I don’t mean to shock anyone, but I’ve always believed in "open relationships." Sure, of course I believe in true love and having a special partnership with that special someone, but I also think experiencing the fullness of life means leaving the door open to other things as well, so long as everyone involved agrees it’s okay. I know a lot of people disagree with me on this. Especially when it comes to baseball.

I have my first love–my deep, abiding, long-term love–and that is the Yankees. If I had to choose between the Yankees and another team, there would be no question who I would choose. I fell in love with the Yankees before I ever even looked at another team. When I was a fan in the seventies, I could name you the whole Yankees starting lineup, but I could probably only name you four or five players in the rest of the league. I’m more mature now, and have expanded my tastes a bit.

Last year, I had a summer fling with the Seattle Mariners. I had picked them during the offseason, when A-rod had jilted them for the Rangers’ money, I found myself really wanting to root for the M’s. The Mariners turned out to be a good choice. After all, their games don’t start until 10pm Eastern, when most of the Yankees games are ending. They’re in a different division, so there was very little direct conflict of interest for me. And then, of course, the M’s went on a tear, as Ichiro proved his star burned just as bright in the American League as in Japan, Bret Boone blossomed, and Mike Cameron continued to make it look like Ken Griffey, Jr. wasn’t missed. It was a historic campaign for the Mariners in 2001, as they went on to win 116 regular season games and tie the major league record.

But they didn’t come close to matching the 125 wins of the 1998 Yankees, thanks to the Yankees. Oh, I had a wonderful time, traveling to Seattle in the summer, getting to root for the M’s and get autographs from Bret Boone and Mike Cameron. It was fun. But when October came, it was clear who my primary partner was. I wanted the Mariners to beat the Indians, but as soon as my two teams faced each other, well … you dance with the one that brung ya. Thanks for the memories, Mariners, and drop by and see me when you’re in Boston. (Hm, I guess it’s me who will have to do the dropping by.)

Speaking of Boston, I suppose if I’m married to the Yankees, the Red Sox are like the annoying housemate you can’t get away from. You know all about their problems and you have to live with them. Sigh. Anyway, you can be sure there will be no love affair between me and the Red Sox.

So who will my fling be with this year? I thought about the San Francisco Giants, because I had a great time at PacBell last year, and I know I will have an eye on Barry Bonds, as will everyone else. But… nah. I like the Giants, but they just don’t get my heart racing. How about the St. Louis Cardinals? Tino Martinez is there now. But I already have a longstanding flirtation with the Cubs, so I can’t really go with another National League Central team. I thought about maybe adopting the Kansas City Royals this season, to see how things go with Chuck Knoblauch there, but I don’t enjoy suffering enough to make it with KC. (See Red Sox, above.)

My favorite non-Yankee player last year was Jason Giambi. I saw him play in person twice, once in Anaheim and once in Oakland, and he hit home runs both times. I thought he should have won the Home Run Derby. And I have really enjoyed watching the upstart A’s romp all over the league. So I kind of thought, hmm, maybe the A’s?

Then, of course, Giambi came to the Yankees, but I find myself still very interested in the A’s. They lost Giambi and Johnny Damon, and their closer, but might they still get better? Mulder-Hudson-Zito, deadly. And you have to love a guy like Barry Zito, a lefty in the Bill "Spaceman" Lee mode. Eric Chavez got the Gold Glove last year–but will he finally get over his postseason jitters this season? Jermaine Dye broke his leg and has yet to return, but when he does you hope he rebounds well…

I listened to the first three A’s games of the year and that settled it. They were against the Texas Rangers (boo hiss, A-rod, Rocker, and Carl Everett all in one place! And glove-thief Ruben Rivera in their minor league system now!). So here you have the three best young pitchers in the league, facing the scariest lineup in the league three nights in a row. And beating them. Oh man, talk about exciting games! The A’s play exciting baseball. Wow, my heart is starting to beat harder just thinking about it. Home runs, awesome pitching, a lot of heart, grit, and fun.

I’m making a business trip to the Bay Area at the end of August. I guess I’ll have to make a date with my boys then. Because by October, you know it’ll be over.

In the ninth inning, when it got dark and started to rain around the time the Yankees brought the tying run to the plate for the first time, I started writing metaphorical ledes for this story. Like “It was sunny all day for the Detroit Tigers… until it wasn’t.”

But, unfortunately, the rest of the ninth inning did not pan out the way I might have wanted. I feel sorry for the people who left early, because they missed the best part of the game, a thrilling ninth, even if the Yankees did fall short.

The day began, as I mentioned, not raining. It was partly sunny and quite windy in the Bronx today. When we took our seats for the first pitch the temperature was 61 degrees, but a stiff wind was blowing straight in from center field.

The wind was evident in the top of the first, when Brett Gardner moved to catch a high fly ball and ended up running almost all the way to the infield to get it. Not home run weather, despite the predictions, which were based on the facts that Max Scherzer was in the top three in home runs allowed this year and the Yankees were the top home-run hitting team. The only kind of homer that would go out with the wind like that would be a low line drive.

Unfortunately, that’s what Miguel Cabrera hit in the top of the first. And unfortunately, there was a man on. Another “Yankee Stadium” homer that just cleared the short porch wall inside the foul pole. I’m not even sure the pitch was a strike.

That was pretty much all the action for a while. Scherzer no-hit the Yankees through five complete innings. After giving up the two-run Cabrera shot in the first, Freddy Garcia largely matched him.

Then in the sixth, the Tigers opened the inning with a bounding ball up the middle that Freddy Garcia slowed down, then Jeter got it and rushed his throw, low in the dirt, which Teixeira was unable to dig out. Thus, Austin Jackson reached, and Magglio Ordonez followed with a hit-and-run single while Jackson went to third. Freddy struck out Delmon Young, but then gave up two singles, and two runs, and left the game on the losing end. Boone Logan came in, and despite a balk, struck out the next two batters to quash any further rally. But two more runsa, unearned, had been scored. 4-0 Yankees.

