Eliminated

Well, we are officially out of the playoff race. We put in a heck of an effort with some huge play during the last month, but unfortunately Tri-City got real hot and reeled off about 8 in a row to clinch the playoff spot. Now we are battling for pride and trying to finish the season above .500. We were way down early, not sure what our low point was, but it had to be at least 9 games below. Ever since we had that meeting about accountability and such, we came together as a team. When you are in a short season, though, you can't afford to start off that bad because there is no time to recover. We play half the season of a full team. Oh well, now we all know that we are leaving as soon as the season ends, so plans are being made. The good thing about this team is that they will keep battling and finish strong.

More from Yakima and a new poll coming up.

Yakima Day 2

The sun here is kind of bad. This is my view looking at the hitter from the dugout. Pretty soon the sun will start going in and out of those banners until it finally dips below the stands. It is actually better this time of year than when we came here at the beginning of the season. Now when the sun goes below the stands, it stays there. Before, it would set off to the right side of the stands and shine directly into the dugout. Home field advantage....

By the way, this is during the game.


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Bus Trip

Here we are in Yakima, WA for a 3 game series. It was a short trip this morning from Spokane, about 3 hours.

It really doesn't matter how long a bus trip is, there will be a lot of sleeping on it. I, for one, love to sleep on the bus and I get asked all the time how I can sleep the way I do. First of all, I have my own seat. That is huge. When you are sitting next to somebody else it is like trying to sleep on a plane, it's tough. I obviously can't take a picture of myself while I am sleeping, but I will try to describe it. I sit on the driver's side and put a pillow on the aisle arm rest. Then I lay sideways tucking my legs up in the fetal position. I put my backpack on the floor to support my knees so they aren't just hanging off the seat. If I need to adjust, I will turn and lay on my back and cross my legs against the window. It is actually not that hard to do. 9 years of practice also helps.

Here is the funny thing about baseball bus trips. When we leave after the game, nobody sleeps even though it is the middle of the night. They just finished playing a game and are all usually still full of energy. There are movies playing, people on cell phones talking and texting, PSP playing, iPod listening, and a lot of trash talking. If it is a longer trip (6 hours), then usually by about 3 am, people start to sleep. When we travel in the morning, a movie goes on, but lots of guys are out. When you normally don't have to be at the field until early afternoon, late nights and sleeping in become habit. The 9:30 bus ride this morning was an example. There were more guys sleeping in mid-morning than ones that do in the middle of the night. Weird.

I thought it would be funny to take pictures of some of the guys sleeping that were around me to get an idea of the creative sleeping positions.








And lastly, here is a short video of a guy trying to sleep without really trying to sleep......the head bob.

Last day of homestand

Today we finished a 6 game home stand.....all against the same team. 6 games in a row against 1 team is insanely long. I think that both teams were both tired of each other and glad to be moving on. On a positive note, we did win 5 out of 6 and pushed our record to 34-33. I heard that this is the first time we have been over .500 since the end of June. If my mind serves me correctly, we were 3-3 after 6 games. The winning we have been doing has been fun. It is definitely much better in the clubhouse, on the bus, and pretty much everywhere when the team is winning. We have a few guys on the injury report right now, but nothing too serious. Both are able to play. Works for me. Off to Yakima for 3 and Boise for 3 in the morning. That's all I got.

Ken the Intern - Mile Run

Today was Ken's continuation of the summer of fitness. This was the mile run day. We set a goal for Ken of 8 minutes. There was much debate on whether or not he would make it. The lowest time anyone thought would be just under 8:00. I don't think you can hear much of the dialogue about his run, so just skip to the end for the final time and Ken's comment.

Ken the Intern - Relay Race

Today was a big day for our Kentern. He was being observed by somebody from his school. I think he may have been a little nervous at the beginning of the day, but once he got outside, he loosened up a bit. The pitchers were doing a relay race today for some condtioning to mix in some variety. Matt Thompson was the only one left and he teamed up with Clark Murphy to go against Ed and Kentern. Here is the video. Sorry it is not so good, but I had to do it with my phone. I need to just start carrying that camera with me everywhere.

Groundhog Day

If you have seen the movie "Groundhog Day" with Bill Murray it is commonly used comparison to the baseball life. Every day is the same thing. That is partly the reason I have been lacking on the interesting posts lately. Here is the typical daily schedule for me.

