P at the Big A

I was a little nervous. Sure, I can talk big. "Look for the beer-soaked boy, that might be me," I wrote. But after getting into the A's gear, and then in the car, I was a little nervous. Grace and I had gone to the Rite-Aid for white-out and a green marker. But did I have the guts to cheer for the green and gold in the sea of red? Would I commit the treason of defacing the Vladimir Guerrero clacker?

When Joe and I got there, we had nothing to worry about. There were plenty of other A's fans there.

So we defaced our clackers. I converted mine to read Chavez, Joe did his to read Zito.

Disappoint- ingly, though the game was close and came down to the very last pitch – Chavez nearly hit a two-run home run in the last A's at-bat – the better team lost, despite a tremendous performance by the A's rookie starting pitcher, Joe Blanton.

We'll get 'em tomorrow night.

More photos from the game.