Last year X@F was the week before the ST ticket sale, Saturday, December 1st. This year, we know ST day is December 7th. If they went with the week before again this year, it would be November 30th. Which would be Thanksgiving weekend. And last year you had the registration period begin on November 15th. So I'm guessing X@F has to be December 14th at the earliest--and I don't see them going with the 21st as it's just too close to actual Xmas and would be way later than what they've been doing lately.

So mark your e-calendars. In e-pencil. Saturday, December 14th. It'll be a big year for the "always popular" Sox Pax, what with rings to be distributed and flags to be raised. And let's hope the Yard Sale info is not all secretive and whatnot.

Sox get righty reliever Burke Badenhop from Milwaukee.

Nice job by us. What the hell were the Brewers doing with this guy? It's almost like he pissed off the manager so he wasn't allowed to play unless the team was losing. So he quietly posted great numbers and now gets to come to where he's appreciated. Presumably. This is another one of those guys who walks nobody. And he's actually getting better as the years go by.

And he's a smarty-pants who co-wrote a book about financial planning. Or at least wrote the intro. It's hard to tell. Anyway, welcome aboard, guy. Go and get your picture taken so we don't have to look at this Photoshop work anymore.

And the spring training schedule has been made. Tix on sale December 7th.

If you want to go to the premiere of the World Series movie on Monday night in Boston, try this link which they sent to me as a STH. Tix should still be available. They cost $50 and $30, and there's a $12.50 charge per ticket. If you've got the money and don't have to work, which is the opposite boat I'm in on both counts, go, and then send me pictures.

I went in '07, it was pretty fun, and we got to hear Matt Damon give his secret shot at the Yankees. This year it's at the same place, only Ben Affleck narrates.

The ticket prices for 2014 are up, complete with tiers, though we still don't know which games are what tier. (Except for what they say in the article--Cubs is second tier while Royals are top tier, oddly enough.)

I had also wondered about the phrase "upper standing room" in that article. They said those would be between $10 and $30. Turns out it was a royal fuck-up, as they must have somehow mixed up "upper bleacher" and "standing room." (Which gives me, as a long time ticket buyer, the feeling like the person who wrote the article has never bought tickets to a Red Sox game, which is pretty goddamn lame.) So we've still got upper bleacher at the lowest, with SRO next, then pavilion SRO. Tier 3 has these tickets at $15, $20, and $25, which is the same as the past few years, except upper bleacher had been at $12. For tier 5, UB and SRO drop to $10, while pavilion SRO drops to $15. For tier 1, they go to $20, $30, $35.

Regular bleachers are 20-28-30-32-40. I'm wondering how this will affect the price of my 10-game plan in the bleachers. Will it average out to tier 3 pricing?

Infield grandstand drop to as low as $43, and $40 for sections 11-12 and 28-31. Pretty sweet deal, as we haven't paid that little in a while. "Select games against the Rays, Reds, Blue Jays and Orioles will be in tier five," says the article, so there will be quite a few of those cheap games.

LF/RF GS go as low as $22. While I almost never sit in the RFGS since I don't have a chiropractor, I love the thought of sitting in 32 or 33 for two bucks more than than a yuppie food stamp. Plus fees, of course. (I hope those haven't gone up to the point where they cancel out the savings: "tier 5 fees: $25 per ticket!")

Note: The post title is a reference to my 9th grade health teacher. I still can't believe she became Mrs. Correnty. Such bullshit. She'll always be Miss Tier to me. Engagement announcement, from the Norwalk Hour, 2/9/1991, unnecessarily shown below:

Wait a minute, Mr. and Mrs. Oakley? The plot thickens....

Have you heard that "missed connection from 1973" story that's been slithering around the e-world today? Google it. It's a craigslist ad (since removed) placed by a guy who shared a night of romance with a girl back in '73, and now he's hoping she's out there somewhere. The story takes place in New York City on Thanksgiving Eve and Day.

You know me. I had to check. I had to. The weather. He says it was a rainy night, followed by a wintry mix the next day. So I went to Weather History at almanac.com. And sure enough (because most stories you hear are total bullshit), no precipitation reported in Central Park on 11/21/1973. In fact, there wouldn't have been a cold rain or wintry precipitation with highs reaching the 60s on Thanksgiving Day. I even found some photos of that day's parade, which show the sun shining brightly and people in short sleeves.

Okay, now to answer some of your questions:

1. Do you have that disease where you're emotionless and immediately start counting the guests at a wedding instead of congratulating the bride and groom?

