Traveling Baseball Babes

“I’m Not Superstitious, But I Am A Little Stitious”

2012-01-29T16:59:00.001-05:00

Last week, we argued our case for why we should be arbitrators. Then we asked if you’d want us on your arbitration panel. 6 of you voted, “yes. You wear suits. And that’s awesome.” It sure is awesome. 1 person apparently didn’t like what we had to say about players being overpaid jack-a-loons and chose, “Oh, HELL no. Taco Bell? Are serious? You’re going to pay me in chalupas? F that!” We’ll have you know that we’ll take Taco Bell any day of the week. Stop being so spoiled.

It’s been a crazy week in New York, celebrating the Giants advancing to the Superbowl for the second time in just a few short years (yes, we know that this is par for the course for the folks up in New England, but give us a break). There’s been a lot of talk of not washing one’s jersey until the Giants lose. As if washing our jersey will somehow wash the magic of victory from our favorite teams. It got us thinking. What other superstitious habits do fans and athletes (professional and unprofessional) have? Superstitious habits that we truly believe will make some sort of difference in the game’s outcome (or our personal performance). As fans, when we fail to perform these habits, we’re devastated when our team loses because we are the primary reason our team performed so poorly. As athletes, we missed that line drive or struck out because we failed to perform these habits. Some of us may be fully aware that these traditions are completely silly, but we’re not willing to take the chance and NOT partake in them. Others…well…others just have a special way of thinking that’s all.

Let’s cover the fans first, shall we? We’ll pick on ourselves first so that everyone else we pick on doesn’t feel bad about themselves. On the subject of the New York Giants, we legitimately think that our actions AND wardrobe before AND during the game make a difference in regards to how the Giants play. That is why Osi Umenyiora has been the TBB Super Hero of the Week for over a month. We can’t risk changing the Super Hero and having the Giants lose. Let’s start with our pre-game rituals. Lisa comes over to Serena’s house early in the morning. Serena then works us out until total, absolute fatigue. Serena takes a photo of Lisa half-passed out in pain on the floor and posts it to Facebook like a true friend. We take turns showering (as in not together). We get dressed. Both of us wear long-sleeved white shirts and Serena’s unwashed Giants jerseys (to stress this fact: we wear TWO different jerseys. We are not squeezing into the same jersey like a two-headed monster from Sesame Street). Lisa also wears her Mets fleece zip-up. Serena wears knee socks and a necklace with an elephant charm on it. Lisa goes to Brian’s Deli around the corner and buys us egg sandwiches (3 eggs, bacon, cheese, black pepper, ketchup, to which we add hot sauce pilfered from Croxley’s Ale House). Lisa has an in-depth conversation with the clerk at Brian’s Deli about superstitions. The deli clerk has a giant Santa wearing a Giants uniform on his front lawn that has remained lit since the Giants/Jets game. His block must be thrilled with the fact that it’s almost February and he still has a giant light-up Santa on his front lawn. Serena makes us coffee. We eat. After breakfast, we blog. At game time, Lisa wraps her head with Serena’s fleece blanket (aka: her burkah), Serena climbs under her Egyptian cotton comforter, and we drink beer. We do not leave our positions for anything until a commercial break. Even if the temperature of the room becomes stifling, Lisa is not to take off her burkah and Serena is not to remove the comforter…or her pants. While this bizarre behavior may be strictly applied to the New York Giants, we tend to exhibit similar habits during the baseball season. If the Yankees or Mets are on a winning streak, we don’t wash our jerseys. If the team has lost a game while we’ve been in attendance wearing a specific hat, we never wear that hat again during the season (don’t worry, we have plenty of Mets and Yankees hats to make up for one being removed from the rotation).

Next up is Noah (and we should forewarn you that 98.8% of our poll panel is from the same bar that we steal the hot sauce from. We also never got out of our seats to conduct this poll because we’re lazy, so the people mentioned here are pretty much individuals within our vicinity, customers who made the mistake of getting a drink at the bar near us, or employees of aforementioned bar). Noah wears the same jersey and drinks the same beer at the same bar during each game. Noah’s friend, Brendan, drinks an unsweetened iced tea from Dunkin Donuts and he doesn’t wash his jersey. If his team loses, he is overcome by a feeling of failure. That’s his words, not ours. This is the one time where we did not put words into someone else’s mouth. The boys also talked about their friend, Sage, who was not in attendance. Before walking into a Yankees game, Sage always orders 3 Ozzy dogs (we’re not even sure what kind of hot dog that is) from the same street vendor.

Joe explained that during a game, he wears only regular clothes. He does not like to represent the team.

Bill has an old throwback Lawrence Taylor jersey that he only wears on special occasions. It’s only washed after a loss. He’s currently 7-1 with this jersey. Even though the white fabric of the jersey is sporting a stain, he will not wash it until the Giants lose. He will definitely be wearing it for Superbowl. A minor ritual he has before every game is that he posts the same Facebook status prior to the game. That status is, “Gameday.”

Now for the athletes. We don’t care who you are. If you play or once played sports, you have participated in superstitious behavior whether you realized it or not. For example, Serena played college softball with a girl who when she was on the mound, had to start each approach to the mound with the following system: stand at the rear of the circle, take 3 steps toward the rubber starting with her right foot (the third step lightly kicking the rubber with the toe of her right foot before planting). If any part of this procedure went awry, she had to start over again or else the mechanics of her next pitch would be off. Another pitcher on Serena’s team had to face the outfield between each pitch and scan the field to make sure every player was in position before approaching the mound. These are all superstitions. That committing the same act over and over again will in some way, effect what’s going to happen next.

Our paneled athletes came from the same pool (with a few exceptions) as our sports fans panel (remember, we’re lazy). Chris the Bar Back (and hot wing arbitrator) and a fellow patron (also named Chris) both have an at bat ritual. While standing at the plate, the boys use their bat to make a cross (you know…tap north, tap south, tap east, tap west) across homeplate. Chris the Bar Back also had other traditions: it’s bad luck not to wear his #23 wristband during a baseball game and prior to football games, he performed the same stretching routine.

The Great Awesome Super Fantastic Adam The Bartender (yeah, he had absolutely no involvement in how he was portrayed in this blog post) spits in his glove every time he gets into his position at short stop.

Herve played soccer, volleyball, and baseball. Regardless of which sport he was playing, he had to have a vanilla shake before every game. He also wore a lucky wristband.

Serena wore her hair in pigtail braids until a batting streak came to an end. Prior to stepping into the batter’s box, she waited until the catcher was in position. When getting into her position at third at the start of each inning, she smoothed the dirt just ahead of her with her right foot.

Lisa had no pre-game rituals as a cheerleader. Or if she did, she can’t remember them.

You know you’ve seen the professionals do it as well. Ever notice the at bat ritual of Joe Mauer or Nomar Garciaparra. It’s so repetitive that it’s like a tic. It could drive a person crazy to watch these routines over and over and over and over again. Mauer kicks the dirt around in the batter’s box, runs his hand up and down the handle of the bat, steps into the box and taps his helmet with his left hand. Nomar fiddled with his batting gloves before stepping into the batter’s box and performed some sort of twinkle toes routine combined with a bat swish. We tried to find a better video of it, but this was the best we could do. Ignore the fat man who abruptly steps into the camera’s view just before the second pitch. You can see the whole routine just before the third pitch. Craig Biggio never washed his helmet. It was gross. By the end of the season, it looked like it was dipped in the La Brea Tar Pit. We’re not going to even touch upon the whole Jason Giambi golden thong situation. In fact, we just threw up a little bit in our mouths.

Superstitions can spill onto the pitcher’s mound as well. Ever notice a pitcher who has a no-hitter or perfect game on the line is always sitting at one end of the dugout by himself? And despite the fact that a no-hitter and perfect game is one of the most exciting things to witness, no one ever talks about it while it’s happening? As fans, we don’t even like to talk about it, fearing that it may jinx the pitcher…unless, of course, you want him to fail. Then you chat that sh*t up every chance you can.

Feel free to email us or post a comment to this blog about your strange rituals. We look forward to hearing from you.

Now onto some semblance of normalcy: this week’s baseball notes! On Tuesday, Jorge Posada officially announced his retirement. You can view the video of his speech here. You’ll notice that his wife is extremely hot. Watch this video with caution. It’s a little emotional and we’re a touch embarrassed to admit that we teared up a bit. Serena remembers when Posada when he first came onto the scene. He was a great hitter and a sh*tty catcher who eventually usurped Joe Girardi (who worked with Posada on his fielding skills, mind you. It was very similar to when Anakin Skywalker betrayed his mentor Obi-Wan and struck him down. Yes, we just compared a real life situation to Star Wars. Don’t judge us) behind the plate. At first, Serena hated Jorge and missed Joe (a similar sentiment that Mamadukes felt when Don Mattingly retired and was replaced by Tino Martinez). Over the years, Posada’s ability behind the plate vastly improved and his big Dumbo ears gradually grew on Serena. Now as we think about how we’ll never see Jorge Posada bat at Yankees Stadium ever again (except maybe at Old Timer’s Day), we can’t help but feel old. First Andy Pettitte. Now Jorge Posada. You know Mariano Rivera’s retirement is gonna come sooner rather than later. He’s like 500 years old. He’s the Yoda of closers (see how we did that? Brought it full circle back to Star Wars again). Then all we’ll be left with is Lisa’s favorite Yankee: Derek Jeter. It’s an end of an era. It’s the Circle of Life. And it moves us all.

The Yankees have officially acquired RHP’s Michael Pineda and Jose Campos in exchange for Jesus Montero and Hector Noesi. With Seattle, Pineda went 9-10 last season with an ERA of 3.74 and finished 5^th in the American League Rookie of the Year Award voting. He led all AL rookies in strikeouts (173) and strikeouts per 9 innings (9.11). The Yankees have also re-signed Andruw Jones to a 1-year contract worth reportedly $2 million with $1.4 million in performance incentives? Really? You need performance incentives? How about a f*cking cookie, you d*ck licker? How about if you don’t do your job well, my foot goes up your ass? F*cking a-hole. Go back to Atlanta. Oh, wait, now they’re too classy for you. What’s another d*ckhead team that you can be a part of? Hmm…the Red Sox. Go frolic around the outfield at Fenway and let them pay you performance incentives. PS- you spell your name wrong, you f*cking d*ck.

Tim Lincecum and the San Francisco Giants have agreed on a 2-year deal worth $40.5 million. It’s a little disappointing that they came to this agreement considering we were ready and able to arbitrate that situation. We tried on outfits and practiced speaking in legal jargon. Serena practiced not using the word, “f*ck.” Or any variation of that word, like f*cked, f*cking, f*cks, f*cker, f*ck-ass, mother f*cker, etc.

As the great Stevie Wonder once said, “Very superstitious behaviors at the bar. Very superstitious unwashed jerseys about to smell. Your 13-hour batting stance broke the no-hitter. The goat’s brought the Cubs 66 years of bad luck. The good things in your past. When you believe in things you don’t understand, then you suffer. Superstition ain’t the way.”

Arbitration

2012-01-22T23:47:00.005-05:00

Our discussion of men’s grooming habits last week naturally led to a poll covering the topic. We asked which of our subjects had the best look. 11 of you sounded off. The results? Baffling. Mind blowing. Makes us feel like we’ve smoked crack recently. Of the 11 votes, 5 of you legitimately chose Brian Wilson’s Porn-Bush. We want the 5 of you to close your eyes and play a little imagination game with us. Are your eyes closed? Now imagine you’re alone in a quiet room with your significant other. Your significant other has tied you to a chair. You literally cannot move any part of your body. Your significant other approaches you for a sexy, smoochie. But wait…he/she has a beard the size of an afro sported by many of the actors in Jackie Brown. The beard is getting closer to you. The beard actually touches your lips before their lips can (Lisa just moaned and said, “eww, this is making me itch”). The beard grazing your face feels like a brillo pad and still, their lips haven’t touched yours yet. In fact, their lips can’t reach your lips through the beard because the beard has now taken control of everything. The beard wants to take over the world now. Wants to run for President of the United States. Wants to eat everyone’s firstborn child. Wants to bring about the apocalypse. You can’t escape. Remember, you’re tied to a chair. You’re doomed to face a lifetime of beard suffocation. This is worse than the Salem Witch Trials. You wish you were dead.

Now open your eyes. Still feel warm and fuzzy about your choice? Hmmm? We didn’t think so. The runner up with 4 votes was Justin Verlander’s Gentlemanly Scruff. In Verlander, we trust. Cole Hamels’ Compromise and CJ Wilson’s Effortless Sex each earned 1 vote. Really? The name of Wilson’s look was called “Effortless Sex.” No one bought into that? No. Why would you do something that makes sense? You a-holes bought into a porn bush with food stuck in it. No one voted for Will Rhymes’ Lack of Commitment, Brian McCann’s Proper Beard, Jayson Werth’s Sherwood Forest, or Barry Zito’s Magnum PI Stache.

Tim Lincecum and the Giants are finally closer to a contract agreement that would enable the parties to avoid a salary arbitration hearing. “Industry sources” (who are these industry sources they’re always talking about anyway? Are they fans? Stadium garbage pickers? Grounds Crew members? Concession stand employees? Front office staff? Training staff? Other players? WHO? WHO are these people?????) have confirmed that talks between the club and Lincecum have progressed quite nicely. For a 1-year contract, Lincecum requested $21.5 million and the Giants countered with $17 million. Seriously, Lincecum? $17 million for 1 year’s worth of work is a pretty sweet deal. Take it. Don’t complain. And don’t grow a porn-bush. We’re begging you.

Before we go into the rest of this week’s baseball notes, let’s talk arbitration. Admittedly, when you combine our college educations, you get a BFA in Writing, Literature, and Publishing, a Minor in History (Western Civilization), and 2 years at Nassau Community College studying Liberal Arts. Basically that’s a sh*t ton of useless knowledge and creativity (because we’re “artists”). We have zero smarts when it comes to business or anything related to the legal system. After hearing this term, “arbitration” over and over every offseason and stumbling upon it again when reading about Tim Lincecum, Serena had enough. She Googled “What the f*ck does arbitration mean?” If you knew Serena at all, you’d know that that’s legitimately what she Googled. Apparently, to make a bunch of legal jargon short and sweet, arbitration is basically when two disputing parties agree to let someone else decide the fate of the argument. For example, if we were fighting about whether to order our 10 cent wings Hot or Super Hot, we’d call in Chris, the bar back, to “arbitrate” and make the decision for us. We’d agree to do whatever Chris decided. If we’ve got this concept right (and we think we do), this means that if Tim Lincecum and the Giants have to go to a salary arbitration hearing, a person or persons would determine Lincecum’s salary and Lincecum and the Giants would have to comply with whatever the decision is. Super. Now, here’s why we should be on this arbitration panel:

• We’re awesome. We don’t ever stop being awesome.
• We own suits. Therefore, we’ll look extremely professional while arbitrating your salary or whatever it is you want us to arbitrate
• We like 10 cent wings which means we’re fiscally responsible. We’re not going to overpay athletes for simply playing a game. C’mon. Like we should pay you to play Monopoly or something. Please. You’ll get a salary that we feel is acceptable for what you contribute to the world. So, Timmy? If the Giants are offering you $17 million, you should take it because there’s no way in hell we’re giving you that much money to pitch once every 4-5 games in one season. You’ve got to be out of your goddamn mind. You’ll make the equivalent to a secretary. $35,000/year. If you make it to the World Series, we’ll give you $30 worth of Taco Bell. Anything on the Taco Bell menu that your heart desires…totaling $30. Not $31. Not $30.99. Not $30.01. $30 (including tax). We can discuss a raise after conducting a performance evaluation at your next arbitration hearing in 2013 just like every other hard working American in this country.
• Even though we hang out at a bar every Monday night, we still manage to get up for work on time. We even get dressed and comb our hair. This means that we’re responsible adults…we think. Or it might mean that we have a drinking problem. We’re going to stick with “responsible adults.” Just go with it.
• We work out so when sh*t gets out of hand during the arbitration process, we will be able to exert force and authority in order to reign it in and stay on track.
• We’re inherently lazy. Why will this benefit you? Any time spent away from eating, drinking beer, sleeping, or other bedroom-related activities is pretty much a nuisance to us. Therefore, we will not allow this drag on any longer than it has to. You’ll be in and out before you know it.

And that is why you should vote TBB for Arbitration! TBB 2012! Peace out!

Elsewhere in the league. The Oakland A’s have reportedly shown interest in Manny Ramirez. If you recall, Ramirez retired last season rather than face a heavy suspension for testing positive for steroids a second time around. A real class act. Awesome. Like that stadium needs to be made even uglier. Good job, folks. Keep up the good work out there in Oakland. At this rate, your team will never get a new stadium. At best, someone will blow up the Coliseum and never rebuild it. You’ll be homeless. Exactly how many stupid decisions does a team need to make before their decision-making rights are revoked?

Apparently, Ryan Braun was in Midtown last night. Lisa was also in Midtown last night. She could’ve banged a professional baseball player. Then we would’ve blogged about it so that you could’ve shared in the magic of their night. God, how the fates toy with our emotions. ANYWAY, Braun was in town receiving his NL MVP Award. During his acceptance speech, Braun spoke briefly of the situation regarding the positive results of his drug test. Of course, he denied ever doing steroids (But really, are you going to admit to taking steroids while accepting an award congratulating you for your performance?) and spoke a lot of crap about character and being humbled by this experience and all that mumbo jumbo. Listen, we’re not trying to take away from his eloquent speech here, but let’s face it. We don’t really care. What we care about is the fact that he was in Midtown and Lisa did not hit that sh*t when it counted. Steroids or not. Feel free to Google his acceptance speech though. It’s quite intelligent sounding, which says a lot considering that he is a professional athlete and a power hitter to boot. Power hitters are usually dumb as dirt. Just look at Alex Rodriguez. Good-looking and talented, sure. But he shouldn’t talk anymore. He should remain seen and not heard.

Cyndi Lauper is singing our song: “The phone rings in the middle of the night. It’s a major league baseball team begging us to make things right. Oh, MLB, you know we’re still #1. The TBB just want to arbitrate. Oh, the TBB just want to arbitrate.”

Facial Hair Around the League Strikes Back

2012-01-15T15:17:00.000-05:00

After recounting our experiences with the worst (and best) things we’ve ever put into our mouths (at a ballpark) to date, we decided to ask you what you thought the worst thing we’ve put into our mouths (at a ballpark) was. 7 of you voted and the feedback appears to be split between two items: the Dodger Dog) and the $1 hot dog from Target Field. 4 of you voted for the $1 hot dog and 3 chose the Dodger Dog.

One year ago today, we brought to you our “Facial Hair Around the League” blog (you should know that we now have the Star Wars theme playing in the background as we type this, making this blog even more epic than usual). At first, we were concerned about how you’d feel about such an asstastic blog, considering it had very little to do with the actual sport of baseball and more to do with what we find attractive in the male species. However, you seemed to enjoy it very much. It was even featured on our Popular Posts blogroll for an extended period of time. That being said, we decided that we should bring you an updated edition of the aforementioned Facial Hair post as it’s quite clear that men have failed to take our advice seriously as there’s a repeat offender on our list. He’s a man who, no matter how often we beg, refuses to acquiesce to our request. More surprising is that there’s one man on this list who is typically the golden boy of 5:00 shadows. He apparently lost his goddamn mind this year.

Let’s start with the hot messes, shall we?

Jayson Werth. Is anyone really shocked that this a-hole is on our hairy sh*t list? He was featured on our original Facial Hair Around the League post AND we wrote him a personal letter asking him to do something about the horrendous decisions he makes when playing with razors. It appears as though moving to DC hasn’t helped things. What in god’s name is that? Lisa thinks she just saw a pigeon fly out of it. It’s disgusting. Just looking at it gives us lice. Lisa’s itchy.

Barry Zito. This is the most disappointing situation in the entire facial hair community. You might be asking yourselves why is this so disappointing? It’s just a moustache. No. It’s so much more than that. It’s the end of mankind as we know it. Forget 2012. Barry Zito’s moustache is going to kill us all. Once upon a time, Barry Zito could do no wrong with his facial hair (and pitching come to think of it. My, how things have changed). He sported everything from clean shaven (Lisa’s personal favorite), full beard, goatee, to varying degrees of the 5:00 shadow (Serena’s personal favorite) and he did it with impeccable grace. He was the poster child for how men should groom their faces. Then it all went terribly wrong at the start of the 2011 season when we noticed that he adopted a 1970’s porn-stache. Gentlemen, this is quite possibly one of the most offensive things you could possibly do to your face. What are you thinking when you decide to go with growing a black caterpillar beneath your nose? In Jayson Werth’s case, he just let himself go out of laziness. Or maybe when the full moon hits, he turns into a werewolf and eats people. Zito’s situation is so much worse because it was obviously pre-meditated as the rest of his face was clean shaven. He actually intended to look like Tom Selleck.

Brian Wilson. We know that the beard is magical. We get it. We know that the hair and ridiculous bush on his face is all about exerting his independence. We get that he’s got “personality.” He’s not just a pretty face, ya know. We get that. Really. We do. However, at some point, you need to let that sh*t go. On the subject of 1970’s porn, Zito might have the stache, but Wilson is sporting the 1970’s porn bush. As in vagina. His actual hair is bad enough. Couple that with the porn bush and there’s not much else to say. Mr. Wilson, do you get laid? We have this theory that you’re hung like an elephant’s trunk, but jeez, guy. That’s only gonna get you so far and we can’t imagine a girl wanting to make out with you under those circumstances. Furthermore, how do you go down town with that crap on your face? Doesn’t it get in the way???