In the Yankees’ half of the sixth, they had some offense, too… Cano broke up the no hitter with a single. That’s it. The crowd roared like he’d hit a home run. But he didn’t.

Corey Wade pitched two scoreless innings but the Yankees were only able to cut the Tigers’ 4-0 lead by one run. They put the first two men on in the seventh (Swisher walked, Jorge singled), but that ended Scherzer’s day, and Joaquin Benoit came in. All they got off Benoit was a Granderson solo homer in the eighth.

Luis Ayala gave that run back in the ninth to make it 5-1 going into the bottom of the inning. Jose Valverde, the Tigers closer, took the mound in the non-save situation, but somehow it felt as tight as any save.

Well, especially when the first man he faced, Nick Swisher, hit a solo shot to make it 5-2. Next up was Jorge Posada, who tripled.

Yes, Jorge tripled. Remember that big triple that Joe Girardi hit in the World Series back when he was a Yankee? Joe ran faster, though. In his postgame press conference, Girardi was asked for his thoughts about Posada getting a triple there. “Well, it’s certainly unusual,” Girardi said.

This was one of the loudest, most intense ninth innings I’ve been through at the new Stadium. Swisher’s shot really brought people to life, and then Posada’s triple had the place jumping. It really was too bad that thanks to two previous rain showers during the game, neither of which stopped play for more than a few minutes while some extra drying agent was sprinkled on the field, 40% of the fans had left. (And at least 10% never made it there, thanks to the rescheduled game.)

Every pitch that wasn’t a strike was cheered raucously. Martin worked a walk. With the score 5-2, that meant the man coming to the plate represented the tying run. It was Andruw Jones. The inning before, Girardi had pinch hit for Gardner with Eric Chavez. As he said in his postgame comments about the move: “I was hoping he would pop one.” Then Jones went in to play left and keep that spot in the batting order.

I was hoping he would “pop one” here. But he ended up hitting a long fly ball that brought Posada in easily. 5-3 Tigers, with a man on and the tying run coming to the plate again, this time Jeter.

We all well know that Jeter can’t be the hero every time, every day. And he wasn’t. Although he had a fairly long at bat, with much chanting and cheering, he struck out. That brought up Granderson, whose appearance prompted many chants of “MVP!”

Granderson worked the count to 2-2, and then popped up. Except Alex Avila slipped on the wet on deck circle–did I mention it had started to rain AGAIN?–and couldn’t get to it. With renewed life, Granderson worked a walk. Phil Coke was warming up in the Tigers bullpen. And that brought Robinson Cano to the plate. Cano, who broke up the no hitter, and who yesterday had the big blow with the grand slam. On XM Radio this morning the commentators were opining that Cano wouldn’t see another good pitch to hit all month.

A home run would have meant a walk-off win, and pie. But Robbie grounded into a force play and the game was over. To win in the postseason you have to be lucky as well as good. If the Yankees end up losing the series, we’ll think back on this game and how Scherzer shut down one of the toughest lineups in baseball, and how the breaks just didn’t go our way.

I’m writing this post from the Bronx, where I am awaiting the opening of the ALDS in a few hours. End of the regular season, though, means End of Season awards. As a founding member of the Baseball Bloggers Association, I take part in the voting. We’re not as glamourous as the ink-stained wretches in the BBWAA. I suppose as bloggers we’re the eye-strained kvetches.

Here’s what we eye-strained kvetches award:

Connie Mack Award: top manager
Willie Mays Award: top rookie)
Goose Gossage Award: top reliever
Walter Johnson Award: top pitcher
Stan Musial Award: top player

Since Why I Like Baseball is ostensibly a Yankees blog (with a healthy side of Red Sox), I get to vote for the American League entry in each category. Here are my picks:

Connie Mack Award: top manager
If I were voting in the NL, I’d pick Kirk Gibson, but I’m not. But the tendency to want to pick a guy who took a load of underachievers and made them achievers, or a load of achievers and made them overachievers, is high. In that way, I’m tempted to pick Buck Showalter, especially after seeing the Orioles end their season in a dogpile after being the ones to kill Boston’s playoff hopes. Yeah, Showalter takes my #2 vote for getting those kids to prove something. And how about Don Wakamatsu taking over for John Farrell in Toronto? Let’s give him #3.

That leaves Joe Maddon as my #1 vote, for all the teaching and training he does with the Tampa Bay Rays, which certainly makes a huge difference with a young team, and also how much he does to keep it fun. The team dressing up for themed road trips and such? Maddon’s brainchild.

Willie Mays Award: top rookie
I’ve got to give serious consideration to my own team’s rookie sensation, Ivan Nova. The only reason he was “sent down” in mid-season was because the Yankees have a huge financial investment in A.J. Burnett, who clogged up a slot a the rotation. But as I did above, I’ll give my sentimental favorite my #2 vote. There isn’t any one rookie this year I feel is running away with it. Maybe Brett Lawrie would have a shot, but I just looked him up and he hasn’t been up for that long. (Ah, turns out he had an injury or might have been called up sooner.) Well, I’ll give him #3 because of the short service time.

Which leaves my top rookie as…? Let’s go with Jeremy Hellickson, starting pitcher for the Rays. If he were in any other division, his numbers would probably be more eye-popping. Hm, my second Rays pick! Am I starting to like the Rays?

Goose Gossage Award: top reliever
You’re kidding, right? No sentimentality in this. #1 Mariano Rivera. He’s the all time saves leader now, and has had another typical great season. We’re almost jaded to how great he is, and that’s why now he’s practically under-rated. Let’s give #2 to the Yankees’ David Robertson. No, I’m not kidding. There’s a reason this guy has the nickname “Houdini.” Lowest WHIP of his career (1.125), lowest HR/9 (0.1!), highest K/9 of his career (2.86), and a 1.08 ERA in 66+ innings pitched. If you have a look at the Baseball-Reference.com leaderboards for pitchers you’ll see most of the entrants are starters. And then there’s Robertson in the top ten in Win Probability Added, Adj. Pitching Wins, and some other stat-lovers’ stats. See? I don’t just vote with my heart.

