Baseball is not very popular in SA but I really like it.
Some cool facts/things I nocticed at the game that I thought I'd share:
- At the beginning, there were some members of the US airforce who parachuted into the stadium - very cool! Being part of the US Navy/airforce/army is a huge thing in the US, these men and women are highly respected unlike in South Africa
- Every few innings, the sweepers come on and sweep the sand
- A really nice they do, is that they allow people to take home any baseballs that they catch and they often (almost after every ball is used!) use new balls so then just throw the used balls into the crowd - an awesome souvenir for any supporter.
- Each batter has a signature song, so it is played every time that batter comes on. Punto's 'Who let the dogs out' got a few barks from the crowd when he came on :)
- During some of the innings they play some songs for the crowd to sing along to, they played Neil Diamond's 'Sweet Caroline' (not sure how this links back to baseball!) and the crowd just loved this! I guess that there a lot of Neil Diamond fans out there :)
- These baseball players get well paid, Red Sox salaries range from $1m-$21m a year - somewhat ridiculous considering most of these guys are much younger than me!
- There is a Citgo electronic advertisement board just outside Fenway Park, this company went out of business years ago but the sign board was left since supporters felt that this was part of the Fenway "landscape" as seen in many photos of the stadium
Owen did some investigation and found out that there is a reason as to why they play 'Sweet Caroline' at Redsox games. Thanks Owen! Apparently, it is now traditional to play the song in the 8th inning. Originally it was played for good luck and randomly chosen by the music director
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