A Ticket To The Rockpile

And no - the Rockpile is not located at the Colorado State Prison in Canon City.  It refers to the cheap seats in center field at Denver's Coors Field.  I decided to buy a ticket a few days ago to see the Colorado Rockies play the Atlanta Braves.  The tickets costs only $4.00, and if you are 62 or over, you can buy them for a dollar on game day.  Of course, on game day, they are always sold out, so I decided to spend the extra $3.00 so I could actually get in to see the game.  I was late, however, because I had to park clear across downtown to avoid having to pay for parking.  There used to be an old cigarette commercial that declared "I would walk a mile for a Camel."  Well, I would and in  fact did walk a mile to avoid paying those extortionist parking fees.  It's the principal of the thing, not the money.

There was a fairly large crowd at the ballpark for a Thursday night.  Atlanta has quite a following, even if they have the worst record in baseball this year. When my parents moved to Stuart, Florida in 1976, the nearest major league baseball team was in Atlanta, and so my father, as well as everyone else in the state, rooted for the Atlanta Braves.  I remember being in the pool at my parent's condo complex in 1982 and talking to an older woman (she was probably the age I am now) about various things.  She excused herself after a while and said she had to get back home to watch "our Atlanta Braves," who were making a run  for the playoffs that year.  Humorist Lewis Grizard wrote once about how grateful he was to be able to have the Braves and announcer Chip Caray's commentary to look forward to each day on television when he recovered from heart surgery.  And as you can see from the photograph on the left, the Rockies mascot Dinger and the crowd were all enthused during the 7th inning stretch.

And just to make it clear - nobody in their right mind actually sits in the Rockpile.  It is as far away from the game as Mexico.  When I got to the park, I went up to the party deck, where they have a row of counter tops overlooking the park  where you can stand and eat.  Afterwards, I headed down to the infield and stood watching the game from there.  The Rockies are very mediocre this year, which is a tremendous improvement from last year, when they stunk.  The Braves have the worst record in baseball this year - they are the team that stinks this year - and so it was no surprise that the Rockies won 7 to 3 (and seen celebrating in the photo on the left).  Let the good times roll!  At least during this series.