I remember going to Camden Yards once, twenty years ago or more. I went with a friend and if we didn't start before we got on the train we certainly bought as many beers as we thought we could drink in 50 minutes for the ride up. I somehow traded the tickets we had which I knew were in the back of the lower section under a vicious overhang, you couldn't see shit, for a pair of seats on the first row directly next to the visitors' bench. I guess I was the original barter king. Anyway, the A's were in town and we commenced to act like total idiots, shouting at the A's and generally being morons. The highlight was definitely having Jose Conseco flip us off. It wasn't even particularly discreet. He was jogging out of the dugout to take the field and we were hollering at him and he turned around and gave us a prolonged bird in full view of everyone.
Another time I was at a Frederick Keys game with this same friend. There was a rain delay and the local team was ahead and was arguing to have the game called. Marc and I were carrying on like idiots, yelling at the umps, yelling at the Keys' manager, yelling for no particular reason. One of the Keys stepped out of the dugout and addressed me, Do you make your living acting like such an idiot? he asked. Before I had a chance to answer (Why, yes, in fact, I do.) a coach leapt out and grabbed him, pulling him back into the dugout. The game resumed much to our delight and in the end the Keys scored a deluge of runs and set offensive records and basically beat the shit out of whoever they were playing. After the game this same fellow stepped out of the dugout and tossed me a ball, Hey, sorry about before he said and disappeared into the dugout. I obviously tracked him down to get him to sign the ball and to apologize myself after a fashion. Brad Pennington. He got called up later that year and caused a bench clearing brawl in his first appearance in the bigs.
