Almost done...

So, I was supposed to work Monday and Tuesday nights. I was also playing in a golf tournament on Monday afternoon. But with a mid round rain delay at the tournament and a necessary trip back the office, I never made to the Island Monday night. Tuesday was another bout with rain before the game. but we got the game started before 8:00 and it was a relatively fast game, so it wasn't a real late exit. Wednesday's game was a day game, couldn't make that one, so I was done for the week. And with my son's wedding on Saturday and vacation at the shore to follow, I won't be back to the ball yard until August 6th. So until then, later.

Odds and ends (mostly odd)

The rest of the home stand for me would consist of Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Tuesday. Since I'm writing this post after the fact, I'll try and pick the most memorable moments. There are 2 that come to mind. With all the impending nuptials, (weddings, dude..) those events were a lot of the conversation in the dugout. In fact, we all got into the act, as Izzy decided he was going to order his wedding invitations online from the dugout laptop. The website was walking him through, and he was soliciting advice from the group as he went along. That has probably been one of the stranger goings-on in the dugout in recent memory. I'm not sure if it was the same night, but the Saturday night game stands out in my mind and probably will for sometime. It started on time, no rain delays and was a regulation 9 inning game. However, it took 4 and a half hours to play. It was dominated by the Sens in the early innings, but Altoona battled back. Going to the 9th, the Sens had, what we thought was a comfortable 14-8 lead. The game was running a little long at that point, not too terribly though. But the Curve proceeded to post up 10 runs, giving them an 18-14 lead. The way they got them was the main point of contention. First of all, to be fair, our pitchers couldn't get anyone out. Altoona pretty much hit everything they threw. But with 1 man on an Altoona batter hit a ball to right field. Now everyone in the dugout clearly saw it hit the yellow padding at the top of the wall. Ground rules say it must clear the pads to be a home run. And with the metal fencing above that, a home will make a loud clank and carom off in a weird direction. This ball came straight back, with no sound, to the right fielder. But the ump called it a home run. OK, not too much damage yet. But.... after a pitching change, the bases were loaded again. The next Altoona hitter launched one down the left field line and it was foul by about 10 feet. But the home plate umpire signaled a home run. The ballpark had been pretty quiet what with beating the Sens had been taking up 'til then. The place just exploded at that point. People were screaming for this umpires hide. Sens manager Randy Knorr stormed out of the dugout and laid into the umpire. Needless to say, he was tossed in short order. After he departed the verbal storm from all corners was still continuing. Before another pitch was thrown, Sens pitcher Aaron Thompson was ejected. He hopped the dugout fence and went straight for the umpire. Fortunately, Sens pitching coach, Randy Tomlin cut him off before he could make contact. He finally got him off the field, when apparently some other words were exchanged, and Tomlin went after the umpire, getting right up in his face. I don't think I've ever seen him do that before. they separated before he could get tossed, too. All the while, in our space we had kept up the verbal assault on the umpire. At that point, the 1st base umpire started our way, and not wanting to be next on he ejection list, reeled our tongues back in. However, as the game resumed, we took every opportunity to needle the home plate umpire when appropriate. Altoona pushed across 3 more runs to make it 18-14, completing the comeback. The Sens mounted a small comeback of the own in the bottom half, but could only plate 1 run, to make it an 18-15 final. At 11:33 pm. 4 hours and 33 minutes later. easily the longest 9 inning game I've ever attended. With the typical Saturday night post game festivities, our exit time was around 1AM, far later than I had planned. But since I did not have to work Sunday's game, it kind of worked out OK. I had 2 rounds of golf in he next 2 days, so I was looking forward to that. So until the next trip in, later.

Hey Stars. Can you come out to play?