Hm, looking at those same leaderboards leads me to my #3 pick, Alfredo Aceves for the Boston Red Sox. Yes, a former Yankee, who has done yeoman work for the Sox this year. And yes, I know only I would put two set-up men on a list of “best relievers.” Truth is, I’m not that impressed with a lot of the closers this year.

Walter Johnson Award: top pitcher
#1. Verlander. No reason to even look at anyone else for that. But when it comes to the #2 and #3 guys to vote for? I’m looking at the Wins Above Replacement (WAR) list. Most of the guys on the top ten are position players, but two pitchers after Verlander stand out CC Sabathia and Jered Weaver. (James Shields and Josh Beckett just miss the cut. And I have never liked Beckett anyway.) So #2 Sabathia, #3 Weaver. Oh wait, just re-read the instructions and I get to name two more. Well, okay then: Shields #4 and Beckett #5. Have a great offseason, Josh.

Stan Musial Award: top player
We don’t mess around with semantic arguments about what part of an “MVP” is “valuable” to his team. We just vote for “best player.” Which actually makes it harder, I think.

Honestly, I think I have to give the #1 spot to Jacoby Ellsbury. He has managed to shine even while the whole rest of the Red Sox teamed seemed mired in the negativity that is the Boston legacy. #2 goes to Jose Bautista, for a breakout season for a team that is otherwise marching in place. #3 Curtis Granderson whose season is an easy comparison with DiMaggio, Mantle, and Bernie Wililams’ top seasons. (One of my writers for the Maple Street Press Yankees Annual is working on a piece on that.)

I get to name a top ten, so here they are:
1. Jacoby Ellsbury
2. Jose Bautista
3. Curtis Granderson
4. Miguel Cabrera
5. Adrian Gonzalez (Boston’s problem was not their offense)
6. Evan Longoria (and not just for that walk-off)
7. Josh Hamilton (look at that nice fat WPA)
8. Alex Gordon (ditto)
9. Dustin Pedroia (I know! Three Red Sox on this list!)
10. Derek Jeter (I needed another Yankee to balance all the Red Sox! And yeah, sentimental favorite. That 3000 hits stuff just.. yeah. You know.)

I actually watched the crazy extra-innings Braves-Rockies game in which Mayne got the win on television from the Jersey Shore one night while on vacation. I wrote about it the following year, when I tried to get Mayne’s autograph one night in Seattle at Safeco Field, when he was playing with the Royals and I was there for a game. I never did get Mayne’s autograph, but I did get a batting practice ball that night, and the autographs of Mike Cameron and Brett Boone, back when they were both stars for the M’s.

So here’s the flashback post from August 16, 2001, in which I recount my trip to the ballpark and Mayne’s pitching performance along the way:

I arrived in the city known for coffee, Microsoft, and rain with tickets to a Mariners game in my pocket and a copy of Baseball Weekly in my bag. What does an East Coaster like me know about the Mariners? I know what every body knows, about the three superstars who left, about the best winning percentage in baseball, about a seventies expansion team that’s never seen the World Series, about a nice new ballpark that hosted the All Star Game, in this, the year the Mariners have put it all together with pitching, speed, and defense.

I work a job back in Boston that keeps me on the clock until 9pm most nights, which means I don’t get to hear much of my beloved Yankees games on the radio. But I do get home just in time to log in to MLB.com and listen to the Mariners’ broadcasts.

I picked a good year to start following the Mariners, what with the splash of Ichiro, the surge of Bret Boone, the return of Jeff Nelson, and the sudden dominance of their no-name rotation. When I realized my summer travel plans were going to take me to Seattle I immediately made plans to hook up with a friend to see a game and investigate Safeco Field for myself.

The first thing I noticed my first day in Seattle was how many Mariners hats I saw on people’s heads. I’ve been to a lot of major league cities, Chicago, New York, Baltimore–and I live in Boston. Only the Yankees in New York in October rival the sheer quantity of hats you’ll see people wearing this summer in Seattle. And not only a lot of standard design M’s hats, lots of funky variations, green bill, blue bill, “Mariners” spelled out in script, reverse color combinations, you name it. I rode the bus into the city from the ‘burbs and noticed people of every different class and ethnic background sporting the teams colors.

Once I got into downtown Seattle, the M’s fever became as obvious as the measles. So many store fronts had Mariners signs in their windows–”You Gotta Love These Guys,” “Go M’s,” were the standards, but also handmade signs exhorting individual players to greatness… and in every type of store I could find: art galleries, musical instrument shops, craft boutiques, drug stores, restaurants, most of which were NOT in the neighborhood of the ballpark.

When I did head toward the park late in the afternoon, I stopped in to the Elliot Bay Bookstore, one of the best literary bookstores in the country. There on the rack facing the entrance was a special display of sports magazines featuring the Mariners on their covers, a few racks over were the expensive hardcover books on baseball, including Roger Angell’s A PITCHER’S STORY, Don Zimmer’s autobiography, and THE BALLPARK BOOK.

From Elliot Bay, the park is walking distance, and I found myself walking with two fans from Oregon who had driven up just for the game. “We live on an island and the last ferry runs at 9pm,” they told me. “So we’ll stay overnight in a hotel and go back tomorrow.” They told me I’d love Safeco Field.

