What Happened to the Field?!?!

Never a good sign when you are greeted by a field that looks like this:

Apparently they left the tarp on too long on a couple of hot, rainy days last week and burnt it out badly.  A little part of me dies when I see a field look this poorly.

Website, Field, and Why I'm the First To Go

First things first: If you go to http://www.silverhawks.com/, you'll notice a new look. Minor League Baseball has redesigned their pages, but all the important information is still there. Not a whole lot has changed other than the design, but it may take you a minute or two to find things. A link to this blog can still be found under the multimedia tab at the top of the page.

Secondly, here is today's picture of the field. Two things to notice:
1) No Snow
2) Joel Reinebold cutting the grass. It's nice to seem him actually working after sleeping in the office all winter

Thirdly, I teased this in an earlier post, but here's the story behind the weird title to this post. Nick Devlin was an intern for the Quad Cities River Bandits. He's now the broadcaster for the Burlington Bees. He's also blogging, (I'll link to his blog on the right side of this page as well).

Anyhow, Nick had a post about other Midwest League bloggers, and included mine. I appreciate the love, but let's take a look to see what he wrote about me:

"Owen Serey's the South Bend radio guy, and an all-around likable young man. When I was interning with Quad Cities last year, I made it a habit to sit in with each opposing broadcaster when they came to town. Usually I'd listen for an inning, ask a few questions during commercial breaks, thank them for their time, and head out. Owen was among those who seemed most concerned that I learn something while I sat in with him, though. Not in an overbearing way, either. It just seemed like he really cared. Now, maybe it's because he's a really nice guy, or maybe it's because he has red hair and will therefore be the first to go in any apocalyptic scenario, but it made for a very positive experience overall, and it makes me like his blog a lot." (emphasis added by me)

While I appreciate the compliments about the blog, and I do like to make sure people actually learn something from me when they sit with me for an inning or two, what's with the line about how red heads are the first to go in the Apocalypse? Did I miss that memo or something? Why does everyone feel the need to take shots at the red-headed guy?

We have a staff meeting later this afternoon, so this is probably my last post for today. I'll have another red-head related post tomorrow for you....and probably a mention or two about baseball as well.

Friday Field Picture

We're getting there. My hope is that on Monday, the snow will be gone from all the dirt areas, as well as the grass behind home plate that doesn't see as much sun as the rest of the field.

Notice the area in the dirt around second base without any snow. Groundskeeper Joel Reinebold put charcoal in that area. Apparently this is a new technique that Joel wanted to try out. You ground up the charcoal, and spread it around an area on the field on sunny days. Charcoal, being black, will absord the heat of the sun faster, and thus melt the snow faster. Clearly, it works.

Interesting, huh? Apparently we now conduct science experiments at the ballpark. Next week, we'll create a tornado in a bottle.