The above picture was taken with my camera in a ballpark far, far away ... at a time long, long ago. Look closely: That's Eric Milton on the hill getting ready to give up a bomb to Jim Thome in the first inning of an eventual 12-5 Cleveland victory. Just your run of the mill blowout, captured by the picture ... just a normal picture.Or is it?
Can you spot the oddity in the photo?
Give you a hint: You will most likely never see it again. And you would hope to never, ever, see it a Shea Stadium or Citi Field, unless we're talking Game 7 of the World Series ... and even then I'm not sure I'd want to see it.
(And no, nowhere in this picture is Pedro Martinez involved in a cockfight so that's not the answer ... though I would hope to never, ever see Petey holding a cock at Shea Stadium or Citi Field. If I did, I would be highly disturbed. Oh stop it ... you know what I meant. Get your collective mind out of the gutter!)
First to answer it correctly wins ... well, nothing. Except the respect and admiration of your commenting peers.
And we have a winner: "Thou Art Hail Johan" first nailed it as Johan indeed pitched from out of the bullpen that night, and Andrew V. from The 'Ropolitans actually quoted from the scoreboard sign verbatim four minutes later. For the record, Johan did indeed enter the game out of the 'pen on September 13th, 2002, and pitched two and a third innings of scoreless baseball. Of course, he had to clean up after the mess made by Eric Milton, who gave up not only the bomb to Thome (which was hit on the very pitch Milton was setting up for), but a bomb to the immortal Karim Garcia en route to nine runs in one and two third innings. The Indians went on to victory 12-5.
On the same night that I was taking pictures in Cleveland, the Mets lost in Montreal, 11-8 to the Expos. Montreal rode the two hits and three runs from some tiny center fielder named Endy to victory. I wasn't blogging back in 2002, so let me say this: Damn you John Thomson! (In retrospect.)
