As I watch the replay of Wednesday afternoon’s BoSox/Orioles game, I am subjected to the NESN crawl. Most of it is informative and interesting, keeping me updated on the scores of other games, but there is one item that keeps passing by that is annoying the hell out of me.
See, the “Red Sox wives and girlfriends” are hosting a “fashion show” on behalf of the Red Sox Foundation and they’d like you to join them. Now, the Red Sox Foundation does wonderful work, but, in my opinion they forget one important thing: the majority of Red Sox fans can barely afford tickets to Fenway, so to ask them to pay $350 per person (if you want to sit with a wife or girlfriend…for a more doable $150 per person you can attend the fashion show but get no special privileges) is borderline offensive to me.
I realize the Foundation’s business is to make money for their charities, but there are ways to do that without excluding the “regular” folks. Every year they host a “Picnic in the Park” event that only the wealthiest of families can afford to bring their children to. It makes the wives and girlfriends, by association, look like elitist snobs – which is ironic since they are in relationships with men who like to portray themselves as being regular guys who can relate to their fans.
I bring all this up because I spent the better part of August collecting donations for the Taylor family. I received emails from people who had very little to give, yet still donated $5 and $10 because they wanted to do SOMETHING. All the while APOLOGIZING for the “small” donation. Imagine apologizing for being generous? This is the impression the Red Sox Foundation gives off…thanks, but your $5 isn’t what we’re looking for. Horse pucky.
One of the lessons I learned from this experience was that people are, generally, as generous as they can be. By making opportunities like meeting the players out of the price range of the average fan, it seems to me that the Red Sox are making a statement:  You’re good enough to go to the games but the rest of the time we’re going to weed out the rabble.
I’m sure I’m being too hard on the Red Sox and their foundation…and the wives and girlfriends as well…but I really believe they should at least make the attempt to share moments with the players (and the wives and girlfriends if that’s your cup of tea) with not just the fans who can write big checks. There are plenty of people who are happy to write a little check, who get shut out of the opportunity and I think that sucks.
I have a question for fans who DO write a $350 check to have lunch with the Red Sox wives and girlfriends: Why? I’m sure Mike Lowell’s wife (as an example) is a lovely woman…but she isn’t a Red Sox player. She isn’t a celebrity. What has she done worthy of shelling out $350 to eat luch with her? There are plenty of other ways you could donate $350 to charity. (Again, no offense to Mrs. Lowell. I use her to make a point. For all I know, she won’t even be at the fashion show.)
Not too long ago, I wrote about how I think the wives and girlfriends deserve privacy because it isn’t their fault they’re married to someone famous. I have to say, if you rent yourself our for $350 a pop as a “celebrity” worth being paid to grace someone with your presence, I start to rethink my position on your privacy.
If you’ve read me for any amount of time, you know that I’m a defender of the players and I respect their private lives and their families. At various charity events, I’ve met the significant others of Red Sox players and they were wonderful (Dawn Timlin and Ashley Papelbon spring immediately to mind. Down to earth, friendly and genuine). So I don’t really mean to slam the wives and girlfriends…but, again, it bothers me that the average fan gets tossed by the side all in the name of charity – and it seems to happen most when the wives are involved. I’d love to see something like a $50 donation request for one of these things, just to give the “regular” fans a fair shot.
Charity is never a bad thing. So to help the cause, here is the link where you can get the information on the September 12th fashion show. I personally think if you’re a Sox fan and want to make a donation in honor of your team, sending a donation to, say, the Jimmy Fund, is a better way to spend that kind of money, but who am I to stand in the way of a fundraiser?
*A disclaimer: If you’ve met me even once, you know that a fashion show is certainly not up my alley. I didn’t write this because I want to go to their fashion show and don’t want to pay $350. I wrote this because I’ve spent a lot of time, over the last month, dealing mostly with “regular” folks who just wanted to do a good thing – and some of those folks actually felt like they weren’t doing enough. The constant barrage of “Join the Red Sox wives and girlfriends…” on NESN hit a nerve while I was thinking of the people who felt like their best wasn’t good enough – when it clearly was. No one should be made to feel like their selfless effort was less than acceptable.
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