Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Cut Out to Be an A's Fan?

Episode Date: July 5, 2020

Jason Hernandez joins D.C. Lundberg to discuss a super cool thing the Oakland Athletics are doing this season due to the Covid-19 outbreak, offering fans to (sort of) be at every single A's home game, with proceeds going to a good cause. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Thank you for tuning in to Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Here's your host, D.C. Lundberg. It is a beautiful day here in the Lilac City, ladies and gentlemen. I hope you all had a great Independence Day. I'd like to be able to tell you what I did last night to celebrate, but as of this recording, last night hasn't happened yet. So I have no idea what I did, and I still have no plans. Anyways, welcome to Locked-on Mariners, which, of course is part of the Locked-on podcast. Network or T-L-O-P-N or T-L-O-P-N-O-T-L-O-T-O-P-N-ROTO.

Please remember to download Raid and subscribe to Locked-on Mariner's on Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app you personally care to use. Ask your smart device to play Locked-on Mariner's podcast or any of the other wonderful programs here on Tloppen. Follow this program on Twitter at L-O-U-U-S-Mariners, and follow me on Twitter at D.C. underscore Lundberg L-U-N-D-B-E-R-G if you're scoring at home. Why'd I do it like that? Anyways, the Oakland Athletics,

ladies and gentlemen, are giving their fans the opportunity to do something rather unique. My colleague here at Tlopin and frequent guest on this program, my good friend Jason Hernandez, told me about this last night. It will answer the question.

Who is cut out to be an A's fan? Jason is here to talk about that. Jason, welcome back to the show. Oh, thank you so much. I love the Oakland A's. They're such a fantastic, fan-friendly team. And this is proof positive of that. Jason, what exactly are the Oakland A's

allowing their fans the opportunity to do? I'm so glad you asked. So this season, the Oakland A's are trying to have their fans in the stands. Well, they're trying desperately hard to have fans, even though we were in this era of COVID-19. where we can't have any physical fans in the stands, but how about virtual fans? No?

How about cutouts of fans? Yeah, that works. So the Oakland A's are actually, I think is really, really smart. So you can pay a nominal fee, it's a small amount, and you can have your Coliseum cutouts at the Oco Coliseum,

if you can believe that. For just $50 for the access members, you can take a picture of yourself in your A's gear and have a cutout at the Coliseum. But if you pay a little extra, you can have it at the foul ball zone. Now, what does that mean? That means that if a foul ball hits your cutout, you keep the foul ball. How cool is that?

That is super cool. And see, if the Mariners did this at a similar price point at which the A's are doing it, I would totally do this and put my cut out in the foul ball section. because what I would want to happen. Of course, I would want a foul ball to hit my cardboard cutout. I would want it to hit my cutout in such a way that it takes the head off, just because I think that would be really funny. Well, here's what else the A's are doing.

So if a cutout catches the foul ball, you keep the foul ball. Yep. Also, you receive two complimentary tickets to their first exhibition game at the Coliseum the following season, which is 2021. Whether or not you catch a foul ball. Yeah, that part is really cool. So you get free tickets as well. Also, also, your cutout remains in the ballpark for the entirety of the shortened 2020 regular season,

and you'll have the option to pick it up following the season. I do like what it says on the website. Please note we cannot guarantee the condition of your cutout after exposure to weather and outdoor elements. I think fans will still want to keep their outdoor cutout. That's really cool. Absolutely. I would, even if it was just kind of a messy sort of wet blob that used to be me. Yeah, for 50 bucks, that's worth it.

Yes. Even for 100 bucks, that's worth it. But they are doing it for, like you said, Jason, $50. Yeah, for Oakland A's Access members, it is $50. For everyone else, it is $89, which is still not bad. No, that's not bad at all. Because you still get the two free tickets. You could still keep the cut out.

And a spot in the Falob Ball Zone costs $129. It's ridiculous how other teams are going to charge so much for such opportunities like this. Whereas the Oakland A's, they've always been a fan-friendly franchise going back to even a couple years ago. If you remember, the Oakland A's

hosted a very special game. They gave out 50,000 free tickets to their 50th anniversary game, which I happened to be present for. And they had all kinds of stuff to give away. You got free souvenir tickets if you were there early. I also

got the 1968 home Jersey, which I'm considering it because I will admit it. The Oakland days have won me over over the past few seasons. I have a lot of friends that are A's fans. I have some family that are A's fans. I'm up there pretty frequently for sports reasons. Among those going up to San Jose, you know, the sharks, yada, yada, yada. So I find myself going to Oco, and I have a fun time there. I prefer the fans in Oakland over the fans of San Francisco because I just have a have more fun in Oakland. Way more fun. The Oakland A's

do it right. They really do. And the reason they have to do it like this is because they know that they're in a crappy Coliseum. They know they have one of the quote unquote dumps of the American League. Let's face it, they do. But as their fans would say, that's

our dump. But it's still a beloved, I guess. Yeah, it's still a beloved place to go to. There is history in that ballpark. Oakland did win three consecutive titles in the 70s at that stadium. They sure did. Oakland Coliseum has had plenty of great memories.

