Day 2

Day 2 was a league double header day with 2 games. Oh the pain...

Game 1 (field 2, 10:30a) was against Team Carey, managed by Dave Cash and Bob Patterson. I had 3 pretty solid at-bats during the game, the first was a line drive out right at their shortstop, then I tripled with a runner on second for 1 RBI and then scored a run one batter later, and I had a single in the 7th inning. Also, I did some courtesy running, and managed to score another run. In the field, I played 3 innings at first base and had no putouts with two unfortunate flubs. One was a high throw that I probably should have had, and the other was admittedly a real tough play going back over my shoulder on a little pop fly. Then, I played 3 innings in right field and made 1 catch on a hard hit line drive by one of the better Carey players. Unfortunately, this all added up to a 15 to 8 loss to drop our record to 0 and 2.

Game 2 (field 2, 2:15p) was against Team Clemente, managed by Grant Jackson and John Wehner. At the dish in this game, I was hit in the left arm on a hard thrown pitch, I grounded into a fielder's choice, and I hit a single in the 7th inning. (Seems to be a theme.) And in the field, after seeing my antics at first base, Bob Walk moved me to the outfield, where I played 4 innings in right field with no chances, and 1 inning in center field, where I made a difficult catch on a long fly ball.

And then for the evening, I met up with some old friends of mine from when I lived down here in Florida, and we went to the Tampa Bay Lightning game where they defeated the Columbus Blue Jackets by a score of 4 to 2.

Day 1

Day one of my sophomore season at Pirates Fantasy Camp began with the 5 inning evaluation game.  For the game I was assigned to Team 4 and had a single with 2 RBI, I grounded into a fielder's choice, and I struck out swinging after battling the pitcher and fouling off a few. I played 3 innings in the outfield and 1 as the catcher and did not have any chances.

As a result of my evaluation game efforts, I was drafted by Team Stargell headed up by Manny Sanguillen and Bob Walk. Our first test was the afternoon game (field 4, 3:15pm) against Team Cuyler led by Steve Blass and Gary Redus. You knew that they were going to have good pitching because of Blass, and this turned out to be the case as they handled us pretty easily. Personally,  I worked a hard fought walk in my first at-bat, struck out swinging in my second at-bat, and hit a double with 2 outs in the top of the 7th inning, but was stranded there. In the field, I played 3 innings in right field without any chances, and then Bob Walk moved me to first base, where I had 4 putouts, 2 on ground outs to shortstop and 2 on pop flies. We are hurting a bit from our 0 and 1 start, but tomorrow is another day and hopefully we won't run into the hot pitching that we saw today.

At least it was nice and warm here today. Although I heard that it was also pretty unseasonably warm up north as well today.

Pirate City arrival

Well, I finally made it down to Pirate City. I am not sure what kind of good fortune I have found my way into here, but I am in the Bill Mazeroski room this year. No disrespect to the Mike LaValliere room that I stayed in last year, but the Maz room appears to be a bit more spacious and forgiving. I will try to post a picture later. The weather here is very nice compared to Ohio, we shall see how well I can do tomorrow at the evaluation game and in the first league game. EDIT: As promised, here is one picture of the room.

One week to go...

Only one more week before I ship out to go to Bradenton. It should be a fun time. I can't wait for that first taste of Mixon's orange ice cream. It is flat out awesome.