My Baseball Scorecard

[DickZ]

My Baseball Scorecard
Part 1

One day in May, 2005, I was riding the Metro to Robert F. Kennedy Stadium here in Washington, DC to see our new hometown baseball team, the Washington Nationals. We were playing the New York Mets and it was my first chance to see the Nationals in the flesh instead of on television. I was carrying my clipboard which holds my baseball scorecard, and I had my Eversharp Skyline green moire fountain pen with an extra-fine nib. I collect fountain pens, and use them all. Having an extra-fine nib like that allows me to get all kinds of information into each tiny box of the scorecard. Since the pen is green, of course the ink inside it is also green, although I sneak in a little blue to make it not quite so glaring a green. Mrs. Blandings would be proud of that, I think.

I looked around and noticed that there weren’t any females in my car on the Metro. No, everybody in my car was a scrungy looking guy dressed up for baseball the way we go to games now. If you’ve ever looked at one of those books that describes the golden age of baseball, you might have noticed that men used to wear neckties to games back then in those golden days. Now instead most guys wear torn jeans, tee shirts, and baseball caps cleverly turned backwards so you know they are cool. [Author’s note: this was written in 2005, at which time the ultimate mark of coolness was wearing your baseball cap backwards. Coolness has since evolved dramatically, and the new ultimate mark is wearing your ballcap with the visor pointed ahead, but at a very slight angle to one side or the other.]

There was still some construction going on in the vicinity of RFK Stadium, outside the stadium, although they had already finished work on the inside. On the way walking from the Metro station to the stadium, one of the guys with his baseball cap cleverly turned backwards was checking his messages on his cellphone, as lots of people these days seem to have to do while they are walking around the streets. I haven’t been able to get close enough to any of those message screens yet to see just what it is that is so critical that they have to be checked constantly. Apparently, if you take your eyes off the screen for as much as three seconds, you risk losing some essential information that will make a world of difference. Anyway, this guy fell down an open manhole which he would have easily seen were it not for those great messages. I hope that his cellphone had one of those lighted screens so he could read his vital messages down in the depths of the manhole because I looked down there and it didn’t seem very well lit up to me.

I got into the stadium and treated myself to a $4.50 kosher hot dog. My rabbi said I had to eat three if I wanted the team to win - I think he just owns stock in Hebrew National. I had already filled in the names of the teams and the date on my scorecard, and was getting ready to enter the starting lineups. Holding my kosher hot dog, all covered with Gulden’s mustard and not the bright yellow kind that Jewish mothers cringe about with disgust, as well as relish and onions, along with my Skyline pen, while holding the clipboard with the scorecard in my lap at the same time, was pretty tricky. However, my cat Eleanor has given me practice in multi-tasking so I can do several things simultaneously without letting her run off with a particularly important piece. Learning to fill a pen without letting her run off with one of the loose pieces that lies around during a pen filling operation (bottle cap, pen cap, kleenex to wipe the nib) has significantly improved my manual dexterity.

Now mind you I’m not saying Eleanor was there at RFK Stadium, because she likes the comfortable and familiar surroundings of my apartment and doesn’t care that much for baseball anywhere, even when I watch it on TV. I’m just saying that she has taught me to do lots of things at the same time much more proficiently than I could before she came along.

I was seated in RFK Stadium behind home plate in the second deck. At this point, I was filling in the starting lineups as they were posted on the scoreboard. This was my lucky Eversharp Skyline green moire with greenish ink - the one that helped the Red Sox win the American League Championship Series over the Yankees in 2004, and then took them on to vanquish the Cardinals in the World Series.

To understand what this means, I obviously have to give you a little background information. Normally, I keep score with three different pens and colors of ink, using a different color for each band of three innings. For example, I might use dark blue for the first through third innings, greenish for the fourth through sixth innings, and my brown/red mixture for the seventh through ninth innings. If the game goes extra innings, I have some backup colors. Then if my beloved Red Sox lose the game, at least I have a colorful piece of artwork as a memento.