Wake up somewhere between 5:30 and 11:00 AM depending on what the morning plans are.
12:00 - Leave the house for the ballpark and pick up something to eat
12:30 - Get to park, eat and check emails
~1:00 - Players start arriving for treatments
1:50 - Pitchers stretch
2:15 - Extra cage work
2:50 - Position players stretch, followed by infield and batting practice
4:40 - Batting practice over, head back inside
Pre-game treatments, but mostly talk crap and mess around on internet
6:00 - Players head out to prepare for game
6:35 - First pitch
~9:30 - Game over, post-game treatments, eat, shower
10:30 - Leave ballpark to go home
Go to bed between 11:30 PM and 4:00 AM depending on what the evening and morning plans are.

Next day, do it all again. Every few days, do it in a different city, but have about a 3:30-4:00 bus depending on game time. Generally there are restaurants within walking distance of hotel and occasionally a mall or something similar to pass the time. When the family was here, we had a car everywhere we went so we were able to check out the city. Usually there is no car though so we have to entertain ourselves within walking distance.

As you can imagine, it can get pretty monotonous doing the exact same thing every day. In this league, we only had one actual day game at 1:00. Those are always nice because it is a change from the norm and you usually have time to go get a nice dinner and enjoy the evening. When I first started in baseball, I would talk to my then girlfriend, now wife and she would ask how the day went. It took her finally being with me in the summer to understand that I was serious when I said it was the same every day. Spring training is even worse, but that's a story for another day.

Post Game Win Handshakes

There has really been nothing too exciting going on lately. Today we won 14-5 in a game where everybody was hitting the ball everywhere. After we win a game the staff all shakes hands then we line up just outside the foul line to shake hands with the players as they all walk off the field. If you want a great description of the inner workings of the handshake line check out this blog post by Disco Hayes (it is about halfway down). If you haven't found Disco Hayes' blog, you have to check it out. It is awesome. Anyway, here is a little video of the post game winning hand shake. Oh, and Ken the Intern always gets a slap on the ass...it's good luck. Enjoy.

Fantasy Football

It's that time of year again. Fantasy football is somewhat big in baseball. Of course everyone likes to watch football. Since the football season starts right when the baseball season ends it is a perfect time to do a FF league. All the guys have been together the whole year and have developed friendships. Fantasy football is the perfect way to keep in touch and continue to talk smack. If you couldn't tell by my previous posts, we like to talk smack. When you have out with 30 other guys all summer nothing is off limits. Anyway, back to the topic. I am going to be at my all time high of fantasy leagues this year at 5. I am doing on with some old Dodger friends that I have been in since 2005, 1 with some old Jacksonville Suns friends that we have done since 2006 with keepers, 1 with the Spokane Indians guys from this year, 1 with some Rangers guys from this year, and 1 with my friends that we are just starting this year. That's a lot of drafts and lineup setting. Hopefully I can keep up.

Today was my first draft for the Dodgertown League. I had the 11th pick out of 12 guys and the 16 round draft took just under 3 hours. Damn, that was a long draft. My first pick at number 12 was Larry Fitzgerald. Then I heard he was on the cover of Madden '10. I hope he avoids the curse. 1 down, 4 more to go.

Funny side note.....
In one of the later rounds I drafter Mushin Muhammed. This what the breaking news for him was this:

Muhammad (old) is being limited to one practice a day during training camp, the Panthers' official site reports.
Spin: The 36-year-old wideout is getting the preventative maintenance plan in order to remain healthy once the regular season begins. He's still the Panthers' No. 2 receiver, but Dwayne Jarrett could become more of a factor if Muhammad struggles with injuries this season.

His injury is described as OLD. Wow!

Tri City Donuts

A little bit of background on these donuts. Every night there are 3 pitchers in the stands during the game. 2 of them do charts (game chart, velocity chart) and 1 videotapes whatever is needed for the day. They will usually have some food from the concession stand while they are up there. Everyone this time around kept telling me that I needed to go get some donuts. Finally today, I did it. Wow! Pretty good decision. They have a mini donut making machine with an oil river that they float in as they cook. They sell them by the dozen and by the mini bucket (3 dozen). We, of course, went with the mini bucket. Between the whole coaching staff we weren't able to finish them all. Here is the video of the process. It is short, but to the point.

