Friday, March 21, 2014

Batter up

Baseball in Australia.

Who would have thought I would be watching a Major League Baseball game in Australia?  I didn't even know that many people even liked baseball in Australia.

MLB had decided that the opening series for the season would be held in Sydney.  The Dodgers vs the Diamondbacks!  I've loved baseball since I was an university, so I quickly bought tickets as soon as they became available.  They weren't cheap.... not cheap at all.  This would be a disaster I thought. With ticket prices like this, no one will go and the entire experiment will be a disaster.


It turns out I was completely wrong.

Whether it was merely the novelty of having the MLB in Sydney or if instead it was because Australia was full of secretive baseball tragics, it was a full house (I would late find out that all three games of the series were well attended and the entire endeavour was a great success).


I had a great time watching the game.  Seeing the SCG completely transformed into a baseball diamond was also something which I felt glad to witness.  One of my last memories of sitting in the members' stand was watching the cricket, so it was a bizarre image to see a baseball game happening directly in front of it.  It was one of those strange moments in life that may never happen again, but I'm glad I was able to be part of it, even if it's just so that I can tell people one day that "I was there!"

Saturday, March 15, 2014

Through the pouring rains

I've witnessed something historic.  I've witnessed the first ever win by the GWS Giants over their local rivals the Sydney Swans.

Being involved in something that is the "first" is special.  It's something that can never be taken from you.  Things which are the biggest, the best, the greatest or the last.  Those things can change.  They are things that may not necessarily remain so forever.  That's the the case for firsts though.  There is no rewriting and there is no improvement.

The entire crowd gasped as one when the stadium was hit by lightening.

The rain became so heavy that what I could see in front of me gradually faded away.  First the buildings on the other side of the stadium disappeared behind the curtain of water.  Then even the other side of the stadium itself became a shadow. 

The siren rang for quarter time and the players pushed their way through the curtains of water into the change rooms.  This was a rarity as players normally stay on the ground at the end of the first and third quarters.  Sitting in the grandstand, we chatted as waited for the players to return for the start of the second quarter.  Nothing happened, we looked at our watches and started to wonder whether they would come back at all.  The rain was still heavy and the players were still nowhere to be seen.  Eventually the rain started to slacken the players emerged.  I've been watching this game for a long time and I can't remember the last time the restart of a game was delayed for so long.

The Giants wanted the ball.  They wanted the win.  The rain seemed to give them a strength to their legs missing from the Swans and they gradually overwhelmed them.  Their first win over the big brother happened on this rain soaked day.