Good Sandwich, Bad Stadium

I went to the city that I've probably flown to more than any other city last week.  Although I've flown to and from Chicago many times, I haven't actually spent too much time there.  When I go there, it's almost always Notre Dame related.  I flew to and from Midway when I was a student and for many years after for football games.  Since Southwest did away with their Islip-Midway flights, I've been flying to O'Hare for football games and this past winter for basketball and hockey.  So here are all the times I actually spent any time in Chicago:

1.  The 2005 St. Edward's Yacht Dance
2.  A 2006 White Sox game when I was a student at Notre Dame
3.  A 2009 Cubs game when I went to visit some friends at Notre Dame
4.  Dinner at Gino's East with my brothers in 2010 the night before a Notre Dame football game
5.  A night at the O'Hare Hilton so that I could watch Game 6 of the NLCS before the 2013 Notre Dame-USC game
6.  Another night at the O'Hare Hilton before going to Notre Dame for basketball and hockey in February

And I think that's it.  So this was the first time I was going to Chicago and it wasn't connected to Notre Dame in any way.  I was going to get back to US Cellular Field and Wrigley Field for the first time in a long time.  I had been to every other Major League stadium I had ever been to more recently than US Cellular and every stadium I've been to except US Cellular, Shea Stadium, and old Yankee Stadium more recently than Wrigley.

I got to Chicago on a Tuesday and left on a Thursday.  That meant Wednesday afternoon was my only option for Wrigley Field because the Cubs had an afternoon game on Tuesday.  I had a choice between Tuesday night and Wednesday night for US Cellular.  I kind of wanted to do both in one day, but the forecast for Wednesday was looking a little ominous (it turned out to be fine) so I went to the White Sox game on Tuesday.  That meant I saved the better one for last and I was still getting to both within 24 hours, so I was fine with it.

Before going to the White Sox game, I went to another Man vs. Food spot, Lucky's Sandwich Company (this post has all the Man vs. Food spots I had been to before this one).  I walked over there right after I got to my hotel.  It's actually pretty close to Wrigley Field.  The Cubs game was in the 8th inning when I got there, so there was no crowd.  I watched the end of the game, had a beer (I picked some random one that had a good description, but I didn't like it), and had their 2 Bagger Sandwich, which has corned beef, pastrami, cole slaw, and fries all on the sandwich.  It was like Primanti Brothers in Pittsburgh.  Adam went to Lucky's for his Chicago challenge, which was to each three of their sandwiches.  He won easily.  There's no way I'd want to eat three of those (it was a pretty serious sandwich), but the one I had was very good.  When Adam went there, there was a Notre Dame banner hanging behind him.  I didn't see that, but they did have a Jets helmet above the TV behind the bar (and a Bears helmet also).

I took this picture after eating half the sandwich.  I managed to finish the whole thing.

After relaxing for a bit, I took the train to US Cellular Field.  The White Sox were playing the Yankees.  I walked around the lower concourse.  There's not too much to see.  It's a boring stadium.  They do have some statues in the outfield, but it's not like the White Sox have the greatest history.  Everybody went crazy for the Red Sox in 2004.  And then the White Sox won the next year, which ended a drought that was two years longer than the Red Sox and nobody noticed.  And then there's the Cubs.

Fine, Frank Thomas was a great player.

I went up to my seat on the upper level.  I got a ticket for $15, which wasn't bad, but really I just should have bought the cheapest ticket I could and then moved wherever because the crowd was only 20,773.  Whatever.  I got barbacoa tacos from the 35th Street Tacos stand.  They tasted good, but they were too hot, they were falling apart, and there was too much meat.  I didn't finish them.  To drink, I had an Eliot Ness Amber Lager from the Great Lakes Brewing Company.  It was very good, but I was a little disappointed in the beer selection.  The Great Lakes Brewing Company is in Ohio.  Get some good local craft beer in there.

My view for the first pitch

As for the game, the Yankees dominated.  They had a guy thrown out at the plate in the first, but then they scored six runs over the next four innings.  They added three more in the last two.  They just kept getting hits.  They had 20 for the game, with home runs by Chase Headley and Austin Romine.  Masahiro Tanaka started for the Yankees and turned in an excellent performance.  He went seven and two-thirds and gave up no runs on six hits, one walk, and six strikeouts.  The Yankees won 9-0.  It was a boring game.  I wasn't paying close attention after the fifth or so.

As for US Cellular Field, I remembered it being boring and I was right.  There's nothing exciting about it.  It's like they said, let's make a 1991 version of Shea Stadium that's baseball-only (Shea had football early on, of course).  When I last ranked the stadiums, I had it ranked ahead of only Rogers Center (as much as I want to call it SkyDome, I didn't, but I refuse to use a silly British spelling for "Center") and the two stadiums that I haven't been to (the reason I haven't been to either yet is that they're so crappy).  Here's what US Cellular has on Rogers Center:  grass, not being in Canada, and a slightly better beer selection.  Rogers Center has a better location within its city and if they renovated it, put in grass (they did just add the dirt infield this year), and a better beer selection, I'd move Rogers Center ahead of US Cellular, but for now, I'm keeping US Cellular at 29th.

I'll cover Wrigley Field in my next post.