Duh

Saw this place in the food court at the mall in Tri City. I think "made fresh in the USA" is obvious based on the fact they make the food right in front of you.
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Boise Mascot/Tri-City

Sorry for the delay in posting. I have been pretty occupied.

Here is a picture of the Boise Hawk. I don't know about you guys, but to me he looks very similar to Red Robin.

Also, what is the deal with those sandals? Aren't hawks supposed to be tough. He just looks goofy with his sideways hat and sandals. All he needs are black socks and a hawaiian shirt. Nice mascot. He is very fan friendly though. Much better than Crater in Salem.

Today was our second day in Tri City for the second time around. We have played golf every morning that we have been here. A lot of early mornings, too. As a matter of fact, we have a 5:30 shuttle to the course tomorrow. So far golf is winning over sleep in this place.

Now, on to a more job/medical related note. Last night was a pretty scary one at Gesa Stadium. An older lady passed out in the stands right behind our dugout. Some people pulled her up to the concourse and it looked serious, so I headed up there. By the time I arrived (there are big walls around the field and I had to go through the clubhouse to get there) there were already people performing CPR. Huge props go to the security guy (who I heard doubles as an EMT), the nurses sitting near her, and Tri-City's AT intern. They had everything in total control. We ended up hooking up the AED. Luckily, there was no need to shock and the CPR was enough to basically save her life. Got an update today and her doctor said that she had kidney failure from dehydration and if she hadn't had the immediate care she did, she may have not made it. Today she was resting comfortably and feeling a lot better. Wow. What a night.

1st Base Coach - AKA Martinez looking like an idiot

Why do these guys constantly go out there to coach first base with their batting helmets on?!? You can barely tell who is running and who is coaching.

Recycle Man in action

Here is a video of recyle man helping out with an on field promotion. There is just a little bit of a sort of dance in there, but it is mostly just him posing like a superhero and watching. On his way off the field somebody calls out his name and he can't help himself, he has to stop and say hello. I really need to get some video of him getting down and dancing. It's good stuff.



We are now in Tri-City for the second time. I pretty much told you all about it the first time we were here. After a few days of nobody hurt or needing any treatment, other than the day's pitchers, I am finally back to doing something. Had a few guys come in with minor things today. Nothing serious and both are in the lineup tonight. I feel like I am earning my money again. Although, I have one of the only jobs where the less I work, the happier everyone is.

1st Base Coach - AKA Lima looking like an idiot

Why do these guys continue to coach first base with their batting helmets? I think it kinda makes all of us look stupid.

Boise Stadium

Here are a few pics of the stadium in Boise.

View looking into athletic training room



View of athletic training room. It's pretty small so if I actually stood in there to take a pic, all you would see would be the wall. Basically, where that table on the left ends is the wall.



And finally, the view looking out of the athletic training room. Lucky me.



If you couldn't guess already....the athletic training room tends to smell. I do have a can of air freshener handy.


Here is the tiny clubhouse. I'm standing on one side. If you look to the right you can see the end of that side. It is the same on the left side. Pretty small.


Here is the "tunnel" from the clubhouse to the dugout. From left to right it is like a hallway underneath the stands. All of the workers are constantly going back and forth, mostly doing concessions.


Here is the dugout. It is actually a good size.


And, last, but not least, a view of the field from up by the press box.

Ken the Intern - Presidential Fitness Test part 3

And now the exciting conclusion to Ken the Intern doing the fitness test. This final part is to see how many pullups you can do. We really didn't have a pullup bar and the best place we thought of to do it was hanging off the dugout. After he finished, we did find a nice spot where we will probably have him redo this portion of the test. Anyway, the over under was set on how many Ken could hammer out at 5. I saw him hang from that very dugout for a lot longer than I expected a few weeks back, so I went for the over. Braden Tullis, the line setter, went with the under. Ed Yong went with the barely over after some hesitation. Here's what went down:

The close up video is because I wanted to face him and we probably have one of the smallest dugouts in all of baseball. I was sitting up against the back wall of the dugout and that's how close I was.

Enjoy.

