Summer Entertainment

It was another gorgeous day. We had a nice walk in the park this morning, then cleaned up the house, did laundry, and accomplished a lot of little chores. It's a wonderful day for summer entertainment - I'm not sure what son is doing once he gets off work tonight (though I know he has to work the weekend....again!), but older daughter and family were at Worlds of Fun amusement park in KC today, and younger daughter is taking in the KC Royals' home game tonight with friends.

Hubby had the movie "Moneyball" on this afternoon - a Brad Pitt movie chronicling part of the career of a major league baseball manager with the Oakland A's. I was only partially keeping up with the movie as I read and did some chores - but at one point, I became totally engaged. This movie was following the turn-around of the 2002 A's as they progressed from being a losing team in 2001 to winning a record 20 straight games in 2002.

Now, I didn't remember this at all, and would imagine that only die-hard baseball fans would be familiar with it. But the game that ended up being the 20th straight win was against the Kansas City Royals. I didn't know when the scene came on if the A's won the game or not, but I found myself stepping away from the ironing board to voraciously cheer for the Royals as they came back from an 11-0 deficit to tie the game before the A's pulled it out.

It wasn't just that the Royals are the "hometown" team - it's more than I've never gotten over Charlie Finley moving the A's OUT of Kansas City in favor of Oakland. That happened, by the way, in 1967. We Midwesterners don't hold grudges...no, we certainly don't! Especially after 46 years!

Charlie Finley was quite a showman and enterpreneur. He petitioned Major League Baseball to let the Kansas City A's use kelly green and gold as their team colors - normally, teams would use a "team color" accented with either gray or white - and those gray or white uniforms were worn at home. But the A's got to use that kelly green and gold every game. After accomplishing that color change, he had the A's wear white shoes - made of kangaroo leather. He also bought a Missouri mule as the mascot for the A's - and it was named "Charlie O". That mule, named after Mr. Finley, was fodder for several off-color jokes made by KC fans once he took the A's from Kansas City.

I can't recall now whether Finley's publicity stunt with Bert "Campy" Campaneris happened in KC or Oakland - but there was one game where Campaneris, the A's hot-shot player at the time, played one inning at each field position. Finley definitely knew how to draw in the fans.

Anyway, the movie was good and hubby enjoyed it. It was interesting to read "the rest of the story" online about the manager who was the movie's focus. Here in north central Missouri, it's a good weekend for whatever summer entertainment you enjoy!