Just what is Bud Smith up to these days?

My fondest memory of Bud isn't his no-hitter, against the Padres---although that was special---but it was a start he made at Wrigley in July 2001 on an afternoon in which I took off work for the installation of my satellite dish, and the dish was installed minutes before gametime and I settled in and watched Bud mow down the Cubs as he appeared, at the time, to be on his way to becoming a bedrock component of the rotation for years to come. While that didn't come to pass, he did serve the organization well as part of the swag sent to Philly for our current third-sacker.

And that's a FANTASTIC card of Mama Molia---where did that come from?

I should probably give props to ESPN Magazine for the Mama Molina card... I was actually at Bud Smith's no-no when I lived in San Diego. I was bizarre because I felt like I was the only one in the stadium who knew he had a no-hitter going from the 5th inning on...

Funny you should say that, Sean... I guy I worked with was also at that game; he was visiting San Diego with some pals and they decided on a whim to check out the Padres game, and they bought general admission seats and sat way up at the top and watched the game and drank, and he told me (this was a couple years later) that at the end of the game they had no idea why the Cardinals were all streaming out of the dugout and making such a big deal....

Sean: Weird, i was at that game in San Diego too. It was dollar night and any ticket was a dollar. Buds whole family and a bunch of his friends were down from long beach. His boys almost got kicked out a few innings in because they smuggled bud light (haha) in. They argued with the usher for a long time and he finally relented.

After the 7th an usher came and got mr. and mrs. smith.

But i remember the exact oposite, everybody was super keyed up and when gwynn came up in the ninth the place went nuts.

Love those dollar dogs and cheap entrance to the park. Looking forward to visiting Petco, but there was nothing wrong with Qualcomm (just like there's nothing wrong with Busch).

I don't mean to imply that no one knew what was going on, by the 9th inning they certainly did, it's just that if I had to compare the atmosphere at Busch when something similar was going on to Qualcomm, there is no comparison. The fans were pretty laid back in my section in the left field stands. In fact, with the exception of one game where I sat behind a crowd of die-hard Padres fans, most of the crowds at the Q were pretty staid.

Sean: Everything about qualcomm was more laid back than anything at busch.

Petco is alright, it's nice enough (the video screen is incredible), but I really liked qualcomm.