The beginning of the end...

Its time for the last home stand of the season. We on the grounds crew wait for 2 times during the year, the beginning and the end. The beginning is all anticipation of a new season after a long layoff, and getting back out on the field. The end is a different anticipation. We're ready to close things out after a long 5 month season, and hang out at the homes we haven't really seen much of since April. In the 8 previous seasons that has meant, well, the end of the season. But this year, who knows. We start this week neck and neck with Bowie for the last playoff spot. Can we finish the week in 2nd place? We'll see. We play a so-so Portland team but finish up with the Trenton Thunder who just happen to own the league's best record. The weather is kind of iffy for the first three days of the week, but I hope we can fight through to get to the better weather at the end of the week. That and it would minimize the damage to the field. The field has taken quite a beating the last few weeks, pretty much started before the All-Star break. It looks pretty good from the stands, but up close, Tim and Knute having been trying to work their magic on it. Just not enough time to let grass repair itself. Tim even said, if we had 2 more off days, we'd have been over the hump. But this time of year, we expect it and try to coax it to the end. & more games and we can put it to bed for the year or we get about a 2 week break before the playoffs start. That should be enough time to get things back to a reasonable condition for a couple of playoff games. Until then, though its time to play out the string. I report back in about the middle of the week. Later..

Diggin' time, diggin' time....

Thurs. Aug. 19th. It's Diamond Dig Night. This was event first held last year at MBP. It was an evening of mixed feelings for the grounds crew. On one hand it was very entertaining for us to see a bunch of extremely focused women digging like crazy in the infield, some them probably well-oiled from 2-buck beer on the boardwalk night. And digging with plastic spoons to boot. But no plastic spoons tonight. They made such a mess with them last year that we lobbied hard for metal, citing the reduced cleanup factor and the ability to use them again. It worked. We were happy. So we played the game, gave away another one in the late innings. And then it was time. We did some quick cleanup then prepped the infield for the onslaught. The box with the stand-in diamond had been buried by Tim and Knute the night before after we left for the evening. learning some lessons from last year, we knew that it was buried at least a foot off all the grass edges. The women last year dug right next to the infield grass and we had to rake all the dirt out of the grass afterwards. Tim also hinted that it would be buried not quite as deep, so it would probably be in a low traffic area, so as not to be dug up by any of the players inadvertently. We lined the infield into 4 quadrants and the women filed onto the field and staked out their spots. They would have 3 minutes to dig in the first round. After that the quadrants would be shut down 1 at a time and the women in those quadrants would be eliminated from the competition. When the word was given, the action was fast and furious, all the women tightly focused on the big prize, a 1 carat, $2500.00 diamond pendant. The first segment expired with no winner and the women in quadrant 1 were dismissed. No winner in the 2nd segment either and the group in quadrant 2 were eliminated. The diamond still wasn't found in segment 3, and the women in quadrant 3 were moved over to quadrant 4 near the 3rd base line to dig 1 more time. This time, though, we had a winner, with about 20 seconds to go on the clock. It was buried about 2 feet behind the 3rd base bag, right along the line. Of the 80-100 women on the field, 1 was extremely happy. As they all cleared out, we surveyed the carnage, and were actually pleasantly surprised. Not nearly as bad as last year, and no plastic spoons to clean up. One more in the books and now it was time for a weekend break before heading into the final home stand of the season. So until Mon. Aug. 23rd, we'll see ya. Later..

Close, no cigar.....

Wed. Aug. 18th - Back again, not live this time. Well a 3-1 lead last night dissolved into a 4-3 loss. They had a chance to make up some ground on the teams around them, but it wasn't in thee cards.

Tonight's game however, was a different story. They came out of the box strong, scoring early and often. Tom Milone, who's leading the Eastern League in strikeouts was on his game again, striking out 8, padding his lead nicely. The offense was clicking, too putting up 10 runs, for a 10-1 final. Unfortunately, all the others won too, so no movement. Other than that, not too much to report. Back again on Thursday , should be good, Diamond Dig Night. Stay tuned, later...

Live from MBP, City Island

Tues. Aug. 17th. For the first time this season, I'm writing live from Metro Bank Park,watching the game and writing. So far Its been pretty tame. The only thing of note so far, Frank almost got smoked in the head by a line drive. Didn't miss him by much. A recent call up, Michael Burgess has hit 2 home runs so far, the 2nd a moon shot to right field, that landed well into the old horse corral. As of the bottom of the 8th, its 3-1 Sens. Altoona is winning, Bowie is losing and Akron won their 1st game, is losing in the 2nd. If we win, Bowie lose and Akron would happen to win their 2nd game, that would create a 3 way tie for 2nd place in the Western Division. Getting interesting, isn't its folks. Playoffs, who said anything about playoffs.... oh well we'll sort it out tomorrow. Until then, later...