Will Rhymes. We’re not sure what’s happening here. Either this disaster was pre-planned (which is pathetic) or Rhymes is literally unable to grow a full beard. In those instances, gentlemen, please don’t bother growing the beard. Shave it. You look like a giant partial hairy a-hole when you’ve got bald patches and tufts of hair here and there. He looks like he couldn’t even commit to a moustache. He must have commitment problems because if you can’t even commit to growing a full beard, you can’t commit to one vagina. Plus, he must have body hair issues because why else is his neck so damn hairy whereas his face is like that of a baby’s bottom??? Friggin’ weird.

Now…onto the promising young chaps of the 2011 season

Brian McCann. If you’re going to go full beard, this is the way to do it. Aside from being a ginger, which is creepy, McCann has grown a mostly even beard and it’s well maintained. There are no stragglers, no wildlife emerging from the underbrush, no porn music, you can see his mouth clearly, and most importantly, last night’s meal didn’t get lodged there by mistake. If he could just not be a ginger, we’d be kosher with his look.

CJ Wilson. Good grief, this boy is smokin’ hot. Unfortunately, he’s crazy and sober, but that’s a whole other blog for a different day. This is how you do “extra” scruff without committing to an actual beard (or porn-stache). As you can see, Wilson is just at the precipice of sh*t getting out of hand. Another day or two and he’ll need to buzz it down so he doesn’t start looking like a beast. A beast with rabies. This is heaven. Maybe not so much for Lisa, but definitely for Serena. And despite the extra fur, even Lisa can admit to wanting to lick his face off. That’s how good Wilson looks. Men, take note. Meow. This kind of facial hair, when done well, could get you laid.

Justin Verlander. Ah. The “clean” version of the scruff. Like Wilson, Verlander is also sporting a 5:00 shadow of some sorts, only his is more on the conservative side. This is also sexy. With this look, Verlander exudes manly musk, tough and rough play, might pull your hair a little bit, masculinity, hotness, rip-his-clothes-off naughty yet, at the same time, remains controlled and hygienic. Like a true gentleman. Boys, invest in a buzzer as opposed to an actual razor. This way you can maintain a scruff without ever having to go clean shaven again.

Cole Hamels. Hamels is demonstrating how to do a “barely there” scruff. This is as close to Lisa’s clean shaven look as this particular blog post will permit. This is a look you want to go for if you don’t want to go clean shaven, but your woman doesn’t dig nuzzling up to fuzz. It’s what we call a compromise. You’ll still get laid and you get to keep some manly facial hair while your woman won’t bitch about your 5:00 shadow giving her a rash when she makes out with you. Serena doesn’t have much use for the clean shaven look, but even she admits that Hamels needs to be nibbled on, so you know that’s saying something. If you’re not sure what your girl likes, go with this until you find out more. It’s just like when you can’t figure out what color looks best on you, you go with the old reliable black shirt. It’s a no fail. Win-win.

Baseball notes:

According to a source, former Phillies’ closer Ryan Madson has signed a 1-year contract with the Reds that will pay him $6 million in 2012 with an $11 million option for 2013 that carries a $2.5 million buyout. The deal itself is on hold thanks mostly to Madson being on vacation and failing to schedule his physical. Farewell to the only Phillies player that Serena was willing to bang. Lisa’s Forbidden Love, on the other hand, is still with the Phillies’ organization.

Justin Verlander made an appearance on Conan O’Brien where the two men discussed Verlander’s pre-game rituals. Turns out, Serena and the Cy Young Award winner have more in common than we previously thought. Verlander said, “The night before, as you can tell by my amazing physique, I eat Taco Bell. Every night.” He even shared the specifics of his order: “Three crunchy taco supremes, no tomato, cheesy gordita crunch, and a Mexican pizza, no tomato.” We think Serena may have found her soul mate. Now all we have to do is get them to “serendipitously” meet. Perhaps at a Taco Bell. After carefully reviewing the video of this interview, it’s been decided that Justin Morneau has been demoted from Serena’s Future Husband to Serena’s Future Ex-Husband #3. Justin Verlander, on the other hand, shall now hold the title of Serena’s Future Husband.

Commissioner Bud Selig’s 2-year extension through the 2014 season was approved on Thursday night by MLB’s ownership. Not sure anyone really gives a crap, but there we have it.

Remember Johan Santana? Yeah, we kind of forgot he existed as well. The man’s been busy rehabbing in Florida from the surgery he had on his left shoulder. There’s a really long article on MLB.com that basically offered us no answers and included positive, negative, and uncertain feedback. Super helpful. The headline even leads us to wonder what the f is going on: “Mets See Rehabbing Left-Hander Johan Santana’s Tank as Half-Full.” Half-full? Really? The man’s been out for over a year now. He’s not even ¾ of a tank full yet? The Mets are hopeful for him to undergo a proper spring training and to be ready be for the start of the season, but we’ll see. Right now, it feels a little bit like Santana is the Missing Link. There are rumors he exists, but we haven’t seen any evidence of it yet. If the Mets are counting on him to be their savior this year, that is pretty scary.

Closing out this week with a little bit of classic MJ: “Shave it. Shave it. Jayson Werth, won’t you please shave it? Use a razor. It could be nice. It doesn’t matter if it’s disposable or not. Just shave it.”

The Worst (and Best) Things We’ve Ever Put in Our Mouths (at a Ballpark)

2012-01-08T13:13:00.000-05:00

Now that it’s the New Year, we felt that it was time for a fresh start. We’ve decided that we’re going to become magically rich. We’re going to be able to eat whatever we want and not care about whether or not we have enough money to pay the tolls to get back home from Yankees Stadium. No more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for us! We’re gonna look bangin’ because Serena is going to re-hire Trainer Stephen to work our sorry asses out on a regular basis. We’re also going to hire Hair Stylist Lisa McFarland and Colorist Dave Rios to be our full-time hair specialists. They’ll even go on vacation with us. We’ll stay in 5-star hotels. No more crap Wyndham Rewards hotels for us. Furthermore, we’ll invest our money in great things. Great things like a Major League Baseball team. We haven’t quite figured out where our team is going to be located, but thanks to you lovely folks, we’re pretty confident that we know what our team name will be. Of 7 votes, 2 of you chose “Dances with Booze” to be the name of our new franchise. The rest of the options (The Great Whites, The Velociraptors, The Anacondas, The Prancing Daisies, and The Food Babies) each earned 1 vote. Congratulations. You’re looking at the future owners of Dances with Booze.

As you may have guessed from our blog title, today we are going to talk about Ballpark food…or you may have assumed that we were talking about penis. After visiting 19 different stadiums across the country, we’ve shoveled a lot of tasty and not-so-tasty items in our pie holes. We’ll start with the worst of them listed in no order of importance (basically because we couldn’t figure out which item really was THE worst of the bunch).

The Worst Things We’ve Ever Put in Our Mouths (at a Ballpark):

The “famous” Dodger Dog found at Dodger Stadium. One would think that a hot dog with a catchy name would be delicious. You’ d be wrong to assume that of the Dodger Dog. For starters, it’s visually unappealing. To quote our initial assessment of the Dodger Dog, it “looks like a child’s finger that had accidentally been burned on a toaster oven.” Secondly, the taste is an abomination. “It is a raping of your taste buds and a violation of basic human rights.” There is still no word as to whether or not this hot dog has been FDA approved yet. We’re pretty sure it causes cancer.
Target Field’s $1 Hot Dog was awful. It was hardly worth the dollar. We wouldn’t feed this to a homeless man dying of starvation because it wouldn’t be fair to him. We called it “ass in the mouth.” The only saving grace was the fact that Serena coated hers with Sriracha sauce which disguised the “ass in the mouth” taste. Lisa was not as fortunate.
The Minneapie from Target Field sounded awesome, but was a serious disappointment. We had been sucked into the name of the dessert, thinking to ourselves, “We’re never going to find a Minneapie anywhere else! We HAVE to try it!” Plus, the cashier described it as “fried apple pie.” We assumed that it was an actual apple pie fried in dough and then sprinkled with cinnamon and powdered sugar…which probably means that our inner selves are obese children. This dessert cost us $7. What we actually received was a cinnamon-sprinkled Lean Pocket. It’s not like the taste was terrible, but the delivery of the product failed to live up to our expectations, making feeding time extremely disappointing.
On the topic of disappointing desserts, the fried dough at Citi Field failed to live up to our expectations. Like the Minneapie, it didn’t technically taste bad. It was just boring. After 3 bites, we kind of wanted to quit, but the fact that we’d just wasted money on it forced us to plow through it like champions. Disappointed champions. As Lisa puts it, Citi Field’s fried dough was “like an okay lay. You’re happy you got laid, but it could’ve been better.”
The Ball Tip Steak Sandwich from the Kinder’s BBQ stand at McAfee Coliseum. The sandwich itself cost around $9 and consisted of meat soaked in mayonnaise. The red juice from the meat mixing with the mayonnaise looked like an infected cut. Serena just threw up in her mouth reliving this experience. Even Lisa, who actually likes mayonnaise, wanted to end her life after eating this sandwich. Any a-hole who destroys the essence of steak with mayonnaise should be run over with a bus.
Citizen’s Bank Park’s sausage sandwich. Eating that sandwich was 5 minutes of our time that we’ll never get back. That’s it. That time is gone. It could’ve been filled with something better. Like a really good, long piss. Lisa didn’t even finish hers. She claims that her peppers and onions weren’t even cooked. Plain Melba Toast had more flavor than that sandwich, which is sad because as you all know by now, we love Italian sausage.
Another sausage sandwich that depressed the f*ck out of us is the one served at Safeco Field. Sawdust has more flavor in it than this sandwich. At least the onions and peppers were cooked this time though.
We feel bad about including this next one on our list, but it needs to be done. The hot dog at Wrigley Field. The grilled dog itself was actually very good as were the variety of toppings (tomatoes, jalapeño peppers, relish, onions, mustard, and ketchup). The problem with this hot dog was the poppy seeded bun. The stand that serves the grilled hot dogs stores the hot dog buns on a shelf over the grill. As a result, the steam from the grill floats upward and makes the buns soggy. Try eating a hot dog heavily laden with toppings on a wet bun that’s falling apart. It’s a pain in the ass and messy.

The Best Things We’ve Ever Put in Our Mouths (at a Ballpark):

Both the grilled bratwurst and polish sausage sandwiches from Target Field belong on this list. They were hearty, juicy, and the meat was seasoned with black pepper. When discussing these two sandwiches, we called them “FAN-F*CKING-TASTIC.” They could make a girl wet themselves, we assure you.
The A’s helmet filled with french fries were awesome! Golden and crispy. These fries made up for the misery that the Ball Tip Steak Sandwich created.
PETCO Park’s pulled pork sandwich served at the Randy Jones BBQ Pit is monster-sized and totally worth the price of $8.50. We were actually pretty full after eating it and you know how rare that is. One of the guys traveling with us to that stadium couldn’t finish his sandwich because he was “full.” We’re pretty sure he has an eating disorder though, so we don’t know if that really counts as being “full.”
RFK Stadium’s Italian sausage sandwich is the reason why we had put so many terrible sausages in our mouth in the first place. It is proof that god or some higher power loves us and wants us to be happy. The yellow, green, and red peppers were fresh and grilled to perfection. The sausage itself was the perfect sausage. Spicy, juicy, and girthy. It was a party in our mouths and everyone was invited. It might be one the best $5 ever spent.
Yankees Stadium’s Lobel’s steak sandwich is glorious. If you ever have one chance to visit Yankees Stadium and there’s a good chance you’ll never make it back there, go with this steak sandwich. It’s expensive, but totally worth it. The sandwich is served on a buttery roll STUFFED with juicy, thick meat. More importantly, no mayonnaise.
The Xtreme Dog at Coors Field is literally the best hot dog that we’ve ever had the pleasure of putting into our mouths. For $6.50, you have multiple options of hot dogs covered in a plethora of toppings. Lisa had the Denver Dog which included jalapeño peppers, cheddar cheese, chopped onions, and green chili sauce. That sauce was no joke. Lisa breathed fire for the rest of the day after eating that hot dog. Serena got the New York Dog, which included grilled peppers and onions, spicy mustard, sauerkraut, and chopped onions and then she turned around and added cheddar cheese and jalapeño peppers. Our friend, AJ ordered the Rockies’ Bacon Bleu, which included chopped onions, bleu cheese sauce, bleu cheese crumbles, and bacon.
Another expensive ballpark item, the crab sandwich served at the Crazy Crab’z stand at AT&T Park is well worth the cost. The grilled sourdough bread is stuffed with crab meat. STUFFED! If you like seafood, you can’t go wrong with this purchase.
The garlic fries that are now sweeping the nation originated at AT&T Park and they do garlic fries the best. The plate of fries is coated with garlic and oil so don’t plan on making out with anyone after eating these bad boys.

An Honorable Mention goes to the barbecue food served at Boog’s BBQ Stand at Oriole Park. The food is AMAZING and Serena highly recommends anyone visiting the stadium to eat there. The only reason we can’t put this on the list is that Serena ate at that stand during an earlier visit to the ballpark without Lisa. Lisa has yet to experience the wonder that is Boog’s BBQ.

Baseball note:

According to sources, Jorge Posada may announce his retirement within the next two weeks. Posada’s departure cuts the Core Four (Andy Pettitte having retired before the start of last season) down to the Dynamic Duo (Mariano Rivera and Lisa’s favorite Yankee, Derek Jeter). Soon, it will just be Jeter that’s left. Serena suddenly feels old.

Welcome to 2012

2012-01-01T21:22:00.002-05:00

Last week, in addition to wishing you a happy holiday, we asked you what reason a certain TBB fan that shall remain nameless might be obsessed with Serena’s arms. 1 person thinks it’s because her arms are 20 inch pythons so who wouldn’t be obsessed? Okay, we’ll have you know that they’re NOT 20 inches. Sheesh. 4 individuals explained it simply as, “he’s a Phillies fan. Why do Phillies fans do half the things that they do?” 1 other person thinks that he is jealous of her arms and desperately wishes that Serena would train him like she trains Lisa every Sunday morning. Strangely enough, no one chose the option, “he is afraid of her.” Hm.

The A’s continue to astound us with their butchering techniques. They sent Ryan Sweeney and two-time All Star Andrew Bailey to the Red Sox for another outfielder and 2 prospects. At this point, it’s safe to call the A’s the New York Islanders of baseball. Thank you for giving up on all hope, Oakland. Perhaps you’ll be joining the Islanders in Oklahoma in a few years.

The St. Louis Cardinals, as we all know, have lost Albert Pujols. Who is the big name that they replace him with? A hairy, dark mole. We mean, Carlos Beltran. May he rot in hell the day that he dies. Beltran and the Cardinals apparently agreed to the 2-year deal worth $26 million late last week. Beltran is getting closer and closer to us with each team move he makes. We were thankful when he left for San Francisco. The city’s across the country and we’ve already been to AT&T Park. Of course, we felt it would’ve been better if he relocated to Japan. Now he’s in the middle of the country. His proximity is becoming uncomfortable. Plus, we haven’t done our Kansas City/St. Louis tour yet. We’d been contemplating it for 2013. Now this plan may have to change.

Being it’s that time of year again where we’re both bored and antsy for the baseball season to get started, Serena tested our Facebook fans with a little trivia quiz. Identify the baseball-related movie that this quote came from (bonus points for identifying the individual who said it): “Heywood leads the league in most offensive categories, including nose hair. When this guy sneezes, he looks like a party favor.” The first person to answer this correctly was TBB fan Daniel Perez. As a prize, Serena offered him TBB Super Hero of the Week honors. Since he hasn’t gotten back to us with a photo as of yet, Serena decided to go with someone she’s particularly fond of: Osi Umenyiora.

Lastly, we hope everyone had a fabulous and safe New Year! We’ll return to you with a proper TBB blog next Sunday for our first post of 2012.

McAfee Coliseum

2011-12-25T07:00:00.002-05:00

McAfee Coliseum

7000 Coliseum Way

Oakland, Ca 94621

August 29, 2008

We woke up bright and early, excited by what the day would bring us. We changed into our bathing suits and beach cover-ups before heading out for what was supposedly a short, easy walk to the rental car place to pick up our convertible. This “short, easy” walk turned into what felt like a 5-mile marathon hike up and down the steepest hills we had ever seen. Of course, we neglected to bring water like jack-a-loons. People in San Francisco must be in some sort of sick shape. Everyone probably has really perky a$$es.

The rental car place turned out to be located in the middle of the ghetto. We passed a crack head. We realize that we tend to throw that term around a lot like a Frisbee, but we assure you that this time, this woman was a legit crack head. She muttered under her breath, smelled terrible, and was missing teeth. Granted, we’ve met non-crack heads who smelled terrible, so that’s not necessarily a determining factor, but the other sh*t we saw was DEFINITELY adding up to crack head. Her outfit alone could’ve passed for something a strung out Amy Winehouse would wear after a bad night out on the town and spending the night in the gutter.

Finally, we found the rental car place and hopped into our white Sebring convertible. We put the roof down and rolled that baby out into the sunlight. Now we were on our way. Baker Beach, here we come! We made our first left and up a very steep hill. It was at this time that we noticed that the car wheezed its way to the top of the hill like an asthmatic. It was clear that we were going to die. When we reached the top of Lombard Street, we whimpered, convinced that the car would disintegrate as it sped down the hill with reckless abandon. Somehow, we managed to make it safely to the beach and back to the hotel so that we could get ready for the evening’s A’s game. Though now we were less confident about the trip to Oakland in this hunk of tin we paid $200 for.

It was a relatively short drive from San Francisco to McAfee Coliseum, but we got stuck in quite a bit of traffic prior to reaching the Bay Bridge. Once over the bridge, we arrived in Oakland quickly and immediately felt a sinking in the pits of our stomachs. Take a look at the snazzy surroundings of McAfee Coliseum.

Now, we’re not going to sit here and claim that Flushing and the Bronx are the sexiest neighborhoods to visit. HOWEVER, we assure you that once you reach the stadiums, both make up for the neighborhoods’ lack of character. McAfee Coliseum on the other hand? Not so much.

As you can see, taking a photo of the place up close doesn’t make it any better than documenting it from afar. We couldn’t help but feel disappointed. In comparison to Safeco Field and AT&T Park, the Coliseum looked pathetic and depressed. It reminded us an awful lot like a state penitentiary. Welcome, friends to the world famous Athletics Penitentiary! Home of the Oakland A’s!

Just look at the entrance. Can you see why we may have neglected to pose for a picture outside it?

However, we didn’t let the exterior of the stadium prevent us from being open minded and from having a good time. After receiving our free giveaway (a Jack Cust bobblehead), we stopped into the team store to buy an Athletics hat and Stomper puppet that trumpets when you squeeze something in his mouth (it was Lisa’s only option for a stuffed animal). While in the store, we made sure to stop and act like a-holes. What kind of blog post would this be without us acting like a-holes?

After making our purchases, we thought we’d be quite clever and meet Stomper in his Fun Zone in section 219 before the game started.

Upon arriving at the Fun Zone, we found out that it’s apparently only open during Saturday and Sunday home games. Bummer. Now we had to return to our method of mascot stalking. Before leaving, Serena decided to ride the elephant for 50 cents.

Next mission? Would Brad Ziegler remember us from Seattle? But first, a giant Oakland A’s symbol!

When we reached the field, Lisa snapped a few photos of the joint.

Utterly empty stands. Completely foreign to us. Do you see how the upper deck has “Athletics” and various numbers printed across it in yellow? Looks like paint, right? It’s not paint. We found out later that since the team can’t sell out a game, the A’s use tarps to cover the upper deck in order to make the stands look more crowded on television.

We headed over to the A’s dugout for batting practice. The A’s have the most efficient autograph system we’ve ever seen. The fans lined up at the A’s dugout and tossed items down to the player signing autographs. Once the fan received his/her autograph, the fan left the line to make room for the other waiting fans. It’s so polite and brilliant! Usually we’re stuck waiting in a mass of shoving and grumbling people. Why other teams/fans don’t institute this policy is beyond us. The Mets and Yankees should take note as this is the only thing that the A’s have done well.

The player signing autographs happened to be none other than Brad Ziegler. Apparently, he was going to receive a “Player of Week” award (or some sort of bull sh*t like that) at this game. We poked our heads through the sea of fans requesting an autograph (which we already had) and asked him how good his memory was. He looked up at us, hesitated, and then smiled. He told us to come around to the side of the dugout.

He posed for another photo with us. Since his mother was standing there, she also took a photo of us, which we found strange. Why would she want a picture of her son with two random a-holes from New York? We’re pretty sure that this photo has since been blown up, framed, and hung over the family’s fireplace. Perhaps sent out as holiday cards. We are wearing green after all.

After parting ways with our token Ginger, we decided that we were hungry. Like there’s a f*cking surprise. Based on a recommendation, we bought Ball Tip Steak Sandwiches at Kinder’s BBQ for nearly $9. On our way to our seats, arms filled with Jack Cust, purses, food, beverages, and other assorted crap that we find ourselves carrying with us everywhere we go, Serena spotted Stomper in the crowd and made a run for it like a dog chasing a squirrel. She shouted something that sounded like gibberish to Lisa and Lisa was forced to run after Serena while carrying a very large open container of soda. Lisa’s progress was clearly much slower than Serena’s. When we reached Stomper, Lisa tried to put her food down to get into the photo, but Serena declared that “there was no time for such trivial matters.” We had to get this picture now before he disappeared on us! It was a borderline emergency. Serena handed her camera to a random man to take our picture. He could’ve been a common thief for all we knew.

