Let’s Play Ball- London Style

As I explained in my last post, we came to London because we got tickets to the first ever MLB series to be played in Europe- the New York Yankees vs. the Boston Red Sox.

For the record, no, we were not at the game where Prince Harry and Meghan Markle threw out the first pitch, and no, we were not at the game where there was a whopping 30 runs scored between both teams. 🙄 To the young kids who threw out the first pitch at Sunday’s game-you did great, and I’m sure that was a highlight of your life thus far. I’m sorry I didn’t pay attention to you at the time, I was too busy mourning over the fact that no member of the royal family showed up for Game 2. LOL😭

Anyway, now that that’s cleared up, we still saw one hell of a game! 59,059 people were in attendance for Sunday afternoon’s game and there was no shortage of pomp and circumstance.

The series was played at London Stadium, which was built for the 2012 Summer Olympics, and where today, various sports like football (soccer for us Americans), cricket and rugby are played.

The stadium was in great condition and everything about it was really organized. For example, several pedestrian bridges lead to the stadium and your seats determine which bridge you should take so that you enter closest to where you are seated. They had plenty of staff to help direct you to the appropriate bridge and our tickets clearly marked the bridge we should take. This made for a relatively fast entrance to the stadium.

Once inside the stadium, there were stands to buy merchandise, as well as food. The merchandise seemed to be a little low and we all thought that perhaps most of the merchandise had been bought during the first game on Saturday. We all ended up purchasing items that we wanted, but did notice that there were low quantities of some “hot ticket” items. It’s something to keep in mind if you’re planning on heading over there for next year’s series (they announced that next year the St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago White Sox will be coming to London).

Food and drinks, however, were nothing short of low. They had some traditional baseball food like hot dogs, chicken fingers with fries, nachos, and ice-cream. Everything you would expect at a baseball game in the U.S.

But, they also had some British food. In one area of the stadium, they had a bunch of food trucks set up, some with more American food like pulled pork, but others serving fish and chips, and the Great British Fudge Company that was set up in an old two-decker bus!

And let’s not forget about Amy and mine’s highlight: Pimm’s!

I’ve read that Pimm’s is the drink of Wimbledon, similar to the mint julep being the drink of the Kentucky Derby. Regardless, you can pretty much order a Pimm’s at any bar, restaurant, and yes, to our excitement (Amy and me), at the baseball game! Below is a recipe for a traditional Pimm’s, but essentially, Pimm’s is liquor that is gin-based and infused with various herbs. (I honestly didn’t taste the gin). Amy and I merrily drank Pimm’s for the entire game, while Dan and Kyle drank beer. They had some American beers on tap that the guys enjoyed.

Insider Baseball

For the actual game itself, it was really exciting! The Yankees and Red Sox were neck and neck for a good portion of the game, and when the Yankees were ahead towards the end, the Red Sox gave it their all and almost (yeah I said it 😏), almost came back to win, but the Yankees held on. New York, New York by Frank Sinatra played loudly overhead (this song is played at the end of any Yankees home game win), and confetti was thrown in the air to celebrate the win and the end of a historic series.

I have to say that it was interesting to attend a baseball game where the host city is completely neutral, but it made for a really nice experience. Traditions from both teams were carried out throughout the game, like playing YMCA, Sweet Caroline, Shipping Up to Boston, Take Me Out to the Ballgame during the seventh inning stretch and even Wally, the Red Sox mascot, made his way across the pond.

Interesting little side note, the Britts didn’t know what cracker jacks were, and were very confused when that part of the song played during Take Me Out to the Ballgame. My dad just so happened to be eating some at the time, and so we were able to explain to the people around us what cracker jacks were. No one wanted to try any LOLOL. 🤣

There was also some sweetness to this game. I’ve been going to Yankees games with my dad since I was 2 years old. We’ve been to All-Star games, playoff games, home run derby’s, Old Timer’s Day games, and lazy Sunday afternoon games, but this was the first time being at a Yankees game overseas, and it was fun to experience it with him (even if he couldn’t keep score-apparently the Britts don’t know about that either LOL).

We had an absolute blast at the game and realized afterwards that we had pretty much spent about 10 hours at the stadium, but none of us seemed to mind because we were consumed with taking it all in. I highly recommend that if your teams, (or even if your fave teams aren’t playing) are playing in London, GO. You won’t regret it.

-Steph, xx