Results tagged ‘ baseballs ’
Who’s on First?
While in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown last week, one of the exhibits was a TV screen playing an old skit from a play called, “Who’s on First?” After watching it for the first time I was throughly confused and found it hilarious, even though I had no clue what it was. I’ll let you watch it now before I continue on. Here is, “Who’s on First?” by Abbott and Costello.
If you are throughly confused after watching this, click HERE, and now you should be less confused. That’s all for now. I just felt like I should share this tidbit of baseball culture with everybody.
Thanks for Reading- Howie
June 24, 2010 @ Citi Field!
I went to Citi Field yesterday. My father bought tickets for the front row in right field from Mets.com for face value. Earlier in the day, at around 2:30 PM, the sky opened up and these were in my front yard:
Yeah, I got hail. It was nuts. It felt like there were bombs going off all around my house. My whole block lost power, and on the way to Citi Field, there were no traffic lights and that made getting there difficult. I was not optimistic that there would be BP, but we decided to go early anyway. To my surprise, when I arrived, the Mets were already hitting. I went to the area where my seats were in right field. I promptly found TWO easter eggs, one sitting in the front row, and another near the foul pole. Right after that, one of the mets coaches, who is circled in the photo below, threw me ball #3.
Shortly after that, my father, who was in foul territory down the line, snagged a ball hit by one of the Mets. It landed in the seats, and he couldn’t find it, so I had to tell him to go down a ro, move to his left, and pick up the ball. This all happened within the first 5 minutes of entering the stadium. That was all I would get for Mets batting practice.
Then, the Tigers came out for BP, and I changed into my Tigers hat. Shortly after, something odd happened. Some Tigers pitchers were standing around and chatting. Out of nowhere, the batter hit a fly ball right towards the Tigers pitchers, they were not paying attention, and the ball NAILED Jeremy Bonderman right in the head. It looked like it hurt. Then, since the Tigers don’t have enough class, they blamed US for not telling them, “Heads up.” Very classy Tigers, blame the fans for your failure to see the ball and lack of attention span. Here is a picture of some Tigers talking to us.
Then, a security guard came out and gave Bonderman a helmet, which he wore for 2 minutes before giving it back. Then, the Tigers trainer came out and took him off the field. I later saw the ball hit him on the head in SportsCenter. Shortly after that, the Tigers gained some class back when Joel Zumaya tossed me ball #4. That was it for BP.
It had 2 weird black marks on it. After that, my father and I took a picture with the baseballs we snagged during BP. I snagged 4, my father snagged 1. 
After that, I saw something that I have never seen before at a baseball stadium. It was in the fan fest area, in the store. This was pretty awesome.
CANDY! I got some, but it was gone pretty quickly. They had 3 levels of candy: Sugar Fix, Sugar Rush, and Sugar High. I got the middle one.
Before the top of the 7th inning, Chris Carter tossed me his warm up ball. I stood up out of my seat, he threw it right to me, piece of cake. Ball #5 was in the books. Here is a picture of me holding the ball Carter threw me with him in the background.
As for the game itself, the Mets made a dramatic comeback, but it fell short. They lost to the TIgers 6-5. Phil Coke struck out David Wright with the bases loaded and the tying run on 3rd.
This is going to be my last game for a little while.
Here are today’s baseballs. 
The top row is balls 1,2, and 3. The bottom row is balls #4 and 5. Here are the sweet spots. Notice the practice stamp on the Mets balls and the black mark on the Zumaya ball.
I am going away for the summer, so this is going to be my last blog entry until mid August.
Thanks for reading, Have a great summer- Howie.
Lets Go Mets!
April 5, 2010 @ Citi Field *Opening Day*
I went to Mets Opening Day on Monday at Citi Field. I had a great time, so let us get right to it.
My father and I arrived at the Jackie Robinson Rotunda gate at around 10 AM. We were right at the front of the line and that was a good thing. I also was armed with a new yellow t-shirt.
That is correct. I got the Happy Youngster t-shirt. It is a long story, and a special thanks to the Happy Youngster himself for the shirt. (The link above goes to his blog.) As soon as the gates opened at 10:30, I was off and running into the stadium. I chose to take the stairs rather than the escalator, and even though I tripped like 5 times wile running up the stairs, it was a good idea.
I was running in the concourse down the third base line and I saw a security guard standing on the field holding a ball, I sprinted down the steps and asked him for the ball, and he tossed it straight into my glove, and within 2 minutes of me running into the stadium, BALL #1 was in the books. It was also a Citi Field commemorative ball from last season. Ball #1 is shown below.
It was the first ball given to a fan during the 2010 regular season at Citi Field and the first Citi Field commemorative ball that I have ever snagged. On my mygameballs.com page, I counted it as a found ball because I found the security guard holding the ball. Literally a minute after I got this ball the person standing next to me noticed Nate Robertson of the Marlins was walking back to the dugout, and we asked Nate to sign, and he said sure. I got him to sign a separate ball that I had brought to get signed. He even signed it on the sweet spot. Thanks Nate!
