Thursday, June 24, 2004
You Gotta Be Shi**in' Me!
I watched my first out-of-market-via-MLB.TV classic game this afternoon/evening, the 18-inning marathon between the Mariners and Rangers. I jumped on board as the game headed into the 10th inning. Knotted at seven, I figured the game wasn't long for the world at that point. After all, in the first nine innings, the teams had combined for 14 runs and a slew of hits. The teams would ultimately combine for 35 hits.
Like a life-long smoker who's pushing 100, the game amazingly just kept on going. Chance after chance, golden opportunity after golden opportunity, neither team could muster the final blow to close The Ballpark in Arlington for the day, and send the remaining faithful home.
First there was the Mariners getting the lead-off man on in the 10th, and sacrificing him over to second, to no avail.
Texas kept piling on the baserunners throughout the extra frames, but could not push their 8th run across. In the 11th, Blalock and Soriano lead-off the inning with back-to-back singles. Brad Fullmer apparently can't bunt at all, because Buck let him swing and he hit into an inning-killing 6-4-3 DP. Was "Well, that's just something they never ask him to do, so they're not going to ask him now" always an excuse for a guy hitting .238 to not lay down a sacrifice bunt? Just wondering.
The following inning, Texas again got their lead-off man on - in this case via a single by Kevin Mench. And again a double play ended the any chance for a run - in this case a 5-4-3 off the bat of Rod Barajas.
Although not a major threat, Seattle did get the go-ahead run into scoring position in the top of the 13th, leaving Bocachica stranded after a walk and a steal. They posed a similar threat in the 14th, putting two men with two out, but were again thwarted.
My wife and I had a trip planned to the store, and it was around this time I started hemming and hawing a bit. Stalling for time, if you will. As the game was creeping towards 7:00, I was finding it harder and harder to give up on what was becoming one of the longest games of the year.
In the 15th, the Mariners again put two runners on, only to leave them stranded. This lost chance hurt a bit more considering they had the lead-off man on in Scott Spezio who had singled. He was sac'd to second, and after a ground out and an intentional walk to Ichiro, was left on third as Randy Winn struck out.
The wildest sequence, however, came in the bottom of that frame.
The first oddity was the summoning of Jamie Moyer, Friday night's scheduled pitcher, into the game. It was odd in the fact that Moyer, possibly the M's most reliable starter, hadn't made a relief appearance since 1996 when he was a member of the Boston Red Sox.
Being wily and crafty is one thing. Being asked to do something you haven't done in eight years is another. The Rangers opened the inning with a single; Mathews advanced to second on a throwing error by the shortstop. After the obligatory sac bunt to advance Mathews to third, Moyer lost Herbert Perry on a 3-2 count. That created a situation in which the M's gave an intentional pass to Michael Young, setting up a force at every base with one out.
Ballgame. With Blalock coming up this had to be the ballgame.
Of course, the script dictated differently, and Blalock hit into a chronological 1-2-3 double play. Onward to the 16th.
Bathroom break. And it was during this break that the night took another unforeseen turn.
For the record, I went #1, but I felt the need to change the toilet roll thingy. The empty brown cardboard roll looked lonely on the plastic spindle that holds it in place, and I was already feeling a bit guilty for putting off the trip to the store this long.
For whatever the reason (maybe I was still shocked after watching that last DP), I fumbled the plastic piece that holds the toilet paper roll in place into the toilet bowl as it was filling back up. "Oh no..." The plastic piece dangled precariously on the edge of the hole at the bottom of the bowl. "If I miss the go-ahead run 'cause of this..."
I stuck my hand in the bowl (don't worry, remember I said I had already flushed), and just as I was reaching into the deep, the plastic piece disappeared down into toilet bowl oblivion, headed to God-knows-where, destined to get stuck in some impossible-to-find pipe... "S**t!" only seemed too appropriate for the moment.
My father-in-law, who has saved our bacon in various household crises like this one came over to see if he could help.
Baseball doesn't stop for our lives' little dilemmas, and so the season's longest game continued long after it should've been over. From that point on, I was resigned to catching glimpses at the screen of my computer, as I ran from upstairs to downstairs, shuffling tools from one floor to the other, shutting off the water, etc.
"Wow, they're going to the 17th..." and then back to looking at the angles of the piping in my basement.