Look no further than a great, great movie that most of you have probably heard of. Moneyball, anyone? Oh, I thought you were going to say Angels of the Outfield was actually recorded in Oakland, not Anaheim. I know. No, no, no, no. Angels in the Outfield is a great, great film. Great film.

But Moneyball just takes it to a completely different level. that walk off home run to win their 20th game in a row with that specific call, with the king call. That's what really makes that part of the movie. So I give the hires up a lot of credit for trying something different and for getting some attention to their ballpark and to their club and doing it right again. This is a team that has to rely a little bit more on great social media,

on great ideas like this, you know, going back to the free game. Yep. Just a lot of difference. They're a different team. Oakland knows that they are a very different team, and they have to set themselves apart from everyone else in order to get fans in the seats. And they're doing it.

Yeah, they get more fans going to A's games than you see Marlins fans, by far. Or Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay, another dump of the American League who are not taking the Oakland Athletics lead by any stretch of the imagination. Not at all. Not at all.

Jason, we are up on a break, so it's time to pose the Mariners trivia question, which I tried to theme to the Oakland A's, and I think I did it. The trivia question today is, what was the result of the first game between the Mariners and A's? The answer will follow a word from Rock Otto.

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The answer to the trivia question, the first game between the A's and Mariners took place. Is it? 50-50 shot, isn't it? Sort of. I have the score. I have the time of game. I have the hits allowed. No. Okay, but I will let you off the hook with a 50-50 call. Do you think it's a Mariners win or an A's win? Knowing you, this is a pro-Mariners podcast, so I'm just going to say Mariners won. Well, here's the thing. They did win, but this would have been the question, even if it was a 22-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-1-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-2-2-2-2-minute, complete game, allowing 6 hits and a walk, while striking out 8 in front of 2,179 fans at the Coliseum. But that was when Oakland was crap.

They sucked that year, yes, and that was their fourth least attended game of 1977. More locked on Mariners following a word from Postmates. If you're the type who starts thinking about what to eat for dinner while you're eating lunch, yeah, that's me. You will love using Postmates. You will love them even more right now because you can get food delivered without leaving your house or even opening your door, given what's going on in the world.

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Postmate it. Thanks for bailing me out on that one. No problem. Did you turn your AC on or something? Now time for the second half of Locked-on Mariners. Once again, your host, D.C. Lundberg. It's just so hot. I know.

I am glad it's cool down here. But we're back on Locked-on Mariners. Thank you very much, J.M. We are back on Locked-on Mariners. Not talking Mariners today. We're talking a little Oakland A's baseball today on Locked-on Mariners. Just because the A's are doing something so incredibly cool, that we started to talk about at the first part of the show.

They are, and Jason Hernandez from Locked on Anaheim Ducks is here with me to discuss this, a tender of many Oakland A's games, and a, you know, somewhat new fan. They've won Jason over with their promotions and what they have done for their fans because they really trade their fans well, don't they, J.D. Well, there's a backstory to why I'm an A's fan. There's a really weird backstory that took place 16 years ago. But the fan interaction and what they do for their fans certainly cannot hurt.

Oh, it doesn't hurt at all. Just a very quick story. I will just say that I got coerced into going into an Oakland A's game 16 years ago until I realized it was an Angels game. So I said, yeah, I want to check out the Angels and the A's. This was the infamous game where Frankie Rodriguez got the ball back in his glove. He dropped the ball while he was on the mound, and that had the winning score. come in for Oakland.

So it was a walk-off error question mark, I guess. But that's not how I became a fan. I was there with my buddy. We had a little side bet going, which, by the way, talking about side bets. See, I've lost bets as well, D.C. I know it seems like I win a lot of these little side bets, but this is one that I lost.