Walking from there, the new stadium doesn’t rise majestically out of the horizon. Instead, you walk under a highway overpass, and onto a side street that runs along the newly erected, not-quite-finished football stadium and convention center, built on the site of the old Kingdome. Along one side of the street are the businesses you see outside all the old ballparks like Fenway and Yankee Stadium, pizzerias, souvenir shops, beer joints. Out on the curb and in the street vendors have set up stalls selling caps, pretzels, t-shirts, bottled water, boxed pizza. As one pizza vendor proclaimed into his bullhorn, yes, you can bring food into the stadium! At first I thought, oh, how nice, but then I remembered, hey, you’ve ALWAYS been able to bring food into Yankee Stadium! When I was a kid we used to bring in buckets of fried chicken, sandwiches, pastry…

What you can’t bring into Safeco field is any liquid. Oddly, it’s not bottles themselves that are banned, they just make you empty your water bottle at the door. By contrast, Edison Field in Anaheim lets you bring in plastic water bottles so long as they are under a certain reasonable size. At Yankee Stadium, although it says no bottles of any kind, ushers have always okayed my bottle of Poland Spring. It was a bit surreal to see people pouring the contents of their spring water bottles into garbage cans at the entrance before proceeding into the stadium.

Two other stalls worth mentioning outside the park. One sold t-shirts and bumper stickers with the slogan TWO OUT … SO WHAT?! and a variation shirt that reads “Alex out, Junior out, Randy out… SO WHAT?!” There are some folks in the stands in left field who hang out a large black banner with the slogan in glowing green whenever there are two outs. I didn’t actually notice the crowd paying attention to it–there’s no rhythmic chant to go along with it, for example–but these kinds of things only pop up in towns where people are seriously crazed for their ballclub. The other stall I’d never seen before outside a ballpark was one selling roof tiles and reroofing services. I guess in a place where it rained 90 straight days last winter, that’s important.

Of course, the best and newest roof in Seattle is the rolling roof over Safeco Field, which I was interested to see at work, but was happier to have nice weather. It was a 96 degree heat wave when I left Boston, and in Seattle I found it sunny, pleasant, warm in the day, and comfortably cool in the evening. Still, it was a nice feeling of security to know that if rain were to appear, the game would go on no matter what. I’m sure the couple from Oregon would agree with that.

I reached the end of the street and there was the back side of the ballpark. Several thousand people appeared to be milling around it–then I realized they were all IN LINE to get in. It was 4:30 and the gates didn’t open until 5pm. Through various wrought iron openings we could see clear through the centerfield concessions concourse and into the outfield where Mariners were shagging BP flies. Two Japanese men ran up to the doorway, pointed and said something very excitedly to each other in Japanese, one word of which I made out: Ichiro.

From that vantage point, Ichiro was pretty much a speck. How could you even be sure that was him over there? One appeared to talk the other out of trying to take a photograph from there. They wandered away, undoubtedly to try to find the entrance closest to the right field seats that Mariners fans have dubbed Area 51. (Ichiro’s number and, of course, where this particular alien has landed.)

I ended up in line with some young M-Heads, their faces painted blue and green and one of them sporting the actual giant foam M on his head. They seemed surprised that I, and then several other people as we stood in line, wanted to take their picture. How unlike New York where one would be disappointed if no one took a picture or if you didn’t at least once get picked up by the scoreboard camera. (Skipping ahead just a bit, I did notice that M’s fans are amateurs when it comes to the scoreboard camera between innings. In New York, people start waving and trying to get on the screen before the pitcher even gets to the dugout. In Seattle, the camera sometimes had to search for several seconds before finding someone who was aware they were on screen… Then again, watch the news in New York some night. At any murder scene, car crash, train wreck, or what have you where there’s a news reporter live on scene, what do you see in the background? Bunch of people jumping up and down and mouthing “Hi Mom.” So maybe it’s something about New Yorkers…)

Five pm came and the lines crept forward toward filling up the park. When I finally made it inside it was close to 5:30 and I was surprised to find the Mariners still on the field. Two hours before first pitch many home teams, like the Red Sox, are just clearing out as the fans arrive in their seats. (For the record, Yankees BP goes on until 5:40.) I explored the centerfield concourse area: sushi bar, barbecue pit, a bar where you can sit and face over the bullpen … how about three Nintendo set ups? Very cool, but I, like most other people there just then, were more interested by real life than the virtual game. Not far from the Nintendo machines, people stood behind a chain link fence to watch pitcher John Halama do some throwing. The bullpen is constructed on the same level as the concourse, and so you stand literally a few feet from the pitching rubber. The fence seems inconsequential except for the fact that if it were not there, you’d never stand that close to a pitcher on the mound. Even the bullpen coach watching the session is further from Halama than the spectators are.

Even more impressive was walking the sixty or so feet to the other end and standing next to the bullpen catcher. Halama was bringing some heat, if the loudness of the pop in the catcher’s mitt was any indication. Some of the pops were so loud, I would have wanted earplugs if I’d been catching.

From the centerfield concourse I went up the stairs into the main sections of the stadium, and investigated the concessions there. I quickly identified the theme of names of the various stands–any baseball pun relating to food that could be made, was. High Cheese Pizza, The Sweet Spot (bulk candy), Frozen Rope Ice Cream, Good Hops Beer, and how about the fresh stir fry place called Intentional Wok? That’s your cue to groan, but it’s hard to complain about the variety of food available. And how about those garlic french fries! Mmm!

I noticed the Mariners were still batting, but that I hadn’t seen a program vendor since outside the park. Weird. I’m used to places where they sell one thing outside the park, and something different inside, but I didn’t find them selling anything inside and began to wonder if I should have picked up that thing with Bret Boone on the cover while I was out on the street.

I KNEW I should have picked it up when I went down alongside the Mariners dugout a few minutes later. A tv crew was getting set up to do some onfield interviews and I figured I’d see who they got. Ichiro was out there in right field and every time he got a ball, people would scream for him to throw it to them. The coach hitting fungoes didn’t appreciate the intense hunger for souvenirs and made him throw them back in most of the time. Still, a lot of balls did get tossed into Area 51. Meanwhile, down near the dugout, I was standing next to a pretty blond woman, her boyfriend, and a kid who was one of their younger siblings, I believe. She kept waving to Boone, who was taking grounders at second base.

