Spring Training, Day Seven

Day 7, Spring Training. Ed Smith Stadium, Sarasota. Game 2 of 4 to see the Cincinnati Reds. There’s no substitute for knowing what you’re doing. Now that I knew where the entrance to the overflow lot was, I mapped out a way to get there from the other direction, so I had little trouble getting to the lot and parking. There is one potentially troublesome left hand turn, but if it’s backed up, I can just go past it a throw a U-turn, Florida’s most popular traffic maneuver.

According to the program, “The Ed” as the announcer calls the stadium, was built for the Chicago White Sox. But after training in Sarasota for 38 years, the White Sox up and left for the Cactus League in Tucson in 1997. The Blue Jays were the most likely successor, as they were looking to leave Dunedin. After seeing shitty Knology Park, that’s understandable. But the City of Dunedin demanded the Jays buy out the remaining two years on their lease.

The Jays balked, so instead the Reds moved to Sarasota from Plant City. The Plant City facility must be a real pigsty since the Jays could have moved there after their lease ran out. So for want of a few bucks, the Jays are stuck up at Knology. Serves the cheap bastards right. The Jays were also the Reds’ opponent today, so I saw them for the second game in a row.

“The Ed” has not improved since my last visit. The seats are worn, the paint is chipping off the armrests and the hardware holding the seats down is all rusted. It’s better than Knology, but that damns it with faint praise. The field is in good shape and fairly spacious at 340’ down the lines, 375’ in the power alleys and 400’ to dead center. The clubhouse is not connected to the dugout, since when the Reds’ regulars are taken out the game, they have to tote their gear and walk down the right field line and out the park.

My seat was almost the same a last time – four rows up from the field down the first base line a little past the infield. Parks with little shade are now worse with daylight savings time. The games essentially are starting an hour earlier so it takes lengthening shadows an hour longer to arrive. But today there was a mix of sun and clouds with a mild breeze, so it was pleasant throughout the game.

They played the game with three umpires. That happened at the Yankees game too. What’s the deal with that? Did one of them get the shits right before the game? They also played with the DH. At the two other NL home games I attended, the pitchers batted. Both of those games were against NL opponents, so it looks like when the visiting team is AL, they use the DH

Reds win 3-0 in a fast two hours, seven minutes. Even though most of the pitchers were minor leaguers, Jays manage only two hits and the Reds seven, with the sole extra base hit an RBI double by Reds’ sub Norris Hopper. The “Big Skirt” and Vernon Wells didn’t play for the Jays today. Griffey is still a no-show.

Tomorrow, it’s up to St. Petersburg to see the Devil Rays.

Dad

Spring Training, Day Six

Day 6, Spring Training. Knology Park, Dunedin. Home of the Toronto Blue Jays. The recommended route to the stadium on the Jays’ web page put you right past the Phillies’ stadium in Clearwater. I checked the schedule and since the Phils were home today as well, I plotted my own course since I didn’t want to get caught in traffic for two stadiums. I got there early since I knew parking was going to be a problem. I was able to park in a small lot for the VFW lodge across the street.

Knology Park is a real dump. It is an old, weather-beaten, ugly concrete stadium. The plastic seats are all faded from the sun and heads of the metal bolts holding the armrests are all rusted. There is a slight overhang at the top of the stands that provides shade only for the upper rows in the mid-day sun. There is the carcass of one old abandoned concrete light tower down the left field line standing forlornly beside its metal replacement. I sat at a picnic table in the concession area before the game to avoid being in the sun any longer than necessary. Looking up at the concrete overhangs, I saw lots of wasp nests, although I saw no wasps.

I have never seen stubbier foul poles. They were only about 15 feet high. Fortunately, there were no long fly balls hit down the lines, because it would be anybody’s guess whether the ball was fair or foul. A high school team would be ashamed to play here. The best thing you could hear about this place are three little words – scheduled for demolition. All this added up to the smallest attendance at any of the games I’ve been to so far – a measly 3162. And I think that was generous. Although the stadium is small, there were oceans of empty seats in the third base sun field.

