Results tagged ‘ Rays ’
6/21/12 Rays at Nationals: Nationals Park
Ah. Another day, another game at Nationals Park. This time with extra 5 Hour Energy:
There were some people giving out free samples, so I took a couple if for nothing more than the hydration they gave me on a scorching day.
Once I got inside the gates, I first went over to right field to try to get a ball from the pitchers pictured:
Nothing. Every one of the pitchers ignored my request for a ball.
Then I moved over to the left field seats, where this was my view:
Nothing.
I got Drew Storen to toss me my first ball right over the visitors’ bullpen. The ball had bounced off the outside of the bullpen, so check out the marks on it:
After that, I went over to the Red Seats, where this was my view:
You may notice that the pitcher in the middle of the three is Drew Storen. While he was there, I didn’t want to ask any of the pitchers for balls, figuring he would recognize me. When he left, however, I got Craig Stammen to toss me a ball:
(Stammen is the guy to the right of my glove.) After that, a person came up to me and asked, “Hey, what’s your name?” When I responded, he said, “Do you write a blog on Mlblogs?” The mystery person was Steve Miller, a guy who also writes a Marlins-themed Mlblog entitled, Fish Fry. I had actually commented on it a couple of times, and he has a picture of himself on the blog, but for whatever reason, I didn’t recognize him until he introduced himself. This is just one example that if you are at the ballpark and spot myself or another ballhawk you recognize, introduce yourself. We don’t ignore you on purpose. It’s just that with all the interactions/faces that we come across during an average game, it can be hard to keep track of. I know that I personally will never “shoo” anyone away who introduces themselves, and the worst that will happen with most other ballhawks is they’ll ask you if you can talk after batting practice instead. Anyway, I stupidly didn’t get a picture with Steve.
Right after Steve introduced himself, I said, “Man, I wish I could get a hit ball instead of a toss-up, so I can give it away to one of these kids.” pointing to the kids in the first row.
Well, I did get a hit ball to come to me. A Nationals righty hit a high fly ball that I could tell was going to hit the warning track. I aligned myself with the ball and was ready to catch the ball as it bounced over the wall and right right towards my glove. Perfect, right? Well the ball hit off the warning track with such spin that once the ball bounced into my glove, it bounced right out of my glove. It then went into the gap between the two walls I the Red Seats. It was extremely frustrating, but they’ll be more on this ball in a bit.
Okay, now it’s time to make some New York ballhawks jealous. This was the view to my right:
I caught my third ball of the game half way between the kid in the red and the man in the white in the row behind them. I was taking a picture, and just as I took the picture and was putting my phone in my pocket, Adam LaRoche hit a ball to my right. I was still putting it in my pocket, and had to make a back handed catch, leaning over a row of seats. I then gave that ball to the kid in the red hat in the next picture:
Here is the view to my left:
See the man in a blue shirt in the row emanating from the lower left corner of the picture? I got two hit balls right where he is standing in the picture. The first was a ball Roger Bernadina hit that landed in that spot. I then picked it up after running over there from where I took that last picture. I was the heading back to the spot where I took the picture from when Rick Ankiel hit a ball to the same exact spot. I moved back over to the spot and made the catch for which I got some applause.
Sensing that everyone in the section had just seen me get two balls, I asked, “Who hasn’t gotten a ball yet?” Four people raised their hands zero of which were kids with gloves. I didn’t want to be a jerk and crush people’s hopes that I had just gotten up, so I gave the ball away to a girl in the front row.
Soon after this, I was still thinking about if the ball I had dropped into the gap was still there. I figured it was, so I VERY quickly and discreetly went to the center field gap (In a different shirt, hat, and sunglasses, just in case.), and I glove tricked the ball, having learned from my previous- failed- attempt the day prior. After I reeled it up without anyone seeing me, I got out of there as fast as I could and went to left field.
