In a sense, Mother Nature decided at the last minute to give me a birthday present. You see, by turning Baltimore into the Old Testament and sending Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s contests two-by-two onto Thursday (my birthday), she forced a doubleheader with the Pirates.
With the highest hourly chance of rain hovering around 20-30%, I happily headed down to the Yards, ready to take in two.
The first game was slated to start at 4:05, meaning that gates would open at 2. However, the Orioles announced that the gates would not open until 3, a decision I can only assume was made so they did not have to pay the employees for an extra hour.
While this news was certainly frustrating from a ball hawking standpoint — we would not see any of Orioles BP and only about 15 minutes of the Pirates — at least they told fans the night before. With that knowledge, I still arrived at the stadium a little before 2, and could hear the cracks of the bats echoing from the field:
Even though I had known that the gates would not be opening until 3, the majority of the fans in line did not. And boy were they upset when the clock hit 2:01 and they were informed they had to wait another hour. With that announcement, I had a bit of an epiphany: usually, only gates H and A open two hours before the game (that is why I am always outside H). However, if they are only going to open one hour before the game, then that means all the gates will be opening at the same time. So, in order to both avoid the awful employees outside Gate H, as well as to get into left field faster, I went here and waited in line:
Good ‘ole Gate F, directly behind the left field bleachers. And no, I never thought of running through the open gate.
By 2:30, lines started to form outside Gate F and this police officer appeared:
You may not be able to see it well, but he is holding two baseballs in his hand. A free gift for two lucky fans outside the gate being forced to miss an hour of batting practice? Nope, gifts for his son at home.
Just after I took that picture, Alex Kopp joined me in line and we were almost ready to run on in. Our bags were checked by a very nice “rookie” employee, the scanners were ready and the Orioles’ Advocates were prepared to shell-out t-shirts:
Since an usher friend of ours had told us that just about all of the balls hit into the seats in fair territory were already thrown back, I had the plan to run towards the foul pole first to see if any were left in foul ground. Alex and I got there around the same time and did not see any. On my way back to fair territory, I saw a ball in the first row under a seat. The ball was about three sections away and there were people close to it; if I wanted it, I had to book it. I ran as fast as I could and as I got to the ball, but as I approached it, I saw two Pirates pitchers drop back towards the wall then look over their heads, watching a ball sail out. In that instant, my priority became my safety and not the ball on the ground. I covered my head with my arms and waited for the ball to land. Thankfully, it carried about 10 rows over my head, and I was safe. That blast also distracted someone coming the opposite way — who had just picked up another ball in the front row — causing them to walk right by the ball I had seen without even noticing it. I picked it up, happy I had my first ball of the day.
After finding the one, I kept looking for others that may have been missed. As I was about to give up, I walked to my usual spot and a white speck caught my eye in the row to my right. I’m telling ya, I have a trained eye:
I love seeing that.
I also love seeing this:
No rain, small crowd and batting practice. Ahh.
Look at the room I had to my right:
It is a real shame that those gates didn’t open until 3. Who knows how many I would have had if they had opened at regular time?
We got to see two rounds of Pirates batting practice, one of which included Andrew McCutchen. In the 15 minutes that we got to see, I was able to make a clean snag on a blast off the bat of some Pirates righty. I made the catch in the palm of my mitt after jumping, thinking it would be going over my head. It wasn’t the prettiest catch, but it was a catch nonetheless, and my 3rd ball of batting practice (and in 15 minutes).
After BP ended I headed to the standing room above the bullpens, hoping to get one of the coaches to throw me one of the many balls sitting in the Orioles’ bullpen:
As you can see right in the center of the shot, Steve Clevenger came out to the ‘pens first. While he did throw all the balls into the stands, he showed me no love.
With more time to kill before the first game started and a hankering to get my hands on some more 60th anniversary baseballs, I headed behind the Orioles’ dugout and waited for J.J. Hardy, Adam Jones, and the others to start throwing:
While waiting, I saw people taking pictures with and asking for autographs from someone behind home plate. Not being able to tell who it was from that far, I armed myself with a baseball and a pen and took a closer look.
When I got closer, I saw “West” on the back of his jersey. Then I remembered Towson University running back and NFL draft prospect Terrence West was scheduled to throw out the first pitch on Tuesday, meaning that he now would be throwing it out today:
Some people got his attention and called him over for autographs. I told him I was a Towson Tiger myself and I enjoyed watching him play this season. He was very nice and gracious and thanked me excitedly. I got him to sign my baseball, but I had to teach him the proper spot to sign it. Of course, it has to be the sweetspot:
Back on the field, the guys started throwing:
Adam Jones threw his ball to one of the people who were on the warning track behind home plate, preparing to sing the anthem. Hardy tossed his to someone in the front row.
With the game starting in a minute, I rushed over to an empty left field and took my seat, still enjoying the view:
I was ready to pounce on any home run that came my way in the first few innings, but none made it out. Making it worse, this caught my eye and I knew it wasn’t good:
Dark clouds: not good.
Even though I was slightly concerned — two days of torrential downpours will do that to you — I was confident in the forecast I read earlier in the day, and the other white clouds were supporting my case.
But then it got worse:
Look at where the tarp is stored. The groundskeepers are all lined-up behind it. They usually have a firm grasp on what kind of weather system is coming through, so they wouldn’t be behind there if they didn’t think we were going to have to stop play.
