2002-Olde World Parks

July 20 thru July 25, 2002

7/20 – Red Sox vs Yankees – 8-9 – Box Score
7/21 – Braves vs Phillies – 2-1 – Box Score
7/22 – Expos vs Mets – 2-5 – Box Score 
7/23 – Devil Rays vs Red Sox – 4-22 – Box Score
7/24 – Devil Rays vs Red Sox – 9-5 – Box Score
7/25 – Marlins vs Expos – 3-2 – Box Score

The 2002 Baseball Odyssey was, shall we say, a bit more ambitious than its humble predecessor. We upgraded from “four guys and a dream” to full-on logistics: flights, cross-country participants, overnight hosts, five cities, six games, and a loosely held grasp on sanity.

People began arriving Friday, July 19. Jim Carr and I picked up William Jacobsen and Bobbie Jean Rollie at Logan Airport late that evening, then drove to White Plains, NY, where we crashed at Chris and Yuki’s place. That would serve as our base of operations for the first leg of the campaign. My brother Tim joined us for the first two games.

Game one: Saturday, July 20. Yankees vs. Red Sox at the old Yankee Stadium—the one Ruth built and the ghosts still haunt. Classic rivalry, classic venue, and an opener that set the tone.

Game two was on Sunday, at Philadelphia’s dearly departed Veterans Stadium. Braves vs. Phillies. The highlight? The legendary Spooneybarger sighting... and Will’s bladder/colon heroically hanging on for the save. Not all heroes wear capes.

Monday brought us back to New York for a bit of sightseeing and some cultural enrichment, by which I mean the Mets vs. Expos at Shea. Mets won, and we toasted Will’s birthday with a celebratory “pop” at a White Plains bar of questionable repute. Cousin Bill Bates joined us for this game, raising both the IQ and the sarcasm quotient.

On Tuesday, we packed up and drove to Jim’s place in Tewksbury, MA, our next base camp. That night: Red Sox vs. Tampa Bay at Fenway. Total rout. Nomah and Manny had career days accounting for 5 HRs and 13 RBIs between them. We were joined by Greg Krysko and Joe Wex, both Yankees fans but welcome just the same.

Wednesday, we returned to Fenway—this time to bleacher seats approximately 17 miles from home plate, tucked so far to the right William F. Buckley Jr would have been envious. The “Devil Rays” (still rocking the devil back then) avenged the prior night’s humiliation. Because of course they did.

Finally, on Thursday, we hit the road for Montreal and Olympic Stadium—still weirdly futuristic in that “World’s Fair 1967” kind of way. The Expos hosted the Marlins, and we were graced by the presence of “Le Grand Chat” himself, Andrés Galarraga. A fitting grand finale.

And just like that, Odyssey 2002 was in the books. Jet fuel, bladder emergencies, bleacher burns, and all.

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