In left field, Fernando Rodney tossed me a ball left handed. Naturally, the ball was off target. I then grabbed the ball and l gave it away to a girl who had been jokingly complaining that her brother had gotten a ball while she hadn’t. I should mention that this ball came after I missed two other toss-ups. One was a similar one from Rodney that I missed all together. The other was from another Rays player I never identified. Both sailed over my head, where I never got them.
The Rays had a VERY abbreviated batting practice. After getting 6 balls in Nationals B.P., I was eyeing double digits. The Rays actually only had one group of hitters, the pitchers. I thought the infielders were dead until I saw them take the field for the game.
Anyway, after batting practice ended, I got Jeremy Hellickson to toss me a ball as he entered the Rays dugout.
For those of you wondering why there is a lack of pictures in the latter part of this entry, my phone, on which I take pictures, was dying, so I didn’t want to use it that much. Finally, when it was essentially dead, I took my last picture of the day, which was my view for the rest of the game:
I would have gone back and forth from the two sides of the outfield, but there were really only righties in the two line-ups that could homer (with the exception of Bryce Harper). I did go over to right field once or twice, but it wasn’t until the later innings I did so. On one of those trips, the usher I know asked me if I could give him two baseballs, so I did. If you are keeping track, that was now SIX of the eight balls I had snagged that I had given away. I will no longer field any “ballhawks are greedy” comments.
After the top of the inning, the Rays bullpen catcher, Scott Cursi, would warm up Desmond Jennings. EVERY inning, I went down to try and get the ball, and every inning ended the same way, me walking back up the stairs in dejection.
The Nationals won the game on the wings of Gio Gonzalez as he bested the Rays’ starter, Matt Moore. The final score was 5-2.
After the game, I went down to see if I could get the lineup card from Stan Boroski, the Rays’ bullpen coach. Not even a reaction when I asked him.
STATS:
• 8 Balls at this Game (2 pictured because I gave 6 away)
numbers 277-284 for my “career”:
• 62 Balls in 13 Games= 4.77 Balls Per Game
• 22 straight Games with at least 1 Ball
• 2 straight Games with at least 2 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 3 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 4 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 5 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 6 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 7 Balls
• 2 straight Games with at least 8 Balls
• 8 Balls x 29,551 Fans= 236,408 Competition Factor
• 75 Balls at Nationals Park in 15 Games= 5 Balls Per Game
• 8 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 1 Ball
• 8 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 2 Balls
• 5 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 3 Balls
• 2 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 4 Balls
• 2 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 5 Balls
• 2 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 6 Balls
• 2 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 7 Balls
• 2 straight Games at Nationals Park with at least 8 Balls
• Time at Game 4:09-10:27= 6 Hours 18 Minutes
6/20/12 Rays at Nationals: Nationals Park
It was my first game at Nationals Park this year, and look who I ran into at the Center Field Gate:
That would be fellow ballhawk, Rick Gold; and for the record, I was wearing the University of Miami shirt because I found out Rick was going to this game and he is an alumnus. It was a pretty hot day, so we tried to stay in the shade until security asked whose bags were sitting alone at the gate and we had to stand with them until the gates opened.
When the gates opened, Rick went to the Red Seats in center field and I went to the seats in straight-away left field. Just as I got there, a coach was picking up a ball right at the wall, so I asked him point blank, “Coach, could you possibly toss me that ball, please?” He picked up the ball and tossed it right back in to the bucket in shallow center field. Here is the coach:
Anyone know who he is?
After that, I had three balls hit within ten feet of me. Want to know how many I caught? Zero. Here are the misssed opportunities:
1. This one feels the stupidest of all three because I was THE ONLY ONE IN THE SECTION. All I had to do was catch the ball and I would be fine. Well, I ran into a row two rows above the landing spot of the ball and when I couldn’t reach the ball leaning over a seat, the ball bounced off a seat in front of me and back onto the field.