Boise Day 2

This is not only our first trip to Boise, ID, but it is also our first time playing them this year. Yesterday we began a stretch where 12 of our 18 games are against Boise. We are staying in a nice hotel here at the end of downtown. It is nice because there are lots of places to eat and plenty of people watching spots. Kudos to whomever picked this hotel for them. JT and I had some lunch a little earlier at a mexican place and then I decided to hit up Cold Stone (why wouldn't I, best ice cream on earth) for an Apple Pie a'la Cold Stone and head over by the fountain thing to watch. It is already past 2:00 now, so not may people still out. Next time I'll have to come closer to lunch time. Anyway, here is where I have temporarily set up shop.

I have my ice cream, computer, and a nice view. It is also a perfect day out here.

I'll get some pics of Boise's stadium tonight and put them on later. Oh, and I also have the final installment of Ken's fitness test, the pullups. We are thinking of having him do a timed mile run when we get back. We will just have to measure it out in laps around the field.

Ken the Intern - Presidential Fitness Test part 2

Here is the latest installment of Ken's presidential fitness test. Here is part 2 of the test: How many situps can you do? This was another one where we may have been a little liberal on the counting. If you really want to laugh, wait until he is struggling and hit pause. His faces are priceless. I can say that he is doing these to fatigue though.

Oregon Trail

Today is a travel day down to Boise, I'd. We took the Deadman's Pass exit to stop at a rest area. Apparently we are on the Oregon Trail.
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Ken the Intern - Presidential Fitness Test part 1

Ken's latest adventure was doing the presidential fitness test. I think there are more parts to it than just the 3 we did, but we figured the 3 was enough. Here is part 1 of the test: How many pushups can you do? We were pretty generous with the counting because the ones he did toward the end were brutal. Here he is:

1st Base Coach - AKA Bonadonna looking like an idiot

Joe Bonadonna looking like an idiot coaching first with his batting helmet on. Especially since there was a helmet with no ear flaps in the dugout.
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Ken the Intern - BP

Ken told us that he used to play baseball in high school. Well, that was a long time ago. We want to see if he still has it. We are still waiting for the right time to have him catch a bullpen. We have fireballers, knuckleballers, and junkballers. Not sure which one Ken should attempt. The pitchers got to take batting practice today because they threw a shutout last week. JT gets worn out throwing to all the pitchers so Ken was the logical choice to throw BP to half of them. He started out pretty good. When I got out there he was still pretty consistent. After a while, fatigue started to set in and he started to fade.



After this he got nervous and couldn't throw strikes. Overall, he did well though. Better than everybody expected. Well, everybody except for Andrew Doyle.....

Stadium Host

Here in Spokane we have a stadium host. His name is Jamie Patrick and his day job is a radio dj.

Basically, his job here is to get the crowd into the game by any means necessary. His job description may actually say "by any means necessary" because he does some goofy stuff. On the 4th of July he painted his hair red, white, and blue and on Go Green Night, he painted it green. Everyone likes to make fun of him, but to his credit, the crowd loves him. He announces the team before the game as they head to their positions, but before he does that he has a little bounce going and says "Gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood evening ladies and gentlemen!!!!!". He gets the crowd to start chanting "Go Indians" all the time. Him and Otto do their little thing whenever we score. He does a great job. After seeing what he does with the crowd here, I'm surprised more teams don't try to get someone like him. Well, here is one of the reasons he gets made fun of.

As you can see, the crowd loves him, but at what price.......

Lost game 2 in extra innings, 2-1 in 10 inn.

Game 1

We picked up where we left off last night with 2 outs in the bottom of the 4th with a 2-1 lead. The count was 2-2 and Jared Prince singled on the first pitch and Zach Zaneski homered. Those were the runs we needed. Won game 1, 4-3.

30 minute break, then game 2.

Ken the Intern

There was a video on youtube of a kid beat boxing. We decided it would be a good idea to ask Ken if he thought he could do it too. Here is the result:


Got a game and a half coming up in a few hours.

Home v Salem Day 2

We played almost 4 full innings tonight before the sky opened up. The rain stopped after about 20 minutes and they started getting the field ready. Just as they finished and the field looked ready for us to start again.....more rain came. Game banged.

Tomorrow we will play out the rest of this game and then play a 7 inning game. The good thing is that the only pitcher we used tonight was the starter so we have pretty much everyone available to pitch tomorrow. We will need them all since we will have at least 12 innings to fill.

Until tomorrow......

