When I saw the O's rotation for after the All-Star break, I groaned. I realized that I have tickets to the game with Cabrera and Ortiz starting. And last night...oh, I don't even want to think about it. Cabrera's potential is through the roof, but he's pitching horribly. He started the last game I went to, and it wasn't pretty, either. What good is throwing 100 MPH if you can't control it?
Even so, I was surprised when I turned on the tv to watch the game and saw that Cabrera had been sent down to AAA. Happily, this means the return of my Reserve Boyfriend Adam Loewen, who's been tearing it up down there. I've been pleased with how quickly the O's have been reacting to the crappiness of certain players; I'm hoping this bodes well for the period before the trade deadline.
At least there was a positive from last night; Paul was visiting the East Coast and happened to also be at the O's game. (Poor guy--he deserved to see a better one.) We had a pleasant time chatting for couple of innings; it was even when the game was still in control. Anyway, as expected, he was very nice and funny.
So at least there was a decent reason for me to miss Big Brother and my evil, funny boyfriend Dr. Will.
ETA: Oh, bliss! Apparently Ortiz is being bumped back a day in the rotation, so hopefully I'll get to see Adam pitch Monday night.
Posted by Barb at July 14, 2006 07:17 PM | TrackBackIt appears that you will indeed get to see Loewen pitch tonight. Good times - let me know what he looks like (piching wise, i'm not moving in on your reserve oriole boyfriend here). So, I must admit (unlike most of our other friend, probably) that I'm glad your posting more recently about baseball and the O's. As you can probably tell from my seventy-six page email the other day, I'm missing regular objective baseball conversation... I really should call you more... or at all, I suppose. My bad.
Anyhow, "baseball" up here is really weird... people are not baseball fans, they're Red Sox fans. Blindly. And mostly ignorantly. Maybe this comes from "rooting" for a team that hasn't had a winning season in a decade, but I like baseball first and the Birds second... I also like other teams: the A's (largely b/c it was my first little league team, and more recently b/c i've read Moneyball three times); the Braves (yeah yeah, I know, but my parents were too cheap to get the O's on cable when I was a kid, so I watched the Braves 100+ games per season on TBS during my formative years); the Nats (I'm totally excited about the coup that Jim Bowden just pulled with the reds; i'm hoping he doesn't screw up the Soriano deal in some effort to balance our the karmic world); and teams like the Tigers are an awesome story this year. Plus, I generally root against teams like the Red Sox (mostly because David Ortiz, Curt Schilling and Manny Ramirez make me throw up in my mouth a little bit every time I watch a game), the Yankees (for really no good reason other than I'm supposed to hate them having grown up in Baltimore, and they have A-Rod, who also makes me throw up in my mouth a little bit), and he White Sox (mostly because Ozzie Guillen has officially replaced Dion Sanders at the top of my if-i-met-this-guy-in-a-dark-alley-i-would-beat-him-within-an-inch-of-his-life list). Anyhow, my point is that people up here don't follow baseball. They follow the Red Sox, generally have some sort of vague idea as to what is going on with the Yankees, and it would be some sort of sacrilege to even consider rooting for or following any other team (even in addition to the Sox, not instead). I find this frustrating... that they are largely uneducated fans. Anyhow, I find myself starving for some sort of educated baseball conversation. The other day in the supermarket, there was a guy with a Phillies hat on, and I ended up having a 15-minute conversation about the NL East with him.
So yeah... that's my story. The moral: keep writing about baseball - I appreciate it. :o)
Take care!!!
Posted by: Dave at July 17, 2006 08:58 AM