Suddenly he came trotting over. “Sorry! I didn’t see you, didn’t recognize you!” he said to the woman. “I don’t have my contacts in!” He proceeded to autograph everything the kid was carrying and his shirt, while exchanging pleasantries with the woman. Then he went on to sign at least fifty more autographs, including one for me. Unfortunately, all I had was my ticket! He graciously swooped his double B’s across the stub and then I yielded to other people trying to reach him. After he stopped signing, said goodbye to his friends, and headed for the dugout, Freddie Garcia came out and signed for quite a while, too. I don’t know why, I wanted Boone’s autograph but didn’t feel like fighting for Freddie’s. Maybe it’s because he beat the Yankees in the postseason last year? I didn’t even think of that until later though–at the time I was only thinking of the Mariners. One autograph from a star was enough for me, maybe, and I decided to check out my upper deck seat.

My favorite place to sit in many parks is upper deck, behind home plate (above the press box, usually) because of the complete and panoramic view of the action it gives me. I can watch a runner tagging up on the bases while watching the outfielder going back for the fly ball. I also like the view of the pitches it often gives. I made my way up several long flights of stairs (stairs! there ain’t no stinkin’ stairs in Yankee Stadium except in the seats themselves!) to my level. There an usher looked at my ticket and seemed as psyched about Bret Boone’s autograph as I was. “That is so cool!” he enthused and then pointed the way to my seat.

Stanley Jordan, the amazing jazz guitarist, played the national anthem by playing two guitars simultaneously–a very appropriate rendition here in the city that was home to Jimi Hendrix.

Now, the night before, the mighty Mariners had been humbled by the lowly Kansas City Royals. Today, the Royals learned they had lost their last remaining star, Jermaine Dye, to the same Oakland A’s who had taken Johnny Damon in the offseason. It didn’t seem too likely that they were going to be able to beat the Mariners.

But baseball is a funny game, and even the worst team can beat the best team on a given day. As I found out as they game went on and the Mariners were held scoreless until the ninth inning, when they scratched out a run on a double, single, and sac fly. Now, the Mariners bullpen stacks up favorably against just about any in baseball, but the Royals’ starter, a fella named Paul Byrd, pitched the complete game, holding the M’s to six hits in the game and walking only one. The result was a very pleasant evening in Safeco Field for me, but some measure of frustration. These weren’t the Mariners I had been hoping to see!

Instead, I spent most of my time watching the crowd. A few more observations about Mariners fans. In many stadia around the country, people start to leave en masse after the seventh inning. Not M-Heads. Maybe it was that they were still hoping for a miracle in the late innings? In any case, people did not really start to quit the ballpark until the ninth inning itself.

I saw some very clever home-made signs. KA-BOONE! and OLERULES! were among the slogans I saw, but my favorite was one in the distinctive maroon stripes of a certain overnight delivery company that read “AIR BOONE EXPRESS.”

And just to prove that the world really does revolve around ME, the scoreboard department made the oldies trivia song of the day “Cecilia” by Simon and Garfunkel.

Somewhere around the sixth inning I asked myself, what the heck does Safeco do, anyway? Looking around at the other ads sprinkled throughout the ballpark there were a number of head-scratchers. Cloverdale Meats? Try to imagine Perdue Chicken having a billboard in Yankee Stadium. Les Schwab Tires? Oberto Beef Jerky??

For the record, some M’s fans do know about the two strike clap, but they wait until the late innings to use it. Some of them out to give lessons to the Orioles fans at Camden.

Probably the final surreal moment of the night was, as my friend and I were walking from the ballpark to the big parking garage adjacent to it, there was a group of people there yelling “Free Money!” It was a group of Microsoft employees, giving away copies of the checkbook management software called “Money.” You know, in other parks they give things away free as you come IN to the ballpark, things like t-shirts, towels, cups, pins… Definitely something you’d only see in Seattle.

Well, maybe it was the delicious garlic fries, or maybe it was my still-not-quenched desire to see some exciting Mariners baseball that brought me back to the ballpark the next night to see if any seats were to be had. They had announced that only “single seats” were available, but hey, that’s all I needed. I arrived around 5pm again and went up to the window. For a mere $36 I was seated in the SECOND ROW just past the Royals dugout, close enough to third base to hear David Bell sneeze. Wow–I’ve never sat that close to the field even in spring training.

The Mariners hadn’t lost three in a row the whole season, and I was hoping I wouldn’t be on hand to see them finally do it. I’d really think I was a jinx then. But they were sending rookie Joel Piniero to the mound, and he’d been battered a bit in his previous two starts. Confidence–or maybe it was naivete–was high among fans though. When your team has a completely ridiculous winning percentage, that’s what happens. And even if you lose, so what? The nearest division rival is what, thirty games back? Among the fans gathered behind the dugout, I was the only one mildly concerned.

In fact, the only thing these fans weren’t cocky about was their team’s ability to make it to the World Series. One woman wouldn’t even say the words “World Series.” Yet another difference between M’s fans and Yankees fans, who repeat the words “World Series” like a mantra.

I was once again in the right place at the right time. This time I had bought the magazine (The Grand Salami) outside the park and was prepared with my Sharpie to get autographs. This time it was Mike Cameron who took time to make the fans happy! Now, if I had really planned ahead, i would have gotten Boone to sign the magazine which has him on the cover, and would have had Cammy sign on the ticket stub. But there’s no planning for random good luck. Cammy graciously signed the magazine and then I found myself trapped by the crush of fans. I served as a conduit for several people behind me, including a woman who played softball and wanted a softball signed. Cammy signed everything within arms reach for a good ten minutes. Then BP was over, and the team came in, and he joined them in the clubhouse.

The Royals then had their BP and I caught sight of the guy they had gotten in trade recently, Brent Mayne. He was taking grounders at first, even though he’s a catcher most of the time. I yelled to him, but didn’t expect him to turn around while he was busy. If there was one non-Mariner player whose autograph I would have liked it was Mayne’s. Why? Well, last year, when he was with the Rockies, he was a part of the weirdest game I’ve ever seen.