Well, using this scheme worked great in the American League Division Series against the Anaheim Angels in 2004, whom the Red Sox swept in three games. But then when Boston lost the first three games of the ALCS to the villainous Yankees, and was on the verge of elimination, I knew I had to do something to change our luck. That was when I switched to using ONLY my green Skyline with greenish ink representing the luck of the Jewish, and even lots of people who don’t follow baseball know that the Red Sox won every game after I switched the color scheme on my scorecard, not stopping until the world championship was in their hands. I’m still waiting in vain for some thanks from the team management.

Anyway, back to the game this season at RFK. I filled out the visiting team’s lineup with no problem whatsoever. I had already taken three bites of my kosher hot dog with all its mustard, onions, and relish without my usual klutzy dripping onto whatever was beneath it, which in this case was my scorecard. The little bottle of white-out in my shirt pocket was just sitting in the pocket very peacefully. The sky was clear - not a cloud in the sky.

My greenish ink is NOT waterproof, which isn’t really a major concern when I’m in my recliner watching the game on television, but can be when you're at the stadium.

I finished getting all the starting lineups down on my scorecard before the first pitch. I spelled all the names correctly, including the Mets’ first baseman, whose name was Doug Mientkiewicz, which is pronounced ‘mint-KAY-vitch.’ Now you know why I use my Skyline with its extra-fine nib. I was able to stay inside the lines of my scorecard, which is more than you could say about my coloring books back in the first grade. But that’s another story.

[ampoule]

This is great. Luck of the Jewish? You tripped me up there because I naturally had Iri.......what? Jewish? I didn't know THAT! :) And oh, I am waiting for the 'mustard to drop'. :D And by the way, I would love some of that brown/red mixture. You have many things going on in your story and now I want to know about all of them. I love Eleanor. Hope she doesn't mind. ;)

[pbmn]

Nice. And yeah, green ink to represent the luck of the Jewish? Way to catch the reader. And if you are waiting for the Boston Red Sox to give you some honor for helping them win, the Cubs would have a better chance to win a World Series, and trust me, that will be a long time.

[DickZ]

My Baseball Scorecard
Part 2

The game proceeded into the third inning with no score, and I had already finished my first hot dog even before the first inning had started. I was proud of the fact that my scorecard survived that hot dog without a scratch, and without even a drop of Gulden’s golden brown mustard or relish. The first three innings were neatly recorded without the need for white-out even once. The bottle just stayed in my shirt pocket, but I checked occasionally to make sure it hadn’t fallen out. Usually I make some sort of mistake, like crediting a guy with a base hit before the official scorer rules it an error after waiting a few minutes that I didn’t want to wait. Then I have to pull out my little bottle of white-out and make the change from a hit to an error. But so far, my scorecard was white-out free, mustard free, and relish free.

I noticed that there were two senators in the row in front of me (an advantage of living near the nation’s capital – or a maybe a disadvantage), each with a few members of his staff. The two senators were sitting right next to each other; this amazed me because according to all the news reports these two senators despised each other. So as not to violate our well-conceived rules and to avoid invoking political passions, I won’t say who these senators were. But they each had a big mug of Budweiser and were laughing at something that must have been some kind of hilarious, because they were almost falling out of their seats. There certainly wasn’t anything happening on the field that would trigger such laughter so I don’t know what the joke was. And it was just the first beer for each, as I had a special place on my scorecard where I was keeping track of the number of beers they had, as well as the number of kosher hot dogs I had. Remember that my rabbi said if I really wanted the hometeam to win, I should have at least three Hebrew National hot dogs. Four would even be better.

To pace myself, I decided that I better get another hot dog for the fourth inning - otherwise I would wind up having to stuff my second and third hot dogs down in a hurry in the late innings when the game’s outcome might be hanging in the balance. I asked the lady sitting next to me to please keep an eye on my Levenger clipboard (it’s the black leather model with the magnetic arm that holds the papers in place), which I left in my seat so it wouldn’t impede my ceremony of adding all the condiments to my hot dog.