Wednesday July 14th. The return of the All Star Game to City Island. 22 years after the last one. A long time coming. And as I awoke that morning, it was raining. Can't say that I was surprised. It wasn't going to be a smooth road to game time. I was going to be at the island by 8:30 am for setup work. But by the way it was coming down, I thought I'd wait awhile. At about 9 I decided to head downtown. Of course it was still raining, although more lightly than it had been, when I arrived. When I got in, I donned my mud clothes. All the years on the grounds crew have made me Mr. Practical. I brought along several changes of clothes, knowing that I would be a muddy, sweaty mess by game time. We had decided to wear something special for this game, to show off a little bit. We would all be wearing a black and red, Dri-Fit, all-star game logo-ed polo, khaki shorts and red hats. The dress for most games is the same in that we wear the same Carolina blue t-shirts and that's about it. But for tonight we would look like pros. No guarantee on acting like it, though. I headed for the dugout to hang out with everyone else to watch the radar screen and watch it rain. When I got there, Jordan, Doug, Asheleigh, and Knute were there, staring at the laptop. The word was that, hopefully, by 11ish we could get things started. All the boys were supposed to be in tonight, arriving at various times. The rain did finally slow down by 11, so we dumped the water off the tarp and got ready to roll. The first event was to be the semi-finals of the high school home run derby. high School kids from the area competed through the season to compete today. It was to start at 1 pm. we couldn't get things ready quite that fast, so it was pushed to 1:30. It did finally get started at 1:30 and went off smoothly. So far, so good. The preliminary round for the big boys started at 2:30. Chris Marrero represented the Senators and made a fine showing, hitting 8 homers, the last of which was a moon shot. his strongest competition would be Hector Gimenez of the Altoona Curve. The high school derby wound up after the big guys were done with a young gentleman from Lower Dauphin High School taking the honors. The Eastern League final round was a tight battle between Marrero and Gimenez duking it out with Gimenez coming on top with a couple of monster shots, the last one landing on the Island drive behind the team office building. and then it was onto the game. The rest of the crew had shown by then with all the guys dressed in their finest. We had more than a few compliments about how good we looked. one of the highlights of the pre-game festivities was the appearance of NASCAR driver Kevin Harvick. His Nationwide Series car is sponsored by Ollie's who just happen to be owned by 1 of our minority owners, Mark Butler.He got to take the car they had brought out around the warning to the loud cheers of the more than capacity crowd. He asked Tim beforehand if he could do some donuts on the field. Tim replied something to the effect of 'Sure, but it might be hard to drive your next race with 2 broken legs" or something like that. As a plus, though, Frank got to autograph the front of the infield machine. Its the first time in about 12 years that its value went into the plus column. Once the game got under way things settled down nicely, with Tom Milone of the Sens getting the start. It went back and forth for a while with each team scoring a couple of times, but the West blew it open in the 7th with Chase D'Arnaud striking the big blow with the grand salami. The next batter Andy Dirks of erie added a solo shot and the put the West in front to stay, the final 10-3. Ther was a huge post-game fireworks show, which I actually watched part of for a change. (My non-love for fireworks are well documented in earlier posts) Since Thursday was back to regular games, we got things cleaned up, but with the size of the crew, it was done in record time. Be nice if it was like that every night. So, 7 more game to this home stand and then a break. So until next time, later

MBP, Center stage

OK, its run-up time for the Eastern League All-Star Game. If you are reading this, you're probably a moderate to hard-core fan off the Sens. And you;ll know that there hasn't been an All-Star game her since 1988, the 2nd season of baseball on City Island. So is it a big deal? In the words of Sarah Palin, "You Betcha!" It was an all-hands call to get the place spic and span for all the big shots and just regular old fans. From all reports, it should be a full house for the game. The weather is looking kind of iffy, so we'll be keeping a keen eye on that. We haven't had a rain out all year, yet so I don't see a little rain keeping this game from going ahead, unless its a monsoon at game time. I've been going in and doing a lot of extra work, getting the field in shape, putting it back to near opening day shape. Of course, it never looks as good as opening day, and as I've said before, its all downhill from there. But we do our best, with camouflage techniques and just general sprucing up. And I must say, when I left on Sunday, it looked pretty darn good. All that was left was general cleaning up and for Tim to paint the logo behind home plate. That was to take place on Monday evening with lots of paint and string and a fair amount of beer. However, a late afternoon rain shower it was canceled. Looks like a Tuesday day job, so I won't be there to help out. Most of the other finish work needed to be done by noon Tuesday and the weather didn't look all that great either. So my next trip will be in on Wednesday morning. I've taken the day off from work, so I can have the full experience. So, until then, later.

Catching up...

