Unfortunately, I was not able to go to spring training this year. However, loyal blog reader and Silver Hawks official scorer Pete Yarbro made the trip to the desert, and I've asked him to send reports that I can put on the blog. I told Pete that he could write about the games, the players, or anything he wanted. As you will read, he clearly took me up on the "anything you wanted" part of the deal. Enjoy!
"My alarm went off at 3:30 Sunday morning. Actually, two of my alarms went off. Unfortunately, I set four. The first thing I need to do when I get back to South Bend is buy a new alarm clock. And remember that when I set the alarm on my cell phone I need to switch it from vibrate mode. That's why you set four alarms. With that hurdle behind me, it was off to the airport.
My first leg was from South Bend to Chicago. The flight is only 48 minutes, so accounting for the time change, we landed before we took off. Flights like that always remind me of Bob Costas' story about ABA player Marvin "Bad News" Barnes who refused to board a similar flight from Louisville to St. Louis, protesting, "I ain't getting on no time machine!"
Every one of my flights was on time. So, with a couple of naps along the way, I got into Tuscon about the time today's game started. Off the plane, through baggage claim, past the rental car counter and straight to Tucson Electric Park, spring training home of the Arizona Diamondbacks. I'll worry about checking into the hotel later. There's nothing quite like a day when you can wake up in northern Indiana, facing a 36 degree temperature, and by the middle of the afternoon be soaking in the Arizona sun, enjoying 75 degrees and sunny --- watching the Diamondbacks play baseball against the San Francisco Giants.
The game was already in the third inning by the time I got to the park, but the crowd was still filtering in. With a total attendance of 10,601, today's game is close to a sellout. When I came into the park there were still lawn seats available, but that's about all. I just hope I can find my rental car after the game. Somewhere on the other side of ten thousand people there's a silver Toyota Carolla. I may give the crowd a headstart before I go looking for it.
It's a beautiful view from my seat in the pressbox. Right in front of me is a patch of the greenest grass I've seen since last summer --- not to mention the baseball game being played. Past the left field wall is Mt. Lemmon and the Santa Catalina Mountains. If all that gets boring, today there's an airshow at Davis Monthan Air Force Base here in Tucson. So there are A-10 Thunderbolts and F-16 Falcons twisting through the air over the right field wall. On top of all that the smells drifting up from the barbeque stand under the pressbox are making me really hungry.
Late in the game, former Notre Dame pitcher Aaron Heilman and former Silver Hawk Clay Zavada both made appearances. Heilman pitched a scoreless inning, giving up one hit. Zavada followed that with a one-two-three inning, punctuated by an impressive strike-out. My binoculars are still packed in my luggage, but Zavada appears to be sporting an impressive mustache. The Giants beat the D'Backs 4-3.
In the morning I'll be checking in over at the minor league camp before coming back over to TEP for the game against the Padres. In the meantime, I'm headed over to the Mexican take-out around the corner from the stadium to pick up dinner. I'm leaning toward a chili relleno. Then back to the hotel to check in and have a couple of margaritas before what I expect will be an early bedtime. But not before I buy some sun screen.
I just hope I get to sleep a little later tomorrow."
Thanks for the update Pete!
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