And then it happened: rain for third day in a row.
A mass exodus happened:
Which brought about this, a good sight for me:
But, it was raining pretty hard with big drops, making everything wet:
The sky started to look the part, as well:
About a minute after that picture, I saw movement from the groundscrew behind the tarp:
I mean, why wouldn’t we have a delay? Dumb weather.
I hung out in the concourse and waited to make ticket exchanges while everyone else sought shelter:
The delay lasted only about 20 minutes, and I was able — barely — to exchange the tickets and make it back into my seat for the first post-delay pitch. The sky looked so much better:
Beautiful, even:
The rest of game one went on without another delay, and also without a home run to left field.
I had a couple plans I wanted to execute before game two started that would maybe land me a few more baseballs:
1) Go for an “umpire ball” in the bottom of the ninth of the first game
2) Try to get Hardy or Jones to throw a warm-up ball to me before the start of game two
3) Try to get someone — maybe my friend on the groundscrew — to throw me this ball left over from batting practice:
See it? Look at where the dirt meets the grass, and follow that line all the way to the far wall. It’s that white speck nearly all the way to the ivy wall.
Well, I could not bring myself to attempt my first plan of an umpire ball because Andrew McCutchen was due up in the bottom of the ninth. I did not want to leave my seat in left field to only hopelessly watch him hit a home run I could have caught.
Plans #2 and #3 were foiled by, well, you guess:
Those clouds are even darker than before. And those clear skies we had for the end of game one? Yeah, they were moving on out:
It looked like two different worlds colliding:
Within a few minutes, it started to POUR, much harder than it did during the first delay. I took shelter under the awning of the Warehouse, surrounded by people who had been drinking for about 5 hours at this point:
It was miserable out there. Just look:
But, there was some hope that this was just a quickly passing storm:
By time the rain ended and the field was prepared, it was 8:55, nearly two hours after the game was scheduled to start.
For game two I decided to hang out on the flag court instead of the seats in left field:
And yeah, the flag court does puddle. Thankfully it was still rather warm after the storm passed, so that water evaporated (or drained, I guess) in a few innings.
To my left, it was a pretty average flag court crowd:
To my right was — well — pretty much just Alex, who was taking a picture of me taking pictures:
See:
Doesn’t it look just miserable and wet out there? Well, let me tell you: as much as I love being at the Yards, it did get miserable after a while. Once we reached 10:00 and I had been at the stadium for more than nine hours, my brain was mush. I just didn’t know what to do with myself. I had a hard time sitting or standing still. Maybe that was my body’s way of keeping me awake. At one point I did sit on the ground and use the railings as a nap corner and my glove as a pillow. It was dark times.
Anywho, after Manny’s first at bat, a whole lot of fans left, clearing-up the flag court:
That was the first time in a long time that I could see the batter — or at least some of the field — through the railing when standing at the back of the court. But, even though I could theoretically watch the batter, I still used the Roma Sausage sign as my home run gauge.
As for the fans that stayed, there seemed to only be two types:
1) Ball hawks.
2) Zombies.
No joke. A wide majority of the people left were essentially zombies. They had all been drinking since they got there — which for a lot of them was between 3 and 4 — and they were barely functioning at this point. Beer sales were supposed to stop at 8:30, then it was changed to 8:00. But at 10 people were still coming back with two tall cans of Coors Light.
For most of the game, especially when the Orioles were struggling offensively, the stadium was absolutely silent despite still having a good bunch of fans still there. Everybody was just like me: completely wiped-out.
Speaking of completely wiped-out, as we reached the 11:00 hour, the flag court was nearly empty:
Not long after taking this picture, I left. Why? Well, I had taken the light rail down to the game, and that hunk of scrap metal stops running to Lutherville at around 11:30, no matter what time the game ends (don’t let them fool you with that “hour after the game” crap.) I could have left early to get on a train, but then I would have been riding it without the comfort of all the fans who were also leaving the game. The light rail can be scary.
So I called my mom who was scheduled to be leaving work soon and making her way home, which conveniently includes passing the stadium. Luckily for me, she was getting off later than usual, so I was actually able to stay a little later than 11:30. When I walked out of the gates, Thank God I’m a Country Boy was playing for the 7th inning stretch.
Yes, that means I was home when Matt Wieters hit his walk-off home run onto the flag court. Would I have caught it if I was there?
Well, look at the picture just above. Do you see that bar at the far wall, with the “Budweiser Patio” sign just above it? Wieters’ home run looks like it hit just before that (possibly off the part of it that faces the field) and shot straight into the air.
For some batters — guys like David Lough or Jemile Weeks — I play down the line. However, for Wieters, I play him in the middle of the flag court, meaning I would have not been close to where it landed. Plus, the ball was hit on a line and went out so fast that I am not sure that I would have been able to see it eclipse the Roma Sausage sign at all. I am more than positive that I would not have been able to catch that ball.
Would I have been able to grab it off the ground? I don’t think so either. I feel like my instinct would have been to charge after it instead of dropping back.
Am I mad about it? Not at all. If it would have landed in the middle of the flag court, would I be? Absolutely.
Season Stats:
14 games
45 balls
– 24 hit
– 9 ball retrieved
– 6 thrown
– 6 found
