship is sinking" on a clubhouse board, and was DFA'd the following day.

3) Being a 4 game weekend series against New York, everyone knew a ton of Yankee fans were making the trip.

I went with two friends, and although we had our pass which guaranteed us a seat in the 500 level, we did something that we'll never do again: buy from scalpers. $40 later, I had a horribly overpriced seat in the 100 OF that I complained about for 7 innings. Of course, sitting there ensured that we were surrounded by Yanks fans, which made the game even better.

The game was broadcast on ESPN, one of the only Jays games in the past 15 years that has been shown there. A matchup of the aces (Mussina/Halladay) led to an amazing game. Toronto was down 3-0 going into the 6th before a doubles parade and a timely A-Rod throwing error gave the Blue Jays the lead. But BJ Ryan blew a save, and going into extras, it was 4-4.

Its not often that a dome stadium can make a game better, but it did in this case. It was raining hard outside, so the roof was closed. With about 45,000 fans in there, it must've been 100 degrees. People were taking off shirts like they were on fire it was so hot in there. So a split, sweaty crowd in the outfield continued their heckling of both RF's (both fanbases were going ape on them, but only Bernie Williams responded, when I gave a horribly off-key rendition of "Old Man River") into the 11th.

When Vernon Wells stepped in against Mariano Rivera, there was this buzz. I didn't remember much about the '93 World Series, but there were a couple things that came to mind. The first was the crazed excitement when Carter hit the homer, and my dad lifting me on his shoulders so I could see the celebration. The second was the informal parade inside the stadium once the game ended, and everyone had just stood cheering wildly for well over an hour. But the memory I'll remember the most was just the atmosphere. And the feeling in the crowd when Wells stepped into the box was the closest I've ever been to experiencing '93 again.

If you've clicked on the link, you know what happened. Wells hits an incredibly high fly ball that just keeps carrying and carrying, and eventually lands just beyond the left field fence. Cue madness. Every Jays fan in the section goes into a group hug, which had the same feel (and smell, mind you), of winning a hockey championship in overtime. The Yankee fans are just standing there, not moving, while we're all jumping in and out of this massive bear hug. It gets to the point where I'm just standing at the top of my section, giving high fives to random people walking by. Then we all walk back up the Skywalk (think horrible accoustics), and the "Lets Go Blue Jays" chant feels like its going to make the entire subway explode. By now, I'm starting to wonder what would've happened if I was 16 in 1993.

Post-script (7/20/07): Its been exactly one year since this day, and about eight months since I wrote this. As the days goes on, this game actually keeps on growing on me. The one thing I forgot to mention was the "Victory Snake." During the game, they had this silly promotion for Snakes on a Plane, and through a fluke, I managed to get one of these small snakes. After the Jays won, it became superstition to take the snake to every game, and kiss it for luck. From the 20th of July to the 25th of September, the Jays won every game that the snake was at (12 games to be exact). We've carried the tradition into this year and are once again well over .500 in attending games.

The best feeling about this game though, and something that I really should've mentioned, was the fact that this game made a lot of people feel that baseball was "back" in Toronto, and that the Jays would finally contend. I went to three of the four games in this series, seeing AJ Burnett shut down the Yankees on the Friday night, and Toronto destroying the Yanks on the Sunday. I watched the mild heartbreak of Ted Lilly walking in the winning run on the Saturday afternoon on TV. Unfortunately, after this the Jays collapsed hard, and were never back in playoff contention. As of today, they've still never been closer, which I guess makes this game lose some points. But for the 3 hour slot, not much was better.

Post-postscript (2/22/08): Since this is long enough already, I'll just add two more sentences after this. After reading this blog post again, I'm absolutely sure that this game was better than '93. When I read about the '93 series, I think of myself watching the game video I have on TV, but when I read about this game, I think of the feeling I got at the stadium.
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[Millennium]

Re: Best game attended in person?

One number: 2131

[Chief Illinimac]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Theaub wins. Thread over.

[ComfortablyLomb]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Best 2 innings were the '99 AS Game when Pedro decided to elivate himself. The rest of the game was awfully boring.

Best game was Game 4 of the 2003 ALDS when Trot hit the extra-inning walk-off.

[TheLetterZ]

Re: Best game attended in person?

theaub - I hate you. You ruined my childhood. I hope you're happy.

[DrJones]

Re: Best game attended in person?

Best 2 innings were the '99 AS Game when Pedro decided to elivate himself. The rest of the game was awfully boring.

