Idiots Write About Sports

I went to a baseball game in Anaheim last week. Or perhaps it was in Los Angeles. Iim not really sure which. It was somewhere up in that conglomeration of smog and traffic that lies north of Camp Pendleton, and the team wore red, which Iim pretty certain makes them the Angels. Or, as two-thirds of the players and staff actually refer to the team in their internal dialogues, ilos Angeles.i

But never mind. The point of this post is not to become the seven-millionth person to criticize Arte Morenois goofy new nomenclature. If the guy wants to refer to his team by a name that inherently pisses off every resident of Orange County n many of whom spend up to six hours a day angrily informing tourists that, iOrange County isnit Los Angelesi n then more power to him. It takes a bold new owner to irritate people right out of the gate, completely skipping over the three days it usually takes for fans to find something to bitch about.

It had been a while since I’d been to Angel Stadium. The last time I took in a game there, Brian Downing was on the cover of the program. Iim told that some changes have been made to the place in the intervening years. Frankly, I wouldnit know the difference, since twenty-odd years ago I was a lot more interested in running up and down the ramps and pestering my parents for a sundae in a batting helmet than in actually paying attention to my surroundings.

As far as I can tell, the fruits of the $118 million dollar renovation are: an unobstructed view of the tangle of terminally clogged freeway arteries behind center field, and a pile of fake rocks that spew milky fluid and flaming balls of gunpowder whenever the home team sends one out. Thereis also a bunch of iinteractivei batting cages and other stuff for the younger crowd to do during the game. These were presumably put in because the club couldnit figure out a way to charge an extra ten bucks for kids to run up and down the ramps for three hours.

But Iim not writing this to denigrate the ballpark, either; not when thereis something at Angel Stadium thatis ever so much more horrible than the perpetual money shot out in center field…

So anyway, my sainted mother wanted a Rally Monkey. Sheis been an Angels supporter through thick and thin for thirty years, but sheis recently been feeling like somewhat of a second-class fan because she does not have a plush simian of her own to shake feebly at the television. As it happens, a recent business trip brought me to a hotel room a couple of miles from the stadium, so I decided to be a good son and buy my mom a monkey.

After purchasing my ticket beneath a huge and slightly embarrassing wrought-iron cap, I picked up my obligatory beer and dog, and ascended to my rightful place in the nosebleeds. Iid arrived fairly late, but it was still the bottom of the first, thanks to a four-run shellacking the Angels had doled out to opposing pitcher Kenny Rogers. Evidently the Texas coaching staff had not adequately prepared Rogers for all the cameras that would be in the stands, and he was having difficulty maintaining his focus through the fiery red miasma of anti-camera loathing roiling in his brain.

The Rangersi half of the inning passed uneventfully, after which I sat back to take in the local flavor of between-inning scoreboard entertainment. iWhat will it be?i I wondered. iWacky bloopers? The batting helmet shell game? Pick the Horribly Overplayed eStadium Favoritei That Will Be Blared Over the P.A. Next Inning?i

iHey, that looks kinda likeOei

iOea crummy commercial?! Son of a bitch!i

And it was.

Thatis right, apparently not content to cover every square centimeter of the outfield wall with advertising, the Angels have seen fit to cover the Jumbotron*, too. And while I do appreciate being made aware of the incredible convenience and friendly spirit that are in abundance at my local Wells Fargo branch, I canit help but feel that when I shell out twelve bucks for a seat in the mesosphere, I shouldnit have to deal with TV ads that I can get at home for free. Ads that, in fact, I specifically came to the stadium to get the hell away from.

Iill admit to not being a terribly well-traveled fan, so itis possible that this sort of thing is par for the course at a lot of stadiums these days. Certainly the Angelsi faithful around me didnit seem fazed in the slightest by the crass commercialism. But Iid never had to deal with between-innings commercials before and, frankly, it kind of soured the whole experience for me.

The game turned out to be a rout, so after a couple more innings I headed to the team store. I couldnit even offer up a perfunctory smile to the clerk as he handed me the monkey and exhorted me not to spank it. As I walked into the twilight of the parking lot, I thought I could hear Gene Autry, whirring gently in his grave. Or perhaps it was Charles Schulz.

* I feel I would be remiss if I didnit point out that Microsoft Word summarily rejects my spelling of the word iJumbotron.i Instead, it helpfully suggests either iUmbertoi or iJumbo Ron.i Exactly how iJumbo Roni made its way into Wordis database of common English phrases is a mystery, but I bet itis a hell of a story.