I was on vacation in New Jersey, and turned on the tv to find the Braves and Rockies game was on TBS. The game went into extra innings so long that the Rockies were down to their last pitcher, John “Way Back” Wasdin (who they had picked up from the Red Sox), facing Andres Galaragga. Wasdin hit Galaragga with a pitch, then while Andres was trotting to first, exhorted the Big Cat somehow with commentary from the mound. He said something that made Galaragga suddenly snap, veer toward the mound, and deck Wasdin. Benches cleared and when all was done, Wasdin had been ejected.

Let me say for the record that although I like a lot of the individual Braves players (Galaragga, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz) I really don’t like most of them (Chipper Jones, then John Rocker, etc…) and don’t like the Braves in general. I really wanted to see the Rockies beat them. But the Rockies were out of pitchers. Mayne was on the bench and they ended up bringing him in to pitch.

At this point the Braves were now out of pinch hitters, and had to use Tom Glavine as a pinch hitter. So here’s Glavine, a starting pitcher, pinch hitting against Brent Mayne, a catcher. it doesn’t get much wackier than that. No wait, yes it does. Mayne pitched a one-two-three inning, and when he got back to the dugout, his teammates made a big thing out of it, wrapping his arm in a towel, getting him a drink, etc. Then in the bottom of the inning, they got him the win! Thus Brent Mayne became the first position player to be credited with a pitching win in a million years. Okay, not a million, but I’m too lazy to look up the actual stat. A long time. The point is, that’s why I really like Brent Mayne, and why I would have really like to meet him.

With this in mind, I went over to the Royals side of the field, where I discovered just how close to everything my seat was. I had my glove on in case any foul balls should come my way, and lo and behold, one did. It kicked off the wall and rolled onto the grass. A stadium employee went and picked it up and I yelled and waved my glove–and he tossed it right at me. Without the glove, I think the kid next to me would have grabbed it. But I got the ball in my glove, and hung on.

The ball was a bit muddy and had bits of wet grass stuck to it. I turned it over and found it was marked with a red circle and the letter KCR. For Kansas City Royals, I presume. Wow, do major league teams need to bring their own balls to each park they visit?

I didn’t get a chance to get Mayne to sign the ball, though. The Royals were doing a good job of ignoring the crowd, who were also mostly ignoring them. They hustled into their clubhouse at the end of their BP, and that was that.

People began filling in their seats and I wondered who I would be next to. A few rows over from me I spotted one guy in a NY Yankees hat, blue turtleneck and home white pinstripes. I went over and chatted with him for a few minutes, but then went back to my seat. Next to me were two Japanese tourists, who spoke just enough English that they could ask me questions,and I could come up with answers that they seemed to understand. They were a couple, I think, a man and a woman, young and nattily dressed.

The first question they asked me was after the fourth inning. Rookie Piniero had allowed only one hit up to that point (to Brent Mayne! yeah Brent!) with four strikeouts and one line drive comebacker that he snared out of the air himself to end the inning–after which he shook his glove hand in pain! “This one of the best pitcher?” the woman asked me. “No,” I said, “rookie.” “Ah, rookie?” her partner asked. They knew the word rookie perfectly well, they were just finding it as hard to believe as everyone else what a gem Piniero was pitching.

The Mariners began to score in the bottom of the fourth, scratching out a run on back to back doubles by Boone and Olerud, but that was all they could get. They got another one in the fifth, spreading out the excitement and making Piniero bear down to hold the lead. Which he did, leaving the game after six still having only yielded that one hit to Brent Mayne.

The next question the tourists asked me was “What does SODO MOJO mean?” This was after the Mariners got their third run on hits by Cameron, Bell, and Stan Javier. First I had to explain that SO- DO- is short for “South of the Dome” since that neighborhood where Safeco is now is south of where the Kingdome used to stand. There’s no dome anymore, but they still call the area SODO. And Mojo? That’s another word for magic. So, SODO MOJO is Seattle Mariner’s Magic. Phew–they seemed to understand my explanation.

“Take Me Out to the Ballgame” I did not have to explain–they both sang along perfectly, so I can only assume that they sing it in the seventh inning in Japan, too.

Nelson pitched a perfect inning. Arthur Rhodes pitched a perfect inning. There was much cheering and excitement for every Ichiro at bat, and I don’t mean just from my neighbors. Ichiro, unfortunately, never made it to third base so my neighbors could take lots of pictures of him–though he did steal second in the eighth. But if you want to hear Safeco Field get loud, have a listen to the place when Kazuhiro Sasaki comes in for the ninth.

Kaz did not have a one-two-three–I’ll be darned but Brent Mayne got the second and only other Royals hit of the night off him–but he did the job. And so the Mariners streak of not losing three in a row continued, and I finally got to see what the buzz was all about.

My next ballpark sojourn would be to the Oakland Coliseum, to see the A’s take on the Yankees for two games. Coming soon!

BRJ is SABR’s main research publication, and has become one of the premiere places to publish ground-breaking research into both baseball history and statistical analysis. (SABR = Society for American Baseball Research).