Yeah, I was at that game too. The All-Century Team ceremonies and Pedro's epic start (plus the fact it was my first game at Fenway) more than made up for the fact that the game itself was a dud.

Biggest tragedy of that game: I was sitting right beside Kris Benson's parents. But where was Anna???

[sbmnky]

Re: Best game attended in person?

I'm a 7 year old kid in the spring of 1988 and much to my father's excitement, I'm finally taking more of an interest in baseball other than eating hot dogs at the ballpark! Up to this point, I'd go to Dodgers games with my Pop only to eat 2 dogs and then want to leave – I was a chubby child with a low attention span!


My Dad is adopted, so his first prayer was answered when he had a son and his second prayer is answered when the only biological relative he's ever met has taking a liking to baseball. We had signed me up for baseball the previous winter, so not only am I enjoying going to Dodger games (we had season tickets), but he's also playing catch and teaching me to be a switch hitter.


So when the Dodgers miraculously beat the hated NY Mets in 7 games to win the NLCS, it was only natural that my Dad would take his only child, his 7 year old son. I was going to school while living at my Mom's (my parent's are separated) at the time the Dodgers recorded the finally out in game 7! I immediately called my Dad with the same excitement I had every Christmas morning! I immediately asked him when game 1 of the World Series was and how excited I was to go. My Mom can only describe what happened next to have broken her heart. She saw my lit up little face go from all smiles to complete disappointment as I said “Okay Dad, I understand,” and reluctantly hung up the phone. My Mom knew that my Dad was taking his soon to be wife to Game 1 instead of his only flesh and blood. Needless to say, I was devastated! To be rejected at a young age sucks, but to be rejected by the one man who you've looked up to your entire life was something I was not ready for – I'm not sure any child is ready or prepared for that rejection.


My Mom called my Dad the very next day to explain to him how lucky he was to have a son who shared the same passion for baseball and wanted to go to the World Series with his father. My Dad's only reply was that he'd never been to a World Series when he was 7 or ever for that matter, and that I'd have plenty of opportunity to attend a Series in the future. So basically my Dad was jealous that I'd have the chance to watch the team I'd only ever love play in the World Series at such a young age! Needless to say, my Mom was pissed! My Dad called me that night and because my birthday was coming up in November, he'd take me as my birthday present. I thought this was complete rubbish as I felt it was my birthright to attend that world series, plus I was going to turn 8 years old. What 8 year old would turn down presents for a baseball game – I wanted both dammit! So the call ended and I was still not going to the World Series. I was bummed!


The next day at work, my Mom told everyone she knew the story about how a father, her ex-husband, would rather take his girlfriend to the World Series over his son. My dad was getting hammered by everyone for being a jerk – which to this day I still maintain, even though we have a great relationship, however we hardly ever talk about the '88 Series. One of my Mom's co-workers knew a fairly prominent writer at the LA Times who she told the story to. He wrote the story on their Intranet and it was read by one of the editors of the Real-Estate section (at least I think it was the Real-Estate section). He obviously felt sorry for the kid and the single Mom in the story. This editor had 2 tickets to Game 1 of the World Series and couldn't go. He was able to get in contact with my Mom and sold her the seats at face value - $40 a ticket!


So I'm going to the World Series with my Mom and not my Dad! In the end I think it worked out great because we all (Dad, Mom, future Step-Mom and me) got to see arguably the best HR in Series history! The most coincidental part was the tickets my Mom bought were very close to my Dad's season tickets and we could see him the entire game. Of course, he still didn't come over to say hi – he was either jealous, upset or embarrassed. Whatever the case, it was the best baseball game I ever attended!

http://www.baseball-reference.com/bo...98810150.shtml

[theaub]

Re: Best game attended in person?

theaub - I hate you. You ruined my childhood. I hope you're happy.

Wait

[jorge380]

Re: Best game attended in person?

best game back in 1979 seeing the birth of the San Diego chicken hatch out of the egg now that priceless.

[homer73]

Re: Best game attended in person?

http://www.baseball-almanac.com/box-scores/boxscore.php?boxid=198907150BAL

Hell of a back and forth game that saw the baby birds of '89 winning it with a 9th inning homer by Mike Devereaux that might have been foul.

I'll always remember too (listening to the next game on the radio (John Miller and Joe Angel rocked))... the Angels manager got ejected before the game as he was turning his lineup card for arguing the previous nights hr call.