2. My biggest problem the whole day was that I was going too far back on balls. I kept thinking balls were going to keep travelling when they didn’t. This ball was no exception. I to a spot that was about three rows back from the ball, and watched as a fan tried to barehand the ball, and later picked it up after it scooted away from him. Had I judged the ball well, I could have gone into the row in front of him and caught the ball, or I would have picked up the ball after he dropped it.
3. This time I actually was in a spot to catch the ball. The problem was there was a fan in front of me. He then deflected the ball, which made it go to my left, where it ricocheted off the seat back into his row, where he picked it up. There was no one even close to me other wise, so had the ball just stayed after it deflected off his glove, I would have been able to easily pick it up.
Then I noticed a few balls were going into the bullpen. I then saw this guy, who I tried to glove trick:
First I reeled out my line to knock it closer, then I pulled it up to insert the sharpie and rubber band. (If you don’t what the glove trick is, here’s a link that should explain it. Disclaimer: the link is to Zack Hample’s blog, not mine. That’s because he thought up the idea, not me. I’m simply a vulture.) What happened when I pulled the glove up is the string got tangeled, and the glove therefore couldn’t go as far down. I then spent what seemed like an hour trying to untangel it before relenting and simply letting down more string (I call it string, but it’s actually a fishing line.). I then had the glove over the ball and was pulling up when the ball dropped out of the glove. I tried to make the necessary adjustment, and then dropped the glove down again, but when I did, a security guard started yelling, “Sir, sir.” I looked back, and he motioned for me to get my glove out of the bullpen. I then headed back to over to straight-away left field- the bullpen is behind the left-center field wall- and caught a ball on the fly off of the bat of Mark De Rosa.
I then moved over to right field, where I quickly got Michael Morse to toss me a ball. He was fielding basebaballs where you see him here, but when he ran back to the wall, I called out to him and he threw me the ball.The red arrow is where he moved to field the ball and the black arrow is the path of the ball he threw me:
My next ball was hit by a Nationals lefty. It touched down in the row the woman in blue is right here, I believe, which is also where I picked it up:
Want to see how I could run so far? This was the crowd in the right field seats:
Right about the time I took that picture, I caught a Michael Morse opposite field shot on the fly from about the spot from which I took the picture.
After that, an usher came through saying, ” Does anyone have an extra baseball? I’m going to try to get Bryce Harper to sign a ball.” I wanted to be all cool and catch a ball, and then give it to her saying, “Here you go”, but I eventually relented and pulled one out of my backpack for her.
I then headed over to the third base foul ground, where the Rays pitchers were throwing:
There I got Wade Davis- who was in the last throwing group- to toss me a ball over the protective netting along the third base line:
As I left the section in right field, an usher who lets me sit there during the game asked me if I could give him a ball. I said, “sure”. He later reported that he had given the ball to a little girl.
After that, I went over to the Red Seats, where this was my view:
There, I got David Price to throw me a ball. He is the one all right by the right edge of the picture, and when he ran over to center field to field a ball, I asked for the ball and he tossed it to me:
I then gave it away to the kid in blue in the following picture:
After B.P. ended, I went over to the Rays dugout and the guy in dark blue tossed me a ball out of the ball bag. Anyone know who he is?:
As for the game, Stephen Strasburg outpitched Chris Archer, and the Nationals won 3-2.
During the game, I was planning on running back and forth between both sides of the outfield, but instead, I decided to stay put in right field and talk to Rick the whole game. After the game, though, I went to the Rays’ bullpen in left field and got a bullpen attendant- who was picking up the Gatorade cooler- to toss me my eighth and final ball of the night:
STATS:
• 8 Balls at this game (5 pictured because I gave three away)
Numbers 269-276 for my life:
• 21straight Games with at least 1 Ball
• 8 Balls x 27,485 Fans= 219,880 Competition Factor
• 67 Balls in 14 Games at Nationals Park= 4.79 Balls Per Game
• 7 straight Games with at least 1 Ball at Nationals Park
• 7 straight games with at least 2 Balls at Nationals Park
• 4 straight Games with at least 3 Balls at Nationals Park
• Time at Game 4:51- 9:45 = 4 Hours 54 Minutes
Tampa Bay Rays 2012 Offseason Recap and Preview
The Rays were the beneficiaries of (reportedly) the greatest day in baseball last year:
Grade: A-
Notable Additions:
Carlos Peña, Burke Badenhop, Jeff Keppinger, Josh Lueke, Jose Molina, Fernando Rodney, and Luke Scott.
