Since we're not playing real well right now i'm in a negative mood so a negative subject is what you're going to get. I have a real problem with people who show up late for the games. I'm not talking about missing the first pitch or getting stuck in traffic and missing the first inning and a half. I'm talking about the people who show up in the fith, sixth, or seventh innings and think nothing of it.

I remember a game I went to a few years ago. My friend and I had bleacher seats, but we decided to go and try to find some box seats to sit in. We figure we'd sit out there for an inning maybe get lucky and be ther for two, get kicked out by the real ticket holders, and go to our real seats. The Sox were playing Oakland that night, Mark McGwire was still on the team, and he had launched a dinger earlier in the game that I still remember as the quickest I ever saw leave the stadium. It was the fourth inning and still nobody had come to claim ther seats.

We were psyched, we figured whoever was supposed to be there couldn't come and coudn't find a taker for the tickets. So we got comfortable, started up a repore with the fans sitting around us, and really got into the game. The fifth inning passed and there we were, still in box seats, paying $12 for a bleacher ticket, and sitting in $35 seats.

The top of the sixth came and went and just as we were getting ready for a Sox rally in the bottom of the inning we hear: "Excuse me, those are our seats." Now we didn't say anything, we got up and left and went to where we were supposed to be. But I remember thinking in my head: "Are you kidding me? It's the bottom of the sixth inning and you're just getting here now? You call yourself fans?

I was really ticked, not so much for getting kicked out of the seats (well ok, yes I was), but the fact that these people called themselves Sox fans, and didn't even come til it was almost over. ARGH!

So i'm at the game last night (May 25th), it's the seventh inning, the Sox are getting killed, and we were in our correct seats this time. The row behind us was completely occupied the entire game, and then comes a group of eight people (in the 7th inning) and said that all the folks behind us had to move because those were their seats. Huh? In the seventh? This was too much, so I decided I had to write about it to vent my frustration.

During the course of the game you start to become comfortable with your surroundings. Those who have been to alot of games, and sit in a different seat every time, know what I mean. You know, at the start of the game you barely even look at the people around you, nevermind talk to them. You don't want to get up out of your seat to disturb them becasue you don't want to seem like a pain. But as the game moves on you become more comfortable, more chatty (for lack of a better word), you talk to the guy next to you, even send out a few high fives when things go right.

But then some jerk, who is barely a fan, comes in the seventh inning, and asks you to move, and the process of "breaking in" starts over in new seats. But now it's the 7th inning, and there's not enough time left to get very acclimated. Maybe i'm looking too much into it, call it my pet peave.

So what I propose is that any seat in the stadium not claimed by the ticket holder by the 4th inning (and I think the 4th is too long), loses rights to their seat. Anyone can claim any seat after the 4th, if you get there late too bad. If you were a real fan you'd make sure to get there on time. Everyone has the occasional situation where they miss a couple of innings, it's happened to me. But if you show in the 5th, 6th, or beyond, that's just ridiculous. Stay at home and watch it on tv, the Red Sox need fans, people who are going to be there for them, not bandwagon jumpers who like to think their fans.

Hope I didn't make too many people mad with this one. But things aren't going so well for the Sox right now (2-4 on this homestand), and it doesn't take much to set me off, when the Sox aren't winning.