1st one of the year...

Thurs. Aug. 12th. This will be a short entry, but of note. We had our first rain out of the season. For us, that's pretty remarkable, considering the kind of weather we've had. We haven't had near as much this year as we did last year, but still we've had our share of delays. But up until now we've played every one of them. Until tonight. It rained on and off all morning, then absolutely poured around 3 o'clock. When Knute called he said the outfield was under water. So that's all I got to say about that. Later...

Someone I can identify with.

Tues. Aug. 10 th. After a welcome night off, it was back in for another short 3 game series with the Binghamton Mets. Things seemed very much the same, except that I could tell that there was a little buzz in the place. Turns out we were to see the City Island debut of Orlando Hernandez, 'El Duque'. The Nats had picked him up and sent him to Harrisburg to get back to big league form and probably a September call-up. I didn't spot him until I saw him walk out o the first base line for the National Anthem. He looked like a grandfather compared to all the young faces he was standing with. But someone who was only slightly younger than me, so that's good I guess. He went back into the dugout and disappeared into the clubhouse. I figured we wouldn't see him the rest of the night. But lo and behold, in the 6th inning, it was time for a pitching change and who comes running from the bullpen? Yep, El Duque. And he didn't pitch too badly for a first outing in a while. He didn't look like the El Duque who was the MVP of ALCS in 1999, but that was 10 years ago. He threw a lot of off-speed stuff and was pretty effective for 2 innings, striking out 1 and walking 1. And he got a big round of applause when he came out. Just goes to show you, if you stick around long enough, you 'll see some big names come through. I've sure seen my share. Maybe I'll see if I can snag an autograph. But until then, later...

Movie time, Movie time.....

Sat. Aug. 7th. Its scout camp out night. This has been a bit of a tradition on City Island for the past several seasons. Usually I don't think too much about it, because its just a bunch of Scouts and their leaders camping out in the outfield overnight. My participation in the past has been limited to roping off the infield and watching them file in as we're finishing up our work for the evening. I may have stayed around for 15 or 20 minutes after the work is done, but that's about it. But this year I would be in full participation. As you may or may not remember, I acquired an older VW bus/camper. I haven't really used it for camping other than sleeping in it out in the driveway at my brother-in-law's house in Delaware over the 4th of July. Now this wouldn't really be considering full fledged camping either, but to me, its roughing it. That evening's game was running a bit long and when it did finally end, we still had the ever-present Launch-A-Ball and the kids base race. And, of course, there were a gazillion kids there for the camp out. So until everything finished it was getting late. I finally was able to pull the van right onto the warning track and took a spot right in front of the home dugout. I had brought provisions for the evening (beer) and for the next morning (eggs, sausage, bagels, the grill, etc..) so I plugged in the on board frig. and moved all the breakfast stuff inside from the cooler and checked the beer to see if it was nice and cold(yep!) The scouts were all getting situated and I was getting set up as well, setting up the chairs for : Movie Time, Movie Time! That is Tim's catch-phrase for, well, movie time. They always have a movie for the kids and now that we have the new scoreboard, its pretty convenient. Nobody has to go anywhere, just kick back and relax by your tent and watch. When its over, you climb in you sleeping bag and fall asleep. But the movie is for the scouts. For the rest of us its beer drinkin' time, beer drinkin' time. We all headed back to the back picnic area, out of sight, out of mind and popped some tops and talked and laughed until about 2:30 in the morning. I almost forgot, too. It was alumni night on the grounds crew with former head groundskeeper, Ryan Schmidt in attendance. He was last on the job in 2oo5 so it was great to have him back in the house. Ryno now works at Lebanon Valley College as head groundskeeper for football, baseball, and softball. He slid right back into the job like he never left. After everybody dispersed for the night I stumbled back to the van, I discovered that I forgot to inflate the air mattress,so rather than start up the electric pump and disturb everybody I just climbed in and went to sleep. After several beers, it didn't take long. The next morning, though, sleeping on just the seat cushions took its toll. I was as stiff as a board, groggy and had a ferocious headache. But I managed to get up and wander around for a bit, taking care of a few things to get ready for the next game, which fortunately was at 6 PM instead of 2 PM. That gave me some wiggle room to go home clean up, get to church, and grab a nap before I had t be back. After a bit, I pulled the van back around to the back lower picnic area and broke out the grill and started cooking breakfast for myself and the other guys. I wasn't sure if trying to make breakfast on my portable grill was going to work, but it actually worked out great and everyone had a great start to their day. Knute, who rarely eats breakfast, said that this breakfast actually helped him make it through the day and Tim said his was the best bagel sandwich he ever had. So we all survived another scout camp out, I learned a few things about camping, and the Sens won the evening game. All's well that ends well. Until next time, later...