Braves vs. Duke

[EarlJam]

Fordgirl (Shelly) and I are talking and just realized something dramatic. First of all, this is our first joint-post (DRAMATIC!)

Secondly, we realized that in one short week, we have watched our favorite team lose more than our favorite basketball team lost in six freakin', dad gum months.

Damn the Braves. Damn them to Hell.

Best,

-EarlJam and FordGirl (a.k.a. Dan & Shelly, a.k.a. Danelly)

[lawgrad91]

As a long-suffering Orioles fan, I feel your pain. When they were 2-14, I was thinking, "how many seasons does it take for Duke basketball to lose 14 games?" I stand to be corrected, but I believe in 1997-2001 (and '98-2002) Duke lost 15 games. Total.

Of course, right now, the Birds are on a winning streak. A one-game winning streak, where they nearly blew a 4-run lead in the 10th, winning by 1 with the tying run on 3rd, but a winning streak is a winning streak.

Damn Orioles.

[TillyGalore]

Whoa! EarlJam, lawgrad91, and I are all long suffering O's fans. I miss the O's of the 70's/early 80's and late 90's.

[colchar]

I didn't realize anyone still played attention to baseball.

[OZZIE4DUKE]

I didn't realize anyone still played attention to baseball.

Yes. A few more people than are paying attention to the Stanley Cup playoffs at this point. ;)

Hmmm. O's on a 1 game winning streak. Yanks on a 1 game losing streak. They play tonight. I think both streaks will end tonight!

[lawgrad91]

Whoa! EarlJam, lawgrad91, and I are all long suffering O's fans. I miss the O's of the 70's/early 80's and late 90's.

Amen, Tilly. My great-grandfather "Poppy" lived with us when I was young, in the early to mid '70's, and he had followed the O's since Babe Ruth played for them. We listened to their games on the radio EVERY NIGHT during baseball season. I miss having pitchers who could actually throw the ball across the strike zone.

Didn't know EJ was an O's fan, too. My heart goes out to him....

[Lavabe]

-EarlJam and FordGirl (a.k.a. Dan & Shelly, a.k.a. Danelly)

Is this sort of like Bennifer?

[wilson]

I didn't realize anyone still played attention to baseball.

Yes. A few more people than are paying attention to the Stanley Cup playoffs at this point. ;)

Ozzie's point is seconded.
colchar, you're fond of needling us for being fans of supposedly obscure baseball. But at this point, the NHL is far smaller a blip on the radar than MLB.

[EarlJam]

Didn't know EJ was an O's fan, too. My heart goes out to him....

I've become much closer to the Braves since moving down to Atlanta in the 90s, but yes, there was a time when I was as big of an O's fan as a Duke fan. My walls were adorned with all kinds of Orioles stuff, and I even handmade banners for all of their championships and hung them up in my room.

Every time I hear "We Are Family," I want to throw up. And that Spock look-alike Kent Tekulve (sp?)?, Well he can of course burn in Hell!

-EarlWeaverJam

[CathyCA]

Dawn, you don't know this, but everyone else here has heard it. My very first boyfriend's dad pitched for the Orioles in the 1971 World Series. We were in the 4th grade. Everyone wanted to know what Patrick's dad was chewing and spitting out there on the mound. (It was tobacco, not gum.)

Patrick's dad was one of four 20-game winners on the Orioles in the 1971 season. The others were Dave McNally, Mike Cuellar and Jim Palmer. Amazingly, they lost to the Pirates in the 1971 World Series. They were a GREAT pitching staff.

After that series, the Orioles traveled to Japan to play. Patrick's dad brought back kimonos for Patrick and his sister Nancy. They brought them to school so that we could see them.

[TillyGalore]

Whoa! EarlJam, lawgrad91, and I are all long suffering O's fans. I miss the O's of the 70's/early 80's and late 90's.

Amen, Tilly. My great-grandfather "Poppy" lived with us when I was young, in the early to mid '70's, and he had followed the O's since Babe Ruth played for them. We listened to their games on the radio EVERY NIGHT during baseball season. I miss having pitchers who could actually throw the ball across the strike zone.

Didn't know EJ was an O's fan, too. My heart goes out to him....

A few years back my parents decided on an O's themed Christmas for me. Most all my presents related to the O's or Cal Ripken as that was the year he was inducted into the HOF, which I attended. One of the presents my dad gave me was a collection of O's games on DVD. Can't remember what they were, but I suggest we have an O's party to watch one or two or all of these games.

I have a print of the Normal Rockwell painting of Brooks Robinson hanging in my "den". I also have a Cal Ripken autographed ball and an etching of his HOF plaque. I'm starting to feel nostalgic. Sigh!

[EarlJam]

One of the great, and oft-overlooked, contributions the Orioles HAVE made to baseball over the past couple of decades can be found in the stadiums where the games are played. The O's set the mold for the "throw-back" design of baseball stadiums that almost everyone started building/copying through the 90s and beyond.

Before Camden Yards (I am still thankful it is not yet named after a corporation), fans marveled at "super stadiums" like the then Skydome in Toronto. It IS pretty cool. I've been there and love it and the city. But it is hardly as intimate and "cozy" as the stadiums designed in the same mold as Camden Yards. If I may digress, remember Exhibition Stadium? Geeeeeeeeeeeeesh. Anyway, creating a "new look and feel" for baseball in 1992 (first year of Camden Yards) was no small feat. It entirely changed the way fans would watch and enjoy baseball across the U.S. for decades to come; and the Orioles organization, along with the stadium's designers, paved the way. That's something to be proud of, or at least something to point to when year after year we fans must wallow in Oriole poo poo.

-EarlWeaverJam

P.S. And the "O!" in the National Anthem started in Baltimore too.

P.P.S. As did the singing of "Thank God I'm a Country Boy!" at games (the Braves do this today)

P.P.P.S. And now, for some vintage and classic Earl Weaver (I loved the guy!):


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl-4FSRYagc

[TillyGalore]

I miss Earl Weaver.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl-4FSRYagc

[EarlJam]

I miss Earl Weaver.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl-4FSRYagc

Jinx?

I love how, on multiple occassions, he starts heading for the dugout then does a 180, heads back to the ump to continue his verbal beatdown!

-EarlWeaverJam