Minnesota Twins 4, Detroit Tigers 5

Friday, June 22, 2001, 7:05 PM (EDT), Comerica Park

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Scott picked me up at the airport, and within a few minutes we were parking right next to the gigantic tiger out in front of Comerica Park. What a place, and what a great night for baseball.

It was $20 to park in the surface lot in front of the stadium, but from car to concourse took all of a minute or two. I bought a scorecard immediately for $1, and got a free pencil to go with! A good omen, to be sure.

After exploring a few of the park's amenities, and purchasing a few souvenirs, we found our spectacular seats right behind home plate on the lower deck. Amazing seats which I had purchased at the Tigers' web site (by way of the detestable Ticketmaster). We would be able to see everything up close, and we started by watching a little bit of the Twins' batting practice.

This would be the major league debut for the Twins' rookie pitcher Kyle Lohse. It felt a little bit weird to be sitting there, kind of like an alternate universe. I mean, it's my team, but I've never seen the starting pitcher before, and this sure ain't the Metrodome! All in all, though, it was a good feeling.

We inspected the park, the scoreboard, got up and looked at the carousel and Ferris wheel, got a snack, then settled back into our seats for the game.

It crossed my mind that I still hadn't seen the Twins win on the road. After being swept in Chicago, they dropped 2 of 3 to Cleveland at Jacobs Field. They were a bit off their game, and having an untested pitcher couldn't help.

But before we even got to see that pitcher, or anything else for that matter, Matt Lawton homered into the bullpen on the first pitch of the game. With fresh memories of that Cubs' first inning against Brad Thomas, I had visions of a rout. But though Lohse looked great, the Twins couldn't pull it out. They led most of the way, but just couldn't hold on.

Late in the game, we enjoyed a delicious ice cream treat, and there were fireworks immediately following the game. One of those shot directly into the stands, but we never heard if anybody got hurt.

Leaving the park we had to wait quite a long time in a line of cars headed for the freeway. We might not have taken the exact route we did but for the police direction. We ended up traveling through block after block of buildings burned out during a riot in the 60s! Talk about a weird way to end the day.

But it didn't detract at all from the sheer enjoyment of watching baseball with my brother on a beautiful summer night.