Then I settled down in a good spot in the front row right behind where the Marlins started playing catch, but first during the end of Mets batting practice, Luis Castillo, hit a hard foul ball down the line bounced foul on the field then went into the stands and hit me in the thigh. I said, “Ouch.” as I bent down and picked up BALL #2, also a Citi Field commemorative ball. Here is that ball:
You could say I was a little happy.
During this time, I got so unlucky that I don’t even want to share the details on the blog. My bad luck changed when Anibal Sanchez threw me BALL #3. It was pretty much brand new, except for a small green mark on the sweet spot. After he threw me the ball, Jose Veras, a reliever on the Marlins, started signing, and I got him to sign the ball Sanchez just gave me.
Here is a picture of him signing:
If you can see me, I am in the teal Marlins hat. Here is ball #3, which was signed by Veras. 
Then, after with a quick photo with the 3 balls, we were off to the seats for the game.
The game went great. The Mets won 7-1 behind David Wright’s 2 run homer and Johan’s solid outing.
See you next time from Citi Field
Thanks for reading- Howie
September 4, 2009 @ Citi Field
I went to Citi Field yesterday, here is the story. The night before the game, my father and I bought tickets in section 110 row D, which is 4 rows behind the field. It was quite a bargain if I should say so myself, the face value of the tickets is $270, and we paid $96 per ticket and it came with a free parking pass. We got there at about the time that the gates opened and I went straight into fair terratory in right field because the Mets were hitting. My father was standing in the 4th row near the foul line and I was in the front row. Daniel Murphy was hitting and he hit a homer into the 4th row then it almost hit my dad, hit a chair, rolled down to the 2nd row when I grabbed it with my bare hand, which then was grabbed by another kid who let go after I said, “It’s mine, It’s mine.” Upon looking at the ball, I realized that the stitches were not red, and the ball had a circular logo, it was: 
That ball was the first commemorative one I have ever snagged, unless you count training balls commemorative. The area near the foul line was getting dead, so my dad stayed there and I went behind the Modell’s sign and near the bullpen when I saw K-Rod sign autographs for about 2 kids then left, I didn’t have anything on me to get signed but my hat, and I didn’t get him. I stayed near the Modell’s sign and when reliever Sean Green picked up a ball, I asked him for it, and he threw it to me. There was almost no one there when I got it. It was another 2008 All-Star Game ball, and when I looked at it after I caught it, there was a large black mark from where the hitter’s bat hit the ball. I have no idea who hit it.
The rest of Mets BP was pretty dead, so while the Cubs were getting set up, I took a baseball, ran around to the field level in foul territory and got Pedro Feliciano and Nelson Figueroa to sign a baseball using their own black sharpies. Here is a picture of Pedro signing taken by my dad who kept my spot in fair territory.
I went back to my spot in fair territory and put on an old Cubs hat. The coaches were not giving anything into the crowd, so I moved behind the Modell’s sign in right field and tried to get a ball from a relief pitcher. And then a pitcher, whom I believe to be sean Marshall, to throw me a ball, I was in the corner near the bullpen, and I had to reach over and make a nice backhanded snow cone catch. Then he imitated me catching the ball and said nice catch or something, I couldn’t really see him. Here is a picture of Ball #3:
That was all I got for the Cubs portion of BP. After that, I had my picture taken with the 3 baseballs:
Then, my father and I returned to our seats before the game, and I just barely missed out on Anderson Hernandez. After the national anthem, Angel Pagan signed my other baseball in someone else’s black pen and I was almost crushed because there were so many people trying to get him. If you can see me, I am just standing there trying to leave.
Then we took our seats and the game began. Bobby Parnell had easily the best game of his career. Cory Sullivan also had a pretty good game, as he started off the scoring with a second inning solo homer off the Pepsi Porch in right field off of Cubs pitcher Carlos Zambrano. Then, there was no scoring until the 8th inning, but the Cubs mounted a threat in the top of the 7th, the bases were loaded for pinch hitter Mike Fontenot, not even close to hitting anything, 1 out. Kosuke Fukudome, swinging at thin air, 2 outs. Ryan Theriot, hard shot off of Parnell’s hand, gets the ball and throws to first, inning over. In the 8th Brian Stokes could not hold on to a 1-0 lead as Jeff Baker got Milton Bradley home on an RBI single. In the bottom of the inning, the Mets exploded to score 5 runs against the Cubs bullpen capped off with a 2 RBI single by Omir Santos. In the 9th, the Mets brought in Frankie Rodriguez, who got save #29.
Winning Pitcher- Brian Stokes
Losing Pitcher- Kevin Gregg
Save- Francisco Rodriguez
3 baseballs and 3 autographs, a pretty good day in my opinion.
Here are the baseballs in the order I snagged them.
And here are the autographs, you could probably tell whose signatures they are.
Thanks for reading. Feel free to leave comments,
Howie
Howie
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