BURGER SCOOT

“Anyone who doesn’t think the best hamburger place in the world is in his hometown is a sissy… and probably a security risk.”

— Calvin Trillin

I was reminded of the above truism by Joe Posnanski, arguably the best writer in baseball, the author of two of my favorite books on the subject: Why We Love Baseball: A History in 50 Moments and The Baseball 100. He also writes the only blog I have ever paid to read: Joe Blogs. He rarely writes about my lifelong favorite team that I have finally shunned. He also loves to write about the Cincinnati Reds which–props to past legit successes and current Elly De La Cruz*–I’m a little tired of reading about how great the Pete Rose, Johnny Bench, Joe Morgan and the Big Red Machine were. We know, Joe. So, enough already!  

Hmm, my writing has decided to take the scenic route, weaving through tangents and meandering across the page. It’s like a verbal road trip with no GPS! Let’s get back on track. 

Anyway, I brought up Posnanski for a reason. Oh yes, he wrote in one of his latest Joe Blog posts because he said he liked the above statement from Trillin but thought it didn’t go far enough. Here’s a list of his suggestion additions with my comments after the dashes in bold face.  

1. Hamburger place — For the most part true, (Scott’s Burger Shack) but I can only ride so far on my scooter, so I’ve never really tested this one  

2. Barbecue joint — I guess, but I haven’t ventured too far for ‘que  

3. Ice cream shop — Me loves some Gunther’s BIG TIME!  

4. Hardware store — My old hardware store was the best before it closed, but I’m not a handyman; just ask my long suffering wife; I liked it because it was the closest place to buy the best caramel corn in the world: Sacramento’s own Carmazzi Caramel Corn!   

5. Pizza — Masullo rocks!   

6. Weather person — There’s a meteorologist by the name of Dirk Verdoorn on KCRA that my wife and I like, but we don’t watch network TV much and prefer smartphone apps; sorry Dirk  

7. Farmer’s market — I haven’t been to one for a while, but, when I worked Downtown, I liked Bodega Days every Thursday in Cesar Chavez Park  

8. Fan spirit — I’m not into basketball, but Sacramento loves their Kings; I follow The River Cats, but definitely won’t be following the A’s when John Fisher and his impoverished team flops on Vivek Ranadivé‘s couch for a few years  

The point Posnanski, who grew up in Cleveland but now lives in Charlotte, was getting to was the announcer for the New York Yankees, John Sterling, was retiring. The author commented on how Sterling was an institution to Yankee fans, but might not have been, to most non-Yankee fans, that lovable. Nevertheless, before Posnanski got to that point, he stressed how people love their respective hometowns even when their products may fall short in outsiders’ opinions. Posnanski waxes on about St. Louis’ pizza as an example: 

“I think now of St. Louis pizza. There is no foodstuff on planet Earth worse than St. Louis pizza. It flies in the face of that universal truth that pizza, like sex, is good even when it’s bad. There is nothing at all good about St. Louis pizza, not the texture, not the shape of a slice, not the monstrosity they use as cheese, nothing at all. If you’re stuck on an 18-hour flight where the only food option was St. Louis pizza, I’d eat the seat cushion. AND YET… if I ever ran into a St. Louis person who did not defend to the death the honor of St. Louis pizza, I would wonder a little bit about their character.”

I would imagine the same would go with my hometown of Sacramento. It hurt like hell in 2014 when the Sacramento River Cats bailed on Oakland and became a San Francisco Giants affiliate, but though I couldn’t care less about the players anymore, I stuck with what my father taught me when I was a kid: stick with your local team; and so I have, at least to a point. That’s enough hometown “Fan Spirit” I can muster without feeling like, what Mr. Trillin would call a “sissy” or a “security risk.”

* I mentioned De La Cruz earlier. Here he is. With all the crap that is going on with my ex-team, the Oakland A’s, this kind of stuff makes me want to dump the whole “favorite team” shit and just watch the game whoever is playing.