Well, it's borderline. Just kidding. I'll out-emotion you any day. I'll work emotional circles around ya, I'll wrap yer fuckin' head in with a ratchet! Wait, where was I? Ah yes, look, jerky, I appreciate the sentimental story, but don't bullshit people. He seems pretty positive of when this happened, and I'm telling you that there's visual and recorded proof that that time didn't look like what he said it did. Maybe he added the rain and wintry mix for effect. Maybe there was a little rain and it just wasn't measurable--despite that he implies this was quite an extended weather system. Or maybe he was one year off or something. Hell, maybe he meant Canadian Thanksgiving. But what really happened was, he's full of shit.

We're just going to have to accept this story as a good piece of fiction. Like the Bible. Any other questions, leave 'em with my secretary.

As a 10-game plan holder, last year I got to take five swings on the Fenway field. After the team won the World Series this year, I had no expectations of the team doing the BP again. So I was surprised and excited to see "the e-mail" earlier this month. This year it was "10 pitches" as opposed to "5 swings." I got a Tuesday night time slot and prepared to brave the cold and possible snow. And I gave my swings to my new friend, the 9-year-old slugger Nathan. He came out from a little town in New York State on the Vermont border with his father and older brother Kyle. I drove up from PVD to meet up with them....

I arrived a little early and got my first look at the new cloth-ware on Yawkey Way.

The flurries cleared out earlier, but it was in the 20s by 8 p.m. when Nathan took his cuts. I don't know how he gripped the bat. I don't know how any of us gripped our cameras either. (The lights were on throughout the park except the two towers you see, creating the cool effect of the park being lit up with the lights off. Also note the linescore from World Series Game 6, still up on the board.)

Here I am with Nathan in the Red Sox dugout. Part of the deal is you get to go inside both dugouts and clubhouses. He's looking happy because he just got to take batting practice at Fenway F***ing Park! It's funny, when I told him, "you're gonna hit in the exact spot where Big Papi hits," he said, "Big Papi is lefty." A kid after my own proofreading heart! So I corrected myself: "the exact spot where Dustin Pedroia hits."

The World Series Champs logo up on the board. Moving on... But wait, Jere, you silently say, you said the kid just took some swings, where are they? A good question, reader. It should be noted that I was armed with both regular and video camera on this frigid night. Later I'll be making a video of the actual hitting part, the walk to the field, etc. Stay tuned.

Now we're in the Red Sox clubhouse. It was doubly sweet as not only were we in the clubhouse, but we finally got a chance to warm up.

Some players' stuff was still there. Here's a pile of wristbands and some sunglasses at Pedroia's locker.

Here's a Middlebrooks head up in the rafters.

We were on our way out through the stands when we decided to go back on the field. And look who was taking cuts! Wally hit the ball, too. Into the outfield. (Am I more impressed that a green giant can hit or that a man in an unwieldy mascot suit can hit?)


Video I shot on the still-cam of the monster in the cage.

Left to right, Kyle, dad, Nathan, Wally.

Posing with Wally. (Note: Later, while in the stands watching the last few people hit, Wally came up to me with this gesture as if he knew me or something. Like he was specifically happy to see me. I guess this is what mascots do, but it felt different. I feel like the man inside the Wally costume knew me. But he didn't break character so I guess I'll never know.)

Now under the stands again, Nathan throws for the speed gun. I think he hit 40, which is about what I could do with my lingering rotator cuff issues from '88.

Even the balloon guys are all beardy these days.

Me with the three recent trophies. (Photo by Kyle.) As it was the end of the night, I got to watch as six guys put little blue jammies on the trophies and whisked them away:



Last year I didn't get any actual balls from the event. I had this idea of maybe picking two up by the cage and rolling them back to the mound, but covertly keeping one in my sleeve and taking it home. This year, after Nathan hit, they gave him a ball. I was really glad to see that. As we stood in the third base stands, another ball came into the crowd. Some guy beat Nathan to it, but gave it to him. Nathan was nice enough to come right to me and give me that ball.

Then a ball came screaming right at me--I didn't even have a chance to move and my hands were full of cameras, but fortunately it smacked the concrete behind me instead of my face. I got that ball and gave it to Kyle. Now only dad needed a ball, and at that moment, an employee started going around shagging the last of the balls in the outfield, and gave us one. So we all got hooked up. But since we were the only ones left, and there were still plenty of balls on that field, we stayed until another employee gave another ball to Nate, who promptly and selflessly put it right into my hand. As you can see, these things are beat to hell! One of them is almost completely hiding the fact that it's a major league baseball at this point.

So we all had a blast. It was great meeting those guys--the dad knew all about the Bernie Carbo/Bill Lee era so we got to talk about that a lot. Kyle told me that he and his dad didn't tell Nathan where he was going until that day when they picked him up from school. What a surprise.... Here's hoping the Red Sox continue the tradition next year!

In case you missed it, here are my posts from last year's event: Part 1 (in which you see they had the entire seating bowl open, unlike this year (boo)), and Part 2 (which shows the actual hitting).