SI.com's "Things We Miss in Baseball."

I miss players wearing stir ups and shorter pants.

 

God, I do hate the pajama pants they're wearing these days.

 

Mariners played at their single-A affiliate, Wisconsin Timber Rattlers, in 2002.

 

April 29, 2002. Good catch, Gutter.

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/ballpark/page.jsp?ymd=20060302&content_id=44710&vkey=ballpark_t572&fext=.jsp&sid=t572

 

Not the same, mpcincal. Not the same at all. There was something mystical about being able to do the safecracker thing with the dial on the off chance you could pull in something from waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay far off, late at night.

Another example: You can have "Alice's Restaurant" from iTunes, but it's SO much better just catching the over the air radio version on Thanksgiving.

 

See - being able to watch The Wizard of Oz, A Christmas Story or A Charlie Brown Christmas whenever you want to, instead of gathering around and watching it only once a year.
As a kid, sometimes I'd be able to dial in a Dodgers game or Lee Pete from Vegas at KDWN, sometimes even an Albuquerque Dukes game. I felt like Jodie Foster in Contact.

 

Gotta disagree. Missing Charlie Brown Xmas the one time it was on was a terrible, horrible feeling. But having it on DVD and watching it as I finish wrapping presents Xmas Eve has turned into one of my favorite traditions. Ditto for baseball on the radio. I'd rather know I can tune into Rangers-Angels in the middle of upstate NY than find it by sheer random luck.

(Of course, relying on sheer random luck to hear an old favorite song is why I love listening to XM in the car instead of CDs or my iPod, so there you go)

 

I'm not saying I dislike being able to watch those shows whenever - but I do miss being excited about it being on and watching it that one time every year. Now they'll air those specials two or three times during the holidays.

And does anybody actually buy pennants at sports events any more, let alone wave them on the end of a stick? Back in the 70s, Raider fans would hit the souvenier stants in the fourth quarter, buy a pennant of the team they were beating and light the thing on fire.

 

Man I loved pennants as a kid. They were by far the coolest souvenir one could get.

I bought my nephew a pennant at an LCS or World Series a few years ago. I'm pretty sure it's collecting dust in the bottom of his toy chest. Oh well.

 

In 1989, my wife and I were camping and I turned the Dodgers-Astros game on the radio. The game kept going and going, and I had to keep trying to find it on different stations as it would fade out. By the time it ended after 22 innings, I was picking it up on that Vegas station.

The Dodgers never should've left KFI--you could hear those games all over the West Coast.

 

That was f'n incredible. So much great shit in that. Ed Whitson with a preview of how bad his Yankees stint would be as he couldn't hit a guy who was squared around to bunt and then misses hitting him again. The dude throwing the cup of beer from the top of the dugout was priceless. Then later when Horner came down there were 5 or 6 cops there. But I guess they didn't mind fans walking all over the dugout. Champ Summers had a coiffure and stache that made many 80s porn stars jealous.

 

I will say I think they shouldn't show them multiple times a season. (And BYH is correct about what an awful feeling it was to miss Charlie Brown the one time they showed it. After I started working for newspapers, that was a constant fear during the holiday season.)

We've got a newsie here who turns on EVERY SINGLE CHRISTMAS SPECIAL, at way too loud a volume, no matter how many times it has already been shown, right in the middle of deadline (the 8-9 p.m. hour, usually), for the entire month of December.

Good grief, Charlie Brown. :