INCIVILITY STRIKES OUT
and granny gets the win.
The Pirates lost to the Atlanta Braves last night,
but PNC Park patrons in Sections 119 and 120 who went to the game expecting a
civil, family-friendly atmosphere in which to watch the game saw a sweet
victory; the win (and the save) went to a diminutive but deceptively tough
gray-haired grandma of an usher who ejected a gaggle of eight teenaged idiots
for shouting obscenities in the stands.
They began simply enough, heckling Adam LaRoche for his disappointing .168 batting average, shouting the number over and over and over again, before moving on to a series of adolescent insults and inarticulate invectives that proved to anyone within earshot that, however pitiful LaRoche's average, it was still higher than their combined IQs. Before long, they'd moved on to a few garden-variety vulgarities -- Hey, ump, get yer head outta yer ass! and That was a fucking ball! -- and I'd begun to wonder how seriously the ushers or anyone else in customer relations would take my complaints if I, sitting with my own two kids and seeing at least fifteen other children in the rows ahead of us, asked them to enforce their PA-announced foul-language policy. I decided that these morons -- looking into their eyes was sort of like looking down the steps and into your basement during a power outage -- now had two strikes, and that after the third, which could only be seconds away, I would appeal to the umpires in the stands and see what they would do.
Two pitches later, Adam LaRoche grounded out. When a Braves fan a few rows ahead of us stood up to cheer and then to deliver an especially lame version of the Tomahawk Chop, the twit-wits to my right, one after the other, with a kind of pack mentality that suggests they might make excellent fraternity brothers if they actually had a chance in hell of graduating from high school, began shouting Goldbergian variations on the phrase, Sit down, faggot! I turned to Adam and Ethan, told them to sit tight until I came right back, then turned to stand in the aisle. But I never even had to leave my seat. Deceptively Tough Grandma Usher was already there, no doubt operating on the same Three-Vulgar-Strikes-And-You're-Out policy that I'd decided to test, telling these all-bark, no-bite teens, in a voice so hushed but firm that I could barely hear her from three feet away, that their behavior is not tolerated in the park and that they had to leave.
I smiled. I laughed. I chalked one up for DTGU, for PNC Park, and for the whole darned Pirates organization. Then I did all three again about ten seconds later, when DTGU, even more pissed now that the malcontents had ignored her and stayed in their seats, returned and told them again that unless they left, she'd bring security and a whole lot of ass-whuppin' down on their heads.
Okay. She didn't say that last part. She didn't have to. Because the cool, steely, resolve with which she did speak to them, coupled with the don't-mess-with-me-you-wannabe-punks glare in her eye, already said it. And so, knowing that she meant it, and knowing that they shouldn't mess with DTGU or the world of hurt she and her security-guard homies could bring, the puny-brained, potty-mouthed posse got up and slunk out of Section 119, doing their best to look all tough and pissed and suburban-white-gangsta, even as they were herded away by a woman who looked like she'd just stepped out of an old episode of the Golden Girls.
It would have been nice to see the Pirates win, but it was even nicer to see civility and courtesy and the corporate promise of them both upheld with assurance, by the proud and simple self-assurance of a little old lady with some big ol' tenacity. With apologies to Jack Wilson and to Andruw Jones, Deceptively Tough Grandma's put-out was the best play -- the most inspiring example of good, strong defense -- I saw all night.
They began simply enough, heckling Adam LaRoche for his disappointing .168 batting average, shouting the number over and over and over again, before moving on to a series of adolescent insults and inarticulate invectives that proved to anyone within earshot that, however pitiful LaRoche's average, it was still higher than their combined IQs. Before long, they'd moved on to a few garden-variety vulgarities -- Hey, ump, get yer head outta yer ass! and That was a fucking ball! -- and I'd begun to wonder how seriously the ushers or anyone else in customer relations would take my complaints if I, sitting with my own two kids and seeing at least fifteen other children in the rows ahead of us, asked them to enforce their PA-announced foul-language policy. I decided that these morons -- looking into their eyes was sort of like looking down the steps and into your basement during a power outage -- now had two strikes, and that after the third, which could only be seconds away, I would appeal to the umpires in the stands and see what they would do.
Two pitches later, Adam LaRoche grounded out. When a Braves fan a few rows ahead of us stood up to cheer and then to deliver an especially lame version of the Tomahawk Chop, the twit-wits to my right, one after the other, with a kind of pack mentality that suggests they might make excellent fraternity brothers if they actually had a chance in hell of graduating from high school, began shouting Goldbergian variations on the phrase, Sit down, faggot! I turned to Adam and Ethan, told them to sit tight until I came right back, then turned to stand in the aisle. But I never even had to leave my seat. Deceptively Tough Grandma Usher was already there, no doubt operating on the same Three-Vulgar-Strikes-And-You're-Out policy that I'd decided to test, telling these all-bark, no-bite teens, in a voice so hushed but firm that I could barely hear her from three feet away, that their behavior is not tolerated in the park and that they had to leave.
I smiled. I laughed. I chalked one up for DTGU, for PNC Park, and for the whole darned Pirates organization. Then I did all three again about ten seconds later, when DTGU, even more pissed now that the malcontents had ignored her and stayed in their seats, returned and told them again that unless they left, she'd bring security and a whole lot of ass-whuppin' down on their heads.
Okay. She didn't say that last part. She didn't have to. Because the cool, steely, resolve with which she did speak to them, coupled with the don't-mess-with-me-you-wannabe-punks glare in her eye, already said it. And so, knowing that she meant it, and knowing that they shouldn't mess with DTGU or the world of hurt she and her security-guard homies could bring, the puny-brained, potty-mouthed posse got up and slunk out of Section 119, doing their best to look all tough and pissed and suburban-white-gangsta, even as they were herded away by a woman who looked like she'd just stepped out of an old episode of the Golden Girls.
It would have been nice to see the Pirates win, but it was even nicer to see civility and courtesy and the corporate promise of them both upheld with assurance, by the proud and simple self-assurance of a little old lady with some big ol' tenacity. With apologies to Jack Wilson and to Andruw Jones, Deceptively Tough Grandma's put-out was the best play -- the most inspiring example of good, strong defense -- I saw all night.
Posted: Sat - May 12, 2007 at 02:15 PM
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Published On: Aug 28, 2008 10:23 PM
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Published On: Aug 28, 2008 10:23 PM