Baseball at gym
I am in the gym this morning. It is 7:20, and the Extreme Spotrs channel is on TV. The guy on the elliptical next to me has the remote, and I ask him if he is watching this. He isn't, and passes me the remote.
I flip on ESPN, hoping to catch the last few minutes of the All Star game, and am treated to the National League batting in the top of the twelth, with the bases loaded and two outs.
The guy next to me tells me he doesn't like baseball, but doesn't mind if I keep it on. I am relieved; the thought of another twenty minutes on the machine watching crap when I could be watching baseball is abhorent. Maybe not abhorent. Maybe just a deep level of suck.
The feed comes back to begin the bottom of the twelth, and opens with a shot of Yankee Stadium from the blimp. I know why the guy next to me isn't interested. He doesn't know that he is looking at the very mound where Don Larsen pitched a perfect game from in the 1956 World Series, that this is where the Babe changed the game of baseball by hitting homerun after homerun, and the site of the first great home run chase back in 1961.
The Tiger's lone representative leads off the bottom of the twelth with a drive off the wall in left, and goes in for a stand up double. Grady Sizemore grounds out to second, moving Guillen to third with only one out. I want to see Guillen score; I like watching Tigers in my highlights, but on this night it is not to be.
The game continues on to the 13th, and as I am staring dead ahead on the screen, a woman who is now on our set of machines asks if I am watching. Yes, I tell her, and continue to watch the game. I have the remote, which means I am in charge of what happens on TV for as long as I am on the machine.
My friend Mike walks into the gym. After watching the opening ceremony, he went back to sleep, and had no idea that the game was still on. He takes the machine next to me and we watch together through the bottom of the thirteenth. My thirty minutes are up, and I need to get to the office, so I leave the remote in ihs capable hands. Mike's enthusiasm for the game has diminished all hope the woman had of changing the channel, and she leaves the machine shortly after I do.
I shower and return to my office, and catch the end of the game on MLB.com radio. I had hoped they would show the game for free, as they occasionally do in the last inning of a no hitter, but they do not. I am listening as the AL wins on a sacrifice fly off Brad Lidge.
At the same time as this is going on, Israel is in the middle of a prisoner swap. Two of ours, possibly alive but probably long dead, in exchange for five really bad guys. The trade reminds me of some old Tiger trades, where we gave up prospects in exchange for nothing, but I understand the need for closure with Goldwasser and Rechev, and hope that Gilad Shalit will be coming home soon.
I choose not to try to find a video feed online. It is partly the hebrew, but more because it is a game I don't understand. Like the guy standing next to me at gym, this is a game which has been played long before I got here, and will continue to be played for a long time, and one where I don't have the sense of history that most Israelis get after serving in the IDF.
I flip on ESPN, hoping to catch the last few minutes of the All Star game, and am treated to the National League batting in the top of the twelth, with the bases loaded and two outs.
The guy next to me tells me he doesn't like baseball, but doesn't mind if I keep it on. I am relieved; the thought of another twenty minutes on the machine watching crap when I could be watching baseball is abhorent. Maybe not abhorent. Maybe just a deep level of suck.
The feed comes back to begin the bottom of the twelth, and opens with a shot of Yankee Stadium from the blimp. I know why the guy next to me isn't interested. He doesn't know that he is looking at the very mound where Don Larsen pitched a perfect game from in the 1956 World Series, that this is where the Babe changed the game of baseball by hitting homerun after homerun, and the site of the first great home run chase back in 1961.
The Tiger's lone representative leads off the bottom of the twelth with a drive off the wall in left, and goes in for a stand up double. Grady Sizemore grounds out to second, moving Guillen to third with only one out. I want to see Guillen score; I like watching Tigers in my highlights, but on this night it is not to be.
The game continues on to the 13th, and as I am staring dead ahead on the screen, a woman who is now on our set of machines asks if I am watching. Yes, I tell her, and continue to watch the game. I have the remote, which means I am in charge of what happens on TV for as long as I am on the machine.
My friend Mike walks into the gym. After watching the opening ceremony, he went back to sleep, and had no idea that the game was still on. He takes the machine next to me and we watch together through the bottom of the thirteenth. My thirty minutes are up, and I need to get to the office, so I leave the remote in ihs capable hands. Mike's enthusiasm for the game has diminished all hope the woman had of changing the channel, and she leaves the machine shortly after I do.
I shower and return to my office, and catch the end of the game on MLB.com radio. I had hoped they would show the game for free, as they occasionally do in the last inning of a no hitter, but they do not. I am listening as the AL wins on a sacrifice fly off Brad Lidge.
At the same time as this is going on, Israel is in the middle of a prisoner swap. Two of ours, possibly alive but probably long dead, in exchange for five really bad guys. The trade reminds me of some old Tiger trades, where we gave up prospects in exchange for nothing, but I understand the need for closure with Goldwasser and Rechev, and hope that Gilad Shalit will be coming home soon.
I choose not to try to find a video feed online. It is partly the hebrew, but more because it is a game I don't understand. Like the guy standing next to me at gym, this is a game which has been played long before I got here, and will continue to be played for a long time, and one where I don't have the sense of history that most Israelis get after serving in the IDF.
posted by Air Time at 2:29 AM
2 Comments:
So many things wrong with this post, not the least of which would be air zacks on an elliptical machine at 7;20 am, but I will just correct one part. Larson;s perfect game was in the 1956 WS.
Fixed. That's what happens when I write off of memory instead of looking things up.
And I'm sure there's nothing wrong with you surfing the web at 2:15 in the morning...
I leave the house at 5:45 most mornings so I can go to Minyan and hit the gym before work.
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