Do you at least remember what the bet is? Because I don't remember the bet I lost. I honestly have no recollection of placing that bet. the one between us. It was some auxiliary thing. I forget what it was. And I honestly forgot what the bet was in the Coliseum. All I know is that I ended up wearing Oakland A's gear after the game. I mean, I could just say that it had something to do with maybe just the Angels Lost. But I know that's not what it was. But I'll say for the sake of the story, that's what it was.

All right. So the Angels lost. Yes. So my buddy had me wear his extra Oakland A's jersey. He was prepared for this, by the way. He was prepared. Uh-huh. So he let me wear his extra Oakland A's jersey, which he ended up giving to me. So I still have that jersey to this day.

Oh, cool. That was my first Oakland A's jersey. An extra large regular home jersey. Okay, that's kind of neat. And he was like, you know what? I'm feeling generous. So he got me an A's cap, which I also still have to understand. I'm looking at it right now, the old school dark green yellow cap.

So I still have that to this day. Nice. So I got the cap. He said, okay, try it on. The minute after I purchased it, there was a large crowd after the game because they're all happy that the A's won. And what he did next, he yelled to get everybody's attention. He said, excuse me, can I have your attention? I'm like, what are you doing?

Stop this. I would like to announce to the entire world. That we have converted another one. And he just went on and on, like, oh, my God, what are you doing? This went on for a couple minutes, by the way, where he just embarrassed the crap out of me. Me, at the time, I'm still an Angels fan, but I was rooting for the Angels. So I had to take off my Angels cap. I still had my red shirt on underneath.

So he just said, like, we've turned an Angels fan into an A's fan. Hallelujah. It was just so ridiculous. But going, so that's how I kind of became an A's fan. The thing that happened afterwards was instead of getting laughed at, I had a bunch of random ass fans saying, oh, welcome, welcome. I know they're partially kidding, but also partially like, welcome, like, come join the club. Like, all the drummers are here.

Like, they were really cool. I'm like, okay, that wasn't so bad. The fans are really cool. They do seem to have really cool fans. They always have. Yeah, and that's something that I just want to talk about, not just the A's, but I guess baseball in general is each market has their own specific fans

that endear them to the city. Oakland has their bleacher creatures out there banging their drums, they have their flags, they have their signs. They're a very loose group of fans and that is something that is very endearing to Oakland and something that should be replicated in other cities,

but it's just not. I don't think Seattle has anything quite like that as far as a massive fan base. the only thing that comes close is whenever you have the king's court, that one's a little bit more manufactured. But when you have the king's court in its heyday, those fans went absolutely berserk. And I really like that. It was fun. Yeah, about what Seattle did.

So that part was really cool. You didn't really have a whole lot of that at Dodger Stadium or even Angel Stadium, but it's California cool. Even San Diego, they have a few fans. They're crazy friar fans, which I also like a lot. But when you think about crazy fans, you got to think about New York, right? Yeah. Yeah. They do their roll call out there.

They do their Derek Guter clap, clap, clap, clap, until he responds. And then they do that for every player, all nine players, until they respond. Right. Which is very cool. Mm-hmm. Florida doesn't have that. The closest thing Atlanta has, and I know this.

This might be politically incorrect now, but the closest thing that Atlanta has is the fans that will always do the Tomahawk chop. Didn't they steal that from Florida State anyway? Yeah, they did. And Robin Hood Men in Tights stole that from them. Ah. Yeah, see, we're back to fun movies.

But, I mean, most fan bases, they just have their own unique style. Look at the Chicago Cubs. They have all those bleacher folk, stacking beer cups as high as possible, which is also very fun, by the way. If you can do that once in your life, sit in the bleachers at Wrigley Field.

It is a blast. If you're that kind of person, that's just kind of loosey-goosey, yeah, why not? And I'll throw a shout-out to Cleveland as well, by the way. Okay, after you throw your shout out to Cleveland, I have a story to tell about Cubs fans. All right. So Cleveland, they have their set of fans in the bleachers,

and our buddy Mike Klaus show me that. John Adams. John Adams is the guy in the top of the bleachers that continually bangs his drum, and you have that set of fans out there by the Wahu Club. Yep. Those are a group of fans that are just really rowdy and ready to go, and they support John Adams 100%.

Those are some fun fans as well. Yes, the story I had to tell about Cubs fans, when the Mariners, when the Cubs came to Seattle several years ago, had to be about 10, 12 years ago at this point, it was a three-game series. I went to two of them. And the second game was a day game. It was about 95 degrees outside.