My seat was three rows behind the Jays’ dugout, but all things considered, at $18 for my ticket, this was by far the worst value. I kept my eye on seats in the shade at the top of the stands on the third base side and after three innings, I went up there. I’m glad I went when I did, because lots of other folks wandered up there as time went on. It was still a good view from there, since it was only about 20 rows up about halfway between home plate and third base. By the middle of the 7^th inning, the seats a few rows up behind home plate found the shade, so I moved down there.

The Blue Jays also have the crappiest program. There was only one little article about the team and nothing about the history of the park or baseball in the area. The scorecard page was filled with ads so that there wasn’t enough room to write in all the replacement players. At least they charged a buck less ($4) than the programs elsewhere.

I guess a lot of crazy Canuks are down here, because more people sang the Canadian anthem than the American anthem. Maybe Canadians just like to sing more, eh?

Blue Jays power to an early 6-1 lead with homers by Vernon Wells, Lance Overbay and Alex Rios. As is often the case with these spring training games, things turned around once the minor leaguers came in. The Jays put Beau Kemp in to pitch the 6^th, but it was an inning too soon since the Astros kept their starters in and torched Beau for 5 runs. Astros go on to win 9-7, scoring all but one of their runs against the weak relievers.

Monday, it’s back to Sarasota to see the Reds again.

Dad

Spring Training, Day Five

Day 5, Spring Training. Chain of Lakes Park, Winter Haven. Home of the Cleveland Indians. A somewhat more pleasant place to visit compared to the “mistake on the lake” in northern Ohio. I don’t know what the “Chain of Lakes” is all about. I suppose there may be some lakes in the area, but there are none within eyeshot of the park. It’s a serviceable ballpark. The outfield is huge – 340’ down the lines, 380’ in the power alleys and 420’ to deep center. Three outfielders kind of look lost in all that acreage.

I sprang for a more expensive lower box ($13) rather than an upper box ($11) seat. Unfortunately, the upper box seats are all under cover in the shade while my lower box seat was in the full sun when I got there. However, past the first few rows in the upper box, there could be some obstructed view issues due to the support poles. By the third inning though, the sun cleared the top of the stands and I was in the shade. My seat was five rows up from the field just past the 3^rd base bag.

Bob Feller, hall of fame pitcher for the Indians was on hand signing autographs – if you were willing to pay him whatever was the going rate. I walked over to where he was doing the signing and saw money changing hands at the signing table.

I planned none of the visiting teams, so it’s by chance that I saw the Phillies for the third straight game. Checking my schedule, I see the Phils at total of seven times, including one at their home in Clearwater. Since the Indians wore dark blue, the Phillies were clad in their usual red. Now they looked recognizable to me. There were a lot of Phillie fans here too. They must travel well or there are more retired Philadelphians in the area than I realized.

In the second inning, Indian reserve first baseman Mike Aubrey lashed a foul ball into the Phillie dugout and broke some plumbing fixture. Water erupted like a geyser from the dugout and arched onto the field. It was quite spectacular. It took them a while to find the right valve to turn it off.

Indian all-star catcher Victor Martinez staked the Indians to a lead with a 3-run homer in the first. Ryan Howard, batting from the right side against lefty C.C. Sabathia, crushed a solo shot well over the wall between the 380’ and 420’ signs to start the Phillie comeback in the 2^nd inning. Phils eventually take a 6-5 lead into the 9^th, but Jim Ed Warden takes the 7-6 loss and the blown save when Tribe outfielder Shin-Soo Choo hits a walk-off 2-run single off him in the bottom of the 9^th. Old Jim Ed can pack his bags and head back to the minors. Choo is a local fan favorite. The chant of “Choooooooo” goes up when he takes his turn at bat.

It took about an hour and a half to get up to Winter Haven. I took the Interstate there, but took the back roads through scrubby, rural Polk County on the way home. There’s not much in this state between the two coasts.

Tomorrow, I venture up to Dunedin to see the Blue Jays.

