Then I get an idea. I have dozens of friends who have no interest in Monster seats. I can use their names, and if by some chance they win, I can pay them face value for the tickets. I imagine scalpers are using dozens, even hundreds, of e-mail addresses.

The comparison’s unavoidable. Now I’m like them, bending the rules in my greed for the seats. It feels decidedly squirmy, and yet for the next few hours I span the continent, tapping Oklahoma and the Rockies and San Francisco and Edmonton for names, addresses, phone numbers and birthdays donated by pitying friends.

March 20th

The team dwindles as Theo assigns seven players to the minors, including optioning Kevin Youkilis to Pawtucket.

Steve’s worried about Trot, and brings up Tim Naehring, our ill-fated third baseman of the nineties. Naehring was that agonizing player who’s vastly talented but always hurt. At 6′2″, 205, he wasn’t delicate, but he broke his wrist, he broke his ankle, he had a bad back. He was on the DL so much that he came to seem like a platoon player. When he finally retired at age thirty, it seemed possible that he was just hurt again. That’s not how Trot wants to go out.

March 21st

This morning Philadelphia blew up the Vet. While Phillies fans remembered their one World Series win, Eagles fans hoped it would change their luck. Back when our old owners were planning to build a new Fenway, I heard the same kind of superstitious talk out of stalwarts like Ted Williams (who always hated the Monster’s effect on Sox pitchers). So, if we win, do we have to keep it as a good-luck charm? The Vet, like Three Rivers Stadium or the Kingdome, bit the dust not because it was unlucky or falling down, but because it just wasn’t a fun place to watch a ball game. That’s not true of Fenway, unless you’re stuck behind a pole or in line for the bathroom. The true test of a ballpark, and maybe a ball club, is percent capacity—how many butts versus how many seats—and Fenway’s aced that test every year since 1967.

Steve couldn’t even scrounge a ticket to the Sox-Jays game yesterday—at their place.

SO: I can see you in the parking lot, wagging a finger, waylaying strangers—“Need one.”

SK: The Sox are a hot ticket everywhere they go in Florida. Folks think they are a genna-wine Team of Destiny. They banged out Ed Wood Stadium, or whatever they call the place here in Sarasota where Cincy plays; first time in two years. And were turning them away at the door. All that and Air-Cast Nomar didn’t even play. It will be interesting to see if the phenomenon carries over into the regular season.

Remember the year the Orioles were relatively stacked and started 0-21? Or was it 0-22?

Go you big David Ortiz.