SABR was founded in 1971, and it’s probably not a coincidence that the society’s formation came about just as many other changes were coming to the game. So this special themed issue will have some (not all) of its articles focused on baseball from 1971 to the present. Consider the following upheavals & changes we’ve seen in our lifetimes:

• SABR was born just after the mound’s height was reduced, and just before the game’s economics were changed forever by free agency.
• SABR was still young when the first players’ strike occurred (1972) and when the first designated hitter took his swings in 1973.
• We witnessed Babe Ruth’s home run record fall to Hank Aaron, and then Aaron’s record fall in turn.
• The role of the relief pitcher has changed; in 1974, Mike Marshall was the first relief pitcher to win the Cy Young Award, yet we didn’t see a spate of relievers in the Hall of Fame until just recently.
• Advances in technology have changed the way players train, and sabermetrics itself has changed the way teams acquire players, how they value them, and how they train them for major league performance.
• Speaking of performance, advances in performance-enhancing substances have not just changed baseball, they’ve necessitated a change in the way the game is governed.
• Baseball has had several expansions in the SABR era, as well as at least one crazy flirtation with contraction, abandoned when the Twins were presented with this era’s version of the marry-me-forever diamond ring: a new baseball stadium.
• SABR arrived around the same time as Astroturf, and it appears we will (happily) outlive it by a wide margin. New stadium construction has been a huge part of the past four decades, along with advances in field preparation, drainage techniques, etc.
• Even the minor leagues are changing, with more franchises coming to urban areas with fancy training facilities, and fewer in rural communities with “rustic” fields. Is this changing the players and the game, or having no effect?

SABR has always presented a synergy of quantitative analysis and historical context in our research, helping us (and the world) to understand the game as it both was and is. Looking at our recent past should be no different than looking at the far past, except that we need to be even more exceptional at setting aside our preconceptions to examine the facts than we usually are.

When you’ve lived through an era, it’s different from peering through the mists of time, where lost information may obscure the story. Instead, we may have too much information at our fingertips and our own memories may cloud the picture. However, if there is one quality I have prized in SABR researchers at the many conventions and research presentations at chapter meetings I’ve attended, it’s a passion for ‘getting it right.’

So what I’m looking for in this journal is articles which tackle these and related themes as research and analysis subjects. What I’m not looking for is a bunch of opinion pieces about how baseball “used to be better when comic books were a dime” and the like.

The BRJ does not pay for articles, but some college professors whose research has appeared there have told me that it “counted” as a scholarly publication for them. The contributors to the Journal are mainly SABR members, looking to share their research with other members and drive baseball knowledge forward. One does not have to be previously published to be considered.

SABR is the vanguard writing the history of our own era for future researchers to read. So I’m psyched to see what lines of research will not only populate the pages of this anniversary issue of the Baseball Research Journal, but future general issues and convention presentations.

Please send all pitches, ideas, suggestions, drafts, and questions to my SABR email address: ctan@sabr.org. Abstracts, queries, and proposals will be accepted until the end of April. All assignments should be made no later than May 1, and first drafts of papers are due no later than June 1 unless by special assignment.

One tip: When querying with an article idea, please include not only an overview of what the article would be about, but why you are interested in the topic or why you’re uniquely qualified to research the topic. Include what sources and resources you’d be hoping to use and approximately how long you guess the article might be.

I’m not just saying that. I’m a SABR member after all, and part of what we do is analyze history based on the statistical record. Well, looking at that record, the chance for warm on March 31st in New York City was pretty slim. The normal low on March 31st is 39 degrees, the normal high 51. 51 would have been GREAT. However note that the record low for March 31st is 22 degrees. If you love graphs, check this one out that shows the steady march upward of averages from March 1st through 31st:

(Courtesy of NYCWeather.us)

Now check out April and you’ll see the average temperatures much more firmly in the humane 50s and 60s, with even the lowest temps a bit more survivable.

The upshot of all this is that my overwhelming memory of the Opening Day 2011 season is that it was COLD. Verlander of Detroit’s Tigers pitched a three-hit gem, and yet the Yankees got three runs in the process thanks to one of them being a three-run homer by Mark Teixeira, who finally seems to have the formula to beat a “slow start” like he traditionally has. Sabathia wasn’t his best, but he kept them in the game, and Granderson added a homer against his old team as well (hit off Phil Coke, who was traded for him, haha). The final three innings were a preview of a pattern that would emerge over the following week–”Jo-So-Mo”–referring to Joba in the seventh, Soriano in the eighth, and Mariano in the ninth.

Not a lot was new at the Stadium this year that we noticed. The white championship flags that flew all last year had reverted to the usual divisional team flags (rearranged daily to show the standings). I hear there is new stuff in the museum but I wasn’t going to fight my way in there on opening day when I’ll surely have a more leisurely chance later in the season. There is a new design for collectible hot chocolate & coffee cups. That’s the kind of thing I was noticing, because it was so cold the vendors were resorting to walking around selling hot chocolate. One of my companions brought a beer back to the seats and we were too cold to drink it.

Another cold note, it was the first opening day I’ve been to without Freddy the Fan. We miss you Freddy.

I ended up spending the entire sixth inning in the women’s room, where it was like a sauna, thank goodness. Another of our group spent a whole inning in the men’s room, which he said was like a party going on there were so many people huddled in there.

The actual game-time temperature, if you must know, was 40 degrees. However, it was also drizzling with a steady wind. Acuweather’s “feels like” indicator said “Feels like 23 degrees.”

It was colder than that Opening Day where Chuck Knoblauch played left field for the first time and got a standing ovation for catching a ball. Heck, it was so cold that day that when the SUN came out, even that got a standing o. (Maybe we just felt warmer standing up…) It was also colder than the opening day where Hideki Matsui hit a grand slam, his first game at Yankee Stadium, a game which had been delayed by a day because of snow. Yes, I was there, too.

I seriously think it’s time to go back to a 154 game schedule, so that there is room for actual baseball during actual baseball weather as well as the three-tiered playoff system. The April games are the worst attended of the entire season (right, Bud?) so the revenue lost wouldn’t be that significant, and guess what? That might even make a bit of time for the World Baseball Classic to be played without making everyone scream, as well. Please Mr. Commissioner, give it a thought, or start building a dome in the Bronx.

This coalition of baseball writers and enthusiasts includes everything from individual fan sites for teams to group blogs of analysis and specialized topics. I joined the group when it was first forming and have had a terrific time networking with this group of people who love the game of baseball in all its forms.

