My Larry Bird State

I got home from my first baseball trip of the year yesterday (more on that later in the week hopefully).  I'm getting very close to finishing off the Major League Baseball stadiums that aren't total dumps, but my other goal is to get to all 50 states.  I've started using my baseball trips to get to other states that I've never been to before (like Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas last year).  So with this baseball trip, I wanted to get to a couple of states that I hadn't been to.  I wanted to see some minor league baseball, but the season didn't start until Thursday.  So for Wednesday, I decided to go to an NBA game.  I picked Utah over Portland just because flights were cheaper.  So Utah became state number 33 for me.

I got to Salt Lake City around 2:00.  I started by going to Bruges Waffles and Frites, which Adam Richman visited on Man vs. Food.  I got the same thing Adam got, the Machine Gun sandwich.  It was interesting.  I didn't love the sausages, but the fries and the sauce were good.  There is sauce on the sandwich and you can pick one other side sauce for free.  I did enjoy the fries and the andalouse sauce on the sandwich and the aioli sauce were good, but not as good as European Republic's fries and sauces.

The Machine Gun sandwich

After that, I took a walk around Temple Square.  It seemed to me like it's the Mormon version of St. Peter's Square (of course, I've never been to St. Peter's Square, so maybe it's not a good comparison).  As I was walking around Temple Square, all I could think about was the South Park episode about Mormons.  Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.  They believe some wacky stuff, but I do like Mormons.  Every Mormon I've ever met has always seemed really nice, which is also what the South Park episode is about.

Joseph Smith was called a prophet.  Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.

I went back to my hotel and watched the first half of the Celtics' game.  Brad Stevens is going to get them into the playoffs.  They should have won like 25 games with the team they have.  Part of it is that the Eastern Conference is terrible, but part of it is that Brad Stevens is awesome.  Danny Ainge, for the love of God, use all those draft picks to get Brad Stevens some legitimate NBA basketball players and the Celtics will be winning their 18th championship soon enough.

Then I headed to the Jazz game.  They were taking on the Kings.  There's nothing like a late season NBA game between two teams that aren't going to the playoffs, but I was excited to see Jack Cooley, the only current Notre Dame player in the NBA.  The Jazz also have Gordon Hayward, who was my second favorite non-Notre Dame college player (behind Doug McDermott).  Hayward scored the first two points of the game, but he only played 20 minutes (the Jazz were resting him) and scored two more points for the rest of the game (1-3 shooting, 2-2 at the line).  Jack Cooley was the first Jazz player off the bench.  He had no points and one rebound in five minutes.

Karl Malone and John Stockton

The Kings were up by six at halftime, but the Jazz controlled the second half and the Jazz won 103-91.  Rodney Hood scored 20, Donte Exum (an Australian) hit four threes, and Derrick Favors had 18 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 blocks.  The game also had a wedgie (Tas Melas was excited) and Trey Burke hit about a 55 footer at the end of the first quarter.  I would have applauded for that, but Trey Burke went to Michigan.

My view from the last row

So with that, I crossed Utah off my list.  There's a pretty good chance that I'll never be back there again.