A Booming Voice

On Friday, my friend Chris Cobb and I attended a Braves game at The Ted. Inside the stadium we swipe our Bravo Club cards which give us various useless one-day coupons. One of them is for a free poster at the Bravo Club Headquarters, so we make the 15 minute walk. I ask the guy behind the table for my free poster and he hands it to me.

Then he says something like, "Congratulations! It's your lucky day!" and started to hand me a sheet of paper. At this point I'm avoiding eye contact because I think he's trying to sell me something and I will have to turn him down. But he tells me that I have been picked to say "Play Ball!" before the game. Of course, I start asking idiot questions like: "Are you being serious?" "On the field?" "In front of everybody?" Yes, Ryan, yes.

So a hot little intern leads us down to the close seats explaining the order of things and I am surprisingly not too nervous. I'm more happy and excited than anything. Once they start introducing the players one-by-one, I go onto the field, stand in the middle of the On-Deck Circle, and look at the camera far away underneath the 9-story hi-def board.

"And pitching for the Atlanta Braves: Kyle Davies!" ::applause::
"Now, introducing Bravo Club member Ryan Smith to lead us off for tonight's game!"

The upper-half of my body appears as a 9-story giant on the screen. I imagine people could see my blackheads quite well. I knew I couldn't half-ass this task that was appointed to me, so in my most cheesy "Let's Get Ready to Rumble!" voice, I drew out a "LET'S plaaaAAYY BAAAALLLLL!" In my excitement during the applause, I smiled and stuck out my tongue. I don't know why. One of the ladies in charge of things pointed at me and said, "Now, that's how you do it!" The hot intern told me it was one of the best she had ever heard.

A group of people my age sitting next to me were looking at me towards the start of the game and eventually the guy next to me asked, "Did you say, 'Play Ball?'" I love being a celebrity.