Take you Out---or Take you Home?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Are you a take-me-out-to-the ballgame? Or a take-me-home?

 Got to say, I  love baseball, sitting in the ball park ,with all the hilariously happy (sometimes) people, rooting for your team to win. And that moment, when it's one guy, the pitcher, against one guy, that batter, and everyone focused on the moment when everything could change. And how it's a team sport, and an individual sport, and ah. I love it.

Not so much the spitting (what is there to spit? I have NEVER spit.) Or the rowdy beer-throwing and whatever. And the hitching of pants. I have never hitched my pants.

But I love the families in the bleachers, and the cheering for success, and the sunny days and crackerjacks and hotdogs. Delicious hot dogs. And I don't even generally like beer, but you've gotta have at least a sip at the ball game.

And yes, the Red Sox often break our hearts. But there' s always next year. But this year..it could happen!

So how about you? Take you out to the ballgame? Or take you away it?  And if you were playing, would you want to be the batter when it's the last up of the last inning in a tie game and you could win it all?  I always think the world is divided into the "put-me-in" people and the "no way" people.

And who's your team?

RHYS BOWEN: Giants fan here, Hank. Love my Giants although they have started this season with the worst record since 1980 something. We usually go to spring training in Scottsdale which I find more fun than the real games in a cold and drafty stadium in San Francisco. A friend has season tickets and I snap up the ones she can't use. And they are in the friends and family section so we get to sit with players' families. You can tell the wives by the enormous rocks on their left hands!

Your question about whether I'd want to be that last batter... I know what I'd hate and that would be to be closing pitcher, last game of world series, being handed a one run lead in the ninth. I know, it happened to the Giants once and he blew it.

HALLIE EPHRON: We are blessed here in Boston with Fenway Park and the reliably unreliable Red Sox. I go to about one ball game a season (we're going in a few weeks to see them play the Minnesota Twins) and I love almost everything about it, especially when we win. My husband listens to all the games at home.

I was a terrible baseball player. Afraid of the ball. It's very hard, you know. And I never learned how to use a glove. But in my dreams I'm on second base, bases loaded, two outs in the final inning, Red Sox behind by one, and Big Papi hits a base-clearing homerun.

The worst thing about baseball is when your favorite players retire or go to different teams.

INGRID THOFT: I wouldn’t characterize myself as a baseball fan, but as Hank and Hallie know, when you live in Boston (or it’s your hometown,) you are a Red Sox  fan.  For life.  I’ve been to a handful of games over the years, and what I’ve enjoyed most is the atmosphere at Fenway Park.  A warm night, some snacks, the Green Monster, the traffic rushing by on the Mass Pike, all make for an iconic baseball experience.  Every New Englander should go at least once, if only to soak up the scene.

 I never played baseball or softball growing up, but I lean towards the “put me in, coach!” frame of mind, so I would rather be the last batter up than riding the bench. 

DEBORAH CROMBIE:  I didn't grow up watching baseball or going to games. Which is weird because my dad coached a corporate women's softball team before I was born, but somehow that didn't translate to professional baseball. But my daughter played softball all through elementary school, and we became big Texas Rangers fans. I loved going to the games and following the team. I still watch the games when I have a chance, and I was really rooting for the Rangers to make it to the World Series last year.

I haven't been to a game in years, though, because Rick doesn't like baseball, or any kind of organized sport.

JENN MCKINLAY: I grew up in Newyorkachusetts (i.e. Connecticut) in which baseball is pretty much divided by the Connecticut River. On one side it's all Yankees fans and on the other it's the Red Sox. I spent my middle school and teen years on the Red Sox side and am a member of Red Sox Nation in honor of my grandmother who was one of their most ardent fans. That being said, when the Diamondbacks came to AZ, I was all in. Hub and I had just started dating and his father had season tickets so much of our first year together was spent watching the Diamondbacks, which was a pretty awesome courtship but that could be because of the hotdogs, peanuts, Red Vines, beer, and gourmet popcorn.

Yes, I love the game but my favorite part of baseball is the food. Shocker, I know. "'Cause it's one, two, three strikes you're out at the old ball game!"

LUCY BURDETTE: We spent a couple years living outside Detroit when I was a kid, so we all became mad for the Tigers. When I lived in Gainesville Fl, the closest team was the Braves, but I never did get very attached to them. Now when we're in Connecticut, it's exactly as Jenn described--and we live right on the dividing line for Yankees versus Red Sox fans. I only get interested in baseball when the playoffs and World Series come around. Though I think I could become a Red Sox fan!

Ask me about UCONN women's basketball, however, and I can tell you anything and everything about the players, the coach, the competition...I love watching those girls play!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I married into New England, and so became a Red Sox fan, as one is required to do. (Ross and I have a good friend who grew up outside NYC and is an adamant Yankees fan, despite living in Portland for close to thirty years. It takes real guts to be a Yankees fan in Maine.)

For me, however, the best of baseball is our local AA team, the Portland Sea Dogs. They play in Hadlock Field, a perfect gem where there's not a bad seat to be found (and general seating is less than the price of a movie ticket!) In all the years we've been going, I've never seen or heard any altercation, beer-throwing or loud profanities. Instead, it always seems a festival gathering of Mainers grateful to be out under the blue sky, eating hot dogs and drinking local microbrews from the Shipyard Brew Pen. We've seen some amazing talent play there: Mookie Betts, Clay Buchholz, Dustin Pedroia and Hanley Ramirez all came up from the Sea Dogs. They have fireworks after the game on the 4th of July, and promotions like Dog of the Day (featuring adoptable dogs,) Superhero Day (come in costume,) and Pride Night (to coincide with Portland's Pride Day festivities.)

You can't beat it, which is why we have tickets for a double header this coming Friday!

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HANK: Whoo hoo! How about you, Reds readers? Baseball—yes, no? And who’s your team? 

photo credits and thank you to: C. Penier. Yobro,  Onyschenko, David Lee