We finally found our seats and dug into what we thought would be one tasty sandwich. When we unwrapped this sandwich, we found that it was slathered in mayo. Serena is deathly afraid of mayo. It ignites her gag reflex. The sight of it oozing off of her sandwich made her want to puke. Furthermore, who the f*ck puts mayo on steak? What a-hole thought that slathering steak with mayo would be a kick a$$ idea? It’s disgusting. Do you put mayo on your roast beef? No. Why? Because it doesn’t make any damn sense. You use mustard, horseradish, or steak sauce. If you use mayo at all, you use it for things like turkey, bologna, or egg salad! Sick people!!! Lisa managed to get down half of the sandwich because mayo doesn’t bother her, but she still didn’t think it was a very good sandwich. Definitely not worth $9. Serena only took one bite and nearly choked on it. She had to toss it. Since she was still hungry and now had gross oozing a$$ taste in her mouth, she bought a helmet full of French fries, which turned out to be fantastic.

We sat next to a very nice woman who explained to us about the differences between what the field looked like during an A’s game versus during a Raiders’ game. She found us to be very funny.

Unfortunately for the Athletics, the game didn’t seem like such a fantastic time for them. The Twins kicked a$$ and ended up defeating the A’s 12-2. We left before the end though. The beat down was too much to watch anymore and we weren’t even real Athletics fans. The team’s actual fans left way before we did. Beyond the roof of the Coliseum, we could see a heavy fog rolling in during the 7^th inning. It was a fog we’d never experienced before. It was as thick as the fog featured in the movie, The Fog. It became a little scary for us. The score and the weather. We decided to hit the road and beat the fog to the bridge before it became impossible for us to see while driving.

Here’s a picture of us driving across the Bay Bridge. You can see a hint of the fog in the photo, but what you can’t see is the fact that we were basically outrunning the fog. If we had taken a picture of what the view behind us looked like, you’d see that we were being chased by a wall of fog. We could barely see the lights of the cars behind us.

At the hotel, we pulled into the parking space in front of the main office. We carried Stomper upstairs to the room to introduce him to his new friends. As soon as we entered the room, our telephone started to ring. We found this to be a bit strange considering our friends and family members tended to call us on our cell phones, but Serena answered it anyway. It turned out to be the a-hole man who ran this Palace of Filth we were staying at. “I watched you pull up in front of the office and figured you’d be back in your room by now. You parked over the line. Can you please come back down and adjust the car?” Serena hung up on him. He couldn’t have asked us to move that car while we were down there? Wouldn’t that have made sense? Serena went downstairs to move the car and saw that the wheel was literally on top of the line. Not over it. Annoyed, she moved the car the half inch that was necessary to be all the way in the spot. Thank god we were leaving the next day.

Finally, we presented Stomper to the rest of the kids. It’s the Circle of Life. And it moves us all.

“Welcome to the Hotel California. Such a lovely place.” *Sung in a sarcastic voice*

Tis’ the Season

2011-12-24T10:11:00.001-05:00

Being that the holidays are upon us, we asked what you’d like for Christmas (or Hanukkah). 11 of you sounded off. 5 extremely intelligent people would like find the TBB Christmas Album in their stocking this year. We don’t blame you. It’s pretty epic. The symphony of our voices alone is enough to make you weep. We pretty much rival Josh Groban. Nevermind the powerful, poetic lyrics. Those’ll kill you. No one voted for management, money, hair (really? none of you are bald and wishing for a luscious full head of hair that can be compared to Tim Lincecum’s), alcohol (sorry, the lack of enthusiasm for this option is just flabbergasting), $1 hot dogs (don’t blame you on this one), and a prosthetic limb. 2 people voted for offense and 1 voted for sex, which could technically be interpreted as the same thing if your minds are as dirty as ours are. Regardless, we support both of these options! We’re glad you have your priorities on track. Lastly, each of these options earned 1 vote apiece: a Red Ryder BB gun, pitching, and Malibu Barbie. Only 1 of you wants pitching this year??? In the severe pitching drought that baseball community is suffering from this offseason, we were sure that more of you would be clamoring for some hot shot pitcher to bolster your rotation. Well, except for Cliff Lee since he’s so confident that the pitching staff he is a part of is destined to be “legen…wait for it…dary.”

Outfielder Jason Kubel and the Arizona Diamondbacks have agreed on a 2-year deal worth $15 million. So it really does seem that Twins have no plans to retain anyone. What the hell is going on over there in the Midwest? Kubel saved Serena’s butt late in the fantasy season when she picked him up for Tigers Love Pepper because Nick Swisher was doing nothing but taking large dumps at the plate. We could only assume that Kubel will do for the Diamondbacks what he did for Tigers Love Pepper.

The Mets have finally done something. On Monday, the Mets signed reliever Frank Francisco (really, Mr. and Mrs. Francisco? What are you? A pair of a-holes? You couldn’t give the man a better first name to compliment Francisco?) to a 2-year deal reportedly worth $12 million. In 2011, Francisco went 1-4 with 17 saves and a 3.55 ERA in 54 games with the Blue Jays.

The MLB has released this year’s candidates for the 2012 Hall of Fame ballot. ESPN.com’s Jim Caple has voiced displeasure at the underwhelming choice of candidates, but there is one bright spot in the list…at least for Serena. Bernie Williams!!! Of the ballot’s first-timers that are under consideration, Caple predicts that Bernie is the only player that will earn the 5% necessary to qualify him for the 2013 ballot. Here’s what Caple had to say about Bernie:

“Finally, we get someone who merits serious Cooperstown consideration. Williams was a four-time Gold Glove-winning center fielder on the Yankees' four World Series champions, batted .297 with a .381 on-base percentage for his career, hit .300 eight times, won a batting title, scored 1,366 runs, drove in 1,257 more and appeared in October prime time more often than promos for the Simpsons' "Treehouse of Horror" while driving in a record 80 postseason runs. He'll probably finish just shy for me, but I'll continue to consider him based just on his great "Seinfeld'' appearance, when he asked George, then the Yankees' assistant traveling secretary, ‘Are you the one who put us in that Ramada in Milwaukee?’”

Other first-timers are Jeromy Burnitz (who shouldn’t be allowed into the Hall of Fame simply because his parents were a-holes who apparently didn’t know how to spell the name Jeremy), Vinny Castilla, Brian Jordan, Javy Lopez (who’d be a sexy, sexy addition to the Hall of Fame…DAMN), Bill Mueller, Terry Mulholland, Phil Nevin, Brad Radke, Tim Salmon, Ruben Sierra, Tony Womack, and Eric Young.

We hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday! Drink up, eat cookies, and don’t punch any annoying relatives. We don’t care how badly you may want to

AT&T Park

2011-12-18T07:00:00.001-05:00

AT&T Park

24 Willie Mays Plaza

San Francisco, Ca 94107

August 27, 2008

We flew Alaskan Airlines from Seattle to San Francisco. From the airport, we took the longest cab ride in history to the biggest dump of a hotel in history. Take a look at the view from our hotel room:

Sexy, isn't it? Just a heads up to anyone planning to stay in the Bay Area, DO NOT book a room at the Travelodge on Lombard Street. There are two of these hotels on Lombard Street, so when you call, ask if they are across the street from an I-HOP. If they are, hang up your telephone immediately and proceed to call the other Travelodge. We hear that they actually have a concierge. The cleaning staff also does not leave poop in your toilet while supposedly cleaning your room. Can you imagine how the discovery of random poop in your toilet went down? Allow us to demonstrate.

(Following walking into the room after spending the entire day at the beach)

Lisa: Serena? Did you go to the bathroom today?

Serena: What?

Lisa: Like in our bathroom. Did you say, do something and forget to flush?

Serena: No?

Lisa: Oh. Okay, well someone pooped in our toilet and forgot to flush.

Serena: What??

Lisa: I’m staring at it right now. Can you please come look?

Serena: NO!

Lisa: Please?

Serena: NO!!!!!!

Lisa: Should I flush it?

Serena: YES!!!!

The aforementioned cleaning staff also ate all of the candy that The Boy had given us to snack on during our trip and left the wrappers on the nightstand. Like we wouldn’t notice our missing candy and the wrappers just sitting there. However, the cleaning staff was not the worst part. When Lisa went to use the shower for the first time, she only found one bath towel. One. For two women with really long and thick hair on their heads. No big deal. Serena would take care of this. She went down to the main office and had this conversation:

Serena: Hi, we need two more bath towels, please?

A-hole: I have no bath towels.

Serena: You have no bath towels?

A-hole: No.

Serena: How is that possible?

A-hole: I have this (holds up a small wash cloth and hands it to Serena).

Serena: (holding said wash cloth up to her boob) Does this look to you like it’s going to work?

A-Hole: Oh. I have something better. Here (hands Serena a bath mat).

Serena: (silently stares in absolutely hatred for one full moment before speaking) Right.

Sorry. Back to AT&T Park. The whole purpose of this blog. From our spiffy hotel, we took the bus through wonderful Chinatown to AT&T Park. We’re pretty sure that the bus was way over its legal capacity because for the entire ride, we were crammed into people’s armpits. It was hot and while it wasn’t confirmed, it’s quite possible that there were folks who failed to invest in deodorant. To make matters worse, a stranger took a photo of Serena. The creeper explained that the photo was for art class and that he’d call the photo, “On a Crowded Bus.” Wow. That’s some powerful sh*t.

The ball park was the last stop on the route and naturally, the bus was packed until the second to last stop. The stop was only a block from the stadium apparently, but since we couldn’t see it and we didn’t know where we were, we pretty much stalked the other two Giants fans that had been on the bus with us.

Our first task upon entering the stadium was to get our merchandise: a hat and a Lou the Seal beanie baby. After the store, we walked down to the field to watch batting practice and hopefully, get an autograph from Barry Zito (yes, again…shut up), but he ran into the dugout before we could flag him down. The remainder of the team jogged off the field with Zito as well, so disappointed, we left our stolen seats to investigate the rest of the park. We found that left field had a bevy of activities to behold! We were denied entrance to the little leaguer’s ballpark because we were too big.

Height restrictions did not prevent Serena from enjoying herself on the Coke slide though.

Following the fun slide, Serena found the Crazy Crab’z stand behind center field (and behind AT&T Park’s scoreboard) that she’d heard so much about. She bought a crab sandwich for $15 and it was AMAZING. And enormous. And served on grilled sourdough bread. Well worth the $15. Lisa was not down with the crab, so she passed on this meal. After Serena devoured the sandwich, we continued on our merry way. We found a Ghiradelli trolley on the other side of the scoreboard.

We hopped off the trolley to take a peek at McCovey’s Cove. Dozens of kayakers were already in position to catch a home run ball. On the field behind us, the Rockies were taking batting practice. We could see McAfee Coliseum in the distance. Before finishing our circuit, we wandered over to the left field wall to get a full view of the park. If you look in the far corner of the photo, you can see the Bay Bridge.

After touring the park, we headed to our actual seats for the game. We got a view of Lou the Seal for the first time. Had we known this would’ve been our only opportunity to get our picture taken with him, we wouldn’t have acted like such lazy a-holes.

Just before first pitch, Lisa bought a sausage sandwich because she couldn’t figure out what else she wanted and we all know how much she loves Italian sausages. Unfortunately, she forgot that we were closer to Chinatown than Little Italy. The sandwich was just so-so. The game was a pitchers’ duel between the one and only Tim Lincecum (<3) and the Rockies’ Livian Hernandez.

The Giants were losing up until the 7^th inning when we decided we needed to feed on garlic fries. While stuffing our stinky faces at a nearby bar-top table, Bengie Molina and Pablo Sandoval hit back to back home runs. The most exciting thing happened next as we jumped up and down, screaming and high-fiving like we were actual Giants fans. The fog horn in centerfield went off. Fountains sprayed straight up into the air from behind right field. It was pretty close to being just as fantastic as when Shea Stadium’s aged home run apple emerges from the decrepit top hat after a home run. At one point, Serena shouted at Lisa, “we should move to San Francisco and become Giants fans!” Lisa agreed. Then Lou the Seal hopped onto the dugout and partied like a rock star. This was our chance.

We attempted to bob and weave through the field level section surrounding the Giants’ dugout, but our efforts were deterred by fences blocking our path. Lisa politely asked a very sweet elderly lady working in the section how it would be possible for us to get down there to meet Lou. Apparently, Lisa wasn’t clear enough because what we got instead of a photo with Lou was a baseball card of Lou.

As the lady handed us the baseball cards, she cheerfully stated, “I normally give these to the kids, but you girls seem to really like seals.” She then added, “He usually comes out during the bottom of the 9^th inning to rally the team when they’re losing.” Um…lady? Have you checked the score? The Giants are winning. It was a bittersweet game for us. The Giants won 4-1, but we suffered our second defeat in the Mascot Game. Damn you, Phillie Phanatic and Lou!

We took the bus back to our super awesome flea bag luxury suite. Our bus was crammed to the brim again. The strange part about it is the fact that our bus was followed by another bus on the same exact route. It was virtually empty. Mindboggling. We introduced our newest edition to the gang.

He wept tears of misery at the sight of his new home, but his new friends did try to make him feel as comfy as possible. The following morning, we had plans to pick up our sweet rental car (we invested in a convertible. Oh, yeah) and drive to the beach before hitting up our last stop on the Northern Cali tour circuit. Oakland. Where we’d be reunited with red headed Brad Ziegler. “Reunited and it feels so good!”

All We Want for Christmas

2011-12-17T22:00:00.000-05:00

A sh*t storm went down last week. Talk about a Wind of Change. We think that maybe this is what the Scorpions were singing about. The baseball offseason. Makes total sense now. With all of the changes going down, we asked which team you felt should earn the Most Improved Award. 6 of you felt that the Marlins’ aggressive purchases make them most improved for the 2012 season. 1 person felt that the addition of Albert Pujols and CJ Wilson made the Angels most improved and 1 person thought that the departure of Jose Reyes made the Mets the most improved. Not a single soul voted for the Arizona Diamondbacks. So sad.

Not much in terms of transactions happening this week. Maybe the MLB has taken time off to do their holiday shopping. Outfielder Michael Cuddyer signed a 3-year deal with the Rockies worth just over $31 million, but the Rockies won’t make the official announcement until Cuddyer passes his physical.

As expected, the Phillies resigned Jimmy Rollins with a contract worth $33 million over 3 years and includes a vesting option for the 4^th year.

Last year, we gave you our rendition of the “12 Days of Christmas” called “The 12 Days of Torture.” In the spirit of the holidays, we’d like to present you with our cover of Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas.” It’s called “All We Want for Christmas.” We’re so creative, aren’t we?

We don’t want a lot for Christmas.

There’s just a couple of things we need.

We don’t care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree.

We just want some players for our own

more than you could ever know.

Make our wish come true.

All we want for Christmas

is for our teams to be improved.

(cue the silver bells)

We don’t want a lot for Christmas.

There’s just a couple of things we need.

We don’t care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree.

We don’t need to throw our traitor jerseys

there within the fireplace.

Santa Claus won’t make us happy

with Carlos Beltran on Christmas Day.

We just want some players for our own

more than you could ever know.

Make our wish come true.

All we want for Christmas

is for our teams to be improved.

Improved, baby.

Oh, we won’t ask for much this Christmas.

We won’t even wish to bid for Norichika Aoki

and we’re just gonna keep on waiting

for spring training.

We won’t make a list and send it

to New York City for Fred Wilpon.

We won’t even hold our breaths to

hear that the Yankees signed Roy Oswalt.

Cause we just want a team that wins

without giving us a bunch of douches.

What more can we do?

Baby, all we want for Christmas

is for our teams to be improved.

Improved.

Oh, the Marlins are spending

money everywhere

and the sound of Mets fans

moaning fills the air.

And Angels fans are singing.

We don’t hear any change jingling.

Santa, won’t you bring us what we need?

Won’t you please give both of our teams a good year?

Oh, we don’t want a lot for Christmas.

This is all we’re asking for.

We just want to see our teams

in the playoffs next year.

We just want some players for our own

more than you could ever know.

Make our wish come true.

All we want for Christmas

is for our teams to be improved.

Improved, baby.

Thank you, New York! Goodnight! *Insert crowd going wild*

Safeco Field

2011-12-11T16:26:00.001-05:00

Safeco Field

1250 1^st Avenue

Seattle, WA 98134

August 24, 2008

Our first major stadium trip was to the west coast. Needless to say, we were ridiculously excited (just not about the flying part). The people we spoke to about this trip were impressed with our dedication. Our goal was to hit three stadiums over the course of the vacation. Our overnight flight was smelly and unpleasant, but we’re not going to get into that at this time. If you’d like to hear more about it, email us and we’ll tell you about the gassy individuals sitting near us.

We arrived at the Inn at Queen Anne in the wee hours of the morning. It’s a lovely, quaint hotel, but it’s on the old side, supposedly haunted, and has no elevators. Therefore, we had to lug two overweight suitcases up three flights of stairs.

On to the actual game. We took a bus to Safeco Field (one of the easiest and cleanest public transportation rides we’ve ever taken).

We bought our traditional souvenirs (a hat and a mascot) at the team shop before heading inside to watch batting practice. It was a beautiful sunny day, contrary to what we’d been expecting. Because of the amazing weather, Safeco’s dome roof was open, exposing us to the clear, blue sky and the roof of Qwest Field, home of the Seahawks.

The Oakland A’s were warming up in left field, but before checking that out, we got our picture taken with the field in the background.

In left field, we chose seats in the first row. As we peacefully enjoyed the warmth that the sun provided, took in the sights of Safeco, and listened to the calming sound of the baseball slapping the leather of a mitt, we were suddenly interrupted by alarmed shouting. Serena looked toward the field and saw a white sphere speeding toward us. Shrieking at Lisa (who was fervently searching her purse for something), she ducked. The ball passed directly between where our heads had been and nailed the seat behind us with a loud smack. The fans scurried to behind us to claim ownership of the rouge ball. We slowly sat up, struggling to catch our breath and slow our heart beats. A security guard came over to check on us to make sure there was no brain damage (there wasn’t…only emotional). Henry Rodriguez, the player on the receiving end of the catch, checked on us from afar and a few fans encouraged him to throw us a ball, which he did and which Serena caught. After batting practice ended, the culprit who tried to kill us jogged over and apologized. We think he was being sincere, but there’s a slight chance that he’d been hired to “take us out.” The culprit turned out to be A’s relief pitcher, Brad Ziegler. He claimed that he felt pretty guilty about trying to assassinate us, so he posed for a picture and signed two balls for us.

We told him about our stadium tour and he encouraged us to stop by the A’s dugout to see him when we visited Oakland later in the week.

Once he disappeared into the bullpen, there were no other players to watch on the field, so we wandered around the stadium to get a better look at the place (and perhaps find Mariner Moose). We found on one wall, depictions of the American League and National League created with license plates. American League:

National League (a bit out of date, considering it’s still showing the Montreal Expos):

While we took pictures of the license plate artwork, Mariner Moose’s #1 fan shuffled by. Literally. We’re not exaggerating. This dude is Mariner Moose’s #1 fan.

We’d like everyone who has been calling us furries to really study this photo of the one who calls himself “Moose Man.” He has dozens of little Mariner Mooses affixed to his outfit. So…no more calling us weirdos, kay? This guy has totally topped any bizarre behavior we may have exhibited (for example, our traveling stuffed mascot entourage). Feeling better about ourselves having witnessed this situation, we continued on our way to find the location of the real Mariner Moose and discovered this stamped on the floor:

We followed the trail of hoof prints to the Moose’s Den (located on the main level behind center field), where Mariner Moose poses for photos between the 2^nd and 3^rd innings and 7^th and 8^th innings. We’d have to return for our photo opportunity.

It was at this time that the crisp blue sky rapidly began to turn to a dark charcoal. Rain drops started to darken the cement and then the coolest thing happened. The dome’s roof began to close. We stopped walking and stared open-mouthed as the roof slowly made its way across the field. We took at least ten pictures of the stupid thing closing and gawked like tourists while locals walked around us, paying no attention to what was happening.

At the end of the 2^nd inning, we returned to the Moose’s Den to get our picture taken. As we waited on line, we could barely control our happiness. Why don’t all stadiums do this? It would solve the major problem that we have regarding having to stalk the creature and its entourage around the entire stadium in an effort to get a picture taken! It’s such a waste of time. In the Moose’s Den, not only do they take your picture on your camera, but they also take a professional picture that they print off and GIVE to you without asking for any money. They simply hand it to you on your way out of the Den. It’s a complimentary photo of you and glory. Free.

On our way back to our seats, we stumbled across yet another free activity. Face painting! Where the hell were we? The Twilight Zone? Since when does anyone in this country give anything for free? Especially in the MLB. We obviously couldn’t turn down an opportunity to be sprayed in the face for free. Normally, in New York, we’d have to pay for this kind of sh*t.

We decided to get the Mariners logo sprayed on opposite cheeks (on our faces, not a$$es…we feel that it’s important that we specify with this audience).

Ta da! Now we really were #1 Mariners fans.

Free mascot picture and free face painting. There was only thing that could top this ice cream sundae with a cherry and that was a nice, fat, juicy Italian sausage. We climbed the steps to the upper deck where our seats were located and bought our sandwiches. Apparently, Safeco is known for its Ichiro Roll, but feeling skeptical about eating sushi at a stadium, we did not partake.

The sandwiches were not good. Ok. They weren’t necessarily bad, but they weren’t good either. Enough’s enough. At AT&T Park, we would NOT be buying an Italian sausage. It’s just senseless at this point. Clearly the Italian goodies should be left to Italy and New York because no one else (except for RFK Stadium) does it better. Lisa was so disappointed in her sausage that she bought an ice cream sundae in a Mariners helmet cup.

Back to the actual game being played on the field. A Mariner (who we can’t remember exactly) hit a home run and on the electronic scoreboard in center field, Eric Estrada popped up and danced. This prompted a hysterical fit of laughter that garnered strange looks from our neighbors. If anyone knows the reason for this Eric Estrada video, please email us. We need to know. We struggle to sleep at night because of this.

