Saturday, April 12, 2008

Autograph Fiasco Runs Its Course

From T.J. Simers at the LA Times:

Dodgers drop rule, will give all autograph seekers access
Club bows to wishes of fans and will give them field-level access before games.

The Dodgers, surrendering to the wishes of irate fans, announced Friday they have dropped a new rule and will allow all youngsters to seek autographs in Dodger Stadium in much the same way they have done for years.

No comment yet from the rich kids, but now everyone in the stadium will be given the same opportunity to stand on the dirt strip at the end of the Dodgers dugout and be ignored by the players while trying to get an autograph.

[...]

But despite the Dodgers' efforts to improve the situation, only a few players took notice. Andre Ethier, Delwyn Young and Matt Kemp were seen obliging some of the kids; Andruw Jones was obviously in the batting cage beneath the stands getting in some extra work.

The Dentist, the team's new PR guy, said a large number of fans provided "data," using the team's e-mail address published on Page 2 this week. They apparently made it quite clear they were not happy about kids' being kept away from the players.

"I read the e-mails aloud to everyone here and it helped," the Dentist said. "We decided to allow everyone to enter the field level the way they have in previous years -- through the end of batting practice.

"We had been concerned about crowding on the field level but that just doesn't seem to apply through batting practice. We'll try to funnel people down Aisle 27 to help with the cleanliness and occupancy problems in the field box seats, and we'll see what we can do about expanding the available area in center field for kids."

It looks like it's up to the players now, and it's never a good situation for them because someone is always going to be denied an autograph. Just pray that someone doesn't have a blog.

Earlier: The Rich Get Richer at Dodger Stadium
Where Are You, Frank McCourt?

1 comments:

Falling LEAVes said...

Yay! I for one am excited to hear this. So excited that I am writing a whole blog entry in response to this. So I'll try to keep this comment short. I love going to batting practice. And it's not for the autographs because I know my chances of getting one is slim to none.