ROW 1, Seat 4

FRONT ROW AT FENWAY! FRONT ROW!

On the off chance that you're a baseball fan who has never experienced the hallowed ground of Fenway Park, or Wrigley Field, stop reading now! I cannot stress this enough! Abandon all interest in what is written next.....for your own good. This experience can never be surpassed, nor measured up to, and it is an unfair frame of reference for those unlucky souls who read further.

Still here? SUCKER!

So I blow into Boston in much the same way that I blow into Chicago. On business, with a mission and a goal that could possibly open more doors for me and continue moving me along a career track that three years ago I had never envisioned. The beauty of both cities is the opportunity that business there lends me to visit friends I so seldom get to speak to, let alone see. Since the dissolving of the infamous FEDERATION X I hear from Bruce Lerch a great deal less often that I would like, and see him less again than that. I fear that his recent struggles at the World Series of Poker will impact his scheduled trip to Toronto, and I'm thankful that once again life at domnick hunter has opened up a personal opportunity at the same time that it has opened up a professional one.

Bruce and I met under the strangest of circumstances. Not normal. Those would be the two words I would choose to explain the nature of a friendship that was born in imagination. You see, Bruce and I both like to write, and we both enjoyed that sinful indulgence known as wrestling. It lead us to an online game that required a knowledge of both. The net result was a friendship that is better than most people can ask from lifelong neighbor's. We're just cut from the same cloth, he and I, and for some odd, inexplicable reason, our friendship works. If you know either of us, you understand.

In any event, I hit downtown Boston on Friday night with Ray Ray (Ray Jeffries, senior management with my company, and one hell of a great guy to socialize with. Maybe one day we'll talk about the wonder that is Singapore!) and checked into the Doubletree. Bruce was there waiting. A few quick drinks and we were prepped for a trip to Fenway, where is all went right Brian (he of the Killer Bee fame) would meet us for the game. Then the skies opened up (a sure sign that our night was ordained from on high. It helps to have friends (read Shepherds) in high places) and our fate was sealed. We would sit in the greatest seats in Fenway!

The storm that followed was unbelievable, but Bruce got on the phone with Brian, and we were quickly convinced that it would pass. So we hopped a cab to the park, and lined up in the rain to get into one of the happening bars. It pissed on us, and the line didn't move, but some of the scenery was.............ummmm..........spectacular! So Brian shows up (sporting 2 seats to Fenway that he scored for a grand total of $20) and we decide to find a bar without a line. A few drinks later, and Ray (trapped in a different time zone) decided not to join us for the game, as jetlag was winning the war. As the rain let up, and the game got started, we set out into the evening air, in search of more seats.

No sooner did Ray hop a cab, than we stumbled on a scalper who offered a sweet deal. Brian's 2 tickets ($20 paid) and $200 cash for 3 Dugout Box seats (face value of almost $900). The man was losing money, and prepared to cut bait. Bruce had his wallet out faster than Brian could haggle, and we were off to the game. We got into Fenway, and then we blinked as we looked for where we were going to sit. We hadn't actually read the tickets.

ROW 1, Seat 4.

I'll repeat.

ROW 1, Seat 4.

In all their visits to the Green Monster, even the locals didn't know what that meant. Oh, they knew it was good. They just had no idea HOW good. Until the usher lead us down to our seats. I couldn't see the batter. Vladimir Guerrero was standing right in my way. So close that I could have reached out an tapped him on the shoulder. Asked him politely to pick a side! Instead, I simply opened my mouth, and uttered something that was a cross between a sigh, and a longing for a diamond in Toronto with that kind of..........presence.

Thing is.....you can't build presence. You can't buy in. It comes from the fans, and the employees, and the culture of the game that permeates the very air inside the park. Some parks have it. Some don't.

Boston has it.

Front row. It was the most second most perfect game I've ever watched.

The other?

Bottom of the 9th. Joe Carter. Mitch Williams.