I then began the painful ordeal of crossing in front of the six seated spectators who were between me and the aisle. One of these seated spectators looked like she might have been that Metro rider who tried to turn me in to the police for bumping her in the crowded subway car a few weeks before, so I was very careful when I passed in front of her not to make any contact. I breathed a sigh of relief when I successfully made it to the aisle without jostling anybody, and headed off toward the hot dog stand.

When I got out into the concession area, what should I find on the ground but a New Jersey quarter with the New Jersey side upward? I understand from one of our local yentas that this quarter has become the ultimate in good luck omens. So I picked it up and stuck it in my pocket, and started wondering in what form my good luck would eventually hit.

As I approached the Hebrew National Hot Dog Stand, I noticed the booth next door to it. It was the Subway Sandwich Shop, home of The Famous Foot-Long Lite Subway Sandwich. They had a sign up telling about the product that was soon to be released - The Famous Foot-and-a-Half Long Low Carb Subway Sandwich. They didn’t have any of these yet, and besides, I still needed to wolf down two more hot dogs to make sure the Washington team won, so I went on to the Hebrew National stand instead.

As I was nearing my row in the stadium carrying my second hot dog dripping with all the works, I saw that the guy who had been seated three places to my left was also returning from a chow run. As he was maneuvering towards his seat, he apparently touched the lady who had screamed for the Metro police the last time I had encountered her on the subway. The reason I suspect that he touched her was that she rammed a huge hat pin into his behind. I didn’t think women carried those things anymore. I certainly haven’t seen a woman wearing a hat that came with a hat pin, anyway, for an awful long time.

Now I sometimes proceed through the seated spectators by facing them so I can better see what I have to avoid. But having witnessed the demise of the unfortunate guy who had just run the gauntlet ahead of me, I decided I better keep my backside to the lady with the hat pin. I was very careful and made it back to my seat without incurring her wrath. I don’t think she even remembered me from the Metro. I was beginning to get the picture that she was a perpetual vigilante, and she probably did this kind of stuff as a matter of routine whenever she went out in public.

As I sunk back into my seat, I noticed that Carlos Beltran of the Mets was already on first base. The nice lady who had guarded my clipboard and scorecard told me that he had been hit by a pitch, so I recorded this event on my scorecard. The next batter, Mike Piazza, grounded into a double play - shortstop to second to first - so Beltran was taken off the bases. I showed this on my scorecard as 6-4 in Beltran’s box near second base, and 4-3 in the center of Piazza’s box, completing the double play. I draw an arc connecting the two putouts and write DP next to the arc. Some people use other ways to denote a double play, but I like my way the best. It looks pretty good in my greenish ink, as long as I make the arc smooth and don’t accidentally put any unnecessary squiggles into it.

Then when Mike Cameron of the Mets popped out to our first baseman, Nick Johnson, the inning was over quickly. I could then proceed with eating my hot dog without having to simultaneously make notations on my scorecard. I could also ignore the split infinitive that I just used, because avoiding split infinitives almost always leads to very unwieldy and clumsy wording.

This was my preferred mode, keeping score - and eating - in separate blocks of time. At this point, though, the two senators in the row in front of me ordered their second round of beers, so I recorded that in their section of my scorecard with my Skyline while I was juggling my hot dog with caution. If I waited too long, I would risk forgetting to write down their second round.

[Virgil]

Oh Dick, I can't wait for baseball season to start myself, even though my favorite team, the Balitmore Orioles, is practically a minor league team these days. Nice piece of writing. It makes one recall some of our baseball memories. I don't recall ever seeing kosher hot dogs at a ball park, though. But I wasn't necessarily looking. I was at RFK stadium once during the 2006 season. I think here were playing the Braves. I loved Frank Robinson, both as a ball player and a manager. You can tell I'm an old time Orioles fan. I think the Nationals need a new stadium though. It didn't seem to me that RFK was really a baseball oriented stadium. On another note, my favorite thing to eat at the ballpark is a bag of peanuts. I just love cracking them open and popping the nuts into my mouth watching the game progress. And I love making a mess below my feet with the shells. :D Fun times. Thanks for the writing piece.

