Christina Kahrl Attends Hartford Yard Goats Pride Night
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Richard Note Christina Kahrl is a Senior Editor at ESPN and one of the co-founders of Baseball Prospectus and a LGBTQ activist Jeff Hoffman Jersey. The story of her coming out as a transgender sportswriter in 2003 was part of a GLAAD award-nominated segment entitled ransitions” on HBO Real Sports that aired in 2010. She is also on GLAAD Board of Directors and can be reached on Twitter at ChristinaKahrl.The following text was originally posted by Christina on her Facebook page. Christina and her wife Charley attended Pride Night at the Hartford Yard Goats game on 6 26 17 as part of the “You Can Play” initiative. I thought it was a funny, lovely and quite insightful write up of what her experiences were with the Colorado Rockies Double-A Affiliate, so I asked her if I could share it with our audience here. I glad she agreed )It was just another Monday afternoon at work when Charley called to let me know that, surprise, surprise, it's going to be Pride Night at the Yard Goats game in 2.5 hours, and better yet it's a You Can Play initiative. Since our move to CT we had not yet made the time to get to brand-new Dunkin Donuts Park, but she's taken the initiative on wanting to go, so I'm over the moon.After a quick consult with Dan Mullen on best seats, we pick a section over the phone, and we're off to the races. I swing by home to pick her up, and Charley being Charley, she's donned her "Don't Piss Off the Fairies" tanktop, so we're already laughing as we head to the park. Twenty minutes later we're there, just after the gates open.It's a nice ballpark, roughly on par with the newer spring training parks in Arizona in terms of space, seating and setup. We walk in and promptly collect our rainbow Yard Goats YCP bracelets. Some folks are walking right by the table, and some families with kids of all ages "normal" families as some would have it are putting them on. There's no controversy; some folks are cool, some are uninterested. Not that I worry about such things, because the ballpark is always a place I feel safe, but Charley's reliably, understandably protective.We pop into the team store to get some Pride Night t-shirts, plus yet another novelty baseball (I pick Chew Chew over Chompers for those who must know Garrett Hampson Jersey. At some point I'll wall-mount the bucket or two of the things I have in the home office.) Concessions? Everything that's gluten-free is clearly marked. A chicken sandwich and hard cider might not be a dog and a beer, but it'll do quite nicely for a celiac.We take our seats near home plate down the third-base line, and they're great, although we note that next time some swivel seats might be better still. We laugh over mascot-related pre-game silliness Chompers the Yard Goat likes busting dance moves Drew Butera Jersey, Chew Chew the Yard Goat waves and wiggles her belly, Toner the Copy Cat acts like he's a punitive assignment for somebody in the front office who forgot to refill the coffee machine. The entertainment doesn't need to be highbrow, and isn't. Charley's laughing and I'm at a park on a perfect June night without a care in the world.The pregame You Can Play video with Yard Goats players and staff advocating for inclusion for LGBT folks and safety in the locker room is excellent https://www.shoptherockies.com/Carlos_Estevez_Jersey-22, proud and out loud without being scold-y. A few folks around us are 'family' (if you catch my drift), most of the families are not, and everyone's cool, which is exactly as it should be at a ballpark. I tell Charley a little about Brendan Rodgers, the Rockies' No. 1 prospect who was recently called up, because my superhero identity is Pedantula and I can boringly bring a beautiful night at the ballpark back to the baseball part of it.Shoutout to danafeig for coming up with the idea for YouCanPlayTeam night at DDP and pulling it together.