Ogden Raptors 11, Casper Ghosts 4 - Thursday, July 23, 2009

"I'm ready for another state," Rob said, after we had settled into our front-row seats by third base, with a view of the Wasatches in the distance again.

The proximate cause of this was the jackass who asked us to move down a seat or two so he could splay his gut out further without obstruction--well, actually, he said it was for "the kids," who for some reason had seats not next to his. This of course turned out to be a great fat flaming lie, which is really why it rankles. But we were getting a little testy with Ogden on account of the fact that Lindquist Field--despite some coolio Wildwood-style lettering on the marquee--didn't have much going for it beyond the view.



Principally, the thing it was lacking was the visiting team, the Casper Ghosts, whose bus had broken down several hours previously in Rawlins, Wyoming. When the team did arrive, league regulations gave them an hour to prepare, so we had some time to kill. The food options were mediocre, though the taco salad wasn't too bad until I decided to relocate the majority of it onto my shorts. And what has happened to local beer? Unlike in the past, on this trip the hometown brews have for the most part been pallid and thin. Are they fooling anybody? They must be, I guess.

Anyway, we were two seats down from the jackass with the gut (and, inexplicably, a T-shirt celebrating David Cone's 1999 perfect game for the Yankees) and directly in front of a local wit, who had much to say about how painful it would or would not be to have a baseball extracted from one's rectum. And, what do you know, then an actual ballgame happened.

We saw two real rarities: a straight steal of home by the Casper right fielder, and a 1-2-3 double play. For the latter, Ogden had runners on first and third with one out. The pitch was tight and inside, and the batter check-swung a dribbler halfway back to the mound, then claimed he had been hit by it. This was not the call, however. The pitcher grabbed up the ball, threw it to the catcher, who tagged out the runner coming from third, before whipping the ball to first to get the batter--who was still arguing the call. So, good times, even if it did eventually turn into a laugher.

Still, if I lived in Ogden and didn't drink myself to death inside of a year on that account, I'd spend my baseball time and money schlepping down to Salt Lake to see the Bees instead of coming here too often.