My wife got the trip to a store alright, just not the store she expected. As the game was headed into the top of the 18th, I caught my last glimpse of The Ballpark before taking a trip to Lowe's to pick-up a new wax ring to seal my toilet seat to the bathroom floor.
I was probably somewhere in PLUMBING when Alfonso Soriano hit a 1-0 pitch from Jamie Moyer in the bottom of the 18th to end it. The longest game of the season ended as the sun was going down on the East Coast. It started at 2:00 EST and ended 5 hours and 47 minutes later. There were a total of 16 pitchers used, eight by both teams. And those hurlers combined to throw 552 pitches.
There are a couple of wild lines from the game. Here are a few:
Edgar Martinez: 2-4, 2 R, 1 RBI, 5 BB
Hank Blalock: 3-9, 1 R, 2 K, 8 LOB
Jolbert Cabrera: 1-9
Gary Matthews, Jr.: 4-8, 2 R, 5 LOB
Six players had three or more hits, but only one of them was a Mariner: Randy Winn who went 3-8.
The Rangers ended up with 23 hits and 15 runners left on base. If you think that last number is high, the Mariners left 17 runners on...
Jamie Moyer in his rare relief performance took the loss. He pitched three innings, gave up three hits including Soriano's walk-off, two runs and walked four batters.
I can't say definitively that it's a record, but I have hard time imagining anyone having more than the three walks Edgar Martinez had in extra innings...
The only position player who ended up without a hit was Herbert Perry. But you can't blame him too much; he came in the game as a pinch-hitter in the 10th.
If anyone can actually remember, the Rangers were down 5-1 at one point in the game and needed a game-tying single in the 9th by Mark Teixeira just to get it to extra innings.
According to the AP: It was the longest big league game since the St. Louis Cardinals won 7-6 in 20 innings at Florida on April 27, 2003. It matched the longest game in Rangers history, but Seattle has twice played 20-inning games.
I don't remember ever watching a 20-inning baseball game live, so I was hoping that on my return home the two teams would still be battling it out. It was not to be.
For those who are keeping score on such things, that plastic piece was fished out and my toilet is working like new. And 2004 has one of its memorable games of the season in the books.
I watched my first out-of-market-via-MLB.TV classic game this afternoon/evening, the 18-inning marathon between the Mariners and Rangers. I jumped on board as the game headed into the 10th inning. Knotted at seven, I figured the game wasn't long for the world at that point. After all, in the first nine innings, the teams had combined for 14 runs and a slew of hits. The teams would ultimately combine for 35 hits.
Like a life-long smoker who's pushing 100, the game amazingly just kept on going. Chance after chance, golden opportunity after golden opportunity, neither team could muster the final blow to close The Ballpark in Arlington for the day, and send the remaining faithful home.
First there was the Mariners getting the lead-off man on in the 10th, and sacrificing him over to second, to no avail.
Texas kept piling on the baserunners throughout the extra frames, but could not push their 8th run across. In the 11th, Blalock and Soriano lead-off the inning with back-to-back singles. Brad Fullmer apparently can't bunt at all, because Buck let him swing and he hit into an inning-killing 6-4-3 DP. Was "Well, that's just something they never ask him to do, so they're not going to ask him now" always an excuse for a guy hitting .238 to not lay down a sacrifice bunt? Just wondering.
The following inning, Texas again got their lead-off man on - in this case via a single by Kevin Mench. And again a double play ended the any chance for a run - in this case a 5-4-3 off the bat of Rod Barajas.
Although not a major threat, Seattle did get the go-ahead run into scoring position in the top of the 13th, leaving Bocachica stranded after a walk and a steal. They posed a similar threat in the 14th, putting two men with two out, but were again thwarted.
My wife and I had a trip planned to the store, and it was around this time I started hemming and hawing a bit. Stalling for time, if you will. As the game was creeping towards 7:00, I was finding it harder and harder to give up on what was becoming one of the longest games of the year.
In the 15th, the Mariners again put two runners on, only to leave them stranded. This lost chance hurt a bit more considering they had the lead-off man on in Scott Spezio who had singled. He was sac'd to second, and after a ground out and an intentional walk to Ichiro, was left on third as Randy Winn struck out.
The wildest sequence, however, came in the bottom of that frame.
