Spring Training: baseball as it should be

 3/23

Spring training

Fresh from Florida, I wear this year’s Pirates Spring Training hat and my favorite Pirates Hawaiian shirt. For aesthetic notes, the hats become batting practice hats in the regular season. This year’s edition is a version of the old school mesh “truckers hat” only fitted, not snap back. One ironic result is that the mesh lets in enough sun to create distinctive head tan patterns for shaved head players. 

The jerseys worn in spring training used to be called batting practice jerseys but really aren’t. No one wears them in batting practice anymore. Players prefer pull overs and hoodies and are a pretty motley crew for the most part. The only sad part is that without numbers, one has to have a very well trained …and informed eye…to know who’s batting.  As a kid, I used to love go early with my dad to see our favorites batting, easily identified. No more.

As I reflect on it, spring training is for me, baseball as it should be.  While playoff and World Series baseball is an exhibit of athleticism, skills and strategy at the most dramatic and artistic level, spring training is the expression of the game and its essential ethos in American culture.

The cozy ball parks hold only a small portion of what the big city stadia do. Many have berms where fans spread out on blankets or lounge on chaise lounges or Adirondack chairs. Many are nestled within middle class neighborhoods. There are exceptions...Tampa’s Steinbrenner stadium, just across the street from the NFL Buccaneers stadium has a classic stadium swagger as does the massive Astros/Nationals complex in West Palm. My favorites live as neighbors, part of the fabric of their community.

In Dunedin, people offer their driveways and yards for parking. In Lakeland you can park at the local Lutheran church whose congregants are grilling hot dogs and  have tables with old memorabilia.  In Bradenton, you can park at the Daily Bread soup kitchen and pay $5 to support them and buy a taco for the Korean guy who sets up his barbecue grill near the craft  brewery.

Joker Marchant Field

Ty Cobb

the Parrot made it

Sitting in the stands you hear conversations about “back home.” What part of Pittsburgh are you from? Remember the old Mud Hens park in Toledo? Dunedin is like an extension of Ontario. The ballparks have tastes of home like Detroit "coney dogs" in Lakeland, Iron City beers in Bradenton, crab cakes in Sarasota and "half smokes" in West Palm. The Pirate Parrot appears at Lecom and the racing Presidents are wearing aloha shirts in the Ballpark of the Palm beaches.  And the local  "booster club" of retirees staffs the stands in Bradenton. 

But best of all is the game, up close and almost touchable. Day games in the sun. Players actually stopping to sign autographs. (Many only for kids.) When a player's day is done, they’ll walk off the field to the clubhouse. 

It’s the time of year when everything still seems possible, even for a much abused Pirates fan. You get to see a different team every day. You do get to see some of your favorites for at least five innings. But also a lot of guys who are not yet in the economic stratosphere of the stars and even journeymen. Young. Eager. Hungry, as they say. Still close to normal. For many, this may be a close as they ever get to the show.  A year before his major league debut, I saw Ke’Bryan Hayes hit a walk off grand slam against the RedSox. Like that.

So …hats off to baseball, hats on for spring training.

Living in Coronaviriusworld 253: Baseball in Coronavirusworld

 2/28

How it is these days

It’s been almost a whole year since I’ve sat inside a ballpark and watched a real baseball game with real people. March 7th, 2020…Bradenton, Florida. Pirates and Yankees, my two favorite teams. The beginning of my last week of what was. The last week BC…before Corona.  But that’s another story still to be told.

Ed Smith Stadium

I’m in Sarasota. It’s sunny and 85 degrees. Opening day of the 2021 Spring Training Grapefruit League season. I find a $12 parking spot and walk to Ed Smith stadium enjoying its Spanish mission style exterior. Then it’s time for  baseball in coronavirusworld. 

You can only buy tickets in “pods.” Only entry by digital ticket. I came early expecting an opening day giveaway but none because of hand contact issues. Pandemic “heroes” will be honored before the game and the first pitch will be thrown and star-spangled banner sung virtually on the scoreboard. No programs are sold….hand contact again. So for the first time ever I keep score on folded paper towels from the restroom.

play ball!