Clubhouse Snacks

Our booster club in Spokane is quite nice. They load the bus with a ton of snacks and drinks for all of the road trips. They take real good care of the players by giving them a welcome goodie bag when they get here along with a nice pillow (I feel like the odd one out with my tiny travel pillow), a lot of them are host families and let players stay at their houses at little or no cost, and they are always having picnics and bringing pre-game food into the clubhouse. However, every home series there is always a box of stuff in there that is probably not the healthiest for the guys. Finally, Ed put labels on his supplements and the box of food.

Which would you choose?

Spokane Mascots

We are back home in Spokane and just finished game 1 of a 5 game series vs Salem. We did win 5-3 to extend our winning to 10 out of the last 12. Today was baseball card day also.

Our mascots here in Spokane are entertaining and fan friendly. Otto is our main mascot. He's big, he's blue, and still the world's only spokaneasaurus. My daughter loved him and she is 1. She has a little plush Otto and knows him by name. Anyway, here are some pics of him.



Overall I would rate Otto as a good mascot.

Now on to Recycle Man. This guy has done nothing wrong, but for some reason a lot of people don't like him. He is not your typical mascot because he really doesn't do anything. He runs around the stands, calls everyone "citizen", and collects empty bottles to put in the recycle bin. I think he is good for the environment. He may be a little cheesy though. Here is a pic of him. As you can see, he also enjoys posing for pictures.



He does have a hole in the back of that mask for the ponytail and that little satchel he carries is what he puts the bottles in. He likes to dance on the dugout and in the aisles to all the songs they play during the game. I think he really just wants to fit in.

You can form your own opinion.

Tri City Day 3

The last day in Tri-City was pretty uneventful. After golf in the morning, got to hang out in the hotel for a few hours and then go to the ballpark. Check out at the hotel went pretty smoothly.

We won the final game of the series to wrap up our 8 game road trip at 6-2. That makes us 9-2 since the big meeting.

Here is a picture of the Tri-City Dust Devils mascot, Dusty.

What you can't tell from this picture is that this guy is about 5 feet tall. I think his head is supposed to look like a dust devil so the top is flat and it kind of comes down in a cone shape until it gets to his body. As strange as the tiny guy's head is, I would classify him as a fan-friendly mascot. I think the kids like him because he is so small and goofy.

We will be back in Spokane for the next 5 games, then off day, then back on the road for 6. In the next week I'll get some pics of our mascots here at home, more exciting Ken the Intern video, and some homestand highlight. We also got our baseball cards, so I'll be sure to share that great shot with you.

Adios

Tri-City Golf - Horn Rapids

We were able to play golf again this morning at the same place. The team here has an agreement with the course and we were fortunate enough to get passes to play yesterday. Nothing wrong with free golf. Horn Rapids is the third of the tri-cities, Richland. The course has a lot of little springs and waterfalls, both just off the course and at a lot of the houses on the course. I didn't really see any rapids, so I'm not sure where the name came from. The water also only came into play on about 3 of the holes. Yesterday we played at 6:30 and today we got to sleep in since our tee time was 7:40. We had a foursome today of myself, JT, Ack, and Bob Castle, our radio guy. Here are a few highlights....

If they say your true personality comes out on the golf course, then Bob Castle is a freaking maniac. I tried to get video of one of his blowups, but whenever I had the camera going he always seemed to hit a good shot. It is too bad because he had a few good ones. I am surprised he has a full set of clubs in his bag, I would think he would have broken a few by now. In his defense, he said it was his worst round of the year.

Ack was somehow able to hit a house on 2 consecutive shots. The first one was off the tee box and as he was trying to cut the corner, didn't quite make it. The ball bounced off the roof of the house at the bend. As we were all searching near the house for the ball, a guy came to the window and just started staring at us. I got out of there because for once my ball was on the fairway. Anyway, the ball ended up kicking off the roof back inbounds in pretty much a sand pit. So he did end up cutting the corner somewhat. He hits the next shot and falls down in the desert sand and hits a low line drive along the house line. At least it looked like it was along the house line from my angle. I heard him yell as he fell down and I watch the ball go into a porch and absolutely smoke a glass door. It bounces off the door, straight back, and lands in the middle of the neighbor's yard. I guess when you live on a course, you get really sturdy glass. It didn't even leave a mark. Luckily nobody was home or they would have surely came out to see what the commotion was.

