If you've ever been to a Vancouver Canadians baseball game you've either noticed that there are two 14-foot A&W root beer glasses above the home run fence, or you've received a coupon for a free burger and a root beer when a home run hit one of them. If you're lucky, it's both.
The cut-outs are part of a season-long promotion called Slug the Mug which has been going on since the start of the 2008 season.
The deal is simple: every time a Canadians player hits a home run and the ball bounces off one of the giant mugs, everybody at the game gets a free Teen Burger and a root beer. As fans leave the stadium they're each handed a coupon which they can redeem for them at any A&W location in B.C.
As a longtime fan who makes it to most games at Nat Bailey Stadium, I can tell you with some certainty that players rarely ever hit the mugs, however they give out the coupons about once a month. I have three attached to my fridge with magnets right now.
I asked the team what the deal is, and they tell me that a player "Slugs the Mug" roughly six to eight times every season, and that "there is some discretion," used when they deem a Slug to have happened.
That discretion mostly lies with now-former owner Jeff Mooney, who also happens to have a high-up position at A&W. If he is at the game and a ball goes near either of the mugs and out of the park, he calls it a Slug!
Now if only somebody could only help confirm the legend of a ball going through the handle of one of the mugs at a game. Email me if you ever saw this happen, especially if you have video evidence of it!
