Saturday, June 30, 2012

Seoul

On Never Having Thor Around When You Need Him

Jamsil Baseball Stadium
Jamsil Baseball Stadium, 2012
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Lotte Giants vs. Doosan Bears
Jamsil Stadium
Korea Professional Baseball
Seoul, South Korea
5:00 PM


Outside of the Game:
After going to bed early the night previous, I was up bright and early to find that the weather reports had not changed at all in the interim, and it looked like tonight was going to be wash-out as well. This left a bit of a quandary. If I got in the game tonight at Jamsil, I could use Sunday as a make-up to go back to Incheon. But if the game didn't get played (and 100% chance of rain for the entire day didn't make that seem likely), I'd have to go to the Bears game Sunday night and see if they played a make-up game on Monday. Who would have thought there'd be this much rain at the start of the rainy season, am I right?

I went out to get some breakfast an access the weather situation. (It turned out to be very rainy.) After booking a DMZ tour for Sunday morning, I got all my rain gear together and decided to see if the Jongmyo Shrine was open today, as Saturday was a free walk-around day without tours.

It turns out the shrine was open, and it also answered the mystery of why there were the stone walkways in the middle of everything at the historical sites: when the dirt paths turn into muddy molasses, you walk on them easily (though not on the middle one, which is reserved for the spirits). Who would have thought? Despite the weather, the temple complex was a relaxing experience, with the only complication being handling the camera in extreme rain conditions. It is, however, important to expand your skill sets.

Jongmyo Shrine
Jongmyo Shrine

Despite my best poncho situation, I was still relatively soaked by the end of the experience, so I went back to the hotel to take a shower to warm up and change into my dwindling supply of clean, dry clothes. I had decided to go check out an antiques market, some tech marketplaces, and a fake Disneyland near Jamsil, in case the game was still going to be played if the weather magically let up somehow.

My first stop was an antiques marketplace. It was a series of buildings that had a near-infinite amount of tiny stores in them, all run by one or two people, either specializing in one type of product (books, pottery, etc), or a general range of old things for sale. The only factor that saved me from spending all of the money was that everyone I talked to only accepted cash, and a search for a nearby international cash machine proved to be a fruitless endeavor. It may not have been good for the vendors, but it saved me a lot of cash, and I managed to only spend most of the cash I had on me on various antiques.

My next stop was the Techno Mart, which was just a ten or so story store that sold everything you could want electronics-wise. The first few floors start off disappointingly with clothes and a food court, and from there on up, it is all geek, baby. Each floor was dedicated to a particular set of electronics, such as domestic personal electronics, cameras, PCs, game systems, etc. On the very top floor was a movie theater, just because. Walking around was a dizzying exercise in technical excess. Every possible variation and option was there. If you wanted that special PS2 controller that they only made in India for two years, you could buy one. Want a German after-market lens for a five year-old Canon camera? Ayup.

Doing my best not to buy anything, especially after my earlier spree, I eventually wandered out into the afternoon to get my subway to fake Disneyland when it became apparent that it was no longer raining. It took a minute or two to register in my brain. And then when it did, I realized I needed to get my butt to the stadium to see if they were going to play the game. Because if I got in the game that night, it should be clear sailing for my rain make-up the next night, thus wrapping up the baseball.

I had already been to Jamsil as the first stop on the trip to see the other home team for Jamsil, the SK Twins. This evening's contest would be to see the other team, the Doosan Bears. Since I had already been there before, I did not need as much lead-time before the game, as the obsessive-compulsive photography had already been completed.

Since I had exercised unusual foresight in selecting my rain activities, I was actually able to get to the game with plenty of time to spare, and enough time to do some baseball shopping before the start of the game. Getting a ticket was not nearly the scrum it had been the first time, and I got my seat on the first base side with a minimum amount of fuss, bother, and pantomime.


The Stadium and Fans:
Home to center, Jamsil Baseball Stadium
Home plate to center field, Jamsil Stadium

As mentioned, I had visited Jamsil as the first stop on the Korean baseball tour, so everything was at least familiar to me. The only thing I was really taking notice of was what they did to swap between home teams. The stadium had side-by-side team stores for both teams on the outside of the stadium, so nothing changed there. For the most part, the tickets were printed up with the Bears on them and not the Twins, and all the various hanging signage in the park was switched over to the Bears instead of the Twins (Bears players, Bears team name, etc).

Mascot
Happy fans
Given the rainy weather during the day, it wasn't too surprising that the stadium wasn't full. The visiting Lotte Giants still had a sizeable presence at the game, even though Busan is about as far as you can get from Seoul and still be in the country. However, there were a group of guys sitting behind me that took the proverbial cake.

There were four guys sitting in the row right above the stairs decked out in Bear's regalia that periodically got up and danced in unison while trying to look as nonplussed as possible. To be fair, if they didn't pull it off, they'd look like idiots, but damned if they didn't sell it. I actually started to enjoy them more than the official MC and the cheerleaders. I have to imagine they are well-known by the fan base. This doesn't seem like something they did just that night on the spur of the moment.

