Dae han min-gook. That's what the Korean fans were yelling last night while banging on those gigatic blue tubes in unison to the 4 or 5 bass drums scattered throughout the ballpark. Then you add in the pots and pans and gongs and various noisemakers and what appeared to be every single Korean within a hundred and fifty miles of the ballpark all gathered in one place.
It was crazy.
It took some doing to try to figure out exactly what they were yelling. I didn't bother to ask anybody what they were chanting. Instead I just kept reading lips and then eventually looked it up on the internet when I got home. I love good chants in unison. I wish Padres games were like that. It was just so fun to have that many people that into a baseball game.
Some thoughts in bullet form:
- Looking back now, it's a shame that the night game didn't turn out to be Korea vs Mexico. That would have been absolute insanity.
- Korean fans must be the most organized fans ever. Where do these people buy that many inflatable Korea sticks? My guess is Kearny Mesa. They must have them in every Korean restaurant and supermarket up there.
- Through Gaslamp Baller Jay's recommendation, we (Jess, her dad and I) had lunch at Bread on Market before the Cuba vs Dominican Republic game. Let me tell you right now, it was excellent. They might not be lying when they say this is the best BLT in town. This is going to become a regular spot before games for us now.
- We spotted a lot of Korean Party Girls and Japanese Party Girls all shaking their thangs and cheering and stuff. At one point there were a couple of KPGs and they spotted some JPGs and they got into a little shouting match that turned into a little bit of a slap boxing fight, and then they totally started making out.
- Just based on the quality of play, Japan is totally going to kick Cuba's ass. Japan would've kicked the Dominican Republic's ass too. Both Japan and Korea played extremely solid baseball, despite the meltdown in the 7th.
- Speaking of that... Byung-Hyun Kim's modus operandi is apparently to appear solid for an exteded period of time before completely crapping all over himself in a pressure situation. Poor guy.
- Any one of the four teams that played yesterday would have killed the U.S. team. Let's say you added in Barry Bonds and a few others who dropped out of the tourney for the United States; I still would have picked any of those other teams.
- The one thing that's missing from the WBC is flashy logos and mascots and stuff. The uniforms were so plain. While it worked for some, for others it would've been kinda nice to have a drawing of a bear or a bird of prey or like a Japanese Party Girl.
- Every single Korean player has a three syllable name. It makes for perfect cheers. Not unlike "Beat L.A." except with whatever batter happens to be up.