OK, I'll admit it, I haven't been as diligent in updating these posts in a timely manner as I should. As I write this, its June 17th. My last post was written regarding the game of May 9th. Has a lot of stuff happened in the 17 games and a month or so since then? Yes, most definitely. Can I remember any of it? Well yes and no. I' m going to try and cover some of the highlights, but unfortunately, it will not be all inclusive. Wait, did I say June 17th? well that was when I started this post. I've finally gotten back to it on July 6th, so several more weeks and baseball games have passed. Oh wait, did I say July 6th? Actually I mean July 23rd. In case you haven't picked up on it yet, I been starting to write an entry and keep getting sidetracked a few sentences in every time. Either I'm at work, and you know how that tends to get in the way, or its late at night after a game and I fall asleep before I get a few sentences down. There's too much going on this summer with my son getting married and all the activity at the ballpark, starting with the Strasburg show and continuing with all the changes to our routine, the stinking hot weather, our fair share of rain and all the extra work leading up to the All-Star game. The highlights? I try to list them here as best as I can remember them. First of all in the personnel department: Frank finally made it back. It was great to finally get him back in the fold. His personality adds so much more to whole experience for me and I'm sure, the other guys, too. Sure we try to have fun every night, and we do for the most part. But, in my eyes, its that much more fun when he's around, with the lively banter and such. As for the others, like I mentioned before, my son Alan is getting married, tomorrow, as I write this. That's a whole 'nuther post right there. But wait, there's more! Izzy bought a house and is getting married at the end of September. And if that weren't enough, Knute and Asheleigh bought a house and are also getting married in October. How's that for an event list? So, houses were bought and rings were bought and plans are being made. I'm probably going to need to sleep for the entire off-season. So I think I'll stop here, regroup and collect my thoughts and we'll talk about the All-Star game and other stuff next time around. Until then, later.

Movin' Out...

When the season started, I had written about all of the changes that had taken place. One of the things that was easy to get used to was our new in-game home. We very much enjoyed the spacious confines of the dugout box on the 3rd base side. It was way more room than we had ever had in years past, with a great view of the field and easy access for in-game activities and pre and post game work. I could never quite shake the feeling that it wouldn't last, though. And those suspicions were to become reality today. We were informed that "our" area was to be transformed into another dugout suite to be sold on game nights. So, Sunday, the last day of a a 10 game home stand was to be moving day. Now, I must confess, I wasn't there. I hadn't missed a game so far this year, so I was granted a day off. And did I ever need it. I was exhausted. So all of the information contained herein is 2nd hand. So when I returned for the next home stand, I would have to get used to new digs, ( the former first base side media well) a new storage area, (the former keg storage area behind the home dugout), and a whole new way of doing things. Oh well, i knew it was going to be a year of change, so I guess we'll all have to get used to it. We won't have nearly as much room, but that should cut down on all the excess traffic, a good thing. But not nearly as much storage space and access to tools and such will be in a more roundabout way, not so good. But we've dealt with it all these years, so I guess we'll deal with it some more. I 'll report back during the next home stand and let you know how its going. Until then, later.

Draggin' the Line..

With my butt. Its Friday May 7th. Game # 8 of the home stand and I'm fading fast. I did something today that I've never done before. I stopped at the Turkey Hill before heading for City Island and bought a 5-Hour Energy drink. Never thought I'd have to resort to this, but I'm afraid its the only way I'm going to make it through the evening. Too many long, long days. I've had a fairly busy week at along with all the baseball and so I'm just about out of gas. As I arrived on the Island, i remember its Friday, so that means fireworks, which lengthens the night even more. I know most of the fans love the fireworks, but I've seen so many shows over the past 15 seasons that I can really take them or leave them. I don't really have time to stand around and watch them, because I'm trying to get my post-game work finished and get outta town at a reasonable hour. We haven't really had the issues with the debris on the field as much as we used to, so my absolute hatred for the fireworks shows has mostly faded. it actually looked to be a decent evening for baseball tonight, so that improved my outlook greatly. our opponent for this weekend series would be the Richmond Flying Squirrels, the newest entry in the Eastern League. The Squirrels are affiliated with the San Francisco Giants, kind of an odd arrangement. The Giants had double A affiliates in the Texas league for years, but decided to move into Norwich, Ct a few years ago when that affiliate was open. The fans there never really warmed to them, surprise, surprise. So when their lease was not renewed, nobody was shocked. They moved south to Richmond , VA, another odd situation. The Atlanta Braves had their Triple-A team there for quite a few years, but pulled out for a closer, newer facility in Georgia. That left Richmond with a big big empty stadium. So the Giants moved their affiliate there, still far far away from California, with no regional fan interest. The stadium itself is cavernous by Eastern League standards holding 10000 plus. But by all accounts, they're doing pretty well, packing in the fans, who must've been a little hungry for baseball, after having it all those years, and then all of a sudden, nothing. Tonight, though the Sens were coming off a tasty little 6-3 win the night before, finally getting the upper hand on Bowie. They started off strong against the Squirrels,jumping out to a quick2-0 lead in the first, only to see the Richmond put up 3 in the 2nd. Both teams added a run over the next 2 innings, with the Squirrels on top 4-3 after 6. They added 1 more in the 7th to make it 5-3, and that's the way it ended up. After all the post-game hoopla, we got our work done, and I headed out, seriously dragging butt. I hoped to make it home without falling asleep. We still have 2 more games to go. Can I make it 10 for 10? We'll see I guess. Until then, later.