Notable Subtractions:
Casey Kotchman, John Jaso, Kelly Shoppach, and Andy Sonnanstine.
Why?: Really every thing they lost, they replaced, and they also added talent. They replaced Casey Kotchman with what I believe to be a better first baseman in Carlos Peña. They downgraded a little by replacing Shoppach with Molina, but also added a very good player in Luke Scott, who I see most likely to be the Casey Kotchman of this year for the Rays in that he will over-perform his contract.
Andy Sonnantine would have been a reliever for the Rays (because of the depth of their rotation), so they over-replaced him with Fernando Rodney, Burke Badenhop, and Josh Lueke. This was a huge bolster for a bullpen depleted from their form two years ago.
I haven’t even gotten to what may be their best move of the offseason. Okay, so it really wasn’t an addition, per say, but signing Matt Moore to a 6- year, $14 million (or something in that range. I’m sure of the money, but not the years), contract was probably a good move, potentially a spectacular. For those who don’t know, Matt Moore is ranked in the same echelon as Stephen Strasburg. This is $2+ million a year for an ace-type pitcher for six year. They then have a secondary part of the deal made up of club-options that make the deal a total of 8 years and $40 million (this I am sure of).
You may or may not remember that Evan Longoria signed a similar contract (6 years 17.5 Million on his seventh day in the league, or something ridiculous like that). Well, doesn’t that look like an incredible deal now? They can’t really lose that much. At worst, they are losing the $16 Million over the first part of the contract if he stinks, or injures himself. Even for the low-budget Rays, that isn’t a huge blow. The upside on this deal is enormous, though.
Predicted Record Range: 92-97 wins
Re-view of the Preview: Tampa Bay Rays
Never mind what I said about my worst predictions being in the AL Central. Here is the link to the horrible prediction in form of entry.
Predicted Record: 65-70 wins
Actual Record: 91-71
So… at best I was 21 games off with this prediction. I still don’t know how the Rays did this. I don’t know if I mentioned this in the entry of my 100th ball game at Tropicana Field, but they have a “pump-up” segment before each game that is a highlight reel for the Rays that begins with the showing of the quote “Luck is the residue of opportunity and design.”- Branch Rickey. Well, they certainly explicated the quote throughout the year. I didn’t closely follow the Rays during the season, but one example of the Rays winning games through smart moves was the acquisition of Casey Kotchman. That said, it doesn’t make sense that they won the number of games that they did.
My main point in the entry was that they lost most of their relief pitching and I honestly don’t know how they made up for the pitchers they lost. I have seen the roster, but they lost some quality pitchers out of that bullpen. I think I compared the Rays of 2011 to the Rays of 2007, or whenever the year they were in last place was. This was mostly out of comparing the bullpens and offenses. The thing I didn’t account for was the new Rays ownership, who has really made a difference. On a side note, I am and have been reading The Extra 2% for a while (just because I have been really busy and have like 10 baseball books in front of it), but from what I can tell, it is going to be a really good book and shows why the Rays have been winning, because of the attention to detail.
I apologize to the Rays for grossly under-estimating them.
7/2/11 Cardinals at Rays: Tropicana Field
First game at what they call the Trop:
No there is no typo in the title. I did not go to the game the day before because my step-brother’s USF tour among other things caused me to miss what would have been all but 20 minutes of batting practice.
I knew this game was going to be chock full o’ Cardinals fans as I saw this on my plane in:
Yes that is a Cardinal head. A visor with plumage on top. He was one of at least five Cardinals fans but the only one that could be spotted from his seat. Anyway, not good considering the Cardinals would be on the field far longer than the Rays.
