I talked on the phone with a friend today. In a nutshell, he is a Cubs fan who lives in Chicago proper. After going round and round about the Cubs woes, I mentioned I’ve been going to see the Illini baseball team practice a couple times this week.
“Wow, you go and watch and watch them PRACTICE?”
He seemed a bit incredulous.
And yeah, from his point of view, it does seem a little hard to believe. Living in Chicago, a few hundred feet from the Red line and boom! you’re at Wrigley Field.
But I’m not in Chicago (or for that matter, St Louis) and haven’t been all summer. I need my dose of real live baseball even if it’s a loosely played split squad practice game with the coaches hitting fungoes to the infielders in between pitches.
The fact that Illinois Field is one block away from my workplace doesn’t hurt either.
Meanwhile, the way I hear it from my friend, you can’t give away Cubs or Sox tickets these days. From his perspective, fans aren’t interested in either team this late in the season especially considering how they’re doing. Now that’s harsh.
I’m hoping the situation isn’t near as bad as my friend is portraying it. Baseball is baseball whether it’s college kids taking fungoes or two teams on the downswing.