I’m on my way to Citi Field this morning for some video stuff and some watching-baseball stuff. Our man Catsmeat sent along this excellent story from the Rochester Red Wings game last night that I figured I’d share. It’s like Casey at the Bat, only with a happy ending:

So, at each Rochester Red Wings game one opposing player is designated as the “Taco Bell K-Man.”  If that player strikes out, everyone in the stadium wins a free Taco Bell taco (oddly, however, the scoreboard visuals showed the K-Man in front of a Crunchwrap Supreme, which I consider false advertising but whatever.  Free taco is free taco.)

Although, in my experience, the K-Man is usually a washed-up MLB player, tonight’s K-Man was Cale Iorg, son of former major leaguer Garth Iorg.  Iorg comes up in the third inning for his third at-bat of the game and swings and misses at the first pitch.  I am sitting in the third row behind home plate and yell “THERE’S MY HARD SHELL!  NOW GO GET ME SOME SEASONED BEEF, SON!”  I figure maybe I should go with this and start chanting “SEASONED BEEF!  SEASONED BEEF!” and Iorg rewards my chanting with a swing and miss for strike two.  The folks in my section and nearby are laughing along at this point.  Not much left to put on the basic Taco Bell taco so I then turn to “LETTUCE AND CHEESE, SON! LETTUCE AND CHEESE!” as he first fouls off a pitch and then takes strike three.  The crowd, who has been so supportive of the efforts, raise a cheer for our newly won tacos.

As Iorg walks back to the dugout from the plate, he looks straight at me with a big smile on his face and shakes his head.  Timo Perez, who is on deck, also cracks a smile as he walks to the plate.  I also smile, because I have part of tomorrow’s lunch squared away.

Beautiful. It has all the elements of my favorite stories: people named Garth, seasoned beef, and Timo Perez.

Of course, this is not the first we’ve heard of this taco-related Minor League promotion. Recall that Nelson Figueroa once won tacos for a whole section of fans and acknowledged it, and that Brandon Phillips steadfastly refused to provide tacos to one hungry college student.

Taco Bell rules. I’ll be back with more soon.