I'm With Burt

April 1, 2003

Sadly enough, the absolute best part of this game was when they announced the starting line up and introduced Bret as "Burt Boone".  Bret, or Burt as the case may be, was jogging past the cameras and said loudly, and just as plain as day, "you've gotta be shitting me!" which killed me no end.

So anyway, they pan to Bret during the A's intros and he's totally sulking and I have to say that is incredibly WEIRD to not have Lou here and I'm not sure I'm going to survive this, I mean first Junior demands to be traded and let's not EVEN GET ME GOING on Alex Rodriguez & His Disgraceful Departure, and then Jay Buhner retires which very nearly killed me thank you very much, and now Lou's gone and I REALLY DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH MORE I CAN TAKE, and you know, as long as I'm going on and on about things I can't stand, can somebody please tell me why in the hell don't we have another left handed reliever?  So anyway, there's my favorite Athletic supporter (pun intended), the A's mascot Stomper, whom they don't even bother to introduce even though he is the one redeeming thing about that stadium and there are all the A's in their ugly green and yellow uniforms and evidently it is Weapons Night there at the Oakland Coliseum as all the fans are waiving some kind of clubbing device around, and all I can say is that PLEASE GOD LET THEM USE THOSE ON THAT GODAWFULLY HORRIFYING HONKING TUBA BAND.

So we get down to business and Ichiro starts things off by grounding out which really isn't like him at all and then Randy Winn doubles which was rather excellent and then Edgar "strikes out" and I drop my first F-bomb of the season and then John Olerud grounds out and we leave Randy stranded and if Tim Hudson wanted to shave off that stupid strip of hair on his chin that would be SUPER DUPER.

So bottom of the first and that Ellis guy hits a routine grounder and as he's winding down from running it out, he totally checks his cup, I guess to make sure that everything is still there  where he left it, like I'm sure it didn't fall off as you were running down the baseline but thanks for being conscientious and double checking just in case I guess, and Freddy ends up sitting the side down in order and can I just say to that fan with the sign that read "Stop the War, A's, & Sign Tejada", if you're going to try to tie world events into baseball, at least have it make sense as I have no idea what "war" the A's have been waging, like they can't afford him, how is that a WAR and PS, that is the stupidest sign I have EVER SEEN IN MY LIFE.  

So second inning and Burt I mean Bret flew out and Mike Cameron reached on an infield single and Hudson and his stupid chin hair make about 5000 throws to 1st to keep him on which was seriously grinding my nerves, and Jeff Cirillo strikes out which he will probably try to blame on Lou Piniella somehow, and then Hudson and his chin hair throw to first some more and Ben Davis - oh nevermind.

So bottom of the second, and Eric Chavez singles which really gets me irritated but not nearly as irritated as the homerun that occurs an out later off the bat of Durazo and it's now 2-0 A's and then Terence Long singles and then Ramon Hernandez singles and I borrow Burt's phrase of "you've gotta be shitting me!" and thankgodfully they don't score any more, and you'll all be happy to know that Freddy is SNOT FREE after having wiped his nose on his shirt following the 2nd out.

So then we get to see that commercial where the two guys are trading baseball cards online and the one guy panics because their boss is coming so he throws the monitor which strikes me funny and we head into the third inning and blah blah blah we waste Randy's single and as far as that so called excellent defensive play that robbed Ichiro of his base knock, I really didn't think it was excellent and in fact, I thought it TOTALLY SUCKED.

Bottom of the third and we retire the side in order only Miguel Tejada tried to run to first when the ball got away from Davis on strike 3 and I SO HATE THAT RULE but at least we got him at first and can I just say, HONK THAT, stupid Honking Tuba Band.

So fourth inning and we waste Burt's I mean Bret's single and then with two outs, Long singled and thought he might take two, but then thought better of it and scampered back to first since Cammie came up with it in a hurry and then Hernandez singled and I accidentally yelled LOU! for Lou to come get Freddy but I really meant to say BOB! and I guess it doesn't matter that much since nobody pays any attention to me anyway but at least we get out of the inning without any more runs scoring.

So fifth inning and nobody cares what happened. 

Sixth inning and with 1 out, Randy singled like WELCOME TO SEATTLE MR. WINN and then Edgar walked and unfortunately, the only thing worth noting in the next two at-bats is that Bret had torn his pants at some point and unfortunately, no one has taken their free weapons to that stupid Honking Tuba Band.

So bottom of the sixth, and we mercifully don't let them score anymore and meanwhile the umpire and his protective shoulder pads looks like that gold robot guy C3PO or whatever that hung out with R2D2 in Star Wars which I've never seen being much more the musical type and not the intergalactic battle look at my spaceship type although I did enjoy Spaceballs.

So anyway, seventh inning and we do absolutely nothing and Julio Mateo relieves Shiggy who had relieved Freddy during that inning that I'm not even going to talk about since I'm still recovering from minor stroke I suffered over it earlier and he retires the side in order.

Eighth inning and we waste Mark McLemore's lead off walk and then Giovanni Carrarra relieved Mateo and retired the side in order and let's just keep moving right along to the ninth where Rincon relieved Hudson and we can't get anything going and lose 5-0 and I am very, very, very, very not happy about this.