Don’t try to steal at a Baltimore Orioles game in Camden Yards.
I remember it like it was yesterday. I was standing in the concession stand line, with some chicken and french-fries. At these concession stands, you got your food, and we’re corralled to the end of the line where you paid. You were blocked in until you got to the end, so there was no chance of escape.
Because of that, the college kid in front of me waited until he got right in front of the man who collected the payments until he decided to try and make a run for it without paying. When he took off, you could tell that he thought he was running a mile a minute.
But the truth was that he was drunk wobbling and could’ve been caught by a slow toddler. Meanwhile, the attendant was about 6’4” and probably weighed 350 pounds. He was built like he used to be a bodybuilder when he was in college but had let himself go a bit. Not anybody I would want to pick a fight with.
The college kid, on the other hand, was about 5’10” and scrawny. The attendant took off after the would-be thief, leaving me standing there with my food feeling a bit like Napoleon Dynamite standing with his tater tots.
The attendant caught up to him right as he tried to turn into the seating section. The attendant unleashed the cleanest body check I’ve seen to this day. I think Ray Lewis would’ve been hard-pressed to top it. The result was that the college kid’s food went flying, and the kid himself hit the floor.
You’d think that the kid would’ve been taken off to the drunk tank or something, but no. He got up and went back to his seat to watch the game, and the attendant came back like nothing had happened and sold me my chicken and french-fries.
It’s an experience that you wouldn’t get anywhere but a student night game at Camden Yards.