But to the game…
Actually no let me first express my love of domed stadiums.
I was the first one into the stadium and it was truly magical. My NEW photographer (it was my mom this time as I fired Pipe promptly after I saw the pictures from last game) was pretty close to a heat stroke from standing out in the Tampa heat for half an hour so she took the local route to the seats stopping at the water fountain. So, I didn’t have any pictures from this time but let me tell you that (at least for me) was great. I like domed stadiums to begin with because they are like their own little world of baseball but then to be the first fan to arrive in the seats is something surreal that I would highly recommend doing sometime. Though, I have only gone to Tropicana and the Metrodome (i have gone to miller Park but the roof was open every game) so it might just be the white roof and all the light that it reflected but for me it was great.
Okay, this time I mean it back to the game…
I was the first one to arrive in the Left Field Bleachers for a good five minutes. Within the first two I got Jeremy Hellickson to toss me a ball. Yeah, Number 100,WOO/phew!:
I celebrate in this way because half of batting practice at Nationals Park, I expected to get it in San Francisco after all the praise I had heard, didn’t go to any games in New York in the week between, and didn’t go to the game yesterday.
I could have just stopped there and called it a day and I would have been a clam as the stadium was filling up but it was still pretty empty at the time, there were still balls to be snagged, and the Cardinal pitchers were starting to warm-up.
Quickly after that picture was taken, I ran into the tunnel to my right went into foul ground through the concourse and emerged a Cardinals fan (no picture). I then slid behind the pitchers warming up as I was going to ask them for a ball after they finished. Turned out I didn’t need to wait as whoever Mitchell Boggs was throwing with air mailed their ball into the beach bar along the left field foul line. A security guard picked up the ball and was about to throw it back to Boggs but he had picked up a different ball. Here is the path of the ball:
The path is the white streak. The ball actually bounced off of the foul pole a bit but the security guard was in the actual beach bar.
I then moved back further to straight away left field. Before I could make it all the way Kelly Shoppach pulled a ball pretty well down the left field line and this is not a picture of the exact tunnel but for purpose of demonstration it should do:
The arrow is the spot where I caught ball. I was walking to the right, saw the ball coming, ran to the back of the tunnel, and jumped to make the catch. Pretty simple and I got some applause for saving a couple sitting a few rows behind me that were enjoying some nachos.
As we neared the end of Rays bp several lefties were coming up, the left field seats were really crowding up. So I went over to right field. I probably should have tried to get get another ball from the Cardinals pitchers but I live with my decision because I got the Shoppach homer in the process . I didn’t get anything for the rest of Rays bp but was sooo glad I didn’t stay in left field:
That may not seem like it is that crowded but if you look carefully the tunnels that I mentioned before are actually in the seats so they impede lateral movement in rows say 3-10 ad since the first few rows are usually crowded in any stadium that means that the best way to catch a Home Run is to stay back behind the tunnels which means that you have to be on your toes in case a ball is hit into the outfield that could possibly could be a toss-up because one must maneuver the fans on either side of the tunnel to get within ear shot. In the picture above it shows that the seat were even crowded behind the tunnels making the conditions miserable.
After the Rays stopped hitting, the Cardinals took a good 5-7 minutes to get hitting. In that time, Jason Motte was throwing a ball against a wall about twenty feet and I was really tempted to ask him to play catch but didn’t because he had Mitchell Boggs right next to him. Oh well, I got him to throw me a ball a few minutes later.