It wound up going about 15 innings. I had a horrible sunburn, and the resulting Farmers Tan lasted about three years. No joke. But anyways, the Cubs fans, I have to say, I was not impressed with the Cubs fans that showed up. They were the most obnoxious, rude, annoying, loud fans I have ever been around. I thought they were jackasses. I did not like them. Maybe there's...

Can I say this? You can edit this out, but maybe there's Seattle-based jackasses that are Cubs fans. That's completely possible, but that has given me a negative opinion of Cubs fans. Hey, I'm sure the fans back east thought that we were insufferable when our SoCal teams would go out to Florida. Yeah, I was part of that. If you're simply rooting for your team loudly, that is what you should be done. doing, but they just took it to a completely different level. And they got me to give Milton Bradley

a standing ovation just because we had to drown out all of their booze. And just for that alone, I hate them. That was a joke. Yeah, but I'm a little more than loud. You know this. Yeah, sure. But yeah. Yeah. Anyways, we're running a little long. I want to get back to what we were talking about originally. And that is, I want to get your opinion, JD, on whether or not, I should submit a picture of myself to the Oakland A's to be a cardboard fan at the Coliseum this year. Do you have any A's gear? No, I don't.

But I could find some green and some gold. I have a gold t-shirt that I use under my Pittsburgh Pirates jersey. And the only reason I have a Pittsburgh Pirates jersey, ladies and gentlemen, is because I'm a preschool teacher, and that's what I wear when we have Pirate Day. Just to kind of troll everybody. If you knew how many jerseys I have, if you only knew. It's a Roberto Clemente jersey, so you cannot go wrong with that.

Clemente is one of my all-time favorite players. Yeah, he's one of mine as well. And I have like a green headband type thing I can wear. And here's the thing. My high school colors were green and gold, too. So if I take a picture myself, I'd say, hey, he actually likes his high school now? No, I don't. But it would just, you know, be for the Oakland A's.

So I could kind of fudge something, yeah. Yeah, I put up on my Twitter, which you can find at Stimpy J.D. There's a little poll there as to which jersey I should wear, either the regular home A's jersey, the Dennis Eckersley jersey, which is also a home jersey, the 68 home jersey, or the Kelly Green jersey. Go to his Twitter and vote for this, ladies and gentlemen. You know, and tweet me at DC underscore Lundberg. Tell me whether or not I should drop the money to be a cardboard fan at Oakland this season.

Mariners fans would denounce you for that. I don't care. The Mariners aren't going to do anything like this, and I want to at least pretend to attend a ball game this year. Mariners, do something like this. Don't make it $250. No. Speaking of that, though, Jason,

we did not speak of where the proceeds from this are going to go. Ah, so the proceeds from the Coliseum Cutouts are going to benefit the Oakland A's Community Fund. So the proceeds are going to charity. just another reason to do this. Yeah, why not? Absolutely. Absolutely.

So I think I am going to do it. I think I'm going to do it. This will be a fun season. And I'm wondering, if I pay extra, will they put my cardboard cutout next to that of a cute co-ed? Maybe in the notes you could put that. Let's see what happens.

And then, anyways, Jason, we are running a little late. We've got to run. You've already given the Twitter at Stimmy. MPJD, do follow this man, good hockey, good baseball content, and where can people listen to your show, Locked on Anaheim Ducks? They can search for Locked on Anaheim Ducks on the Lockedon Podcast. I'm going to just typing in Locked on Anaheim Ducks, and that'll be the first thing that pops up. Although it turns out that if you type in Ducks podcast or Anaheim Ducks podcast, there's not many of those around either. No, and if you just type in Locked on Ducks, you either get the Oregon Ducks or a hunting and fishing show.

Also true. I just look this up. Apparently, I'm the second rated Anaheim Ducks podcast right behind Crash the Pond. Hmm. So I'm number two. Woo-hoo! Gang, let's get him to number one. Next time on... Crash the Pond is a very, very good podcast. I will definitely take number two on this one. That's awesome. Okay, fair enough. Next time on Locked-on Mariners, ladies and gentlemen, I will be joined by guest panelists, Ben C. mayor honeypot and a tuna sandwich. You will not want to miss that one,

so please remember to download rate and subscribe to Lockdown Mariners, so you never miss an episode on Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app that you can think of. Follow me on Twitter at DC underscore Lunberg. Follow the show on Twitter as well at L.O. underscore Mariners. We will be back next week, which begins tomorrow. In the interim, have a great day. This is Joey Martin.

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