Come for the baseball, stay for fan show

You can cross one off of my bucket list.

Fenway Park on a vacation to Boston last week. I’ve always liked history and Boston has a surplus of all kinds of it, gobs of history, including baseball.

I was smart enough to get seats in the Fenway shade, third base side, for a midweek afternoon Red Sox game against the Mariners.

The famed Green Monster was out there in leftfield. Looked just as I had imagined it, but I was a little taken aback at how crooked and haphazard the rest of the outfield boundaries were — and part of the rightfield wall looked to be no more than three feet tall. There were just enough ancient beams blocking sight lines to remind you this is the oldest ball park — don’t call it a stadium — in the Major Leagues.

Baseball heaven, though I never got misty-eyed.

I think the Red Sox won, 3-2, 10 innings as I recall.

I really wasn’t paying much attention.

The real entertainment was going on right behind me in the next row.

I guess I spend too much time in the press box, where all you get is the game and some snidely clever remarks from your fellow media stiffs.

It was different down there in the stands, no matter the history of the ballpark.

But these two guys sitting right behind me were straight out of Baah-zun central casting.

I can’t even type the proper accent, but they were both pure New England.

I wasn’t taking notes, so I can only paraphrase as to the exact back-and-forth banter.

But it was better than the good game in front of me.

In fact, I was beginning to think it was a set-up. Two guys, maybe actors, planted as part of the Full Fenway Park Experience Tour.

After all, although I never wear socks with sandals, Beverly and I might as well have been wearing “Tourist” tattooed across our foreheads.

Must have stood out.

We’d even been, via tourist trolley, to the Cheers bar without apology or shame. You already knew, of course, that the downstairs Bull and Finch is not where the TV show was actually filmed, only the inspiration for it. For one thing, it was taped in Los Angeles.

It is, however, a fully functional bar and, upstairs, past the gift shop, there is another bar, this one a perfect replica of the Cheers TV version. It’s fully operational, too, and — Rube Alert! Rube Alert! — you can sit in Norm’s spot, even take a selfie if you want.

Anyway, back to Fenway.

By now, I wasn’t really watching the game much. Much better stuff right behind me.

There was scant evidence that the two guys back there were watching much either, even in a tight game.

And they were obviously — obviously — die-hard Red Sox fans.

Oh, they might notice a good play — but only to note it still didn’t make up for the error the same guy made against the Yankees four years ago.

Mainly, between pitches, they were more interested in dissecting every move the Red Sox had made over the last 20-30 years.

Non-stop it went, inning after  inning, and rarely did they agree.

Some player who’d been called up a year or so ago and didn’t meet their approval.

“Gave up on him too soon,” said one.

“I knew it,” the other countered. “He stunk in the minors — and they think he’s suddenly a player?”

“What about …”

Frankly, I didn’t catch the name.

“Maybe if he could catch the *&^$%S ball!”

“I heard he was a boozer.”

“Clubhouse cancer.”

“This kid in Salem, now may be on to something with him.”

“He’ll stink soon as he gets to Worcester.”

“You say they all stink.”

“Only when they stink. You could smell him from here.”

On and on …

I was loving it.

Then, along about the sixth inning, I guess it was, there was a mild commotion as a family arrived in that row behind me — three well-scrubbed youngsters and their parents, suspected yuppies, armed with tickets.

The five ducats they were holding included the two seats  being used by the entertaining duo.

I figured it must be a mistake. But, no, the newcomers had legit tickets, which the two hard-core Sox fans readily admitted. There would be no bloodshed. The two trespassers apologized and started moseying toward the aisle.

I figured they were probably headed back to their usual seats. But as they parted ways, one of them said to the other …

“Hey, man, been a pleasure … Go Sox!”

“Yah huh … Great meeting you.”

What?

That’s correct. They had never met each other before alighting in their clandestine seats for this one game.

Tell me you don’t love baseball.