Dad

Spring Training, Day Four

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 9^th, 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

Spring Training, Day Three

Day 3, Spring Training. Ed Smith Stadium, Sarasota. Home of the Cincinnati Reds. The crappiest stadium I’ve been in so far. Very little shade available – only in the top 5 or so rows on the third base side and about 10 rows on the first base side, although the shadows lengthened on the first base side as the game went on. If I were Ed Smith, I’d get them to name the damn place after someone else. I understand that a stadium replacement is planned, and the sooner the better. Seat was in the second row down the first base line somewhat past the edge of the infield/outfield grass. I bought tickets to three other Reds games since it was so close to home so I guess I had better get used to it. At least one of them is a night game. Parking was OK, although the route they sent me to the overflow lot was somewhat convoluted. I think they like convoluted routes in Florida. The weather was a little cool – 62 at game time, so sitting in the sun the whole day wasn’t too bad.

Griffey, Jr. is hurt – again. Seems like he broke his hand wrestling with his kids. Or so he says. He would lose big bucks if he was engaging in some activity prohibited by his contract. But breaking your hand wrestling with kids? How big are his kids? 6’8”, 270#?

The Reds wore, well, red. That’s the Phillies’ color – or at least it used to be. They used to wear grey uniforms on the road, but they wore these funky blue uniforms today. The Phillies looked strange in blue. Ryan Howard didn’t play for the Phils. I get to see the Phillies at least three times more, so I hope to see him at another game. Either there were a lot of Phillies’ fans at the game or these people cheer for everything.

Reds rally from 5 down to win 9-8. Both sides combine for 27 hits. The Reds (and the goddamn Yankees) are undefeated so far in Grapefruit League play. Homers by Brandon Phillips and sub Jerry Gil for the Reds and backup catcher Carlos Ruiz for the Phillies. Although he started the game, I guess he’s the backup because I never heard of him before. Suicide squeeze brings home the winning run in the bottom of the 8^th.

Tomorrow, it’s on to Bradenton to see the Pirates.

Dad

Spring Training, Day Two

Day 2, Spring Training. City of Palms Park, Fort Myers. Home of the beloved Boston Red Sox. Traffic and parking around the facility is nightmarish. Wound up parking on some guy’s lawn for $7 a few blocks from the park. I’ve got a feeling a lot of the spring training sites are going to be like this. There is NO parking for the Pirates’ McKechnie Field in Bradenton (where I go Tuesday). I have no clue where I’ll park there.

Nice facility. As the name implies there are a ring of palm trees just over the outfield wall from foul pole to foul pole. No green monster, though. The outfield wall is only about 8 feet high all the way around. They had a local theatre group that is currently doing “Damn Yankees” sing the National anthem. Nice touch.

Good news was that my seat was in the first row. Bad news was that it was the last seat all the way down the left field line. The Sox games went on sale real early and I missed it. My first few choices for games were already sold out, so I guess I was lucky to get a ticket at all. This game might not have been as popular since it was a split squad game, where you risk seeing few of the stars. But the other split squad game is against – of all teams – Boston College later tonight. Management is not about to let some hot shot college pitcher throw at the starters, so all of the big names started in the day game against the Blow Jays. There was a mix of clouds and sun, so it wasn’t too bad sitting out in the open. The covered stands end about at the end of the infield. Unlike the Yankees fans yesterday, the Red Sox fans hung around for most of the game. I didn’t see a lot of empty seats until the 9^th inning, when I moved down behind home plate. Very laid back atmosphere. Pitchers ran wind sprints around the edge of the warning track during the game.

From my vantage point in left field, I got to keep an eye on Manny. Manny never broke a sweat. In the top of the 3^rd, he slept-walked a single into a double. When he walked in the bottom of the 3^rd, they inserted a pinch runner for him. Since he had no intention of running in the outfield, I’m sure he wasn’t about to run the bases either. I guess it doesn’t make sense for Manny to pull his hammy in March. He can wait for April for that.