As for the seats, no that crowded as this was a picture of the first three rows:
The two bona fide stars of bp were Matt Holiday and Lance Berkman. There was one round where Holiday did not hit one ball below the top of the tunnels hitting one as far as this:
The people up there I am sure were not expecting anything to come close and as a result were taken by surprise. Thankfully no one was hurt but that ball must have gone 500 feet or close to it because although it is not dead center it is also 30+ ft above the field. I was in left field while this power show was going on but sadly didn’t get anything because of the crowded seats. Berkman, on the other hand, was a little less impressive but hit them to the less crowded right field seats. He was routinely pulling bombs to straight away right but the on I caught was in right center right about where the red arrow is:
It might have been on the other side of the aisle but it definitely was once again a jumping catch that saved this time another couple that were in the process of finding their seats for the game. (I am not trying to get people to ballhawk but for safety reasons. I f you are going to bp actually pay attention and/or BRING A GLOVE.)
That was it for bp. I took another picture of myself with #100 with the tiny Tropicana sign in the background:
During the game, I first tried to stand in a tunnel that led to the cross aisle that spans the length of the distance between the foul poles (not in the outfield). I was then told by an usher he had to keep those tunnels clear and I had to leave. Fair enough. I left and found an unguarded section further down the line:
My family (see previous entry) was once again in attendance and I sat with them while moaning in disbelief at the lack of foul balls in our area despite the surplus of lefties in the line-ups. As for the 50s themed promotion:
I guess it is inexpensive because the team already plays music and so all that costs money is buying the new uniforms for the team (the Rays wore the uniform of the Tampa Smokers, which were the team in the area in the 1950s), mascot, and mascot assistants but i would still say it wasn’t worth the effort because I saw maybe 10 people dressed up for the occasion and as you can tell I was all over the place.
Anyway, the Rays won 5-1 with all of their runs coming in the 6th inning as they chased Kyle McClellan out of the game but on a more historical note, Johnny Damon passed Ted Williams on the all-time hits list in the first inning at 2,655:
For those at home who have heard the legend of Ted Williams and think that number is low it is because in addition to hitting well Williams had great eyes and walked a lot. He also took five years off from baseball to join the army in WWII because he was still in his prime when he left we can safely assume he would be in the 3,500 range had he stayed.
Good day for #100.
STATS
- 5 Balls at this game
(#100-104) on the career
- 43 Balls in 15 games= 2.87 balls per game (yeah remember when it was 2.2)
- 40 games straight with at least 1 ball (woohoo)
- 10 straight games outside of New York
- 5 balls* 23,897 fans (20,00 of which were Cardinals fans)= 119,485
- Time at game 4:23-10:17=5 hours 54 minutes
Tampa Bay Rays Offseason Recap and Preview
They did win the most games out of anyone in the American League:
because I knew the they won the AL East but it is still shocking in retrospect.
Grade:D- F
Notable Additions:
Manuel Ramirez, Johnny Damon, Kyle Farnsworth, Casey Kotchman, Felipe Lopez, and Dirk Hayhurst.
Notable Subtractions:
Carl Crawford, Dan Wheeler, Rafael Soriano, Jason Bartlett, Matt Garza, Joaquin Benoit, Grant Balfour, Randy Choate, Carlos Pena, Dioneer Navarro, Gabe Kapler, Brad Hawpe, and Chad Qualls.
Why?: Well, let’s see where to start? For one, that is the first three line notable subtractions segment I have written. Normally, its about five guys that are notable and then ten or something minor leaguers that they lost to free agency. Here, it was just the opposite. I think everyone knew that this was the year they would lose most of their top talent but they lost the barn with the cows, losing so many people in their bullpen:
They did sell the barn to strengthen the farm though. They definitely know what to do with high draft picks. There was a book written on the subject. I think that the Rays will be better in the future because of not paying for their core but the grade is still how they helped their team THIS YEAR.
So, will they one up last year? No, but will they have a solid “time waste” year? What does that even mean?
3rd Place? 4th Place? Or just surviving the year with minimal financial loss?
Predicted Record Range: 65-70 wins Even if they can get a lot of runs. I see this being like the 2007 season. If anyone remembers, they would get ahead of very good teams and then give up afew runs late in the game because of their bullpen and lose. Their bullpen is even worse now but I think that their offense is much better as well. That year they didn’t have Evan Longoria in their line-up.
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