The Mariners’ closer, JJ Putz, was called upon to shut down the A’s in the 9^th inning. Putz jogged from the bullpen to the mound to the head-banging sound of AC/DC’s “Thunder.” Only two lone jack wagons rose to their feet to cheer and scream their heads off for their favorite team’s closer. Can you take a wild guess as to who those jack wagons were? It was us. Like a-holes. We looked like lunatics. Other than a few scattered applauses and cheers throughout the stands, the entrance of the team’s closer was nothing like what we were used to with the Mets and Yankees. In New York, both closers were signaled by Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.” In Billy Wagner’s case, the song signaled a chorus of groans. In Mariano Rivera’s case, Metallica was greeted by a stadium shaking beneath a crowd of fans stomping their feet in appreciation and enthusiastic cheering. For JJ Putz, he got one entrance at Safeco Field where two idiot New Yorkers named Lisa and Serena screamed their heads offs for him in typical New York fashion.

When we exited the stadium, we stepped into what seemed like a monsoon. We decided to be super clever and try to hail a cab instead of waiting on the bus stop. Little did we know that Safeco has a taxi stand and scoring a cab on the wrong side of the stadium would be nearly impossible. It took at least 30 minutes of standing in the freezing cold rain for us to catch a cab and in that time, we saw our bus pull up twice at the stop across the street. When we finally climbed into the backseat of our chariot, shivering (note: both of us wore flip flops), the driver said, “Why didn’t you grab a cab at the taxi stand?” Fail.

Back at the warm, dry hotel room, Lisa introduced Mariner Moose to his new family and then we took a nap like two elderly folks in a nursing home.

The next day, we’d be heading to San Francisco for our Giants and Athletics leg of the tour.

Until then, we’ll leave you with the words of the Beatles: “we’ve got a ticket to ride. We’ve got a ticket to ride. We’ve got a ticket to ride, but we don’t care.”

We Don’t Handle Change Well

2011-12-10T13:15:00.002-05:00

Now that we’ve announced our plans for our 2012 stadium tour, we asked you to tell us which trip you were most excited to read about. Of 5 votes, 3 of you chose Atlanta and 2 of you chose Toronto. No one seems to care about DC.

Now…on to the good stuff. So long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, good night, Jose Reyes! The self-absorbed shortstop signed a 6-year contract earlier this week with the Miami Marlins worth $106 million. According to King A-hole, uh, we mean, Reyes, he wanted to remain in New York, however “they didn’t make a real offer. So that means they don’t want me there.” The Mets offered a deal that is believed to have been worth 5 years and $80 million. Sorry, Reyes. This wasn’t about staying in New York. You wanted the money. Or dinero, if that helps you understand better. For the first time in years, the Mets made a good business decision. Reyes will probably play up to his potential during his first season just to show the Marlins that he wasn’t a mistake. In the following seasons, he’ll resort back to the laziness and I-Don’t-Give-a-F*ck attitude that he displayed in New York the last time he signed a big contract. Then in his 6^th and final year, he’ll play his so-called heart out and some other team will be stupid enough and excited enough to shoot their load and give him more money. Thank you, Mets for doing the right thing.

Another addition to the Marlins is Mark Buehrle, who might be leaving The Windy City, but isn’t going for a complete change. Buehrle will be reunited with manager Ozzie Guillen in Miami. Tired of waiting for Albert Pujols to make a decision, the Marlins pulled their offer and turned their sights on pitching. Hence, the addition of Buehrle. Buehrle’s contract includes a 4 years and $191 million. Hopefully, spending money like it’s going out of style pays off for the Marlins because paying for a new stadium and new roster costs a pretty penny and if this endeavor fails miserably, it’s just gonna get awkward and ugly.

David Ortiz will be returning to the Red Sox as their designated hitter. On Wednesday, Ortiz accepted salary arbitration which binds him to the team for at least another year. They’ll continue to work toward a multi-year contract potentially until February, but for now, Big Papi is at least returning for the 2012 season.

On Thursday, MAJOR changes went down. The Marlins may have stopped sweet talking Pujols in order to get him into the sack, but the Angels stepped right in and swept him off his feet! Pujols signed a 10-year, $254 million contract, making him the second highest paid baseball player in history and the third player to break the $200 million barrier. The Angels also signed pitcher CJ Wilson (who happens to be pretty darn cute) for a deal reportedly worth 5 years and $77.5 million.

The Diamondbacks dealt one of their top pitching prospects to the A’s in exchange for pitchers Trevor Cahill and Craig Breslow. Clearly, the A’s have decided to roll over and play dead this season, conceding the AL West to the Angels and hoping for a brighter future in the seasons to come.

What have the Yankees and Mets done? Absolutely nothing. Hooray!

Thanks in part to the number of changes that went down this week, it’s been pretty stressful for us. You can’t just dump all of this on us without any sort of preparation. You have to ease us into change! Ball players are so selfish sometimes.

Yankees Stadium

2011-12-04T14:08:00.001-05:00

Yankees Stadium

161^st Street & River Avenue

Bronx, NY 10451

July 21, 2008

During this time frame, we had hit games at Shea Stadium and Yankees Stadium within a matter of weeks. We actually went to Yankees Stadium twice in July and once to Shea Stadium. This may cause you to think that for us, money grows on trees. It doesn’t. We’re just stupid and do not plan accordingly. Of the two July Yankees games, we chose to blog about this one because it was the last game we attended together at Yankees Stadium. The Yankees’ opponent was the Twins.

When we arrived at the stadium, we headed down to field level as per our usual tradition to watch batting practice and attempt to meet players from the opposing team (more specifically Justin Morneau) because the players on our own teams have no desire to talk to us. We’d like to blame David Wright for this one again. He has clearly blacklisted us in the New York baseball market.

We stood by the right field wall, minding our own business when a ball suddenly shot off of a player’s bat and made a bee line for our direction. We squealed in terror (sorry, folks, when Serena played softball, she was armed with a mitt to catch line drives. Handling one of those with her bare hand is simply not an option) and ducked. Unfortunately, not everyone in our section followed our lead. We were swarmed by dozens of crazed baseball fans all gunning for that stupid ball. Serena hugged the padded wall and watched in horror as Lisa was swept away from her by the insane crowd. The manner in which she was shuffled between the men vying for this ball made her look like a dolphin performing tricks at Sea World. Serena is pretty sure she saw Lisa’s feet actually leave the ground.

Thankfully, one of the idiots abruptly stood in triumph, proudly holding the ball over his head. Lisa made her way back to Serena. This was clearly a dangerous situation so we agreed that it was safer to head to our seats where we could eat our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in safety.

We would’ve liked to partake in an Italian sausage sandwich, but thanks to our poor planning, we didn’t have enough money to buy one. We also didn’t have enough money to buy water bottles, so we brought our own. Sadly, we didn’t bring enough water into the stadium with us either. The temperature was over 90 degrees. Combine that with the high humidity and that equals a dehydrated and unsexy mess. Yup. We’re f*cking awesome.

The cast of characters that joined us in our section were pretty fascinating. To our right, Serena’s neighbors were a group of Alabama boys who flew into New York to catch a game at Yankees Stadium in its final season. One of them claimed that he knew one of the Twins’ relief pitcher, but he couldn’t produce a name and besides that, why didn’t he have better seats? Normally, we don’t have any problems with tourists. Come to New York, have a good time, tell your friends. Great. However, we do have a problem when tourists spend 90% of the game telling you how much they hate your city, hate your baseball team, trash Shea Stadium when they’ve never been there, and talk about how crappy Yankees Stadium is. Dude, then why are you here??? To make matters worse, they talked to Serena so much that she couldn’t even watch the game! Who goes to a sporting event to spend the entire time talking to strangers and zero time watching the game? Her immediate neighbor in particular kept trying to convince her how great the Miami Dolphins were and how terrible the New York Giants were. First of all, you live in Alabama. Where did the Dolphins come from? Second of all, no. The Dolphins are not better than the Giants. If you think that, you must be an avid crack smoker. Lisa blatantly turned her back on the conversation and left Serena to deal with this alone. Literally. Lisa turned in her seat so that her back faced us. She basically watched the game with her peripheral view. Serena would’ve told the guy off, but he already hated New York (“this is the dirtiest city I’ve ever been to in my entire life.” Really, bro? Have you been to Los Angeles?) and she didn’t want him to return to Alabama and bash the state’s inhabitants too!

On top of this nonsense, by the 5^th inning, we were completely parched, our water bottles were empty, and our new “friends” had to have imbibed at least 2 cases of beer without showing any signs of stopping. As they continued to hassle every single beer vendor that passed us by, all we wanted to do was ask them to throw one water bottle our way. We felt that we deserved it considering the amount of effort it required just to sit near them.

At around the 7^th inning, we opened our wallets and pooled our money. We discovered that we had just enough money to buy ourselves cups of Minute Maid Lemonade ices and still get ourselves home. Thank god! We called the next vendor over and bought our happiness.

After we bought our ices, we cut our losses. It was clear the ‘Bama Boys were not going to do us any favors and Serena was sick of missing the game’s action in order to be polite. Let those a-holes bash New Yorkers. They already hated New York. What difference did it make? The Yankees were finally beating down on someone (instead of the other way around) and we wanted to watch at least one inning without our ears being chewed off. Eventually, the ‘Bama Boys took a hint and left us alone.

At this time, we were finally truly able to take in the game and our surroundings. Unfortunately, our surroundings didn’t offer us anything more inspiring than the ‘Bama Boys. At Lisa’s left, we were greeted by a side boob. No, it wasn’t Peter Griffin’s. It was a side boob belonging to a young lady watching the game with her father. She decided to wear a backless shirt (and obviously no bra since the shirt was backless) and a mini skirt. We’re embarrassed to admit that for a good portion of an inning, we stared at this girl, fearing that at any moment, the wrong movement would produce an entire boob. It seemed that she received guidance from Alyssa Milano regarding appropriate fashion for sporting events. In retrospect, we probably should’ve taken a picture of this girl for you to see, but it’s probably considered rude to post a picture of a stranger’s boob. We’re not that mean. Mean. But not that mean.

Before leaving the stadium (for Lisa, it would be the last time), we got our final picture taken at Yankees Stadium. Aren’t we charming after an evening of sitting in sweat?

We close things out in honor of a man who claims to be a Mets fan, but clearly is a closet Yankees fan because we see him at every Yankees game, fist pumping in the upper deck. In the fine words of everyone’s favorite Guido anthem (and by this point, you should all be aware of how much Lisa loves her Guidos), “Don’t you know, pump it up. You’ve got to pump it up!” Here’s to you, Dino.

A side note completely unrelated to this game’s blog post, since we’re complete idiots and never showed you what the original Yankees Stadium looked like, here’s an extra photo from an earlier game from this particular season. Please disregard the construction going on in the background.

The MLB Continues Not to Hire Us

2011-12-03T18:26:00.000-05:00

Last week’s poll focused on the Red Sox’s pending decision regarding their new manager. At blogging time, the candidates had been narrowed down to Bobby Valentine and Gene Lamont. Naturally, because we’re jerk offs, we can’t just give you two normal options to choose from and as usual, you did not fail to deliver stupidity. This is why you continue to amuse us. Of the 8 votes, 4 of you wisely chose Serena. Obviously, she is a feisty, intelligent, and no BS kind of girl. She’d make an excellent manager. Unfortunately, she was not even considered for the position, which is a damn shame. Since she has little to no respect for the majority of the players on the Red Sox, she could’ve easily overhauled that lineup and revamped its attitude without adding any new players, saving the franchise a boat load of money! Quite simply, all she would’ve had to do was destroy whatever self-respect and ego these players had, make them feel less like men and more like pathetic and sniveling peons, and then slowly rebuild them into respectable, unselfish, and team-minded athletes. Following the mental renovation, the players would be put on a strict diet and workout regime. There’s no room for overweight and out of shape players on this team. The fried chicken and beer would have to be saved for the off season (hear that, Red Sox bullpen?). The men who crumbled under the pressure clearly do not belong on this redesigned team and would therefore be disposed of as she can’t afford dead weight in the clubhouse. Alas, this will not be so.

This signals the third time that Serena has been rejected for a position with the MLB. You may recall that prior to their financial ruin, Serena had reached out to the Mets offering to be a consultant for the team. She’s pretty confident that her being a Yankees fan had something to do with their lack of responsiveness, but it’s quite clear that they needed her assistance badly. Just look at the mess they got themselves into. She also later applied for a community events position with the Pittsburgh Pirates. She never heard back from them either. Still can’t figure out what went wrong with that one. As a package deal, we recommended our skill sets on several occasions to the MLB, including offering to serve on the panel of experts designated to choose the individuals to fill the open management positions following the 2010 season (including the Mets). We even suggested ourselves as the replacement Kansas City Royals’ mascot after an awkward hot dog incident left the original individual unemployed.

The next runner up in the poll with 3 votes is Buddy the Elf. This is a fine choice as we’re pretty sure that Buddy would pretty much run the Red Sox into the ground, leaving the AL East title wide open for the Yankees. J 1 person went the adult route and chose Bobby Valentine. Boo hiss. No one voted for Gene Lamont. Poor Gene. He’s like the fat kid last to be picked for Dodgeball. It’s okay, Gene. Have some cake.

On the subject of our poll, earlier this week, the Red Sox officially announced Bobby Valentine as their new manager. Awesome. So they’ve traded in a creepy, level 5-looking manager (albeit a good one) for a loud-mouthed, arrogant a-hole. Good times. Valentine’s new role includes a 2-year contract with options for the 2014 and 2015 seasons.

Late Thursday night, the Marlins reached a deal with closer Heath Bell for 3 years, pending a physical (as always). The contract is reportedly worth $27 million. So far, the Marlins have certainly flexed their off season muscles. New name, new stadium, and new tacky uniforms obviously require a new roster, right?

Mariano Rivera had surgery to remove polyps on his vocal cords yesterday at New York Presbyterian Hospital. He won’t be able to speak for a week, but he’ll be fully recovered in one month and the procedure should have zero effect on his pitching ability for the upcoming season.

There has been no update on the Jose Reyes front, though Mets GM Sandy Alderson claims that he plans on reopening talks with the a-hole short stop’s representation during the Winter Meetings, which begin on Monday in Dallas.

Joe Mauer has been busy preparing for the 2012 season after his 2011 season came to a close thanks to a bout of pneumonia. According to Mauer, he’s “healthy and happy.” That’s nice. And reassuring for Twins fans and potential fantasy baseball participants (ahem, Tigers Love Pepper). But what kind of non-elderly person contracts pneumonia?? This still bugs us! What’s next for Mauer? Yellow Fever? Small Pox? Dentures?

Last week, we announced our 2012 stadium tour schedule. While we haven’t been able to buy tickets yet, we’re pretty confident in which games we’d like to go to. In fact, we’ve been so bold as to book our airfare to Toronto thanks to a great deal we found on Black Friday. We’ll be in (Oh) Canada from July 26^th-29^th and plan on seeing the Jays play the Tigers either Friday night or Saturday afternoon. The goal is to visit Atlanta over Memorial Day weekend, but right now that’s still up in the air. We’ll be able to provide a more definite answer on that in January when Lisa gets her time off approved. Finally, we plan on driving down to DC on Friday, August 31^st or Saturday, September 1^st for a Nationals/Cardinals game. Exciting, exciting. Now we wait with bated breath for single-game tickets to go on sale.

Shea Stadium

2011-11-27T17:08:00.000-05:00

Shea Stadium

23-01 Roosevelt Avenue

Flushing, NY 11368

July 8, 2008

Ahh…July. Nice and humid. A perfect day for a Mets/Giants face off. A perfect day to finally get one’s picture with Barry Zito…maybe even say more than two words to him without stuttering or drooling on oneself. It was also a perfect day to appreciate the New York Jets…though we’re not quite sure how this idea came to fruition. We arrived at Shea Stadium in time for batting practice (as usual). As we walked to the gate, what did we happen to see? A New York Jets jump, jump. At least, that’s what Lisa saw. Serena spotted something much more important with her shoddy vision. Mr. Met. And he was wearing a Jets jersey. Naturally, we needed our picture taken.

Note that constant happiness on his face. Even when the Mets’ bullpen blows a 10-run lead, Mr. Met’s smile never wavers. No. He doesn’t call the relief pitchers nasty and foul names like we do. No. He doesn’t call David Wright a jerk for avoiding Lisa and Serena yet again. No. He doesn’t run away and hide in fear from Lisa and Serena’s cameras despite the fact that he may want to. No. He only smiles and high-fives his admirers with his giant, soft, fuzzy, and white hands. Could our luck really be changing? We met Mr. Met within a mere 5 minutes of arriving. Maybe this was the day that we’d leave a Mets game with a marriage proposal by both Barry Zito and David Wright. At the very least, a date? Maybe we’d win this ridiculously great prize like a JetBlue getaway. Or (and this was the more likely option) was this a sign that we were about to be struck by lightning and die?

We sincerely hope that there are multiple people playing the role of Mr. Met. After all, we’ve had at least 6 pictures taken with him up until this point and if it is only one individual, he probably fears for his life. Anywho, we practically skipped into Shea Stadium after that chance encounter and headed down to field level to watch batting practice. The Giants were on the field and our primary mission was to meet Barry Zito…again. You might recall our incident in DC when we attempted to get his autograph at RFK Stadium and failed, however that was not our first encounter with Mr. Zito. Admittedly, we met him at an earlier Mets/Giants game. Serena had managed to get him to sign his Athletics baseball card. Unfortunately, in her nervousness, she forgot to remove the card from its protective plastic covering, so he signed that instead of the actual card. She’s a real jack ass. We meandered our way down to the left field wall and waited patiently as he stretched nearby. Eventually, he slowly made his way over to where we stood. Behind us, two Giants fans requested that Lisa get Zito to sign their baseball.

Of course, Serena forgot the baseball card for him to sign, but she did manage to get her picture taken with him without fainting. He seemed nice enough, but he didn’t say much and he didn’t ask for Serena’s phone number. Perhaps David Wright told him not to. That bastard. Or maybe because Serena looked like she had a stink eye. We may never know why.

To thank Lisa for her kindness, our newly found Giants friends treated us to the largest beers we’ve ever seen. They sat with us for a little bit in the field level section while we watched the rest of batting practice. They even took this somewhat decent picture of us:

Unfortunately, as we proceeded to get drunk on empty stomachs, the novelty of us wore off. We started rambling about random topics until finally, they stood up and claimed that they had to leave in order to “use the bathroom.” We’re pretty sure this was code for, “you guys are really annoying and we’re going to leave you now. We’re so sorry that we bought you those beers.” We’d just been dissed by two fat, unattractive dudes. We decided we needed hot dogs. Now, listen. This is very important. When visiting Yankees Stadium, you do Italian sausage, but here in Flushing? You do the doggies. We’re not sure how or why this happened, but the Mets do hot dogs better and the Yankees do sausages better.

After purchasing our dogs, we headed up to our real seats in the upper deck to watch the game. When we reached our seats, we noticed that it was magically the 2^nd inning. Where the hell had we been? How did we miss 2 whole innings without recalling a single play? And the Mets were winning! You’d think the Mets leading the game would have managed to stick out in our minds. Who gets that drunk off of one beer? Were they magical cups of Bud Light?

At about the 8^th inning, we got tired (we were probably coming down from our drunken hot dog high), so we decided we wanted ice cream. Our favorite ice cream place was a little family-operated place around the corner from Serena’s house. In fact, that night was buy one, get one free night, so we decided to leave. Before leaving our section, we got our picture taken by a 12-year old girl who showed off better photography skills than most of the adults we’ve bumped into during our travels. Please disregard the sweaty, skanky look that we are sporting in this picture. We like to think that we clean up rather nice.

Of course, we couldn’t exit our section without bumping into twins celebrating their birthday. They were quite fond of Lisa. They grabbed her and insisted that Serena take their picture. Wanting to get out of the stadium alive and not raped, Serena acquiesced.

As we headed down the ramps of the stadium leading to the building’s exit, we bumped into the “cherry on top.” What, might you ask, could possibly make this night better? Meeting Mr. Met again. Never one to pass up a photo op with one of the league’s best mascots, we took another picture with him. We acknowledge the fact that we don’t look hot in this picture, but look at how thrilled he is to be taking yet another photo with us!

We briefly got lost in the parking lot while searching for Lisa’s automobile.

Thankfully, we found it by Lisa incessantly pressing the panic button on her alarm key chain. Serena just so happened to be standing next to the car when the frightening alarm went off.

A worthy note regarding a piece of Shea Stadium’s history that needs to be included in this post, but is unrelated to this game is the home run apple that lives just beyond the center field wall. Since no one on the Mets hit a home run during this game, we didn’t get to take a picture of it. The rising of the paper mâché apple (it’s supposedly made of fiber glass, but it certainly doesn’t look like fiber glass) from a faded black top hat following a Mets home run is one of the most exciting things that Shea Stadium has to offer. No matter how many games we attended at Shea, it never failed to excite us when a Mets player hit a home run and it wasn’t just because they put a run on the board. It was because that old, shabby apple slowly crept its way out of the hat. We also secretly hoped that one day it would accidentally topple over and squash Carlos Beltran. It’s not like we wanted Beltran to die. We just wanted him out of the lineup. Perhaps on another team. Despite its ratty appearance (and rumors that Middle Earth and a squirrel colony inhabited the top hat), we’re quite fond of the apple. We’ll be extremely put out if we discover that Citi Field does not accommodate its presence. In fact, we may instigate a revolt.

In the famous and highly brilliant words of Bon Jovi, “oh, we’re halfway there. Oh, oh. Livin’ on a prayer.”