Sox lose 9-6 in 10. Reserve catcher Alberto Castillo gives the Sox the lead with a 3-run dinger in the 2^nd, but Bosox non-roster spring training invitee Runelvys Hernandez gets lit for 6 runs in the 3^rd. I doubt he makes the roster. Sox tie it in the 9^th when minor leaguer Bryan Pritz hits a 2-run homer. But some clown named Sturge, whose name wasn’t even in the program gives up three to the Jays in the top of the 10^th. I don’t think he was warmed up properly. I think the bullpen was caught by surprise when the Sox tied it and didn’t have anybody warming up. The bullpen is hidden by the outfield wall, so I don’t know for sure, but he was late getting to the mound to start the 10^th.

On Monday, I see the Reds in Sarasota, so I get an easy commute for a change.

Dad

Spring Training, Day One

Day 1, Spring Training. Legends Field, Tampa. Home of the New York Fucking Yankees. Had to jump in the shower as soon as I got home because my flesh was crawling after being in close proximity to so many Yankee fans.

Yanks trotted out a few of their legends as “guest instructors”, including Reggie Jackson and Yogi Berra. Reggie was animated; Yogi looked dead. Maybe he was. The Yankees had 101 guys on the roster. 101! 8 coaches, 14 instructors, 9 guest instructors, 3 support staff, 2 equipment staff, 30 pitchers, 9 catchers, 9 outfielders, 16 infielders plus Joe Torre. Makes it fun trying to figure out who is who when two guys are wearing # 43, two wearing # 58, etc. I guess they just didn’t want to go to triple digits on the uniforms. The dugout was so packed that about 15-20 of the wannabees had to stand on the top step of the dugout until the regulars left the game and headed for the showers. I don’t see how Torre can possibly play them all.

Highlight of the game was when Carlos Silva plunked AFraud in the 1^st inning. Alas, it just grazed him. Wouldn’t it have been great for ARod to get a season-ending (maybe even career-ending!) broken wrist in the first inning of the first spring training game? ARod already looked like he was in post-season form. He made a crappy throw to second on a ground ball so the Yanks couldn’t turn a double play in the 3^rd, following an ugly strikeout in the 2^nd. He did manage a single to left in the 4^th, but got thrown out at second to end the inning stupidly trying to stretch it into a double. I’m sure that really pissed off Matsui, because all of the other Yankee regulars were pulled after end of the 4^th, but Torre sent Matsui back into the field to play the 5^th, since he was now first up in the bottom of the 5^th. Matsui figured he was done for the day, so somebody must have had to pull his ass out of the locker room since he was real late taking the field for the top of the 5^th. By the way, Matsui made a nice diving catch in left, but what was he thinking? A diving catch in a spring training game? Steinbrenner probably pissed his pants when he saw that.

Speaking of Steinbrenner, I saw him by his luxury box. My seat wasn’t bad – down the third base line a little past the bag. But when the Yankee “faithful” vacated the place in droves after the regulars were pulled, I moved over to behind home plate a little up the first base line. I saw everybody looking behind me, so I turned around and Steinbrenner had come out of his luxury box to get a breath of air between innings. (It doesn’t look like the luxury boxes are air conditioned since all the doors and windows were all wide open. It was a little hot – low 80s – but a nice breeze if you were outside.) I figured if this seat was good enough for The Boss, it was good enough for me. I was in the full sun for about an hour until it came over the top of the stands (which by the way have a faux Yankee Stadium façade). I don’t think I’ll be able to take the full sun on a hot day for 9 innings.

I didn’t recognize a soul on the field on either team by the 7^th inning. I looked at the program trying to identify folks. Who is this #74? What position is he playing? Left Tackle? By the way, the Yanks beat the listless Twinks 6-1. Damon homers to open the game and Giambi adds a two run shot in the 2^nd, by which time the Yanks were up 5-0. Justin Morneau of the Twinkies edged Jeter for the AL MVP last year, so Morneau drew a smattering of boos when he made his first trip to the plate. Gotta love those Yankee fans. The most popular T-Shirt in the place was “Got Rings”? It showed the Yankees’ 26 World Championships beside the few that the Red Sox won with a caption that it won’t take 86 years for them to win their next one. Good to see that they’re still smarting from the ALCS collapse from a couple of years ago.

Well, tomorrow I get to see the Bahston Red Sox in the City of Palms Park in Fort Myers. I’ll feel safer wearing my Red Sox hat to that one.

Dad