Weird Lincoln Tales #3: The Evil Doppleganger

"I know he looks like me,

 hates work like me,

 and walks like me.

 He's even got a twin like me.

 My Evil Twin,

 Bad weather friend,

 I know someday I'll meet him,

 but I don't know where or when."

My Evil Twin, They Might Be Giants

This isn't a real trend, I promise. Not all of the Weird Lincoln Tales will be about people who resemble to me. But these two (this one and the prior) are special to me.

Prior to 1998, my real experience with baseball amounted to 1) being somewhat interested in the Twins winning in 1987, 2) being much more interested (i.e. actually watching games) when the Twins won in 1991 (best World Series ever) and 3) wishing the baseball highlights on SportsCenter would be over so they would talk about football.

Then in the summer of 1998, two things happened to plants the seeds of baseball love. The summer of the home run chase captivated me (and now feels forever stained), and my friend Aaron moved in next door to me. This eventually led to hours and hours of playing baseball video games (and at one point, a broken chair).

Unlike me, Aaron had pretty much loved baseball from childhood. Growing up in Iowa, there's apparently nothing else to do. :) But unlike most Iowans, he didn't follow the Cubs, or even the Twins, Royals, or White Sox. Somehow, he became a fan of the Atlanta Braves.

By the fall of 1998, I met Carma, who was also a baseball fan. For some reason, soon after we started dating, I felt the need to pick a team to root for.  This was not very difficult to do, as the New York Mets were the perfect choice. Carma liked New York (still does, I guess), but I could not root for the Yankees (at least if I wanted to keep my soul). And the Mets were a division rival to Aaron's Braves. Perfect! So naturally I had to go get a Mets jersey to pledge my allegiance. (Photo from 2006)

Moving forward to the summer of 2000, Carma and I went to New York City to visit some friends (as yet unencumbered with children we could still do such extravagant things), as well as take in a baseball game. We had previously visited NYC the previous November, but needed to return to actually catch baseball in action. (The November '99 visit- my first to NYC ever- is also the same in which I declared to Carma, "It's a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.") We took in a Mets game on July 1st, 2000, which happened to be against the Braves. Not only that, it happened to be during the first series where relief pitcher John Rocker returned to NYC after his Sports Illustrated interview filled with derogatory comments about New Yorkers.

"It's the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the 7 Train to the ballpark, looking like you're riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It's depressing." In addition he went on to add "The biggest thing I don't like about New York are the foreigners. You can walk an entire block in Times Square and not hear anybody speaking English. Asians and Koreans and Vietnamese and Indians and Russians and Spanish people and everything up there. How the hell did they get in this country?"

So, yeah, pretty ignorant and a bit hateful. Needless to say, New Yorkers weren't expected to be very welcoming to him after his comments. The series between the Braves and Mets was a 4-game series starting Thursday, June 29th. In preparation, the normal police presence at Shea Stadium was increased tenfold to about 700 officers. The atmosphere was a bit raucous (as was the media coverage), but yet festive at the game we attended. Part of that could be because the Mets won handily that day, and John Rocker did not pitch. 

It was a fun and memorable trip. About a week after returning home (Evanston, IL at the time) I got a copy of Sports Illustrated (another pre-children luxury), which had an article about the series. On the first page I found a surprise.

Looking at the guy holding the sign very closely...

So let's see: Black Mets jersey, brown hair/beard, glasses, a little on the portly side, and was at one of the Mets games against the Braves. Yep, it could have been me. Except for the fact that I would never hold a sign like that.

However, to test how good a doppleganger my evil twin really was, I emailed my friend Aaron (still in Omaha) and simply told him to get the latest SI and look at page 38. A couple of days later, I got his reply:

"You're a jackass."

Fair enough, I guess. But if my best friend was fooled, than it's definitely a twin. How evil he is is anyone's guess, but I figure he can't be too bad if he's a Mets fan.