How to Make Lisa Depressed in 5 Votes or Less

2011-11-27T14:11:00.000-05:00

There was absolutely no rhyme or reason to last week’s poll. We wish there was point to it, but there isn’t. We asked what would you do for a Klondike Bar. Unfortunately, it seems like you people have grossly interpreted the choices that were made available to you. Now Lisa wants to kill herself and/or gorge herself on M&M cookies. You were supposed to pick the “extreme sport” that you’d be willing to do in order to be rewarded with a Klondike Bar. As in I love Klondike Bars so much that I’d do this just to get one! 5 of you chose “Make out with Lisa.” Do you really think that making out with Lisa is equivalent to an extreme sport? Or did you cotton-headed ninny muggings really think that by choosing this option, you’d get a chance to make out with Lisa? 1 person chose “attempt to ride a great white shark across the Atlantic Ocean.” It’s no secret as to who the person is that chose this option. If you need it spelled out for you, you clearly do not read this blog often enough. Other acceptable choices would have been: wrestling a bear, standing on your head for one whole hour in the middle of Times Square, eating 6 pizzas in one sitting, or streaking through the quad.

On Monday, Justin Verlander became the first starting pitcher since 1986 (young Boston pitcher, Roger Clemens) to win the AL MVP Award with 280 points. Jacoby Ellsbury finished second in the race with 242 points. There have been arguments against Verlander being the winner, citing that Ellsbury’s numbers/contributions outweigh the worth of Verlander’s. Apparently, there are also a few folks displeased with the outcome of the NL MVP race. Ryan Braun finished ahead of Matt Kemp by 56 points on Tuesday. It’s easier to compare the numbers of Braun to Kemp considering that both are outfielders whereas Ellsbury’s batting and fielding statistics are a wash when compared to Verlander’s pitching statistics. Verlander doesn’t even hit. They’re simply not comparable. The discussion surrounding Braun and Kemp does not lie in the offensive stats, but in the fielding. Braun is not a good fielder, whereas Kemp is. Plus, Kemp plays centerfield, the most important position in the outfield while Braun patrols left. It is hard to argue in favor of a player whose team did not make the playoffs against a player whose team did. Neither Ellsbury nor Kemp helped the Red Sox and Dodgers advance to the playoffs. In fact, both teams failed to perform up to expectations. The Red Sox, in particular, suffered a major collapse at the hands of the Rays late in the season. The MVP should be given to the player that has brought the most value to a team. It boils down to this: Ellsbury might be more valuable in the sense that he played every day and contributed to his team every day, but when push comes to shove, Verlander’s performance directly contributed to the Tigers making it to the playoffs. Ellsbury’s every day playing did nothing to help the Red Sox. Kemp might be a better fielder, but his fielding did not help the Dodgers. Braun’s offensive prowess did however help the Brewers make it to the post season.

The Twins have parted ways with yet another player this week. Closer Joe Nathan signed a 2-year deal with the Rangers worth $14.5 million. This addition will move closer Neftali Feliz into the rotation next season. This begs us to ask the question: are the Twins going to retain anyone??

Mariners outfielder Greg Halman was stabbed to death in his home in Rotterdam, Netherlands. His younger brother was arrested as a suspect in the incident. An investigating judge has ordered that the brother be detained for an additional 2 weeks. Between the abduction and this murder, this baseball offseason is starting to sound like a typical NFL offseason…or NFL regular season for that matter.

The Red Sox are expected to announce their new manager within the next few days. The options have been whittled down to either Bobby Valentine or Gene Lamont. This decision obviously has more effect on Serena than Lisa being that Lisa is a Mets fan and has more of an adverse reaction to anything Phillies-related. Therefore, Serena prefers Gene Lamont because the sight of him and the sound of his voice won’t make her throw up in her mouth like Bobby Valentine will. So…Red Sox, if you’re listening, go with Lamont. We know what we’re talking about. Look at what has happened to the teams/players in the past who haven’t listened to us…most specifically the Mets.

In touring-related news, we’ve finally decided which series we’ll be going to this season! We’ll be visiting Atlanta in May for the Braves/Nationals series, Toronto in July for the Blue Jays/Tigers series (the fact that Verlander pitches for Detroit is a minor coincidence), and DC in August for the Nationals/Cardinals series. MLB 2012, here we come!

Horrible poll voters, “you’re the meaning in Lisa’s life, you’re not the inspiration. You bring Lisa on the edge and now she might jump.”

Oriole Park at Camden Yards

2011-11-20T08:00:00.000-05:00

Camden Yards

333 West Camden Street

Baltimore, MD 21201

April 19, 2008

We arrived in Baltimore late the evening before and climbed straight into bed without showering…which is gross, but we were tired. The next day after touring the lovely city of Baltimore, we changed for the game and walked to Oriole Park from our overpriced hotel, the Tremont Plaza on St. Paul Street, hesitantly wearing our Yankees hats like battered women, assuming that O’s fans were just like the violent Phillies fans from the night before.

However, it turned out that we needn’t be concerned about being victims of a hate crime. Soon we were joined by a mass of Yankees fans making their way to the game as well. We were surrounded by a comforting blanket of navy blue and white. No one would be spitting on us while we rolled with this posse.

As we approached the stadium, our nostrils were greeted by the amazing smells of sausage sandwiches (did we mention that we like Italian sausages?), shish kabobs, and roasted peanuts. Initially, we thought a bunch of people were just hanging around making tasty delights, but it turns out that they were actually peddling their homemade shit. Being that we were in Baltimore for the purpose of exploring the city’s baseball stadium, we chose to continue on our merry way to “Birdland.”

Oriole Park is pretty much the cookie cutter for what all ballparks should be like. It’s perfect. A friendly couple (O’s fans, we’d like to point out) offered to take our picture. Lesson learned? O’s fans do not care what team you root for. Baltimore is like the Witness Protection Program for New York fans, whereas Philadelphia is the angry mob looking to deposit your body in Jersey…probably in Elizabeth. It smells bad enough there. One decaying body or two will definitely go unnoticed.

The scintillating smell of Boog’s BBQ nearly tempted us from our ridiculous Sausage Theory, but no. We refused to let go of our love for sausage. You would think that our sausage sensation in Philly would’ve taught us something, but no. Nope. Can’t part with a sausage sandwich. There’s an excellent chance that we’d successfully complete the New York City Marathon in record time if someone ran in front of us with a sausage sandwich dangling in front of our faces. Sticking to this asstastic plan would prove to be yet another f*cking food mistake on our parts, but we’ll get to that later. Anyone in town visiting Oriole Park, eat at Boog’s BBQ. You won’t regret it. You will, however, regret a sausage sandwich.

We’d arrived at the stadium with plenty of time to spare, so we decided to check the place out. They had a jump, jump for kids who weigh less than we do, a wooden playground for kids who are shorter than us, and a fast pitch game that we weren’t interested in trying out because we’re lazy. We did get our picture take in front of an enormous poster of the field because we thought it would be super funny to tell people that it was the real field. We don’t know why we thought this was so funny at the time because as we recount this now, we’re not even chuckling at the prospect of sharing this “joke” with other people. We’re obviously complete morons.

As you can see by this picture, our plan didn’t work out. We just look like giant a-holes standing in front of a poster. We walked around a bit more and took other photos before heading to our seats:

The view of the field from our seats:

If you were an O’s fan, this game was super exciting. However, if you were like us, cheering for the Yankees, it was pretty pathetic. The Yankees were pummeled. Not only were they pummeled, but we were constantly being reminded of said pummeling by the random d*ckhead Red Sox fan shouting and carrying on like an imbecile two sections over. His behavior was so atrocious that his friends (who attended the game with him…willingly bought tickets to spend time with him) actually stood up and left in embarrassment.

Around the 6^th inning, we got bored of watching the Yankees run around the field like the Bad News Bears, so we went in search of The Bird because that’s what normal people do when they’re at a terrible baseball game. Obviously, the TBB have a very one-track minds. It’s either Italian sausages or mascots.

The employees at a nearby souvenir stand gave us a secret tip about The Bird…that we’re now sharing on the world wide web. Look at this a-hole picture of Serena with the cartoon picture of The Bird.

Aside from her looking like an a-hole for posing with a cartoon poster plastered to a souvenir cart, do you see that door in the background? Apparently that door is The Bird’s hidden portal from his hideout to the field. It became quite clear to us what we had to do. We walked to the closest sausage sandwich stand, bought our sausages, and had a sausage stakeout by this infamous door.

While inhaling these sandwiches like a lions devouring a zebra, we decided that we should probably start buying the food that ballparks are known for instead of dealing with the constant depression that follows eating lame overpriced sausage sandwiches. Serena had just finished her pathetic sausage and Lisa was nearly done with hers when the door we’d been waiting for opened. Low and behold, a giant, black, fuzzy bird stepped into the hallway. Lisa dropped the remainder of her sandwich on the floor and we ran for it. The Bird’s entourage took our picture with him, so we were guaranteed a normal picture. No fuzzy ass. No clapping Lisa. Normal. Except for that weird orb…

By this point, it was around the 8^th inning. Yes…we hung out with the souvenir stand people for close to 2 innings. Yes, we are aware how pathetic that really is, but if you knew how bad the game was going for us, you’d understand.

The next day, we packed up the car and strapped the kids in for the ride home. Our little travel family was slowly expanding.

We drove past the stadium again on our way out of the city.

It was a relief to finally cross into New York again. To be back with our people again. Who wouldn’t judge us for being New York fans. Or for loving Italian sausages. The city that can actually make a good Italian sausage sandwich.

Our weekender can best be summed up in the following words: “Life is a highway and we want to ride it all night long…until we get tired and hungry. Then we have to stop."

Most Likely To Succeed

2011-11-19T19:43:00.000-05:00

In light of the failed How I Met Your Mother poll, we asked this time around which show’s cast you would’ve preferred us to use as a comparison. We’ve ended up with a sea of 1’s. 1 person wants us to do Dexter, 1 wants Weeds, and 1 wants NCIS. 2 of you actually chose The Big Bang Theory. First of all, neither of us are smart enough to pass for scientists. Nerds, yes. Smart nerds? No. Second of all, we’re not sure which one of us is most like Sheldon and which one of us is most like Leonard, but this process does beg us to ask the question: Why Dexter? Is one of us similar to a serial killer? Or are you more likely to compare us to Debra Morgan or Joey Quinn? No one chose The Office or That 70’s Show.

It’s that time of year again, folks. The time when the MLB announces its year-end awards…much like when you’re a senior in high school and you’re nominated for some stupid yearbook award like, “Best Eyes.” Okay…these awards are a little more meaningful than that, but you get the gist. Up first is the AL Cy Young Award, which unanimously went to the obvious candidate, Justin Verlander. Serena knows from personal experience how valuable Verlander is because thanks to him, Tigers Love Pepper was able to maintain pace in the strikeouts category with her cousin’s fantasy team who was lucky enough to have drafted Tim Lincecum. Every morning after checking the previous evening’s results, Serena pulled a Melissa Gorga and shouted, “Thank you, Jesus” for granting her Justin Verlander. The National League Cy Young Award went to the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw who was among the league’s leaders in opponents’ batting average, innings pitched, complete games, shutouts, and WHIP.

Tampa Bay’s Joe Maddon and Arizona’s Kirk Gibson earned Manager of the Year honors, both managers having successfully pulled playoff spots out of their asses this year. J

Atlanta Braves closer, Craig Kimbrel earned the NL Rookie of the Year Award in a unanimous vote and Tampa Bay pitcher, James Hellickson catapulted to the head of the class in the AL Rookie of the Year category. Kimbrel set a major league record for saves by a rookie with a total of 46. Hellickson went 13-10 this season with a 2.95 ERA and helped solidify the Rays’ Wild Card spot in the playoffs.

The Golden Glove, Silver Slugger, and MVP awards have yet to be issued.

The Marlins have reportedly offered super douche Jose Reyes a deal worth $90 million and 6-years. No word yet as to whether or not the short stop has chosen to accept the offer. Sources claim that the Mets are not down and out yet, provided they’re willing to offer Reyes at least 4-5 years and $20 million a season. If the Mets pay this jack-a-loon that kind of money, they’re a-holes and deserve every piece of bad karma they get. Lisa might actually go postal.

Speaking of the Mets, the Mets are apparently celebrating their 50^th birthday with a commemorative logo and several promotional events during the upcoming season. Seriously? There are people who turn 50 each year and don’t even want to tell people that they’re reaching that milestone. Mamadukes disappeared to Greece for several weeks when she turned 50. The least the Mets could’ve done was wait til’ they turned 65 so that we could celebrate the fact that the team was now eligible for senior citizen discounts. They need the money.

Well…it’s official. The MLB is adding a second Wild Card to each league, a decision that could be implemented as soon as this upcoming season. Puke. Puke. Puke. We suppose this means that 80% of the AL East will be heading to the playoffs each year then, yes? While the format of this extra Wild Card round hasn’t yet been finalized, there are talks that the added round would include a one-game playoff to take place right before the Division Series and feature the “runner up” teams from each league…which means this one-game playoff is an interleague game. What the hell? This is stupid. The playoffs are about eliminating the best of each league before the leagues finally face off in the World Series. Who is the brainiac behind this asstastic idea?

The Houston Astros are going to be sold to a group headed by businessman Jim Crane for $610 million. The deal means that the Astros will be kissing the National League good-bye and heading over to the American League at the start of the 2013 season, giving each league 15 teams.

In terrible news, the Twins are currently examining their options at first base just in case Justin Morneau is not completely healthy at the start of the season. In addition to the incessant concussion symptoms that have been plaguing him these last few seasons, Morneau has undergone multiple surgeries related to injuries to his neck, left wrist, left knee, and right foot. He is a hot mess. Morneau’s ailments may be related to Puppy Cradle Death Syndrome…meaning that Serena’s appreciation of (we’re not going to lower ourselves to suggest that it’s an obsession because it’s clearly not) his combined defensive and offensive talent (which is so rare these days! So few men can do both well!) has caused Morneau to feel suffocated, which has naturally led to a deterioration of his physical and mental health.

Citizen’s Bank Park

2011-11-13T18:05:00.002-05:00

Citizen’s Bank Park

1 Citizen’s Bank Park Way

Philadelphia, Pa 19148

April 18, 2008

Our roadtrip to Philly and Baltimore started off promising. The sun was shining, we were running on time (for once), we had enough money set aside to cover us for the weekend (including a hotel room in Baltimore), and thanks to our disastrous DC trip, we made sure to borrow a friend’s GPS. We even had Yankees Bear and Mr. Met joining us on this trip because Lisa decided that she’d buy a mascot from each stadium we visited going forward. Serena decided that she’d buy a hat from each stadium. A tradition would be born on this weekend. Before hitting the road, Lisa removed her New York Mets license plate frame from the back of her car…something that would prove to be invaluable to the safety of the Corolla.

And that’s where the good vibrations came to an end. For some reason, that a-hole GPS with a British accent decided to take us through Manhattan in order to get through New Jersey, which makes absolutely no sense. However, we didn’t question its motives since we knew nothing about reaching our destination. Once we reached the Midtown Tunnel, our ever faithful British sidekick chose to lose connection with the satellite. Now in panic mode (because we clearly do not maintain level heads in certain situations), we drove in whatever direction our car was pointing in aka: straight, which of course was the wrong direction. Common sense should’ve told us this considering Philly is south of us and heading straight would just take us to the opposite of Manhattan island, but like we said earlier, not thinking with level heads. The British bitch woke up just in time to inform us (in a pissed off tone of voice mind you) that she was “re-calculating.” Eventually, we found the necessary parkway and while sitting at a red light waiting to make a right turn, she said, “Make right on ramp.” Lisa responded by putting on her right blinker. “Make right on ramp.” Ok…. “Make right on ramp.” Right. We got it. “Make right on ramp.” Clearly, being that she’s British, she doesn’t understand that there are no right turns on red unless otherwise noted in NYC. Finally, she yelled (yes, yelled. This is not an exaggeration), “MAKE RIGHT ON RAMP!” Frightened, Lisa screamed, “OKAY” and made an illegal right turn on red without even checking for oncoming traffic. Serena hit her head on the passenger window while cars flying around us honked angrily and drivers flipped us the bird. Obviously, our GPS was a psychopath.

Aside from the random traffic jam we hit in Elizabeth, New Jersey (which despite the pretty name, is not pretty at all and in fact, smells like sewage) and the slight confusion entering the city of Philadelphia, the rest of our trip driving–wise (and we stress, driving-wise) went smoothly (partly because she stopped snapping at us for being incompetent drivers). We had a pleasant time in the City of Brotherly Love and ate a fantastic Philly cheesesteak at Jim’s (don’t ask us to verify the location because we barely found it ourselves).

With our bellies full, we hopped into the Corolla and headed to the Phillies/Mets game. By the way, if you’re ever heading to Citizen’s Bank Park to watch a Mets games (or Yankees for that matter), never, ever, EVER wear your Mets gear. In fact, just don’t travel to Philly to watch your team play. It will be a mistake and you’ll regret it. And you may die. When we think back to this game, we wonder how we managed to get out of that place completely clothed, without black eyes, and without being peed on (will explain later). This is the game where we chose to never follow our teams on the road ever again. Thank you, Philadelphia for teaching us the error of our ways.

We parked the car in the lot across the street from the stadium. Side note: this is something that Philly has done well. They’ve assembled a complex where the Eagles, Flyers, and Phillies all play and therefore, the teams share parking lots and it helps to prevent the backup of traffic created by sporting events from clogging up the city itself. Cities with multiple teams should consider doing this…ahem, New York. As we got out of the car, we nonchalantly donned our Mets hats and were greeted by a DELIGHTFUL Phillies fan shouting at us, “Those are the ugliest hats I’ve ever seen.” Lisa replied, “So is your face, but you don’t see us complaining.” This may be the one instance of Lisa beating Serena in the angry bitch department. As we walked to the stadium, some guy threw a bean bag at us and a few other dudes shouted derogatory things at us. These are men that probably have a future in wife beating. However, one nice Phillies fan said to us, “Don’t worry girls, you go on and wear those hats with pride.” Actually, maybe she wasn’t being nice. Maybe she wanted us to be murdered and she knew that if we left the hats on, the likelihood of us being shanked in broad daylight increased immensely. Outside the stadium, one nice vendor (and they have to be nice because they’re in sales), took our picture.

We were successful with one extremely drunk Phillies fan. Unfortunately, there’s a very good chance that he was so drunk that he was about to die from alcohol poisoning because he slurred at us, “You guys are my favorite Phillies fans.” Please take note of the hats we are wearing in this photo:

They’re Mets hats, right? We’re not high, are we? Is it possible for an “NY” to ever be mistaken for a “P?” Putting aside the violent gestures and greetings we received from Phillies fans so far, we approached the stadium with an open mind. Upon entering the building, we were impressed with the “shiny, new” feel of the place. It’s like climbing into the backseat of a brand new car. The concourse is wide and you can see the field from any of the concession stands. We meandered, bought our merchandise, and headed down to the third base side to watch the Mets take batting practice.

As usual, despite Lisa’s best attempts, David Wright ignored us. We’re not sure what it is exactly because we’ve heard dozens of stories about random a-holes getting their picture taken with him. We don’t smell bad. Both of us shower regularly and wear deodorant.

After the Mets jogged off the field, we decided to check out the rest of what the stadium had to offer. We found a Build-a-Phanatic and Kids Zone. It was the first time Serena found something she was too tall for.

We really wanted to get our picture taken with the Phillie Phanatic (who is apparently as famous as Madonna) as soon as possible, so we walked around the concourse a few times in hopes that we’d get the chance prior to the game. During our multiple trips around the entire field, we were cursed at and a pair of brats threw ice cubes at us. We hadn’t even reached our seats yet and it was already starting to feel like we were in our very own Indiana Jones flick. It would probably be entitled Indiana Jones and the Curse of the New York Mets Hats. Finally the moment arrived. An enormous, green, fuzzy creature with a trumpet-shaped nose emerged from the crowd like Jesus. It was truly a glorious site to behold. He was followed by his own version of the paparazzi (basically insane and mostly drunk fans…including us, only we were unfortunately sober and not Phillies fans) and secret service (an extremely sour lady without an ounce of personality). Somehow, we managed to get a young couple with a kid to take our picture with the town hero. We should’ve known it was too easy since the guy barely understood what Lisa asked him. Excited, we took the camera back to check the world’s greatest photo in history. The actual photo, however, was NOT great. Not even close. It was as Erin says, “angerfying.” The photo was of Lisa clapping and laughing beside a furry, green ass. Serena’s belly button didn’t even make it into the shot. Perplexed and angry, we stared at each other. The vein in Lisa’s forehead throbbed and that means that Lisa is very, very angry. Just so you know. If you ever meet Lisa at a bar and while you’re talking to her, her vein starts throbbing, you should abort whatever mission you have with her immediately. While she may not stab you (that’s Serena’s MO), she’ll definitely do something to you that is not nice.

This was as close as we got to the Phanatic:

Pathetic, isn’t it. We attempted to find the Phanatic again (all while the game continued on the field), but it was no use. Of course, as we searched for him (you’d think finding a giant green creature would be easy in a sea of red and blue), our self-esteem continued to take a beating from the locals. “You’re guys are ugly!” “Die!” “Mets suck!” “We hate your hats!” “We hate you!” “Your mother smells!” “You smell!” “Kill yourselves!” “Go back to New York, a-holes!” Random screaming in our faces. Someone spitting at us. Things like that. It was all very heart-felt. Tired and dejected, feeling a bit like Charlie Brown, we removed our hats and bought ourselves a sausage sandwich because at the time, we thought we’d rank all of the stadiums’ sausage sandwiches and let’s face it. What makes you feel uplifted more than an Italian sausage? We just don’t know.

This purchase would turn out to be yet another mistake on our part. The sandwich could not compare to the sausages of RFK Stadium or Yankees Stadium in any way, shape, or form. It was awful. To date, it is one of the worst pieces of anything we’ve ever eaten anywhere. Lisa couldn’t even finish hers. Obviously, we should’ve had another Philly cheesesteak.

