Won't Get Fooled Again

The signs looked good—the Hollies’ “Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress” the first song we heard on our way to our seats right behind the Sox dugout. Then a little bit of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” just enough to get me feeling like one of the Winchester boys on the hunt for demons. Or maybe Detroit Tigers. Another good sign—the last time Clare and I went to a White Sox-Tigers’ game at the ball-mall Daniel Palka and Matt Davidson hit ninth-inning homers to win it. Why couldn’t magic repeat? A 1-0 Detroit lead going into the bottom of the ninth. If one Sox batter reached base, Colson Montgomery would’ve batted. No such luck. A very sad comebacker, strikeout and flyout gave the visitors the series’ win. The Sox got all of two hits. Talk about lethargic, I don’t care how much praise Sox manager New Mickey Venable heaped on Tigers’ starter Troy Melton, and it was a lot. His team looked like it was going through the motions at the plate. I will say this about Montgomery, who went 0-for-3 on the day: The kid looks like he can play shortstop. Twice he made strong throws on grounders to get the runner, once from deep short. If he can hit .250 with the power he’s shown, I’ll be happy. Enough to go to another game? I don’t know. I’m at that point in life where the little stuff is starting to bother me big time—beef sandwich race on the scoreboard; challenging a fan to get the ball in cup more times than Lenyn Sosa could over the course of a minute that felt endless; t-shirts tossed into the crowd as if we’re a bunch of seals performing for fish. Just play winning baseball, for God’s sakes.