The first oddity was the summoning of Jamie Moyer, Friday night's scheduled pitcher, into the game. It was odd in the fact that Moyer, possibly the M's most reliable starter, hadn't made a relief appearance since 1996 when he was a member of the Boston Red Sox.
Being wily and crafty is one thing. Being asked to do something you haven't done in eight years is another. The Rangers opened the inning with a single; Mathews advanced to second on a throwing error by the shortstop. After the obligatory sac bunt to advance Mathews to third, Moyer lost Herbert Perry on a 3-2 count. That created a situation in which the M's gave an intentional pass to Michael Young, setting up a force at every base with one out.
Ballgame. With Blalock coming up this had to be the ballgame.
Of course, the script dictated differently, and Blalock hit into a chronological 1-2-3 double play. Onward to the 16th.
Bathroom break. And it was during this break that the night took another unforeseen turn.
For the record, I went #1, but I felt the need to change the toilet roll thingy. The empty brown cardboard roll looked lonely on the plastic spindle that holds it in place, and I was already feeling a bit guilty for putting off the trip to the store this long.
For whatever the reason (maybe I was still shocked after watching that last DP), I fumbled the plastic piece that holds the toilet paper roll in place into the toilet bowl as it was filling back up. "Oh no..." The plastic piece dangled precariously on the edge of the hole at the bottom of the bowl. "If I miss the go-ahead run 'cause of this..."
I stuck my hand in the bowl (don't worry, remember I said I had already flushed), and just as I was reaching into the deep, the plastic piece disappeared down into toilet bowl oblivion, headed to God-knows-where, destined to get stuck in some impossible-to-find pipe... "S**t!" only seemed too appropriate for the moment.
My father-in-law, who has saved our bacon in various household crises like this one came over to see if he could help.
Baseball doesn't stop for our lives' little dilemmas, and so the season's longest game continued long after it should've been over. From that point on, I was resigned to catching glimpses at the screen of my computer, as I ran from upstairs to downstairs, shuffling tools from one floor to the other, shutting off the water, etc.
"Wow, they're going to the 17th..." and then back to looking at the angles of the piping in my basement.
My wife got the trip to a store alright, just not the store she expected. As the game was headed into the top of the 18th, I caught my last glimpse of The Ballpark before taking a trip to Lowe's to pick-up a new wax ring to seal my toilet seat to the bathroom floor.
I was probably somewhere in PLUMBING when Alfonso Soriano hit a 1-0 pitch from Jamie Moyer in the bottom of the 18th to end it. The longest game of the season ended as the sun was going down on the East Coast. It started at 2:00 EST and ended 5 hours and 47 minutes later. There were a total of 16 pitchers used, eight by both teams. And those hurlers combined to throw 552 pitches.
There are a couple of wild lines from the game. Here are a few:
Edgar Martinez: 2-4, 2 R, 1 RBI, 5 BB
Hank Blalock: 3-9, 1 R, 2 K, 8 LOB
Jolbert Cabrera: 1-9
Gary Matthews, Jr.: 4-8, 2 R, 5 LOB
Six players had three or more hits, but only one of them was a Mariner: Randy Winn who went 3-8.
The Rangers ended up with 23 hits and 15 runners left on base. If you think that last number is high, the Mariners left 17 runners on...
Jamie Moyer in his rare relief performance took the loss. He pitched three innings, gave up three hits including Soriano's walk-off, two runs and walked four batters.
I can't say definitively that it's a record, but I have hard time imagining anyone having more than the three walks Edgar Martinez had in extra innings...
The only position player who ended up without a hit was Herbert Perry. But you can't blame him too much; he came in the game as a pinch-hitter in the 10th.
If anyone can actually remember, the Rangers were down 5-1 at one point in the game and needed a game-tying single in the 9th by Mark Teixeira just to get it to extra innings.
According to the AP: It was the longest big league game since the St. Louis Cardinals won 7-6 in 20 innings at Florida on April 27, 2003. It matched the longest game in Rangers history, but Seattle has twice played 20-inning games.
I don't remember ever watching a 20-inning baseball game live, so I was hoping that on my return home the two teams would still be battling it out. It was not to be.
For those who are keeping score on such things, that plastic piece was fished out and my toilet is working like new. And 2004 has one of its memorable games of the season in the books.