Some things are still the same. You can still buy a crab cake sandwich like back in Baltimore. The seats come from Camden Yards in Baltimore. The Orioles…like the Yankees…will wear their traditional home whites instead of  spring training orange and black. When Trey Mancini steps unto bat after missing a year to colon cancer, he gets a standing ovation from all the fans and both teams. And he lines a single to center for another ovation.

a visitor from Baltimore...

It’s strange to be in a park a quarter full. Everyone in masks. But still it's baseball. After a miserable 2020 season, I see Greg Polanco homer to left and the new young star, KeBryan Hayes, who I’ve been watching in Florida (and twice in Trenton) the last three years leg out a triple to the deep left corner. In 2019 I saw him hit a walk off grand slam against the Red Sox. By mutual agreement, they end the game after 8 innings.  

It’s been a year. It’s coronavirusworld. But it’s baseball and I’m there. 

3/1

Sun Skyway

I’ve crossed over the Sun Skyway Bridge, which always terrifies me…..I always feel I will sail off the top and wind up in the water….and made my way to Dunedin. Here the modern TD Ballpark is nestled in a cozy neighborhood. I find a friendly woman who offers a place on her lawn for $5. Lots of the same issues here. I shouldn’t be surprised to find no giveaways and once again, no programs. This time I brought along my own paper. I make good use of the sunscreen stations. No standing around, you must proceed to your seat. Which is the only place you are allowed to eat or drink. Or take off your mask. (Only while actively eating or drinking…) And I notice after I use the hand rail for my climb up to my row, the usher immediately wipes it down. Like Sarasota, 75% of the seats are cut off from use with plastic ties. 

There are fewer people in Dunedin. They are a Canadian team and their fans are cut off by our closed border. 

pregame ritual

That same closed border is going to keep the Jays in Dunedin to open their regular season. Both O Canada and the Star Spangled Banner sr once again rendered virtually. 

The top and coming Blue Jays and prospect laden Pirate play to a 2-2 tie with Pirates’ centerfield candidate Tony Alford homering to center. Like obj game of a minor league double header, this game ends after 7.

3/2

LeCom Park

Finally a game in Bradenton, the Pirates’ spring home for over 50 years. McKechnie Filed at Le Com Park. The original Spanish mission style ballpark and the second oldest ballpark to Boston’s Fenway still in use. I look for my regular parking place at the Daily Bread Soup Kitchen and stop at the Darwin Brewery. There’s a pop up Korean barbecue outside which is the best ball game lunch I had anywhere. Korean tacos. 

How far to....

Of course, no giveaways. One of my prized possessions is a "spring training” coffee mug from 2019. But the contact concern wipes that out. Again no programs and I really do not understand the issue here. But surprise! There are scorecards on request! I could hug them. But clearly not. One more unexpected cost of covid…no Iron City.  The reduced seating  capacity means fewer beers…too cost prohibitive for Iron City to ship out down from Pittsburgh.  I will miss that taste of home…907 miles away, the sign says. 

opening day at LeCom

Today the lowly Tigers are whacking the Pirates pitchers around and only a double by Ke’Bryan to deep center and the second homer in three days by non-roster free agent Todd Frazier stand out. And today’s game, on a perfect sunny day, ends after 5 like a rain out game. I find these early endings, especially 5, to be annoying and a bit of a cheat.  I’m trying to understand the reasoning . Part of it has to do with the greatly reduced number of players allowed in the dugout. But still…you know?

Time for one more Korean taco and  Korean iced coffee from K-Bap Barbecue  on the way home.  If I squinted my eyes a little, I could almost feel like normal.  I’m sure the Pirates’ performance is a good indicator of what the regular season will look like.  It’s still coronaviriusworld. But it’s baseball.  And like a runner taking a lead off third, we’re getting closer all the time. Not home yet, but getting there.