OAD Road Report

In our never ending quest to bring our readers the freshest A's commentary out there, your intrepid bloggers here at Oakland A's Days have headed in opposite directions (one north, one south) to watch the A's play road games in Seattle and Anaheim. Especially given the amazing win in the last game of the Angels series, this road trip was a big, inspiring success. Our eyewitness reports from the front follow:

Seattle

Half of OAD went to the games last Saturday and Sunday against the Mariners at the completely awesome Safeco Field. First off, let us say that Safeco is way better than AT&T/PacBell/Telephone Park. The concourses are wider; the food, including the fabled Ichi-Roll, is tastier (except for the chili dog -- avoid); the sight lines are better; and the people, from the ushers (who they call Guest Seating Coordinators or something ridiculous) to the Mariners fans, are unbelievably friendly and nice. The Saturday game, however, wasn't much to write home about. The A's offense looked confused and the A's defense looked confused-er (we are looking at you Jack Cust). But Sunday was a whole different story. After Saturday's game, we went to the ticket window to see about getting tickets for Sunday. The ticket guy was the nicest human being we have ever met and we got seats directly behind home plate and about 14 rows up. Why seats like this are NEVER available at the A's despite the constant whining about low attendance we cannot understand. Anyway, we agree with Ray Fosse that Sunday could be the game that epitomizes the A's surprising and inspiring 2008 season. Watching the A's rally against stupid fist pumping Felix while the lovely retractable roof unfurled was magical. We love watching these A's because they get hits at times when the old A's never would. Emil and Barton and Sweeney look fearless. It is great. And we love using double pinch runners and having fast guys on the base paths. And we love a reliable bullpen. And the return of Frank was spectacular. One of the best things about the Seattle fans was that rather than heckling Frank, they were all shouting that he should have been playing for the home team. When the meanest thing the opposing fans say about your team is that one of your players should be playing for their team, you start to feel like you are in some kind of twilight zone. And we were. As we walked out bedecked in A's flair, we expected some trouble from the Mariners fans given that we had all just watched the A's come from behind to beat their ace. Instead, a fratty looking guy patted us on the shoulder and said -- and we are not kidding, this is a direct quote -- "Good game guys. Go take the AL West from the Angels." We are serious. That actually happened. The Mariners fans had that downtrodden, self-effacing, expect the worse mentality that we used to find charming about Red Sox fans back in the good old curse days. We love that the A's won 2 out of 3. We love that Joe B got a win. And we have to admit that we love Safeco Field. Should the A's continue with this moving to Fremont idea, we might just consider relocating to the Pacific Northwest. The only black spot on another-wise excellent roadtrip was that gross Mariner Moose. The Moose looks even creepier and more child molesty in person. He is just bad.

Anaheim

The other half of OAD when to Monday night's game at the Big A in Anaheim. The place feels like a casino where you are constantly bombarded with flashing lights and background noise to the point of sensory overload. There are huge, HD screens all over the stadium. They flash constantly with advertisements and commands (MAKE…SOME…NOISE!) and the lights are bright enough and the flashing is frenetic enough that you want to lose your mind. It's also very noisy in there, not just between innings like at most parks these days, but even during the game. Have you ever noticed that little bird chirping noise on Angels telecasts? Well, it's very loud when you're there in person. And don't even get us started on the beach balls! Needless to say, all of this distracts from the game on the field. Although we have to give Angels fans credit for coming out every night in such large numbers, we really can't say that they seem interested in baseball. As far as the friendliness of the people, we would rate them as decidedly not friendly. They were not hostile, though...they actually kind of seemed neutral and maybe even numb. It's as if they've been so overstimulated by the monotony of Orange County and all the flashing lights and music in the stadium, that they've been zapped of their humanity. Not to mention that everyone was wearing the same exact outfit – a brand new shiny white Angels jersey and a Crayola red cap. They just all looked the same. We were sitting by one energetic older woman who had a lot of personality and who seemed to be having a really good baseball-related time. She had a huge sign that said "Gettin' Figgy With It" and she would dance around every time Chone Figgins was up to bat. That kind of behavior might otherwise be annoying, but this particular woman had a lot of charm. She was certainly an outlier amongst the rest of the Angels fans. Overall, we would have to say that the experience at the stadium is nice, but in a creepy, sterile, homogenous way that actually makes you really uncomfortable. As for the game, it was AWESOME! That was the game where Big Frank was a home run short of the cycle and every A was great on offense. And of course, Chad Gaudin pitched really well and you just got the feeling that these A's are doing something special. So people and ballpark aside, it was a great night of baseball.

Go A's!

Comments

[Steve-O]

That does it. I'm going to Safeco!

Good summation of Anaheim. Nothing's changed in the last few years except the team has one less loudmouth hurler (Donnelly is gone, Lackey and K-Rod sadly remain). From your description, their fans are still definitely zombie-like, and could care less about baseball for the most part. I guess you could credit them for all buying the team gear and dressing the part. It's as if Artie Moreno has subliminal hold over them, and has them hyponotized to dress up and play the part of baseball fans. And like the movie extras they are, they need constantly to be directed and implored to make noise. It was cool that you ran into an actual enthusiastic fan. They are there, but difficult to find amongst the forty thousand who view them nightly. And yes, I'd like to have the problem of having forty thousand nightly at the Coloseum cheering on the nuttiest version of the green and gold I've witnessed in years. Are they going to go meekly (one run in two games)? Or score 14.5 runs a game? (like the bookend games). If you like the unpredictable, then you, "Gotta love these kids!" (I think that was an old Giants slogan from the late 70's)

[Dave-O]

The Giants slogan was "You Gotta Like These Kids." They couldn't even muster up actual love for that pathetic squad.

[Anna]

I haven't had time to read this whole thing, so I can't comment on it, but I just had to say that this is the current headline on the A's website:

"Athletics welcome Washington back to old haunt"

and I got SO excited! And then I read the bottom talking about how the A's were playing the Rangers tonight... :(

[Oakland Sí]

I saw that woman with the "Getting Figgy with it" sign on TV.

My cousin (Giants fan, her hubby used to have season tickets at the phone booth), moved to Seattle last year, and has become a Mariners fan. She tells me how great the ballpark is, and also thinks it's better than the Giants' park (and she used to love that park!)

I'm completely unsurprised by that Mariner fan's comments. On the blogs they consistently have harsher words for their own team-- especially the GM and ownership -- than for opposing clubs. They have also supported the A's against the Angels when the A's were contending for the division title and the Mariners weren't -- and A's fans on the blogs have done the same for the Mariners.

Last season I went to a Giants game, and happened to sit next to a Mariners fan who was in SF on business. He told me he wanted to go to an A's game, but that weekend the A's were on the road. He was very complimentary about the A's (and I was about his team). Needless to say I enjoyed sharing the Giants game with him.

[Anna]

Okay, I finally read this post and I'm so happy. I've loved all of my friends from Seattle so this just makes sense. One day I will visit Safeco and it will be lovely. And this is just one more reasons that, even as an actor, I will never reside in Los Angeles. PROMISE.

[Steve-O]

The retro jerseys rock! Yellow helmets rule!

[Steve-O]

The retro jerseys rock! Yellow helmets rule!

[Anna]

So much so that you had to reiterate!