[DickZ]

My Baseball Scorecard
Part 3

The game raged on scorelessly for five more innings while the senators proceeded to their third round of beers, and then to their fourth. I was still waiting in vain for my New Jersey quarter’s good luck benefits to kick in, but so far the hometeam had failed to take the lead. I still remembered that my rabbi had said the magic number of hot dogs was THREE, and so far I had only eaten TWO.

Again I asked the nice lady to please guard my clipboard and not let the senators, who were starting to get a little rowdy, mess with it. I then began another dreaded and uncomfortable but necessary journey through the seated spectators, including Hatpin Hattie herself. It was now the ninth inning and time was running short, although the game was still a scoreless tie. I hoped I hadn’t delayed my final hot dog so long that they were now no longer fresh, or worse yet, that they were completely gone.

I was in luck and they still had a few hot dogs left. And they weren’t even all shriveled up like they usually get when they’ve been sitting around for a few hours. The onions were gone, but that’s not as much a disaster as a shortage of mustard or relish, which they still had plenty of.

Now in the olden days, I would have used some contortions on that previous sentence so as not to end in a preposition, but after recently reading something Winston Churchill wrote to one of his assistants, I don’t worry about that any more. This assistant had gone to great lengths to twist his words around so the sentence didn’t end in a preposition, causing Mr. Churchill to write him a note saying “That is the kind of nonsense up with which I will not put.” If it’s OK with Winston, it’s OK with me.

I was actually able to complete my purchase, put a double dose of mustard and relish to make up for the missing onions onto my hot dog, and get back to my seat before the leadoff hitter finished his turn at the plate. Of course it helped that the batter, Kaz Matsui of the Mets, had worked the count to 3-2 and fouled off seven pitches.

As I was passing by her, Hatpin Hattie had some choice words about when was I going to stop eating all those hot dogs and when was I going to quit pestering her by continually shuffling past her seat. She yelled out that just one more hot dog and I would get the hat pin treatment, even if I didn’t jostle her. She also tossed in some snide remark about how glad she was that she wasn’t going to be anywhere near me in a couple of hours, but I just ignored her and kept on moving.

I noticed before sitting down that the nice lady sitting next to me had turned my Levenger clipboard upside down, putting the leather back facing upwards and my scorecard facing downwards. I thanked her for taking the protective action, and asked if anything in particular had happened. She said that the senators had been sloshing their beer and she didn’t want to risk letting the beer make my scorecard run, because she knew that Waterman ink isn’t waterproof.

I was more than a little surprised that she knew so much about ink. Wow, she could even identify Waterman ink when it was a mixture of mainly green with a touch of Florida blue, so I asked her if she was a fountain pen collector. While she doesn’t collect fountain pens, it turns out that she served time in a prison near London several years ago. Someone running the show at that prison was called “The Iron Lady” and this was a few years BEFORE that same name was given to Margaret Thatcher. Apparently, The Original Iron Lady was an avid fountain pen afficionado who was really into writing materials, photography, dogs, and prisoner discipline.

I didn't ask the nice lady what she did that led to her prison sentence. But I sure was curious about it.

[DickZ]

My Baseball Scorecard
Part 4

When the Mets’ left fielder, Cliff Floyd, came up to the plate in the top of the ninth inning, the Nationals put on a Ted Williams-like shift, moving the second baseman into shallow right field, bringing their shortstop to the right field side of second base, and shifting their third baseman to the shortstop position.

