Viva la Sioux Falls (go Canaries!)

Sioux Falls, you have been a surprise.

I guess I assumed that so far removed were thee from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the GREAT NATION STATE that you wouldn't get me, or I wouldn't get you, or we wouldn't get each other and would just spend 4 nights staring back and forth like two people on an interminable first date.

Thus was not the case.

The crowds were perfect. They were in no particular order: polite, enthusiastic, astute and eager to listen (I know I sound like I'm describing a young suitor from a Jane Austen novel but that's how they were).

I can't wait to come back here next year. Hell, even the bachelorette party on Saturday night was perfectly behaved. How often does that happen?

I've noticed something lately. Small-town America ain't so small anymore. No when it comes to ideas, anyway.

Perhaps it's the greater access to information these burgs have nowadays. The 24-hour cable news networks and the internet providing a portal to every tidbit and morsel of goings on, thereby allowing for deeper, more measurable amounts of cultural penetration into the outer sectors of society.

Perhaps...

Or maybe, just maybe I just shouldn't prejudge people.

I dunno. All I know is I had a great time at the Sioux Falls Canaries game yesterday.


This wasn't Triple A, Double, nor even lowly Single A ball. No this was independent Northern League ball.


These are guys hanging on to the dream by the thread of a thread's second cousin.

I have to say, it doesn't get any better or purer for someone of my tastes.

$10 bucks for a box seat right behind first base. A hot dog and a Diet Coke in hand and I was in small stadium heaven.

Loved the atmosphere. Families everywhere, everyone there before the first pitch and staying 'til the last. Not a swear word to be heard.

I sat two rows in front of a greasy-haired 50 year-old chatterbox with a set of teeth like piano keys who never met a Canaries player he couldn't root on or an opposing batter he couldn't work up a jeer or two against. Clad in his late model Rolling Stones concert T-shirt, he was one of those "wants to be funny but never will be" type guys. A know it all. Cliff Claven in Sioux Falls.

The type of guy who stands during the part of the game when everyone else is sitting down.

But I was glad he was there. I found it comforting to hear his unending chatter - rah rah encouragements for the home team mingled with conspiratorial accusations in the wake of every close or downright bad judgment on the part of the umps.

It wasn't satisfying to him that the umpires would actually make an honest mistake from time to time or call to call. No he had to believe these men were actually from the other team's home town or were perhaps in receipt of a bribe from some opposing coach/owner/evil baseball game fixer. Some malfeasance was occurring and would not go uncommented upon as long as Cliff was present, ever-vigilant in the seats behind first.

There was no pitch, no ball or strike, no infield pop-up, no well-laid bunt he couldn't work himself into a frenzy of either joy or disgust over. Every baseball game needs one of these guys. He was this one's.

Now for the recap...

At first the Canaries didn't look to be swinging so hot, falling down 4 to 1 in the early going. But then a bases loaded opportunity in the bottom of the 5th inning led to a no out double and then a homer for a grand total of 7 big runs that turned the tide of the game for good.

Go Canaries indeed!



Lots of in between inning hijinks to kill the time.

An Axe thrower popping balloons between his assistant's legs, a unicycler juggling chainsaws, the Canaries' mascot being chased down and tackled by a ten year-old who won a prize for doing thus.

By the way - is that not the creepiest mascot ever? I mean, what happened to the full body suit? Did he misplace his bird gloves? There is just something incredibly disturbing about seeing a man with a canary face and human hands.

Other than that it was a successful afternoon and a great week in Sioux Falls. I hope I come here every summer and I hope the Canaries win it all this year, whatever "all" is in the Northern Leagues.

It was all enough for me.