Mark Dobson's Sports Photography

I guess my first blog post should feature the first time I ever witnessed a no hitter!Yes, I was one of the 36,108 people who actually attended Clay Buchholtz's no hitter September 1, 2007 at Fenway Park in Boston. To set this up, I have to start at the beginning. Way back in February, when we had 3 feet of snow on the ground, I received an email from the Red Sox informing me that I had won the lottery for being able to purchase Monster Seats at Fenway! YAHOOOOOOOOOOO ! I jumped up and down in front of my computer ! A few short days my buddy Pete Gordon, and I would be sitting in front of a computer for 12 hrs hoping to get the coveted Monster Seat Tickets ! After 11 hrs of staring at a constantly refreshing message in the ticket office waiting room, I gave up for the night. Feeling down, I went and grabbed some food, checked my email, and decided to try one more time.It was now 9 pm, and I found myself staring at the ticket purchase screen !!!! I frantically went from game to game looking for seats. For 20 minutes, I scrolled through the entire home schedule, only to find they had been sold out. Finally, I got to the September 1st game, and it offered me 2 standing room only monster seats !!!!! I called Peter, and we decide what the hell, we would still be on the Monster ! Months went by, and the exciting Red Sox' season was slowly creeping toward the playoffs. After my summer vacation, I remembered to check into finding a hotel for our game.I was excited, but a little bummed that we did not have the "sitting seats" Anyway, September 1st came, and we had an uneventful trip to Boston, and it was finally time to climb up to the Monster. I tell you even without seats, just standing above the famed scoreboard was absolutely incredible !! We took our time, and hung out during batting practice, watching the Orioles try to hit balls our way. Most of the batters failed, and Jay Payton ended up tossing balls up to our seats. The only batter that actually hit some our way was ex- Red Sox player Kevin Millar. he was laughing an pointing at us as he drove 5-6 shots our way. You could tell he was having as much fun as we were!The game began, and I was still frantically snapping pictures from our venue. I wanted to make sure that if this was our last time up here, we had plenty of memories. The game cruised through the first 6 innings, and it seemed kind of like a dull game, nothing much going on. Then Kevin Youkilis hit a 3 run home run, only a few feet from us !!! We could feel the energy from the front row seats ! After Buchholtz retired the side in the 7th, a few drunks to our left starting talking about the no hitter. Can you believe that ? The people around us gave him a raft of crap, and this just made him be more of an A - Hole. He retires the side in the 8th, and Pete and I were starting to think about it. I grabbed my cellphone, and called friends to tell them I was on the Monster with a no hitter going into the ninth! I had one of my good friends Tom Fraser on the line and I just held out the phone, and he could tell by the unbelievable roar, I had just witnessed a no hitter ! I got a lot of joy out of this gesture, as he is always calling me from concerts, ballgames etc sticking out the phone, asking me where he thinks he is ! This event trumped all the calls from the Rollings Stone concerts etc. It really sucked that I had to take the "pig pile" shot with my cellphone. Damn those cheap batteries! Words can'nt explain how crazy Fenway was at that moment! I can only imagine if the Sox win the World Series at home ! After the excitement wore off a little, we realized we were still on the Monster, and 36, 000 drunk, crazy fans were pouring out of the stadium. We somehow had to get to the Kenmore Subway station before the hoards of people piled into the subway.We made a made dash, full speed down Landsdown Street, and sprinted across the I-90 bridge crushing all the vendor's selling the 'YANKEES SUCK" tee shirts. I sort of felt sorry for them, as they had no idea the wave of drunk people piled into the streets, all headed to the subway.We go to the turnstile, and my buddy used the pass to pay his way, he handed me the card, and I inserted it into the machine, and it spit it back to me.. Says insufficient funds. Damn, I know we put the correct amount in. The lady at the turnstile said, you must put the card in the slot! I tried again......then I just grabbed the ticket, and bolted through the gate. Yes MTA, I may owe you a dollar. I would never had gotten to the pay machine with all the people crushing in. We got back to the car around 11 pm, and we were in the hotel in Salem, NH by 11:30. We got to watch the rerun on NESN...............Years from now hundreds of thousands of people will have claimed to have been at this no-hitter. I have the ticket stub, and pictures to prove it !

Video Highlights can be found here: http://mlb.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?video=200709012184163