AT&T PARK, JAKE ARRIETA, AND THAT MELTED CHEESE CRAP.
· Ballpark Food, Joe Sez · AT&T park, Jake Arrieta, San Francisco Giants
The Cubs are in San Francisco for the start of a 3 game series with the halloweenies. Given that english is now a second language in California, this probably won’t be necessary, but I’d like to point out right now that Arrieta is Spanish for “no hitter.”
San Francisco’s AT&T ball park — home of the Giants — is where Mr Arrieta will be notching his 8th win tonight. I hate to admit this, but I have a soft spot for the Orange and Black. It’s cuz they so dutifully rolled over for our broom last August, almost single-handedly ensuring the Cubs’ spot in the playoffs. Mind you, this soft spot is very tiny … and it’s not located in my heart, like most soft spots. It can be found on the caboose of my digestive tract, my friend, which always makes me think about Barry Bonds, and is why I’ll never forget who’s soft spot it is.
Excuse me while I meander back over to my original subject — AT&T ball park. I’ve been there a dozen times or so over the years. Meh. You’ll hear people from the Bay Area talkin’ about it like it’s a friggin’ holy shrine to baseball, cuz it supposedly has characteristics of the pre-Astrodome era. Personally, I’d say that if Wrigley is the Friendly Confines, then AT&T is the Hair Salon. It’s all a little to polished and schmick — not that it doesn’t get properly trashed during a game — but it’s missing whatever it is that Wrigley and Fenway have that make you feel like you’ve gone back far enough in time that baseball is still a game. Before free agency. Before ball girls and designated hitters. Before $14 beers, and idiotic mascots, and obnoxious music blarin’ so loud it almost breaks my ear drums. And certainly before Rob Womanfred’s nad-clipping 2nd base slide rule. AT&T sits squarely in the middle of “right now.” It’s a ball park. Nothin’ more, nothin’ less. Where it’s got it over Wrigley, though — and you have no idea how nasty these words taste in my mouth — is the 3 World Series Championships that have been hosted there. Credit where credit is due, pal. Still, the steroid inflated cheat, Barry Bonds played there, which in my mind sorta cancels that out.