Floyd popped up to the area where the shortstop normally plays, but the third baseman made the catch due to the shift. While I had noticed the Mets put the shift on, out of force of habit I erroneously recorded the putout as P6 since the popup SEEMED to go to short. I immediately realized that it should be shown as P5 because the shifted third baseman was the one who actually made the putout.

I wondered for a moment if I should use my white-out and change this. So far I hadn't had to use white-out even once and I hated to put this blemish on my scorecard now in the ninth inning. "Who would ever know?" I asked myself. But I had to admit that *I* would know. So I put my hot dog in my lap and pulled the little bottle of white-out from my shirt pocket.

I unscrewed the cap and took it out of the bottle. Just as I was applying the tiny little brush to the mistaken 6, Mike Piazza swung at a fastball and hit a vicious line drive foul ball that looked like it had my name on it. Well, it actually turned out to have the name of one of the two senators on it before mine, because it hit the hand that was holding his glass of beer. Budweiser went spraying everywhere before the ball struck my open bottle of white-out, and then bounced into my lap somewhat forcefully. My hot dog, with its double dose of mustard and relish to make up for the missing onions, also took a shot from the careening ball just before it came to rest.

At first, I was elated to have this foul ball in my possession, without having to go through any of the normal heroics that fans have to go through to catch foul balls in the stands. Quite literally, I was just sitting there when it fell into my lap.

But then I looked down at my previously-unblemished scorecard and saw it dripping with beer, mustard, relish, and white-out. You could hardly see any of the plays I had painstakingly recorded as the game had evolved over the last few hours. The few places that weren’t covered with mustard, relish, or white-out were dripping from the beer and because the ink wasn’t waterproof, those places were quickly becoming illegible. What a bummer - as the young folks say today.

Mike Piazza wound up hitting the next pitch for a homerun to put the Mets on top, but I didn’t even bother to record that play, nor did I write down either of the last two Mets to be retired. I didn’t do anything but watch when the Nationals came to bat in the bottom of the ninth when their first two batters bounced out to infielders. The third hitter, Vinnie Castilla, lashed a wicked line drive to left center but was held to first base by a quick-moving Cliff Floyd. I didn’t record that because Castilla’s box was full of mustard.

Everybody in the stadium, except for me who was so dejected about my scorecard, was screaming for Jose Guillen, our rightfielder, to hit one out of the park and win the game with a walkoff homer. But after four pitches, with the count 2-2, he just popped out weakly to shallow center and the game was over. The Mets had won and the miracle comeback didn’t happen. Maybe some other day.

I turned to the nice lady who had once served time in a prison near London, the one who was even able to identify Waterman ink just by seeing it on paper because of what The Original Iron Lady had taught her inmates.

Now most of the time, I prefer going out with women who have not yet seen the inside of their own prison cells. Well, okay, there was that one time when I was younger, when I thought about hanging around outside a prison to try to meet a woman who had just been released after serving a 20-year sentence, but I swear it never got any farther than a fantasy and I never actually did it.

However, it’s been a while since I’ve had an interesting or unusual date. In fact, at the moment, it’s been a while since I’ve had a date of ANY kind whatsoever, so I decided I would ask her out.

I took my New Jersey quarter out of my pocket, the one that was supposed to bring me some good luck, but hadn’t done a thing yet. Maybe it would start bringing me luck now.

I flipped the coin to see which pickup line I should use. It was going to be heads for “Do you come to baseball games often?” and tails for “Do you have one of those cellphones that takes pictures?”

But when I flipped the quarter, it hit the top of a seat back and rolled away into some spectators leaving the stadium.

[pbmn]

Man, I can definitely relate to going to baseball games as my dad gets tickets from his work all the time. I can't wait til we get some more and go to a Cub's home game and sit right behind the Cub's dugout.

So far, I really like this story, and my favorite line is so far:


I flipped the coin to see which pickup line I should use. It was going to be heads for “Do you come to baseball games often?” and tails for “Do you have one of those cellphones that takes pictures?”