Our seats were located somewhere in the upper deck. Where, exactly, we don’t know. We never found them. Maybe we were too tired to figure sh*t out. We’re not sure, all we know is that we couldn’t find them. We spent the rest of the time hanging over the railing in the upper deck near right field and watching the game from there. While standing there, a group of drunk Phillies fans approached and started chatting us up (probably because they assumed that we were fellow Phillies fans since our hats were tucked safely away in our purses). Our new friends decided to inform us that one of them had 20-20 vision, as if that qualified for something with the opposite sex. It was something he was very proud of. We think they would’ve had a better shot if they just told us their penis size.

Chase Utley hit a home run and the Liberty Bell in center field got all sparkly. It didn’t make us want to root for the Phillies, but it was still a pretty cool thing to watch.

By the end of the 8^th inning, the Mets were decisively pulverizing the Phillies and the Phillies fans had already pulverized us. Plus, since we never found our seats, our feet and shins hurt and we still had to drive to Baltimore to get to our hotel. We decided to pack it up and go home.

We shuffled through the parking lot to the car. Before pulling away and bidding Philly adieu, we witnessed a very drunk young man pissing on an SUV with a Mets license plate. Thank you, Philadelphia, good night!

One day, we’ll return to Philly as fake Phillies fans, eat a Philly cheesesteak, and sit in a pair of seats. It doesn’t even have to be our seats, but they’ll definitely be seats. We’ll be incognito to the point that you won’t even realize that we’re secretly hoping that you lose.

After These Messages

2011-11-12T13:58:00.000-05:00

We know that our typical blog day is Sunday (and don’t worry, you’ll still get a blog tomorrow. We know how poorly you all deal with change), but we’re posting our pathetic poll results and baseball notes today so that tomorrow’s post can strictly focus on the rewrite of our trip to Philly in 2008. We’ve posted a new poll that you won’t vote on because that’s been you’re your MO from this blog’s inception. So, good job, guys. Way to not exercise your mouse-clicking finger.

Needless to say our most recent poll failed to live up to its “legen-wait for it-dary” potential. In the two weeks that it graced the blog, the How I Met Your Mother poll managed to earn 8 lousy votes. The only good thing about this is that you guys actually voted on both the Lisa poll and Serena poll, so that’s a vast improvement from the last time we offered you two polls at the same time. We asked which character from How I Met Your Mother was most similar to us (admittedly, this has stemmed from the fact that we’ve caught a lot of HIMYM marathons recently). Truthfully, some of your answers scared us just a tad. 5 of you thought that Lisa was Ted because she is constantly searching for her one true love. Serena felt like this was a given because Lisa is clearly Ted. Period. True, she does have a gambling problem like Barney (1 person voted for this), but aside from the gambling, she literally has nothing in common with that character. No one voted for Lily or Robin, but 2 of you jack-a-loons actually chose Marshall after Serena deliberately added the following statement to that poll choice: “actually she’s nothing like Marshall. If you pick this option, you’re an a-hole.” Don’t get us wrong. Marshall’s hilarious and Lisa might have a touch of a crush on him, but there is nothing remotely similar about Marshall and Lisa. Do you realize that this makes the 2 of you who voted for that option a-holes? Did you understand that when you decided to select that? Now…Serena, on the other hand, received quite the variety in terms of responses. Either she’s got multiple personalities or you people have no idea what you’re talking about. 1 person voted for Barney because she has a drinking problem, likes to suit up, and would kill to find someone to play laser tag with. We suppose that’s all valid statements however she’s not as much of a d*ck as Barney is. At least, that’s what we like to think. You might have a different opinion on the subject. 1 person chose Lily because she is also obsessed with Christmas. She’s like an alcoholic Santa’s Helper. Just so you’re aware, we had to think long and hard to come up with an option for Serena to be compared to Lily. Why? Because she has nothing else that could possibly relate her to Lily. So you, sir or madam, who voted for Lily are wrong. FYI. 2 people chose Ted because she would do something as stupid as stealing a blue horn from the wall of a local restaurant. This is just bizarre. Yes, she’d probably steal something as cool as a blue horn, but do you know why he stole that blue horn? To impress Robin. Serena would steal that horn just because. She’s nowhere near as girly as Ted is. She’d eat a dude like Ted for a mid-morning snack and forget all about him by lunchtime. 1 person voted for Marshall because she would relish the idea of winning a slap bet and having the opportunity to slap Barney 5 times at any time from now until eternity. You’re probably right. In fact, when she read this, she started laughing. 3 of you voted for Robin because she also has a dude’s personality trapped inside a chick’s body. It kind of hurts when YOU tell her this, but yeah. This can’t entirely be denied. Serena is probably most similar to Robin. However, she isn’t exactly a boy trapped in a girl’s body. She DOES have some girly traits. We promise. You should see her shoe closet and she owns dresses. Swear. She even wears them. We did have a Facebook fan mention that he wasn’t too familiar with HIMYM, which gave him difficulty when it came to voting. Was that the problem? You guys never watched the show? What would’ve been better for you? He mentioned NYPD Blue, but we never watched that show.

Okay, enough of that. The big news of the week has been the kidnapping of Nationals’ catcher Wilson Ramos in Venezuela. 50 hours after of being abducted on the front lawn of his mother’s house in broad daylight, Ramos was rescued by Venezuelan authorities following a 15-minute gunfight. Justice Minister Tareck El Aissami, who announced the news of the rescue last night, said that the police had 3 men in custody, one of them being a Columbian that is “linked to paramilitary groups and to kidnapping groups.” Authorities are still gathering evidence to determine if there was anyone else involved in this senseless crime. There had been a candlelight vigil held at Nationals Ballpark behind the center field gate during the day yesterday. Approximately 100 fans showed up to pay their respects. Apparently Venezuela has been ranked at the top of the list in murder rates and kidnappings in the world. This is some scary sh*t. The Ramos family is extremely lucky as many families never see their loved ones again.

Other tid bits from around the league seem to pale in comparison to Ramos’ story, but we feel obligated to talk about it anyway. First, the fun, uplifting stuff. Robin Ventura is back in Chicago, replacing Ozzie Guillen as manager! We LOVE Ventura. He’s a great guy, was fantastic hitter, and an outstanding third basemen (and we know how critical Serena is of third basemen). Serena still can’t figure out what the purpose was of getting rid of him for Aaron Boone. Not that Boone’s a douchebag, but c’mon. Watching him play third is like watching an apprentice attempt to replicate the Sistine Chapel. Just not the same. If you’re gonna replace someone, don’t downgrade.

Speaking of douchebag, Jonathan Papelbon will be joining a roster of douchebags next season! Papelbon recently signed a 4-year deal with the Phillies for $50 million. Apparently this is the largest contract for a closer in baseball history. Isn’t that sweet? It includes an option for a fifth season that could increase the value to $60 million. According to some sources, Phillies GM Ruben Amaro Jr. is now on the hunt for Michael Cuddyer. Can the Twins really afford to let Cuddy walk? They’ve already allowed Jim Thome to go to the Phillies!!! Why, Thome, WHY? Furthermore, there’s a chance they’ll lose Jason Kubel to free agency this offseason as well. Amaro also has to deal with the fact that Jimmy Rollins and Ryan Madson are up for grabs.

Other names potentially seeking other employment opportunities this offseason? A-hole Beltran, we mean Carlos, Yuniesky Betancourt, Jonathan Broxton, Mark Buerhle, Bartolo Colon, Prince Fielder, Brad Lidge, David Ortiz, Roy Oswalt, Jorge Posada, Lazy Reyes, we mean Jose, CJ Wilson, Tim Wakefield, and some guy named Albert Pujols. You may have heard of him. Serena’ll take Oswalt. She can live with the Yankees signing him. : ) Maybe he’ll balance out the fact that a basket case with terrible, terrible hair is the Yankees’ supposed #2 guy. Lisa’s simply looking forward to unloading yet another arrogant and lazy piece of garbage that cares more for himself than the fans and actually trying to win a game.

RFK Stadium

2011-11-06T10:00:00.002-05:00

RFK Stadium

2400 East Capitol Street SE

Washington DC

September 1, 2007

We managed to accomplish this road trip in a matter of 24 hours. As in drove down to DC, watched a game, and drove back to New York all in one day. Why would we make ourselves so miserable? Because we’re poor planners, that’s why. Instead of staying overnight in a hotel, our only alternative would’ve been to nap in the Ford Focus in some creepy ass pit stop parking lot. We literally had barely enough money to get ourselves to the game, let alone pay for a hotel room. Thankfully, Mamadukes loaned us her EZ Pass. It only took us 5 hours to drive to RFK and we made such surprising good time, that Lisa decided she wanted to see “The Pencil.” For those of you who do not know, Lisa calls the George Washington Monument, “The Pencil.” For a good portion of the trip into DC, we could see the monument in the distance and it didn’t seem that far away. Our friends, looks can be deceiving. We called one of Serena’s friends to get directions off of the Google Machine from the stadium to the monument. We had no GPS or road map. According to Meryl, all we had to do was circle the stadium and make a right. To the best of our knowledge, we did just that, but we apparently made the wrong right turn and ended up in some seriously ghetto sh*t. We were lost for at least an hour. At least. Time stands still when you’re in frightening situations, we hear. 10 minutes can feel like a lifetime. Initially, we got turned around because the streets aren’t labeled well and we ended up heading back to Baltimore. Once we realized this error, we pulled over to get gas and received awful directions from a toothless man who said to us, “Oh, baby girl, no. How did you get here?” Sir, if we f*cking knew that, we wouldn’t be here. He was very sweet, but clearly didn’t know his way around his own city. He sent us passed a dilapidated shanty where a man sold crabs from a rusted tin garbage can on his collapsing front porch. Yup, that happened. After several run-ins with extremely a-hole DC citizens and their asstastic directions (one of these charming individuals actually purposefully gave us incorrect directions), we arrived at RFK Stadium just in time to see Barry Zito signing autographs.

We entered the stadium on the third base side and could see him across the field near the right field wall. We shuffled as quickly as we could in flip flops down the third base line, around home plate, and over to right field. He started in the right field corner and moved down the line of fans toward the third base dugout. We slid into a spot closer to the third base dugout. In a matter of minutes, it was all over. He stopped at the kid 2 people away from us and jogged toward home plate to pose for photos with what we assumed was the inner city youth. Not only were we disappointed, but we couldn’t understand why a member of the San Francisco Giants was posing with DC’s inner city youth. It made no sense. Why wasn’t Ryan Zimmerman doing that? He at least plays for their baseball team!

Filled with an intense feeling of failure and rejection, we did the only thing that we knew of that could possibly alleviate this wretched sensation. And that was eat. For $5.50, we got ourselves the best sausage sandwich we’ve ever had (and trust us, we’ve eaten a lot of sausage sandwiches). The sausage was nice and spicy and covered in fresh, crisp grilled onions, green peppers, red peppers, AND yellow peppers! When we say crisp, we mean grilled vegetables that hadn’t been sitting limp in oil for an extended period of time and then served to the masses. FRESH grilled veggies. Oh, yeah.

This was not only our first traveling experience, but Mr. Met’s as well. The game’s free giveaway was a Teddy Roosevelt bobblehead.

The stadium itself is very nice, but clearly not built for baseball. The stands are situated in a way that probably makes watching soccer games more enjoyable.

The most exciting part of the game was the middle of the 4^th inning. It’s called “The President’s Race.” The Presidents in question are Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and fan favorite, Teddy Roosevelt. It’s totally possible that Teddy has more of a cult following than The Goonies. People wear t-shirts with his face on it. The sad thing is that Teddy never wins. He’s like the Susan Lucci of The Presidents. Since our game happened to be Teddy Appreciation Day (hence the free bobblehead), he was carried onto the field on a throne.

While being carried to the starting line, George Washington pushed Teddy off of the throne and the remaining Presidents made a beeline for the finish line. Obviously, Teddy lost again.

At the close of the race, The Presidents gathered at a designated place in field level to pose for photos until the bottom of the 4^th. Naturally, because we’re furries, we took advantage of this opportunity.

Note the Secret Service men rolling with The Presidents. Priceless. PS- Jefferson grabbed Serena’s ass. Pervert. Then again, what do you expect from our nation’s leaders?

Next order of business? The Nationals’ mascot. Because apparently every team needs 5 f*cking mascots running amuck. Unlike Mr. Met, Screech turned out to be extremely easy to get a hold of. He spent the entire game hanging around field level without any handlers to protect him from psychopaths such as ourselves.

We stopped by the gift shop to see what we could play with (because that’s what we do…we drive 5 hours to play in gift shops like a-holes…notice how we haven’t informed you about one single thing that happened on the field during the game? We assure you that we sat and watched 85% of it). They had a plethora of Ryan Zimmerman t-shirts as well as select t-shirts on sale for 2 for $10 and a complimentary Screech bobblehead. Unfortunately, the shirts were all players who no longer played for the Nationals. Despite the fact that we had almost no cash left, we actually sat there and tried to rationalize why purchasing 2 t-shirts for a Screech bobblehead made perfect sense. Thankfully, we chose to put the shirts back on the sale rack. Probably the only smart decision of our lives.

Since the Nationals were beating the Giants by a safe lead at so late in the game and since we had a long drive back home, we decided to leave. Before doing so, we snapped a photo of the field (not even from our seats because we’re incredibly smart like that).

In the parking lot, two very nice (said in a sarcastic voice) police officers pointed us in the wrong direction to get back to the highway. Regardless, we managed to make it home without losing any parts of the Ford Focus to theft or our pants. Pretty successful night, we say.

Perhaps we should’ve thought about conducting this trip because it was the last season the Nationals would play in this ballpark. Now we have to go back. Like we said earlier, poor planning.

In the genius words of Kansas, “carry on my wayward son, there’ll be peace when you are done. Lay your weary head to rest, don’t you cry no more.”

Greetings from Serena’s Bed

2011-10-30T13:51:00.001-04:00

As you may have realized based on our title that we are blogging from the comforts of Serena’s bed brought to us by the glory that is Egyptian cotton comforter. We’re confident that we will finish this blog post by kickoff. At least…that is the mission we’ve chosen to accept at this time. Last week, as we closed in on the final games of the World Series and the official end of the baseball season, we asked if you’d continuing reading our blog after it was all over. The results were…astonishing. 3 of you would keep reading if one of us showed you our boobs. On what planet did you think we’d actually show you nipple? Be serious. You didn’t think that one through, did you? You saw the word “boob” and got so excited that you went, “YES” and picked that option. We are clearly dealing with a pack of perverts here. 3 said that you would continue reading because you are “following us so that you can roofie us.” We don’t even know what to say. 2 of you were kind enough to choose, “Yes, because while I think this blog has absolutely no relevance on anyone’s day to day life, it’s quite well-written and it makes me giggle.” Why thank you. We make ourselves giggle on a daily basis. If only we had a cameraman following us around and documenting our every move, you’d be in for a real treat. This week, you’re getting 2 polls as one pertains to Lisa and the other pertains to Serena. Please vote on both. The last time we gave you two polls (one for the American League and one for the National League), you sucked hard. Please try not to be such a failure this time around. The polls are related to last week’s reference to How I Met Your Mother.

Now that the World Series has come to an end, we officially have no games to report on. Or rather, make fun of cos’ that’s really what we do. We’ll admit that the excitement in this year’s series is the fact that the Cardinals came from behind in game 6 to push a game 7. We love suspenseful 7-game series. Who the hell enjoys a sweep? It’s boring and one-sided. Sort of like when Crash Davis told LaLoosh in Bull Durham, “Don’t try to strike everybody out! Strikeouts are boring! Besides that, they’re fascist! Throw some ground balls – it’s more democratic.” Here’s our problem with the series. Heading into it, both teams had some serious issues with pitching. The Rangers in particular had a combined ERA of over 6. That’s insane. This is supposed to be the best of baseball competing for the trophy. The Rangers had to beat 13 other teams in order to represent the American League and the Cardinals had to beat out 15 others to represent the National League. Having said that, tell us why game 7 involved the Cardinals scoring 6 runs, game 6 had a score of 10-9, and game 3 had a score of 16-7? In one friggin’ game, 23 f*cking runs were scored. WHAT??? Under what circumstances is it okay for a championship team’s pitching staff to give up that much action? That home plate saw more tail than a hooker working the Port Authority. Games 1 and 2 were more on par for what a World Series game should be with the final scores being 3-2 and 2-1 respectively. This series should have been the Tigers and the Brewers and that’s that. It would have been much more entertaining and less of a slugfest.

As promised, we continued our research regarding the MLB post season at MNF. Unfortunately, we only asked two people and we’re not sure this counts because they work at the bar and are technically forced to speak to us. Lisa chronicled their answers in her handy “Memo” feature on her asstastic phone. We’re going to directly quote what she wrote about Adam because this would only be better if she had written it on a cocktail napkin: “Adam is a bartender and he is a huge baseball fan he stull watches.” Yes. We left that typo in on purpose because that’s half the magic of this wonderful entry. That and the total lack of punctuation. Yes, folks. Alcohol WAS involved. Apparently, she did much better with Chris…probably because she had been less drunk when we spoke to him. Chris, if given the choice, would stop watching the playoffs once the Yankees were eliminated. However, since he works at a bar, he was forced to watch all of the games. His father is a Mets fan, so if the Mets had advanced, he would’ve continued watching and cheering for the Mets. Both boys are Yankees fans.

While we failed to further develop our research on this subject, we did manage to research another MLB avenue because as you know, we have ADD and we flit between topics like a bee flits between flowers. Random and with wild abandon. The topic of the evening? What is your ideal lineup? The rules? Active players only, include a 4-man rotation and a closer, add 2 utility players, draw a pretty diamond shape on a paper placemat.

Who was our first target? Why, none other than Adam (who is a bartender)! In all honesty, this only spread as enthusiastically as it did because of him. We did nothing but drink beer and wait for the results to be reported back to us. Adam’s lineup was as follows:

1B A. Gonzalez

2B Cano

3B Longoria

SS Tulowitzki

C Y. Molina

OF Gardner

OF Hamilton

OF J. Upton

P Halladay

P Sabathia

P Verlander

P Lincecum

Closer Rivera

Util Pujols

Util Votto

Interesting story behind how Pujols ended up as a utility player. The man tried putting Pujols in right field because he had “played a few games out there.” Okay. Serena didn’t buy it. Are we going to start calling Jorge Posada a first baseman now? After bickering over this, Adam (who is a bartender) relented and put Upton in the outfield spot and Pujols in utility.

Adam then turned it around on us and Serena had do her own lineup:

1B Morneau (if healthy), otherwise Teixeira

2B Cano

3B C. Jones

SS Tulowitzki

C Mauer

OF Granderson

OF Ellsbury

OF Crawford

P Verlander

P Lincecum

P Halladay

P Hamels

Closer Wilson

Util Thome

Util E. Chavez

Choosing Chipper Jones as her third baseman prompted another argument. Adam also crossed off Crawford (literally. He took his pen and literally crossed Crawford’s name off). Here is why Serena will continue to stand by her choices. For starters, this is our ideal lineup. You can hate on Carl Crawford for his poor performance in Boston this year, but guess what? Prior to this season, Crawford performed in terms of fielding, stolen bases, and at the plate. He’s the complete package. One lousy season with a new team does not change that. Joe Mauer and Brian Wilson may have spent a sh*t ton of time on the DL this season, but that doesn’t change their ability to perform when on the field. Now for the defense of Chipper Jones. Yes, he’s in the twilight of his career, however, that does not change the fact that he’s a clutch performer and still one of the best switch hitters in the game. Look at photos of him batting from the right and left side of the plate. There is hardly a difference between the two swings. Do you know how hard it is to do that? Your dominant side will naturally be the better swing. Jones’ stance and swing are almost a mirror images from both sides. Amazing. Finally, when he DOES retire, Serena can replace him with a young buck worthy of the position like Evan Longoria. BOOM, baby!

Moving on to Mike and Lou who had been sitting at the other end of the bar and got suckered into this game by Adam (who is a bartender). Here’s Lou’s lineup:

1B Fielder

2B Kinsler

3B Beltre

SS H. Ramirez

C McCann

OF Gardner

OF Ellsbury

OF J. Piere

P Verlander

P Halladay

P Sabathia

P Lee

P Carpenter

Closer Rivera

Util

Lou failed to choose utility players and by the time Serena got his lineup, Lou had already left and she was unable to question him on the subject. However, by default he gets us as his utility players. Sorry, Lou. Looks like you’re f*cked cos’ here’s our baseball resume: Serena played college softball and once applied for a job with the Pittsburgh Pirates and never heard back. Lisa’s athletic history is that she was a high school cheerleader, which has nothing to do with baseball. Lisa also enjoys watching baseball from a sofa where she doesn’t have to do anything.

Mike’s lineup:

1B Votto

2B Cano

3B Beltre

SS Castro

C Napoli

OF Kemp

OF Ellsbury

OF J. Upton

P Verlander

P Halladay

P Sabathia

P Kershaw

P F. Hernandez

Closer Krimbel

Util Fielder

Util Pujols

As you can see, both Lou and Mike opted for a 5-man rotation, which we accepted because any manager who has a hard core 5-man rotation is probably the luckiest man in baseball. Besides, we’d rather they stack up their pitching staff and not list 100 first basemen or something stupid like that. The only item on Mike’s list that we question slightly is Krimbel. He’s a rookie and if this is your “ideal” lineup, wouldn’t you want a proven closer? Someone who has been around the block a bit? What if this rookie season was a fluke?

Now…for the real gems. Both of these lineups were done by the same man with a very good sense of humor. Please remember that when you start reading them.

1B McGwire. “Maybe Mattingly”(he didn’t take steroids so that’s an issue)

2B Smith

3B Boggs

SS Ripkin

C Gary Carter

OF B. Williams (you know Serena high-fived that f*cker for this)

OF Barry Bonds (again, very pro-steroids)

OF Canseco (yay for steroids!)

