THIS had me cracking up.
I watched the Indians-Yankees game Wednesday night, and here's the story - and this you just gotta love: Prior to last night's game, the Indians had lost nine straight, and slid from one game back in their division to eight. Things weren't looking good. They needed some magic.
Enter the squirrel!
In the third inning, a young fox squirrel ran into the outfield. Nobody really knew where he came from, but when play was stopped in a failed attempt to catch the tree-dwelling rodent, the audience loved it. They were cheering the squirrel on, and even the players for both teams regarded the squirrel with amusement.
Indians fans and management alike both capitalized on the squirrel's appearance, treating the small animal like a good luck charm. One lady had decal letters on the back of her shirt that read, "I LOVE THE SQUIRREL." (How she managed to do this during the game shows real entrepreneurship.) The team superimposed a Cleveland jersey on a photo of the squirrel and flashed it on the jumbotron screen. And when the Indians came back in the eighth inning to beat the New York Yankees, 4 runs to 3, the squirrel-as-good-luck-charm sentiment was vindicated.
The squirrel never left the game. At certain points, he ran toward the pitcher's mound, and then, later, home plate, but he mostly just layed in the grass in the outfield. Some fans threw him peanuts. For one night, he became a symbol of unity for all of Cleveland.
It's still a mystery as to how a squirrel got into the ballpark. I've heard of the occassional cat wandering onto a field of play, but never a squirrel. However, about 100 feet from the center field fence, there are four young trees. I would guess that's where he came from.
I don't know what happened to the squirrel - whether they managed to capture and release him at game's end or if they simply shut the lights off and left him to his own devices. One way or another, I'm sure the good-luck critter found his way out.
And baseball in Cleveland may never be the same again.
Article comments
1 - Keith Sikora
Just as long as the Indians mess with the Yankees and the Red Sox (most tortured sports city my ass), I should be able to sleep well at night.
2 - Mark Edward Manning
Er ... I am a Red Sox fan, Keith. And, yes, the Patriots' success of late and the Celtics' championships of the past certainly help, but please don't deny to me one minute how awful and heartbreaking it's been for Sox fans. Because you don't care doesn't mean it's not true.
3 - Mark Saleski
mark speaks the truth.
take this year for example....the yankees lead is down to 5 and a half games.
if it drops top below 5, a buncha people will be forced, as if by reflex, to climb back onto the bandwagon.
i know. i'll be one of 'em.
4 - Eric Olsen
this is too painful for me to address directly, but I can muster the courage in a comment: after over two years of putting my emotions on hold to allow for the declared "rebuild" to pan out, I was a gnat's fingernail away from declaring my emotional attachment to this team and exposing my delicate heart for the rest of the season. But thank Bob Feller I didn't, as the slide was as inevitable as every other "corrective" streak this year and had I signed on I would have been a blubbering jellyfish by now. They were right when they said '05 will be the year they get serious.
Dawn and I went to their last win before the roof caved in and the atmosphere was buoyant and electric and felt like the good old days, but deep down we knew it couldn't last. Fuckers.