Day 4, Spring Training. McKechnie Field, Bradenton. Home of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Actually the home of the Pittsburgh Pirates is “Pirate City”, a few miles away in the middle of some orange groves. The McKechnie Field complex doesn’t have much land – just the one field - so while the Pirates play their games at McKechnie Field, they actually train at Pirate City. It’s a nice little stadium. I had a great seat behind home plate in the shade. No lights at McKechnie yet, but lights are planned to be added in the near future. This is the first of four games that I’ll go to here. Online aerial maps came in handy. I had gone to McKechnie before to buy some of my Pirates tickets and saw absolutely no place to park. I looked at an aerial map of the area and saw what appeared to be an empty lot northeast of the stadium and off the major roads on which the park is located. McKechnie is fairly close to downtown Bradenton and it’s well built up around the area. Sure enough, there was a parking lot there. When I walked around the park to the entrance on the main drag, I saw no signs directing you to the lot. You’re really on your own down here. Signage varies from poor to non-existent. It’s going to be a thrill parking at the Blue Jays facility in Dunedin. It’s in an old section of town just a few blocks from the gulf. I see no lots of any kind anywhere nearby on aerial maps. I go there Friday.
I pity small market teams like the Pirates. Whatever good looking young players they have (like Jason Bay, who didn’t play today), they are essentially grooming them for the Yankees, or whatever other team buys them once they hit free agency. They have no chance of winning the Series and little chance of winning more games than they lose. A reasonable goal would be to avoid another 90-plus loss season. Kind of grim for March.
Saw the Phillies again – still in their funky blue uniforms. Another fair amount of Phillie fans in the stands. I sat near quite a few. Ryan Howard played today and doubled in a pair. It would have likely been a home run under normal wind conditions, but the wind was blowing in a gale early in the game. Aided by a bunch of walks, Phils sprint to a 9-0 lead. Biggest blow was a three-run double by Rod Barajas. Phillies haven’t changed much. They gave in all back, including 6 unearned runs on 5 errors. Pirates finally tie it at 9-9 in the bottom of the 9th, but the hapless Pirates, still winless in spring training, lose 11-10 in 10.
The minor league outfielders had a lot a fun with the wind. One dropped ball, one misplayed ball that fell for a triple and several last second stabs at catches. It put excitement back into the routine fly ball.
Wednesday is an off day for me. Next up are the Cleveland Indians in Winter Haven on Thursday.
Dad
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