I mentioned Thursday that I was invited that night to the Tribe Social Deck, which is 10 seats next to the Home Run Porch with wireless Internet and a TV. The deck seats people active in social media so they can communicate with each other and their social media followers throughout the game. Rob Campbell (who works with Indians PR) invited me via Twitter, and I brought my good friend Molly O'Hare to take part in the social media experience.

I felt pretty VIP on the Social Deck, which is an actual deck. Although I would have preferred a better view of the entire field (right field was mostly obscured by the Social Deck banner), I liked that we had our own space, and the HD TV tuned in to STO caught me up each time I missed a play because I was tweeting or chatting (the cable feed is 10 seconds behind). I also got to meet someone I had been following on Twitter, who also had been following me. It's sort of a surreal, bizarre experience to meet someone in real life after you've been learning about them through 140-character bits and pieces.

The strangest thing about the Social Deck might not have even been related to the Social Deck at all. In the ninth inning, the Indians were down 4-2. I tweeted that the game had looked promising earlier on (because I was predicting [correctly] that they weren't getting this one). A minute or two after I sent the message, a male voice from rows up and behind us loudly said, "It's still a pretty close game." I immediately felt a little self-conscious that he might have been responding to my negative tweet but didn't want to identify himself by replying directly to me on Twitter. 

Other than that somewhat awkward moment, I really enjoyed being on the Social Deck and am looking forward to going to more games on it next year. I would love to see more teams doing stuff like this to get fans involved in conversation. What an easy way to get immediate feedback about your team, your stadium, your service and more.

Oh and about the Indians ... They lost, 4-2, so it wasn't an awful game. And my often used phrase of the night: Trevor Crowe, the new Grady Sizemore. I hope we keep that guy around. (But Assistant Sports Editor Kevin Kleps is telling me that he wouldn't be a starter on another team and just happens to be because the Indians haven't been that great.)


-- Cheryl Sadler
CSadler@News-Herald.com