Awesome fans
Pure awesome

The official activities for the night included the Kiss Cam, and there was yet another beer-drinking contest. This time, it was who could finish the beer fastest through a straw. They had a home and visiting fan do this, but the big joke for the evening was that both of the contestants were Caucasian. (The Bears fan won, for the curious.) The home and away fans sadly both got together for some more wave activity, repeating the regular, slow, and fast wave I saw earlier in the trip.

Whitey contest
It is funny because they're honkies.

The home team victory was celebrated with a standard hero interview after the game. One of the honorees was the starting Caucasian pitcher, who had to come out with an interpreter. They broadcast his answers before the translation, so it was the only part of any of those interviews that I understood at all.


At the Game with Oogie:
Foul ball
Say hello to my little friend

Let's just cut to the chase here: I got a foul ball. After however many games in however many stadiums, I actually got a foul ball. Despite very close calls in Cincinnati and Lakewood, the simple souvenir had eluded me for all these years, so it only seems fair that once I do get one, it should be in the most improbable manner possible.

I got relatively good seats right down the first base line, solidly in the home cheering section. Perhaps because of the weather, all the seats around me weren't filled in at the start of the game. The foul ball netting in Jamsil, as in most Asian parks, runs pretty high along the baselines. There was a lefty at the plate, who clearly got around very early on some manner of breaking ball, because his hit managed to just clear the netting, and then backspin dove it down directly at my left leg, where it caromed rather painfully off my left calf before I could even blink.

It was all instinct at that point, as I managed to clamp by foot down on it as everyone within five rows started to make a dive for it. I calmly picked it up while everyone started starting at the white boy who apparently didn't realize what a big deal getting a foul ball was. I believe I was clinically in shock for a good five minutes.

Eventually, all of the seats around me were filled by late-coming fans. A teenage couple was eventually sitting to my left, and the boyfriend seemed very eager when a couple more pop flies came into our general direction. I did not have the vocabulary or the heart to tell him that if he had gotten here at the start of the game that the shot that went off my leg would have literally bounced off his chest.

That's why you show up on time, kid.


The Game:
First pitch, Giants vs. Bears
First pitch, Giants vs. Bears

There was a lot of scoring in what was a relatively quick game. And all that scoring was in tight bunches, and then fields of nothing. In fact, the pattern for the game was scoring only in even innings.

For example, the first inning had one hit in the bottom of the inning and nothing else for either side. The second inning was apparently a scoring frame. The Giants started it off with a single, before a fly-out to short. The next batter up hit that foul ball that I got. (Did I mention that I got a foul ball?) He then singled to right before a walk loaded the bases. The next batter had an infield single to drive in a run, but a bizarre mess-up on a suicide squeeze and a strikeout ended it 1-0 Giants.

Not to let that stand, the Bears managed to pull-off two, two-out walks in a row, followed by a hit-by-pitch to load up the bases. A long single to right cleared the bases before a strikeout ended it 3-1 Bears at the end of two. The Giants managed to get a leadoff single to third with a sacrifice bunt and a fielder's choice, but another fly-out ended the inning. The Bears went in order in their half, and the Giants followed them by going in order in the top of the fourth.

In the bottom of the inning, the Bears nearly had something. A single was sacrificed over to second and stole third, and then a walk made it first and third with one out. But the runner at third tried to score on a fly -out to right but got doubled up at home to end the inning. Both sides went in order in the fifth, and Giants only had a single in the top of the sixth (that was erased on a double play grounder). The Bears, however, had some business to do in the bottom of the sixth. A one-out walk was followed by three straight singles that brought home two more runs, making the score 5-1 at the end of six.

Both sides went in order in the seventh, and the Giants had a two-out double that went nowhere in the eighth that was the only runner for either side in that inning. And then, with their last at-bat in the top of the ninth, the Giants went in order, given the Bears a 5-1 win and a complete game by their pitcher, the only one I saw in Korea.


The Scorecard:
Giants vs. Bears, 06-30-12. Bears win, 5-1.Giants vs. Bears, 06-30-12. Bears win, 5-1.
Giants vs. Bears, 06/30/12. Bears win, 5-1.

There were a couple of odd ones in this game, as well. In the second inning, there was a run-of-the-mill 2-5-2-6-2 caught stealing when a suicide squeeze or hit-and-run did not go off as intended. There was another outfield assist in the fourth in a F9-2 double play. There were also some mild statistical anomalies in this one, with the Bears keeping a great run-hit ratio, getting three runs on one hit in the second and ending up with 5 runs on only six hits.

But most importantly, I had to come up with a notation for getting a foul ball. I put it in red in the notes section, and it was hit by the same player who got stuck in the insane rundown described above.

Did I mention that I got a foul ball?


The Accommodations:
I was at the Sutton Hotel again, and extraordinarily excited not having to move again. Going to the traditional guest house the next was going to be a short trip, and after a few days of not doing that every day, I wasn't dreading the experience as much as I has towards the middle of the trip.



2012 Korea

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