P Clemens (seeing a pattern here?)

P Eckerly

Closer Andy Pettitte

Util Jo

Util Ma

(Read it together now: Jo Mama)

Clearly, he’s operating on a 2-man rotation with this team. Quite bold.

Lineup Take 2:

1B Fielder

2B Mo Vaughn

3B Ray Lewis

SS Tiki Barber

C Peyton Manning

P Tom Brady

P Matt Ryan

P Mark Sanchez

P Ben Roethlisberger

Closer Albert Pujols

Util Sam Davis

Util Ryan Longwell

He obviously doesn’t need outfielders with this legendary pitching staff. It’s also quite clear that between first base, right field, and the bull pen, Albert Pujols is the most talented man currently playing baseball. Honestly, he might be onto something having Ray Lewis play third. Who in their right mind would want to advance past second with a scary mother f*cker like Ray Lewis standing on third. Dude, take third. You can have it. I don’t need to score any runs.

Speaking of scary mother f*ckers, Happy Halloween, fellow traveling baseball ghouls! Would you like to know what we dressed up as? Tough sh*t, we’re telling you anyway. Say hello to Captain Hook and Mr. Smee!

Don’t we look exactly like them? Like a mirror image, no? Kind of like Chipper Jones batting from both sides of the plate. Just sayin.’

Among our many Halloween activities this weekend, we played Rock Band for the first time. Captain took drums.

Smee got himself a guitar.

We failed miserably. We ended our “Here I Go Again” performance with only 40 fans. In our defense, we had absolutely no idea as to what the hell we were doing and at one point, we were definitely following each other’s chords because Serena distinctly remembers trying to drum to Lisa’s guitar notes like an a$$ clown. Plus, Lisa didn’t realize that she was supposed to “strum” her guitar until Chris #1’s friends sat down to “show us how it was done.” They played some really complicated death metal song at “expert level.” Whatever. Show offs. They weren’t even in costume.

By the way, it’s 1:08 and we’ve had to relocate to the living room in order to watch the Giants/Dolphins game. So...we were a little over confident in our ability to write a blog in 2 hours and 15 minutes. Seeing the time written out like that is kind of depressing.

Before we leave you, we wanted to point out a new edition to our blog. Thanks to repetitious questions, topics, and incidents, we’ve decided to create a “Rules of Engagement” section that addresses the most common of these. Check it out. Leave feedback. Maybe a few suggestions as to what we may have missed. Next week and in the weeks following, we’ll be re-writing and posting our original stadium tours in an effort to deliver a consistent format and story regarding all of our travel-related posts. Next week, we’ll bring back RFK Stadium!

By the way, it’s 1:44 pm.

Kinda, Sort of Related to Baseball

2011-10-23T16:07:00.001-04:00

Last week we gave you a blog of nonsense. A brief, yet scary look into our minds. We apologize for this. However, in the midst of a-hole musings, we produced a tiny gem of an idea. Do people continue to watch the MLB postseason after their team has been eliminated? In light of this, we asked what you thought our experiment would bring. You apparently did not have high hopes for this investigation because 4 of 7 of you felt that we’d get nowhere and that we’d probably have some creepy, balding, and married old man hit on us and roofie us. Thank you so much for having confidence in us. To the best of our knowledge, we’ve only been roofied once. Technically, the creeper only roofied Lisa, but Lisa then gave Serena the rest of her beer, roofie-ing Serena as well. There are some who’d say that Serena roofied herself because she couldn’t leave a beer unfinished, but we’re going to stick to the story that Lisa roofied her. Anywho. 3 of you replied that you still watch the postseason even though your team sucks.

Regardless of your opinion, we did do some research during MNF. This is what we discovered:

Tom, who is a Mets fan, watched the Yankees/Tigers series and once the Yankees were eliminated, watched only the Tigers/Rangers games in which Justin Verlander pitched. He wasn’t interested in the World Series at all, but did recently confess to us that he watched both World Series games.
Tom’s friend, Uncle Robin, doesn’t watch baseball at all. So that was a waste of an interview. However, he IS a Dolphins fan, so that should tell us a lot about the person we were dealing with here.
Linda, who is a Yankees fan, is all about the postseason because Albert Pujols is “a hot piece of ass.” We’re not sure what the response would’ve been if the Cardinals hadn’t advanced.
Big Daddy, who is a Mets fan, continues to watch the postseason and he’s rooting for Texas, which we find a little weird since most National League fans stick to National League teams. However his reasoning is that he hates the Cardinals because of Tony LaRussa. Not sure what his issue is with LaRussa, but ok. Plus, Texas “is known for ice cold beer and good steaks.”
Laurie, who is also a Mets fan, continues to watch the postseason and is rooting for the Cardinals because they beat the Phillies.
Colin, who looked like a yeti and is yet another Mets fan, continues to watch, but not passionately. He also doesn’t care which team wins…which sounds kind of boring to us, but whatever floats your boat.
Richard had an opinion as well, however by the time Serena interviewed him, she had had several beers and was more interested in the plate of wings sitting in front of us, so she forgot to take note of his answer. Obviously, it wasn’t very interesting because she would’ve remembered it otherwise.

We met up Maria and her friend, Ming at Foxwoods this weekend to see Kathy Griffin perform. We had every intention of doing additional research among the mixed New England residents, but here’s what happened instead:

As usual, alcohol played a huge part.
We went dancing and were sexually harassed by the drunk Plaid Patrol.
Lisa lost all of her money on the slots.
Serena took off her shoes.
Maria did not hit it big and buy us all mink coats like she said she would.
We were extremely unsuccessful interviewing the female gender as we were apparently the target of Mean Girl behavior.
We had no recollection of the research we were actually supposed to conduct until we were half-passed out in the taxi cab heading back to the hotel.

However, the weekend was not an entire waste. We did learn the following:

Highway McDonald’s do not have $1 Menus. A-holes.
When the chance arises, Serena will definitely pet a shark.
Lindsay Lohan baked cupcakes for dead people, which means she is definitely on drugs.
Big Papi was sighted at Foxwoods, an establishment he apparently frequents often. Lisa thought she spotted him at a craps table, but Serena assured her that there was no way that David Ortiz would be wearing a Red Sox jersey to Foxwoods. It wasn’t even his own jersey.
There is a secret city beneath Foxwoods that the A-listers use when they arrive at the resort.
The “loosest slots on Connecticut” are not as loose as the women that hang out at the “nightclubs” in Foxwoods.
To party at the “nightclubs” in Foxwoods, a woman should wear a dress short enough to expose her vagina and a man should wear plaid.
At Foxwoods, Lisa is the equivalent to Barney from How I Met Your Mother, but only because she has a gambling problem and Serena is like Robin, except she’s not Canadian. Suit up, ey? In reality, however, if we weren’t at Foxwoods, Serena would still be Robin (or Barney to be quite honest) and Lisa would actually be Ted, constantly searching for her true love.
The location of Mystic Pizza. Julia Roberts was not there.

Based on our meager sample of polled individuals, it seems that people DO continue to watch the MLB postseason, but don’t really give a sh*t what happens. If we remember, we’ll continue polling people tomorrow at MNF. We’d ask you to email us your thoughts, but that’s a waste of time and effort as you never send us anything.

2011 Championship Series

2011-10-15T21:59:00.001-04:00

We’re bringing you a post 1 day early this week because tomorrow, Serena will be walking in the Long Island Making Strides Against Breast Cancer event at Jones Beach with Mamadukes, Auntiedukes, and Aunt Cathy. If interested, you can support their team, Mema’s Lasses (“Mema” is what Serena used to call her grandma) by clicking here. If you enjoy boobies, you should consider supporting. Just sayin.’ Much thanks in advance.

Our ADD is in full effect tonight. It’s not helping that Serena has gotten a new cell phone that plays Star Wars sound effects either. It is 7:00 pm.

The Championship Series are quickly coming to an end. At blogging time, the Rangers lead the ALCS 3-2 and the Cardinals lead the NLCS 3-2 after destroying the Brewers 7-1 last night. Since the opponents haven’t been determined yet, we know you didn’t cheat on our poll. 3 of you felt that the World Series matchup will be between the Brewers and Tigers whereas 2 of you felt that the matchup will take place between the Brewers and the Rangers.

It is 8:42 pm. We’ve made some nice, hot tea. Lisa changed into comfy clothes. The Tigers are winning 2-0. Oh, and Serena posted something to our Twatter account with her new portable internet machine.

While both series have been exciting (being that neither teams have been swept), we can’t help but feel slightly disappointed. Both of us want the Tigers to win the ALCS, but for some reason, they’re struggling. Justin Verlander had an uncharacteristic performance in Game 1, where he appeared either rusty or nervous, which put Detroit in a 1-0 hole at the start. However, facing elimination in Game 5, Verlander returned to his old self and Detroit’s bats came to life. Tonight, the Tigers are hoping to push for a Game 7. If they win, there’s no telling where the cards will fall in Game 7. Who has the staying power? Detroit or Texas? And can’t there be some way to make it so that Verlander just pitches every game?

8:47 pm. Serena giggled because her text message notification went off and it’s been programmed to sound like R2D2.

On the NLCS side, while Lisa feels like the Cardinals are going to take the series, she’d really prefer the Brewers win. Serena is no longer sure what to think. One second the Brewers are dominant and the next, the Cardinals are. It’s like watching a ping pong tournament. It’s been a very emotional experience. She’s begun drinking excessively and eating Taco Bell late at night due to the turmoil…at least, that’s the excuse she’s using for behaving like this. Nevertheless, she too is rooting for the Brewers.

9:02 pm. Lisa gave Serena the idea to download the Jurassic Park theme song, which Serena then set as Brother’s ringtone. And then Lisa convinced her to look up Madagascar and Muppets ringtones. The Rangers are now leading the game 3-2. By the way, what’s with the random cheerleaders running around the field with Texan flags every time a run scores?

9:11 pm. Sorry. Spaced out.

Lisa just walked away from the internet machine in frustration because she’s sick of the playoffs and just wants the World Series to start again. Now she’s complaining that regardless of who wins the World Series, we can’t go to the parade because all of the cities are too far. This blog is now turning into Serena cataloging all of Lisa’s random thoughts.

Serena is also sick of all of her teams playing like a-holes. The Yankees, Giants, Islanders, Tigers Love Pepper…why can’t one team she cares about do a good damn job these days? Even her “back-up plan” teams (Tigers and Brewers) can’t even close the deal.

9:21 pm. Sherzer was just taken out of the game in favor of Schlereth. This game is looking bleak. Like this blog. Texas is winning 5-2. Schlereth needs to shave. Serena might start drinking soon…

Jim Leyland’s also had enough. He’s calling the bullpen and there’s a good chance he’s booking a flight to New York so he can join Serena in hitting up the liquor cabinet.

9:28 pm. F*ck balls. This game is toast. 7-2 and we’re only in the 3^rd inning.

Speaking of ultimate team failure, we couldn’t help but wonder how many of you are actually watching this game right now, not counting legitimate Rangers and Tigers fans. We watch because we like baseball (most of the time, when the MLB isn’t raping our bank accounts) and Serena is most definitely harboring a crush on Verlander, but she’s refused to admit it. Any day now, she’s going to demote Justin Morneau to Future Ex-Husband #3 and promote Verlander to Future Husband. Lisa’s just waiting for Serena to come to terms with this reality.

It’s 9-2. We’re going to go ahead and assume that the Rangers are going to the World Series. At this point, are any Tigers fans still watching this game?

Do fans continue to watch the playoffs after their team’s been eliminated from contention? We think we’re going to conduct an experiment during MNF this week. We’ll get back to you with the results next week. Feel free to email us with your input and thoughts. We know you’re not going to because you never do, yet we continue to be nice and offer this option to you.

It’s 9:36 pm and the inning is finally over. F*ck sakes. Ooooh, Aaron Rodgers is really adorable without his helmet on…

Armed with a new stupid project that excites us (because we’re borderline idiots and Serena has the maturity level of a 5-year old boy), we’re going to end this blog now. In all honesty, we probably should have put it out of its misery several paragraphs ago, but for some reason, we just couldn’t let go.

Peace out, bitches. We had a sick night.

PS- We'll be at Foxwoods again next weekend. Bet you can't wait for that blog, huh?

ALDS 2011 Game 1

2011-10-09T16:10:00.000-04:00

Last week, you had Lisa flying solo (unlike Han Solo who flies with Chewbacca) because Serena had to do her adult job by working at the Walk Now for Autism Speaks at Jones Beach. Since we know you’re all dying inside with curiosity, yes. She did meet Darth Vader and yes. A photo of their blossoming relationship was taken. Photos from the engagement shoot were taken on the Death Star...which is way more interesting than an engagement shoot done at a baseball stadium. But that’s just two women’s opinion. Will post photos at a later date. Stay tuned. You’ll love them.

ANYHOO, time for poll results, which we suspect you cheated on because we got a sudden upsurge of response after certain teams were eliminated from playoff contention. Lisa asked who you thought would go to the World Series. 1 person voted for the Yankees (probably before the offense took a crap and failed miserably to do its job) and 1 person chose the Tigers. Again, did you choose this immediately following the Yankees’ offense taking a crap? You’re probably envisioning riding the Verlander ship all the way into the October Classic. We can’t say that we blame you. 2 people voted for the Phillies, which was to be expected. What wasn’t expected was that more people didn’t vote for the Phillies, which pretty much proves that you cheated as is the fact that 5 of you voted for the Brewers. C’mon. Seriously. If the Phillies had advanced, are you really going to sit there and tell us that you believed the Brewers were going to defeat them? Lies. Naturally, 3 of you voted for the a-hole choice and that was us. Us being the TBB. We know that we joke a lot that we can pitch better than certain team’s bullpens, but that doesn’t mean we should try. Rays, Rangers, Diamondbacks, and Cardinals all got a fat goose egg. Looks like we all experienced our own ballet here. A ballet of disappointment.

As you may recall, we were super excited to score tickets to Game 1 of the ALDS. Game 1 featured a matchup between CC Sabathia and Justin Verlander. Golden. This was going to be magic. Of course, it was too easy. As usual with Yankees games these days, we took the train to the game on the eve of September 30^th. We arrived with plenty of time to grab a bite to eat at the Southern BBQ stand on the main level. Both of us ordered a pulled pork sandwich. Remembering how much we enjoyed the stadium’s French fries, we decided to order a side of fries. Lisa ordered a small size like a lady and since Serena was hungry, loves fries, and apparently didn’t remember what the sizes looked like, over-eagerly ordered a large. Upon receiving the enormous cup of fries, Serena remembered why her stomach hurt so much the last time she ordered them. It’s just too much! And yes! Too many fries really is possible!!! Lisa’s order came to $16.50 and Serena’s was $18.50. Had we known what was to go down later in the evening, we would’ve second guessed these pricy decisions.

After we polished off everything (Serena insisted on finishing the fries because they were so expensive despite the fact that her stomach felt terrible), we hurried to our seats to catch the opening ceremony. First, the team lineups.

Next, the national anthem.

Finally, the ceremonial first pitch thrown by Mariano Rivera to Jorge Posada. This was weird to us. We see this all the time. Why were they chosen to do this? We expected an old-timer Yankee or a cancer kid. Maybe a member of the FDNY or NYPD?

At last, CC Sabathia took the mound and the game got underway. Sabathia was on like Donkey Kong. He struck out the first two batters before giving up a solo shot to Delmon Young.

In the bottom of the 1^st, Justin Verlander took the mound. Serena took like 5 stupid photos as if they’d come out awesome with our seats being a million miles away in a galaxy far, far away.

Derek Jeter led off the inning with a single. Verlander walked Curtis Granderson, but got Robinson Cano to ground out, advancing Jeter and Granderson to 2^nd and 3^rd. Alex Rodriguez registered the second out at first, but Jeter scored on the play. Sabathia would return to the mound amid a downpour.

As you can see, the rich folks were already acting like chicken sh*ts and running for cover.

He finished the inning, but following the third out, the umpires called for the tarp.

Of course, like we said earlier. Everything had been too damn easy. The TBB were in yet another rain delay. We’re starting to think a black cloud just follows us around. It was 9:10 pm.

While rich people with high-priced seats clamored into our section for protection (kudos for our usher who didn’t them into the section without correct tickets…how does it feel, rich a-holes who consistently deny us entry even when you don’t bother showing up to the game???), we were nice and dry.

Lisa surfed her BlackBerry and inspected her nails to pass the time while we waited. Keep in mind, Serena had to be at work the next day to set up for Sunday’s walk.

At 9:45 pm, the tarps came off the field. We think we might have high-fived in response.

In a matter of minutes (3 to be exact), the sky opened up again and the tarps came back on.

And boy, did the rain come down.

The game was finally called at 10:24 pm. It took us an hour to walk from our seats to the subway platform because the crowd was so dense and slow moving. We wished we had taken a picture of the scene in the subway station for you because the amount of people sandwiched between the station’s entrance and the turnstile definitely violated fire code.

Now we had a new dilemma. The game would resume the following night at 8:30 pm. Serena had to be at Jones Beach by 6:00 am for the Autism Speaks walk. Also, we were broke. There was no way we could afford to buy food at the game the following night. Of course. It had been way too easy.

Saturday, October 1^st. Since we could waste time dealing with a crowd and the subway station, we were forced to drive into Yankees Stadium for the first time in 2 years. In route, Lisa tried to snap a photo as we passed Citi Field.

Upon arriving at the parking garage, we remembered why we stopped driving to the stadium. Parking cost $45. Awesome. Nevertheless, we remained upbeat about the upcoming game. Since we arrived earlier than the subway ever would’ve gotten us there, we stopped into the Yankees Museum again. New additions included the 2009 World Series ring created by Tiffany’s…

…and the 2009 World Series trophy (displayed in the same case as the jersey worn by Derek Jeter when he hit his 3,000^th hit…cos’ that makes total sense being that they happened in the same year and all…WTF?)

As we stepped out of the museum, we got a good glimpse of the Hall of Legends (As you can see, despite the early time, a lot of people were already arriving):

Before heading to our seats for the second time in two nights, we decided to check out the team store on the main level for new stuff to play with. Lisa found these creeptastic dolls of Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez, and Mark Texeira. Can you guess which is which?

Finally, we headed for our seats to eat dinner. Who is ready for Game 1 Take 2?

Since we had no extra money (a situation the parking fee exacerbated), we were forced to do a recession dinner. Behold 2 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches each, 2 bags of Cheez-Its, and 2 bags of pretzel Goldfish.

The game literally resumed where it left off in the bottom of the 2^nd. No replay of the opening ceremonies or anything like that.

Doug Fister took the mound for the Tigers and Jorge Posada led things off with a single to right field. Despite the promising start, the inning closed with the score remaining 1-1. The Champagne Super Nova took the mound for the Yankees and we couldn’t help but feel bitter that we weren’t getting the pitching matchup we’d been promised. However, Serena enjoyed singing the Oasis song.

Nothing really happened until the 5^th when Robinson Cano hit a home run and then it was ruled a double. Score 2-1. We still don’t know exactly what happened because the jumbotron didn’t show the replay, but the fans in our section were quite displeased.

This is what initial joy looks like:

Eventual disappointment:

In the top of the 6^th, Lisa decided she couldn’t take the cold anymore and went for a hot chocolate run. She paid $4.50 for something that turned lukewarm by the time she returned to her seat. In the top of the 6^th, 2 runs score on a double hit by Brett Gardner. Both Jeter and Granderson got on base to load the bases for Robinson Cano. Lisa turned to Serena and said, “Grand salami.” Sure enough, Cano launched one over the wall, making the score 8-1.

No visit to Yankees Stadium would be complete without witnessing the 7^th inning YMCA. While the grounds crew did their thing, our section did this:

By the way, see that kid to the left in that terrible sweatshirt? He was super annoying. Allow us to tell you why. He chose to sit in front of Serena while his father sat in the row in the section to the left of us. Apparently, his father thought it was really funny that his son (who definitely needs to be put on Ritalin or something stronger) continued to hit Serena with his head (because he wasn’t paying attention to where his head was while head banging) and flailing arms (because that’s how he danced) and spent more time blocking our view of the game (because of his jumping, flailing arm dance moves) than actually sitting and enjoying the sport of baseball. Listen, good ole’ dad. We understand why you didn’t want to sit with your annoying son, but guess what? He’s your kid and your cross to bear, not ours. You’re stuck with him. Not to mention that he is entirely too young to be sitting at a sporting event surrounded by drunk and potentially violent men without a parental figure. At some point, Serena snapped and she couldn’t take it anymore.

She slouched low in her seat, put her feet on the back of the kid’s seat (which wasn’t his actual seat, remember?), and inched her knees forward so that on the rare occasions he sat down, he had her feet in his back and knees against his head. It was a small, yet satisfying victory.

In the bottom of the 8^th, it became clear that this was the Cano show. With Jeter on base, Cano hit another RBI double, making the score 9-1. In the bottom of the 9^th, things got a little scary, but the Yankees held on and the final score was 9-3. At the end of the game, we ran to the car to get on the road as quickly as possible since Serena had to be up in a few hours for work.