But when I flipped the quarter, it hit the top of a seat back and rolled away into some spectators leaving the stadium.

I cracked a huge smile when I read that one, and if I were you, definitely would never say the latter of the options. You don't want to creep her out, do you?:D

[DickZ]

My Baseball Scorecard
Part 5

The botched coin toss had left me without my newly-found New Jersey lucky quarter, which sure didn’t seem to work too well for winning the game. Of course, neither did my rabbi’s prediction that if I ate three Hebrew National hot dogs, my team would win. He would probably say that since I didn’t finish the third hot dog before it was pummeled by the foul ball, I can’t blame him for bad advice. It wasn’t his fault, he would say, but rather it was mine for not eating that last hot dog entirely before Mike Piazza ruined it.

Well, anyway, I see that I’m getting sidetracked on this luck thing, while the reason for tossing the New Jersey quarter in the first place was to see what line I should use to try to get the nice lady in the seat next to mine to go out with me. After seeing the coin bounce off into the crowd, I decided that rather than using some dumb pickup line that I learned from watching that wonderful television show Desperate Housewives, maybe it would work if I just came out and asked her nicely.

So I asked the nice lady if she could tell me more about The Original Iron Lady that she had mentioned earlier. She tore off a clean corner of my scorecard, took my Skyline out of my shirt pocket and wrote something down, saying in her proper British accent “Sure, here’s my name and phone number. Call me sometime when you haven’t been bolting frankfurters all afternoon. Besides, you have mustard, relish, white-out, and beer all over yourself and your Levenger clipboard, and you probably want to clean up this Skyline before it corrodes from all that junk. If you promise to take me to a nice restaurant, I’ll see what I can remember. I think I might even have some pictures of The Original Iron Lady.”

When she slipped the Skyline back into my shirt pocket, my knees sort of buckled, but just a little bit. I doubt that she even noticed - women probably don’t even pay attention to stuff like that anyway.

I told her my name, and assured her that we could go to someplace other than Wendy’s or Burger King, which is usually where I go on dates until I’m sure it’s worth a more substantial investment. I used to take first dates to some really classy places like Ruby Tuesday or Denny’s or even IHOP, but I learned over time that it doesn’t really pay to be so extravagant until you know a little more about a brand new acquaintance.

She lives in Old Town Alexandria, which is just a few minutes from where I am in Arlington, Virginia. We walked back to the Metro station for our rides to our respective homes. We were going to be on the same train, with my station coming several stops before hers.

On the way to the station, I noticed that the EMTs were finally carrying off the unconscious guy (in more ways than one) who had been more interested in his cell phone messages than in where he was walking earlier when I was just arriving for the game.

I guess nobody who saw him was really concerned enough about his fall into the open manhole to do anything, so his absence wasn’t discovered until he didn’t answer his phone messages for the two-and-a half-hour period that the game took up. Anyway, while they were carrying his body away, they played his messages hoping to get some clues as to what happened, so I was able to hear the message that was left when he was down at the bottom of the manhole not bothering to answer his phone calls.

The message said “Frank I’m in the meat section at Safeway and I’ll be going to the bakery section next and after that the pharmacy section so give me a call back and I’ll tell what I’ve bought so far besides the cheesecake and the rye bread I mentioned in my earlier discussion with you when you were on your way to the ballpark and I sure hope you’re OK since you didn’t even answer my last call like what could you be doing that’s more important than my call and I don’t know where I can find anyone else other than you who is brain-dead enough to sit there and listen to my mindless drivel from the grocery store so I sure hope you’re all right or else maybe you know someone else dumb enough to listen to me if you’re not all right enough to listen to me yourself . . .”

Twenty-four of my fellow spectators also walking to the Metro station told the rescue team carrying him away that they would be glad to take phone calls from the wonderful lady who had left the message because they couldn’t come up with anything better to do than to listen to her insane babbling.

THE END

But the saga will continue in another story to follow soon.