I started Why I Like Baseball in 1999, using old style hand-written HTML, just to express my thoughts and feelings about the game which I had followed avidly as a kid growing up near New York City, but had lost touch with in my early adulthood. The McGwire-Sosa home run race brought me back with a vengeance. I was a professional writer, so one way I expressed my love of the game was through writing. Next thing I knew, people were actually coming and reading the site on a regular basis. Advertisers began to offer me money. I happily took it and expanded what I wrote about to include not only the Red Sox and Yankees, but minor league ball, women’s baseball (which I then started playing), baseball history, baseball tourism (ballpark visits, gravesites, museums, etc…)

They say on the Internet you will always discover you’re not the only one. You’re never alone. The term “blog” was coined in late 1999 but didn’t enter common parlance until a few years later, but the concept of maintaining a readable online journal or zine existed long before that. What really came about around the turn of the millennium was the technology to make blogging easier and more ubiquitous. And so here we are, ten years after that, with a vibrant and growing network (over 200 strong!) for people like me.

So I encourage you to check out the central website: BaseballBloggersAlliance.com/ where many posts from BBA members all over the web are cross-linked. The BBA does our own version of annual baseball awards, and even a “what if we voted for the Hall of Fame”? every year. Many of the blogs are also involved in charitable efforts.

What irked me about this story was not the outcome, or even its existence — people including ballplayers making bad choices is nothing new. That the article points out that he is “former Yankee Jim Leyritz” is also nothing new. Heck, that’s what makes it a news story worthy of the Times in the first place.

But what rubbed me wrong is the final two paragraphs of the story:

Leyritz’s famous homer tied Game 4 of the World Series against Atlanta, a game the Yankees won in extra innings. The victory paved the way for their 1996 title, their first in 18 years.

Primarily a catcher, Leyritz also played for the Angels, the Rangers, the Red Sox, the Padres and the Dodgers. He had a career batting average of .264 and hit 90 regular-season home runs.

Is it just me, or does that all seem really… reductive and inappropriate? I think I could have lived with just the final sentence, but the “famous homer” one just feels absolutely muck-rakey to me when juxtaposed with the content of the story.

I know it’s there for those with short memories who read the article and said “Jim who?” but I just cringed when I read it. There’s an edge of sensationalism there (“World Series Hero Driving While Drunk!”) that is just unseemly for the New York Times… or for anywhere, really.

The good news is that my seats are staying the same price, as they have for the past 5 years, going all the way back to the Old Stadium.

The bad news is that in 2010, with the economy still limping along, I didn’t come close to breaking even on the cost of my seats. I even ended up eating the cost of two postseason tickets I couldn’t dump except to a scalper outside the McDonald’s for less than half of face value.

I have been seriously considering either dropping my plan, or dropping from all 81 games to a partial season plan.

I’m sure I’m not alone, which is why the letter to me from the Yankees does things like praise my “unwavering loyalty.” Hoo-boy. Yes, they know better than any other sports franchise on earth that love = money.

At least they aren’t hypocrites, though. Here’s why: The Yankees gave both Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera larger contracts than the front office would have preferred the *last* time they re-upped because they knew they had to demonstrate that they loved those guys as much as the fans do.

Of course, Mariano is coming around again, and the much bigger test of “heart” this offseason will be what will the Yankees do with Derek Jeter? If they come through and pay him handsomely, I won’t have any qualms about plunking down the eight grand they want for my four seats in the upper deck. But if they nickel and dime him or come off looking cheap? Maybe it’s time for me to do the same, and tighten the budget around here…

It’s amazing to think Freddy outlasted Eddie Layton, Bob Sheppard, and George Steinbrenner himself, but still heart-wrenching to realize he’s gone. Freddy was a fixture at the Stadium (and even sometimes in Tampa during spring training), making his way through the entire stands in the course of a game to let as many kids (and the kids at heart) bang on his lucky frying pan with a spoon.

I banged on the pan just last week, before the ALDS clincher at the Stadium, and now I’m so glad I did. I never would have guessed that would be my last chance to do it.

I also wouldn’t have guessed it would be the last time the Yankees looked dominating this postseason. Coming into tonight’s game they are 1-1, but they could have easily been down 0-2.

Every pundit on Earth except for Bill Ripken picked Cliff Lee to win this game. Ripken said on XM Radio prior to the game that you an’t count the Yankees out. Lee can be dominating but a lot of things can happen in the course of a game, and the Yankees have too much firepower to be dismissed.

But it turned out all the other pundits were right, and Lee smothered that firepower effectively all night.

He needed a little luck to do it. Early in the game he was getting in bad counts. Jeter, Cano, and A-Rod all hit rockets off him, all of which were caught. And other than one hung slider/bad cutter to Josh Hamilton that landed in the short porch for two runs, Pettitte matched Lee pitch for pitch.

When you starter goes seven, gives up only two runs on five hits, with five strikeouts and no walks, usually you win the game. But not this time.

That the wheels came off for the Yankees bullpen in the top of the ninth was, for most people, the capper on a disappointing night. Six runs off three different relievers, despite the fact most of the hits weren’t hard, but were grounders through the drawn-in infield? And then Mitre threw the ball away to let in another? Ugh, just ugh.

But for me there would be one more capper on the night, which was that the elevator I was riding in from my upper deck seats down to the ground floor got stuck. There were about 40 of us in there, and although everyone was pretty good-natured, it was only humorous for the first minute or so. I had even called out to the group while the elevator was still moving, “And we’ll get ‘em tomorrow, right?” which was answered with a chorus of “Yeah!” and “That’s what I’m talking about!” only to be seconds later replaced by concerned murmuring as it became clear the doors were not opening.

“What else can go wrong?” one guys said. Another one: “Argh. I never realized before how much I hate this song.” Frank Sinatra’s New York, New York was of course playing on endless repeat through the elevator’s PA system. Someone must have heard that (or it was the elevator operator herself, who was very quietly radioing for help) because at the end of the song, it actually STOPPED.

Now if only the Yankees would listen to us and give us what we want tomorrow. SOME RUNS.