Since this post is a little late, by this time we’re all aware that the Yankees lost the series to the Tigers in Game 5. We’re not going to spend a huge chunk of time on discussing the Division Series, but it should be said that since the loss, fans and media having been screaming for the heads of Alex Rodriguez, Mark Texeira, and Nick Swisher. Folks, Rodriguez, Texeira, and Swisher aren’t the only men on that team that sucked hard at the plate. What about Jeter? God forbid we should say something bad about New York’s personal Jesus. He did absolutely nothing on offense all series. So why aren’t we screaming for his head? The only players that did anything consistently at the plate were Gardner and Cano. Therefore, Cano and Gardner should get cookies for their good work while the rest of the lineup should be given the same amount of sh*t as Rodriguez, Texeira, and Swisher are getting. Granted, Swisher hasn’t really produced effectively all season, so we can kind of understand people’s frustration with him, but Rodriguez and Tex? Really? When Rodriguez was healthy this season, he did his job as did Tex, so shut up and eat it. We’d rather have two players like them on our team that put effort into every single game they play in over a selfish player who doesn’t give a sh*t anymore. No one can say that they’ve ever seen Rodriguez and Tex not put forth effort on the field. They do. And you know what? So does Swisher, which is why he can be forgiven for his uselessness at the plate. If you’re going to hang someone for this loss, hang the entire team.

TBB World Series predictions: Tigers and Lisa’s taking the Cardinals while Serena’s going with the Brewers. Cardinals have momentum, but the Brewers have the 2 BB’s: Bratwurst and Braun. What, what, bitches!

Lastly, we’re closing crap out with a kick a$$ Taco Bell commercial featuring Brian Wilson…cos’ we’re black ops!!!

Use the Force for Good!

2011-10-02T10:30:00.004-04:00

I am just a lonely co-pilot today. Captain Serena is off working the Autism Speaks walk at Jones Beach today. There she is helping to raise lots of money and awareness for a great cause as well as stalking Star Wars storm troopers and jumping on jump jumps. They are so conveniently part of the entertainment for today’s event. I wonder who was in charge of hiring them. Mhmmmmmmmm! In the fine words of your brother “Serena your five”! I too helped out for the Autism Speaks foundation by being the honorary bagel delivery girl! My car now has the tantalizing scent of garlic from picking up 5 large garbage bags of bagels that was so nicely donated from Town bagel of Bellmore and Plainview for the walk. I wish Autism Speaks lots of luck on the walk today!!

Moving onto our poll results. Glad to see there is only one a**hat among the voters last week. We had asked you minions “Who had celebrated victory better? Six of you voted for “The Diamondbacks were so dull it makes me think the entire roster is bad in the sack” We agree! Not to be dirty birds but shaking a champagne bottle is the same motion as well…. You do the movement and let me know what it reminds you of. Go ahead do it now I’ll wait… Now that we all have perverted thoughts in our heads we can go on. If that’s a glimpse of what’s going down in the boudoir then it’s true you all must be bad in the sack. One malicious person voted for “The TBB are stupid. Go Diamondbacks!” Well we think you’re stupid AND were pretty sure you’re probably bad in the sack. You seem to be taking out your sexual frustrations on two innocent females. I mean c’mon did you see our Epic photo. If that photo does not scream celebration then I don’t know what does. We are too legit too legit to quit. Shakalaka Shakalaka !

Baseball Notes:

Jose Reyes needs a lesson in baseball etiquette. On Wednesday at the last NY Mets game of the season Reyes bunted the second pitch he got in the first inning once he was safe at first he then took himself out of the game. This sneaky move basically won him the Nl batting title as well as the first batting title for the NY Mets team. Reyes was up against Milwaukee Brewers Ryan Braun who would have had to have gotten 3 hits on Wednesday night and sadly went 0-4. It was reported that fans booed Reyes which I could not agree more. Fans pay a lot of money to go to these games and to even hope to witness something special and you pull that bullsh*t. This is why it makes it so hard for me to be a fan of you again. Who are you Reyes? I feel like I don’t even know you anymore.
When Reyes was asked about his covert operation he was quoted as saying this- “They have to understand what's going on," Reyes said. "They have to feel happy if I win the batting title. I do it for the team and for the fans, too” No you did not do it for the fans. I am pretty confident that most Mets fans like me could careless if a Mets player took the NL batting title. I would much rather see hmmm… I don’t know maybe a miraculous appearance in the playoffs and for the team to win the NL East Division again. Let’s not kid ourselves Jose you did it so that you could get more money from hopefully some other team next season now that you have this lame title under your belt. Don’t use us poor fans as an excuse for your poor sportsmanship! I am making Ryan Braun Super Hero of the week for when he was asked about the situation he was extremely classy about it something Jose Reyes knows nothing about!

Besides buntgate happening on Wednesday. Wednesday night proved to be quit the entertaining night. Many baseball fans eagerly waited to see the playoff matchups with both Wild Card division titles still up for grabs. The St Louis Cardinals would go ahead and lay the smack down on the Houston Astros winning 8-0. The Cardinals eagerly awaited the results of the Braves vs Phillies matchup. A Braves lost would send Albert and the boys on there merry way to the playoffs and that is precisely what had happened. Atlanta lost 4-3 to Philadelphia in 13 innings. Speaking of Extra innings the Rays were battling it out with the Yankees while Boston went on and lost to the last place Baltimore Orioles. Boston’s only hope was ironically to root on their arch nemesis the Yankees for a Tampa Bay loss would cause a one game Wild Card playoff between them to decide the AL Wild Card winner.

As we all know since it is Sunday and the playoffs are happening as we speak that did not happen. Evan Longoria crashed Boston’s pipe dream when he hit a walk off homer. I am so happy that for once it was not the NY Mets that CHOKED this year! They took themselves out as early as opening day so I was well prepared for failure this year. Feel my pain Braves and Red Sox fans. Doesn’t feel so good does it? So ladies and gents our first round playoff match ups are as followed.

Tigers vs Yankees

Rays vs Rangers

Diamondbacks vs Brewers

St Louis vs Phillies

On Thursday it was announced that the Chicago White Soxs have parted ways with manager Ozzie Guillen by trading him to the Florida Marlins for two minor Leaguers Jhan Marinez and Osvaldo Martinez. Marinez, a 23-year-old right-hander, finished the season in Double-A Jacksonville. He went 3-8 with a 3.57 ERA and three saves in 56 games. He struck out 74 and walked 42 in 58 innings. Martinez, a 23-year-old shortstop, hit .245 with three homers and 26 RBIs in 88 games with Triple-A New Orleans this year. I had no clue you could trade a manager. If I knew this I would of so tried to talk the Mets into trading Jerry Manuel for some little league players.

Terry Francona manger of the Boston Red Sox who led the club to its first two World Series championships since 1918 will not be returning next season. Francona said multiple times it was his decision not to return. The Red Sox held option years for Francona for the next two seasons, and had until Oct. 8 to decide to pick up the 2012 pact, which would have paid him $4.25 million. Francona met with general manager Theo Epstein on Thursday which just so happened to be the day after the Red Sox managed to blow a 9 game lead in the standings in September and not make it to the post season. Now that’s an Epic collapse!! I’m thinking that’s far worse then any Mets collapse I had to deal with. Francona was asked if he would consider improving some of his techniques, rather than stepping down. He indicated that one reason he didn't do that is because he didn't know if ownership was as much behind him as in years past. Farewell Francona I wish you well!

Exciting news is that the TBB attended game 1 of the Yankees vs Tigers game not once but twice. Due to the Asstastic weather in New York our game was postponed and we had to trug on out to the boogie down Bronx again on Saturday night. Keep your eyes peeled for that post!

So as of Saturday night here are the teams that have taken the lead. The Yankees took game one last night against the Tigers. The Rays and Rangers are now tied after playing game two. St Louis disappointed me losing to the Fugly Phillies. Phillies lead 1-0. The Brewers won last night and lead the series against the Diamondbacks.

Late breaking news here! I got a text from Serena that Darth Vader is at the Autism Speaks walk at Jones beach! Go get Darth Serena! Use the force!

That’s all folks enjoy October baseball!!!

-Lisa

Celebrate Good Times…and Mean it

2011-09-25T10:00:00.001-04:00

Last week’s poll told us that our readers are selfish d*cks. Here’s why: apparently no one had in their possession that kick-a$$ “Use The Force for Good” t-shirt, but here’s the worst part. 2 of you decided that even if you DID have it, you wouldn’t give Serena the shirt. Who does that? Who even admits that? What if she smiled at you? Is that enough of an exchange? 2 of you are just plain boring and don’t have the shirt. You’re just a bunch of useless individuals. That’s the conclusion we’ve come up with. We give you priceless literature and infinite humor and memories and in return, we get nothing from you. You don’t even post comments on our blogs!

Enough with the insults. We have exciting news for you! The TBB are going to their first playoff game together! Hooray for you! We know how much you love our game-time pictures! We’re going to Game 1 of the ALDS at Yankees Stadium on Friday! Unfortunately, we won’t be able to post a blog about it until after Sunday because Serena will be working for the Long Island Walk Now for Autism Speaks all weekend. Don’t worry. You’ll still get a weekly post from us, but it will be done by just Lisa.

Speaking of the Division Series, we’re pretty much wrapped up in terms of teams that have clinched. In both leagues, the only spots pending are the Wild Card teams. Just a quick rundown in terms of who we’re above and beyond sure is going to get their a$$es kicked: the Diamondbacks. Every other team has got a fairly decent chance at advancing to the Championship Series. Allow us to explain. The Phillies and Brewers are both very strong teams. Let’s say the Braves take the Wild Card. Since the Phillies have the best record, they’re supposed to be matched up against the team with the worst record, which would be the Braves. The Phillies can’t play the Braves because they’re in the same division, which leaves the Diamondbacks. There is no way in hell that the Diamondbacks are winning that matchup. If the Cardinals take the Wild Card, the Phillies will play them and leave the Diamondbacks to the Brewers. We repeat, there is no way in hell the Diamondbacks are winning that matchup. Dear Arizona, Good luck experiencing your future sweep. Embrace your Cardinals now. PS – your players are the world’s most boring partiers we’ve ever seen. The TBB party harder than that and we’re not rich pansy athletes who’ve just clinched a title. People masturbate with more enthusiasm than the way the Diamondbacks shook their champagne bottles. It was sad. This is what victory looks like (and we weren’t even playing):

Photo taken immediately following a New York Giants victory over the New England Patriots during the 2008 Superbowl

On Monday night, we chowed down on sweet potato fries and amazing 20 cent wings at Croxley’s Ale House while watching the Giants/Rams game. Our feeding frenzy was briefly interrupted (and very much interrupted by our very own Long Island-based Wolf Pack) by the breaking news that Mariano Rivera surpassed Trevor Hoffman for the all-time save record. Congrats to him. Go on, Mo. You can TBB Super Hero of the Week again. Also while watching Monday Night Football, there was one jack ass that apparently was so invested in the MLB that the bartender was forced to waste one television on the Braves/Marlins game. Just wasteful. Pal, we live in New York and the Giants were the MNF game. Let’s get our priorities in order here. Even when the Giants are terrible, we still watch them over an Atlanta/Florida baseball game.

Last but not least, this video is literally one of the funniest things we've ever seen. Jayson Werth, in an attempt to help Teddy win the Presidents' Race (because he never wins), enlisted the Nationals' bullpen to thwart the other Presidents. Werth ended up winning the race. This sh*t was 100 times better than the Diamondbacks celebrating their title.

A Whole Lot of Sh*t Without Really Saying Anything

2011-09-18T14:55:00.000-04:00

Based on the results of our poll, you people are a pack of sickos. We truly don’t even know what to say to you at this point. We asked what you thought Operation Hot Brother was all about and 3 of you actually felt that Lisa was in love with Brother. Are you insane? He’s but a child! He’s like a younger brother to Lisa! That’s almost incest. You people are just gross. 1 person thought we had to rescue Brother from a fire-breathing dragon, which is very noble of you to assume, but if we’re being completely honest here, Serena would probably try to adopt the dragon as a pet whereas Lisa would run away screaming. Note how there’s not much saving involved in either of those scenarios. 2 of you claimed that there was no Brother and this was just another stupid thing that the two of us have concocted. We’ll have you know that there IS a Brother! He’s listed in our TBB lingo page for f*ck’s sakes! Pay attention! Lastly, 2 people chose “you were searching long and hard for Dial hand soap.” This, our stupid friends, is the correct answer. Liquid Dial hand soap is an endangered species these days despite it being an American institution in the soap community. We had to visit 4 stores in order to find it.

The playoffs are just around the corner and we’re obviously a bit too late to talk about our playoff picks because teams have already starting clinching spots. However, we already knew that the Phillies were clinching the NL East. C’mon. We knew this in February when they decided to form a “historical pitching staff” (yes, we’re still making fun of Cliff Lee for that…in fact, we’ll probably keep making fun of him for this even after he retires). Tigers’ also clinched a playoff berth. At this stage, we feel pretty strongly that the teams currently sitting in the division lead spots are going to stay there (Yankees, Rangers, Brewers, and Diamondbacks).

It’s the Wild Card races that are going to be interesting. As previously stated, the Rays are making it EXTREMELY exciting in the American League. The Red Sox are currently leading the race by 3 games, but there’s a real possibility that the Rays can take it. The Rays have games against the Yankees (who they seem to beat all the time) and the Blue Jays to end the season, whereas the Red Sox are playing the Orioles and the Yankees. The Orioles are terrible and the Red Sox have enjoyed beating the Yankees with a wet towel this year. Okay, you know what? We take it back. In reviewing the schedule, there’s an excellent chance that the Yankees will royally screw this whole thing up and not even make it to the playoffs. If both the Red Sox and Yankees advance, win the Division Series, and end up facing each other in the Championship Series, the Red Sox are going to the World Series. Whoopidee doo! On the National League side, the Braves have a 4.5 game lead over the Cardinals. We just don’t foresee this changing.

Baseball Notes:

Because of September 11^th, Major League Baseball moved the Mets/Nationals matchup up to the Sunday Night Baseball spot on ESPN. The players asked if they could wear FDNY and NYPD baseball hats to honor the first responders. The MLB declined this request claiming, “it was not part of league policy.” They were only allowed to wear the hats during batting practice. Sorry, but we just don’t buy it. This was pure corporate greed at its finest stepping in. It’s pretty clear that the only reason that the FDNY and NYPD hats weren’t allowed is that the hats are not issued by the MLB like the special edition hats that the players wear on Memorial Day and 4^th of July (which the MLB has the audacity to charge the public $40/hat for), meaning that the MLB wouldn’t make a dime if the public suddenly felt inspired to purchase a FDNY or NYPD hat for themselves. Who wants to make a bet that next year the MLB releases special edition September 11^th hats that the players WILL be allowed to wear and that we’ll get charged our first born child to buy them? If we’re wrong, Lisa will root for the Phillies and Serena will root for the Red Sox for the remainder of the 2012 season. We’ll post a photo of us wearing Phillies and Red Sox hats as proof. We won’t be happy about it, but we’ll do it.

Tuesday night was a very happening night in baseball land. Mariano Rivera recorded his 600^th career save. While we can admit that this historical moment is important, guess what we chose to direct our intention on instead? Star Wars was released on BluRay this week, which probably gave you techno-geeks a hard on. To celebrate the phenomenon, MLB is offering Star Wars night at select stadiums. Tuesday was Star Wars night at Citi Field. Serena’s life clearly has no meaning anymore because she was unable to attend. This is what she missed:

F*cking storm troopers, wookies, and f*cking Darth Vadar. What is the point in living when you miss something this glorious? This obviously would’ve been the best night of her entire adult life. Could you imagine the pictures we would’ve posted to our blog from this f*cking event? F*cking amazing.

Yesterday, Rivera recorded his 601^st save, bringing him one step closer to tying Trevor Hoffman’s all-time save record. This still doesn’t dull the pain of missing Star Wars night.

Joe Mauer is officially out for the season with pneumonia and as a result, basically screwed Tigers Love Peppers in the a-hole, so thanks for that. Does he have the weakest immune system ever? How the hell does someone just “get” pneumonia?

PS – the Jennifer Lopez Fiat commercial is extremely annoying. It certainly does not make us want to jump out of the sunroof of our Fiat that looks just like a Minicooper and dance with our papi.

Remembering 9/11

2011-09-11T12:35:00.000-04:00

In honor of the 10-year anniversary marking one of the worst tragedies our nation has ever faced, we are not going to do a traditional Traveling Baseball Babes post this week. We felt that our typical a-hole sense of humor would be inappropriate on an important day like today. Therefore we’ve extended our poll for another week (so you can continue to leave your feedback regarding Operation Hot Brother) and listed this week’s baseball notes below.

Remember to thank a fire fighter and police officer today (and every day) for their hard work and selfless dedication.

Baseball Notes:

Last night, Jorge Posada made an appearance behind the plate for the first time all season thanks to a Russell Martin injury, who had taken a foul tip off of his thumb in the 2^nd. From the get go, the Angels sought to test the unpracticed veteran. Howie Kendrick singled and then tried to steal. Posada gunned Kendrick down at second fairly easily. The throw to Robinson Cano was high, but there with plenty of time for Cano to bring the ball down to apply the tag.

In walk-off fashion, Evan Longoria’s single in the 11^th inning last night allowed the Rays to defeat the Red Sox 6-5 and continue to nibble at the Sox’s lead in the American League Wild Card race, pulling within 4 ½ games. The Red Sox loss also helped the Yankees maintain their American League East supremacy for now since they were awesome enough to lose 6-0 to the Angels.

Operation Hot Brother

2011-09-04T21:32:00.000-04:00

Derek Jeter and Minka are still broken up. Lisa thought it would be funny if we asked your thoughts on the subject of Serena marrying Jeter. Serena agreed to this poll under protest. This is the first time in a long time that each option had at least one vote AND the poll garnered more than 4 votes total. Either this poll was extremely popular or Serena is an excellent campaigner because we had 12 people leave feedback this week! 5 individuals agreed with Serena and voted, “Ew, gross. No. He’s such a giant pansy. Serena needs a man that can grow quality facial hair.” It’s true. She does. There was a tie between, “Yes, but only because he’s rich” and “Yeah, ok. It’s time to join Planet Earth. In what parallel universe would Serena land a dude like Jeter,” each option earning 3 votes. 1 person is sick (it is probably Lisa, who keeps denying that she voted) and chose, “Yes. Me thinks thou protest too much. You probably reallllllly like him!”

Sorry it took us so long to post today. We spent most of this day in the midst of Operation Hot Brother (the details of which cannot be discussed at this time). Needless to say, our day started at 12:00 and we’ve only begun the meat of this post at 8:30.

Speaking of Operation Hot Family Members, we participated in Operation Hot Mother on Friday night (please be aware that this has absolutely nothing to do with any relatives of ours because that would be creepy). This ass clown at the bar switched which television broadcasted the Yankees and Mets games. We had gotten there first and instructed George the Bartender to put the Mets on the television to the left because Lisa was sitting to the left and the Yankees on the television to the right because Serena was sitting to the right. This bald jack-a-loon in a plaid shirt sat down and made George switch televisions. Naturally, Serena yelled at George. George wanted to keep the peace so he asked Serena to “handle it,” which she was happy to do…because she likes picking fights after drinking a few beers apparently.

So Serena walked over to Mr. Bald Paul Bunyan and asked him, “Dude, WTF?” In order to agree to switch back the televisions, Mr. Bald Paul Bunyan quizzed Serena on her Yankees knowledge. It went something like this:

Bald Paul Bunyan: What is the Yankees pitching rotation?

(Keep in mind Serena had been drinking for quite some time at this point)

Serena: An a-hole, CC, Orson the Pig, Champagne Supernova, Phil Hughes, and some other guy

Bald Paul Bunyan: Uhhh…

Serena: What? That’s it, right? I got it right.

Bald Paul Bunyan: A-hole?

Serena: *disgusted groan and roll of the eyes* Yeah, AJ Burnett? Duh?

Bald Paul Bunyan: Who are the Yankees’ catchers?”

Serena: Cervelli and Martin?

Bald Paul Bunyan: Wow. That’s pretty good. Okay, I got a good one…

Serena: Is it about Derek Jeter? Because show me some f*cking respect.

Bald Paul Bunyan: What? No…

Serena: Cos’ he’s not even on my fantasy baseball team.

Bald Paul Bunyan: Uh, ok…

Serena: Well??? Let’s go!

Bald Paul Bunyan: Okay, who won the Home Run Derby?

Serena: Are you f*cking kidding me?

Bald Paul Bunyan: What?

Serena: Cano. And his daddy pitched to him.

Bald Paul Bunyan: Okay. I’ll ask him to change it.

Lesson learned? Don’t f with Serena when it comes to booze and the Yankees. Oh, and by the way? Lisa would’ve been able to answer all of these questions too and she’s a friggin’ Mets fan. Bald, plaid-wearing a-hole.

Prior to blogging, we ate lunch at Friday’s. Lisa surfed MLB.com via her craptastic BlackBerry that she will soon be trading in to see if there was anything newsworthy for us to cover today. The conversation went as follows:

Lisa: Oh, CC got his 19^th win

Serena (as she hungrily stuffed a mozzarella stick in her mouth like a velociraptor): So?

Lisa: He’s on your team.

Serena: No, he’s not. Justin Verlander got his 19^th win already, so there.

Lisa (confused): Justin Verlander does not play for your team.

Serena: Yes, he does.

…(Lisa stares skeptically at Serena from across the table)…

Lisa: Tigers Love Pepper is not a real team. I was talking about the Yankees.

Serena: *insert blank stare*

Joe Girardi silenced buzz recently by announcing that the Yankees’ pitching rotation wouldn’t be changing any time soon, which we strongly disagree with. It should change. It should not include a certain blonde someone with tattoos and dinosaur drawings hanging in his locker. We’re not gonna name names, but it sounds like “BJ Aurnett.” No pun intended.

Remember Johan Santana? Yes! He’s still alive! Contrary to popular belief. The left-hander threw 2 innings in a rehab start yesterday afternoon. He allowed 1 run on 3 hits and struck out 2. He is supposedly scheduled to pitch another 3 innings of rehab on Friday. At this rate, the Mets can expect him to return in time for next year’s All Star Break. Sweet goodness.

In the words of The Police, “Don’t change, don’t change, don’t change the channel on me.”