FanPost

"What is your favorite memory involving the Oakland Coliseum?"

Man this is a tough question. On first thinking about the topic, my mind immediately goes to some truly extraordinary baseball moments I've been lucky enough to witness. I saw Dallas Braden pitch a perfect game and Curt Schilling go 8.2 innings of no-hit ball in his final game at the Coliseum. I was there when we won the division on the last day of the season in 2012, and I was there for Verlander's complete game shut out in game 5 of the ALDS. Heck, I was sitting in the left field bleachers during the game where Marco Scutaro hit a game-winning home run off of Mariano Rivera.

Given all these incredible baseball moments, I found it very hard to choose just one. But the one I chose really encapsulates what being an A's fan is all about to me.

It was a game in 2013, and I honestly can't tell you who it was against or what the final score was. I was going to the game with some friends in college who grew up in LA and so were big dodgers fans. One of my friends texted me before the game jokingly asking if he should wear rainboots so he wouldn't step in sewage water. That set the tone for the entire BART ride and walk across the pedestrian bridge to the stadium (on the bridge: "are we going to a baseball game or a prison?"). I made sure to get bleachers tickets and we sat down.

And they loved every minute of it.

The things I'd gotten used to over the years, that are absolutely unique to the Coliseum absolutely blew them away. They were super into all the bleacher chants (especially the IBISV and John Jaso jingleheimer schmidt ones). On one side of us was one of the regulars who offered us sour patch kids and on the other side were a couple of drunk Irish international students making A's cheers out of Beatles songs. There was (of course) a fight a little ways off which provided a good inter-inning diversion. And the game itself was fantastic. For three hours all of us were one weird little community.

By the end of the night, my friends all admitted that it was possibly the most fun they'd ever had at a baseball game.

As A's fans, its so easy to forget all the great stuff we have here. Obviously the moments on the field mean a lot to me, but what is truly unique is that kind of community that is built at the Coliseum. Given enough time, a fan of any team can go see an ALDS game, but in all the baseball games I've watched live or on TV, I've never seen an outpouring of support after a season-ending loss like I saw from the fans in the Coliseum after game 5 in 2012. I still can't believe that Jeff Francoeur met up with our fans and bought everyone pizza. Every team goes through some bad years, but even in our worst years our cheers were louder and in our best years the atmosphere couldn't be beat.

I made three-hour friendships in the Coliseum that I don't think would happen in most places. And that's how I chose my memory of the Coliseum; it reminded me in such a visceral way of everything we have that really doesn't exist anywhere else.