My sister and I discussed how sad it would be that we'd have to wait another 6 months before being able to go watch our Cardinals play at Busch Stadium. That's half a year, people! Knowing this was our last chance at seeing our beloved Redbirds play, we made a decision to go down after the 7th inning stretch, expecting the gates to be open for all to enter...or so we thought.
Living in St. Peters, it took us 35-40ish minutes to drive downtown. We listened to the radio as the crowd at Busch gave Craig Biggio a standing ovation for his final game at Busch (most likely). We also heard Stan "the man" Musial play "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" on his harmonica (I KNOW! We MISSED IT). They were honoring Mike Shannon for 50 years (how OLD is he?) with the Cardinals organization. And of course, the Astros tied the game 1-1 in the top of the 8th. So we assumed, but mostly hoped, we'd have time to make it for some 9th inning heroics.
As we walked towards Busch, we noticed some Cardinal fans-here and there-walking in the direction away from the stadium. This horrified us, as one of our cardinal rules (pun intended) is never to leave a game unless, say, your appendix bursts. We tried to enter the gate closer to the outfield, only to have the usher/entry-nazi tell us "turn around ladies, you can't come in tonight". The funny thing is, we didn't even fake anger or belonging. Instead, my sister just said with mild disappointment in her voice, "How come?" Yes, we could've stood there for 10 minutes pretending to look for non-existant ticket stubs in our purses with fake outrage, but we just moved along, figuring another gate would be open. And of course it was.These developments don't bode well for security, but well, that's another article.
Anyways, we saw that the Astros had magically (seriously, we parked less than 5 minutes away) scored 2 more runs on a Carlos Lee 2 run HR-which explains the small exodus we saw earlier. But we were still excited to be back at our baseball house of worship.
We stood with the other standing-room-only folk and soaked it in. I have to say, though, the ushers have some strong regime going on, as we noticed quite a few seats everyone could have sat in, except that we didn't. So, what I'm trying to say is, the ushers should ease up a little bit or expect some underground insurgency to emerge, outraged at the anal rules they're implementing. We're not all Anheiser Busch employees! Let us move down into their seats when they leave or are no-shows. I'm just tell you how it is! Power to the people!
It was just like old times looking down on a familiar field drenched in lights and dotted with unformed figures. A come from behind was the only way towards victory as we were losing 3-1 but we didn't lose hope. Before the bottom of the 9th inning, we watched a video from the always hilarious Brew Crew broadcaster, Bob Uecker (just a biiiiit outside), in honor of Mike Shannon. At the end, we all applauded and gave a standing O to our "big boy" and Mike stood, waved and blew kisses to us all. Gotta love him... but really, how old IS he?
In the bottom of the 9th, it was all heroics and excitement. Brad Lidge came in to close, but an Astros win was not to be. Miguel Cairo got a base hit. Ryan Ludwick walked. Eckstein was lifted (could be his last Cardinals home game!) for a gimpy Phat Albert. But the crowd was in a festive mood and any appearance from Pujols draws standing O's these days, especially with the clutch pinch hits he's giving lately. So the hair raising ovation continued as the announcer proclaimed "#5, Albert Pujols". Pujols got an RBI single that was nearly a HR, with Ludwick advancing to third and still no outs . And yes, he's so hurt he can barely run to first, but ain't he great anyway? Rick Ankiel stepped in and won the game with a 2 run triple. The team pounced on one another and jumped for joy, all on ESPN for once. In fact, the producers let me go behind the camera to record the game for 10-20 seconds. I've got the pictures to prove it. Oh, I forgot to mention that? That's weird. I must be jaded or something.
We got a win in our final game at Busch this year and luckily I was there to see it and get my Cardinal fix. And even though it was announced the next home game would be March 31st, 2008 (weird), it's good to be a Cardinals' fan. Even now.
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