JT was his usual, consistent self. He did have a hole where his drive was headed way left, but kicked off the bunker lip or a rake and bounced back into the fairway, hit his 2nd shot just off the green, bladed the 3rd shot that squarely nailed the flagstick and landed 3 feet from the hole, and putted in for par. Living right, I guess. He also eagled the last hole to finish solid.

Lastly, I finally broke 100. I shot a 51 on the front nine and a 48 on the back. I started out pretty bad, 7 over after 3 holes, but was able to rebound from that. If you can call a 99 rebounding. I needed a bogey on 18 to get a 99 and it wasn't looking good after my first shot went way right into the crap. I was able to hit out of that and just missed a par putt, but still got the bogey I needed. That hole did take me twice as many shots as JT though. I think it was mostly due to leaving the driver in the bag. I also decided to start using my sand wedge. I should have started using it sooner.

Well, that was the golf morning. Good times. Here are a few pics of some of the holes and some of the little water "rapids". Enjoy.

Tri-City Day 2

We were able to get out and play some golf this morning. I shot a 104. I guess you can figure that I am not very good. I like to play, but it is hard to find the time to do it. We are going back tomorrow to the same course. It was pretty nice and I will get a few pics to post.

On to the stadium here in Pasco. It is a nice stadium and does not look too old. It is in a complex with some soccer fields and some other stuff. Here is a view of the field.

As you can see it is well manicured and I haven't heard any complaints about how it plays from any of the guys. I am guessing this field will be giving ours a run for best playing surface in the league.

Now lets talk about the shade here. Or should I say, lack of shade. I don't know what it is about some of these stadiums with no roof cover? My best guess is because of all of the snow they get in the winter and they don't want them to collapse. I don't know. Like I said earlier, this is a nice stadium and if you come here to watch a game you would want some shade. Well here is what they have for shade here.

It looks like a bunch of snow plows or bulldozer things just stacked on top of each other. Rumor has it that it cost well over one million dollars also. It is just on the first base side of the stadium

It seems like it does the job when the game starts if you are sitting on that side of the stadium or behind the plate. It just seems like it only covers so much. I bet the guys sitting behind the plate here wish there was a roof so they could find some shade.

They might not have found it where they are sitting in this picture, but if there was a roof they could at least find some shade.

Otherwise, this place is a good place to be. Nice hotel with plenty to do around it. Nice stadium with a good training room. Golf 2 out of the 3 days we are here.

Tomorrow I'll post some golf pics and maybe some mascot pics of the little guy here.

Salem Day 5 cont..../Tri-City Day 1

I couldn't finish off Salem-Keizer without letting you see how strange their mascots are. This first guy is named Crater and is their regular mascot. They are called the Volcanoes, hence "Crater". However, I don't really see any resemblance to anything volcano here. He just looks like a freaky, baseball headed, dinosaur bodied freak. In Spokane we have Otto (pics to come). He is a big furry spokanosaurus. The kids like him. I'm pretty sure Mia would not have anything to do with this guy. Anyway, here he is.


Now on to the other guy. I think it was the second day there, they announced that the FAA just cleared Roof Man to land. I kinda wondered about that, but soon forgot. An inning later I hear a brutal rumbling sound from what sounded like a tiny speaker turned up WAY too loud. All of a sudden up on the roof appears this red costumed guy. Roof Man! I thought we were pushing it with Recycle Man (pics to come), but then I see this......


He stands on the roof in the middle of one inning and just throws out t-shirts. The fans love Roof Man because he gives out stuff. Our fans hate Recycle Man because all he does is pick up your recylables and puts them in the recycle bin. Recycle Man is pretty much Roof Man in a blue suit with a cape added. These are actually pictures from our last night there. I waited every day for him to return, but I guess he can only come out a few times a week. The FAA must be getting stricter....

I'm glad we don't go back there.

Anyway, this morning we leave the hotel in Salem at 8:00 to drive to Tri-City. Our hotel is in Kennewick. When we were arranging everything I asked what time would be ok for us to arrive to be sure our rooms were ready. They said 12:30 would be fine. How did I know it wouldn't? We pull in at about 1:00 and I head up to the desk. I tell the lady "Spokane Indians" and she replies with "of course you are....". That's not good. She proceeds to tell me that she can give me the keys and the rooms should all be clean. But they might not be. If the rooms aren't clean the guys can drop their bags in there and walk next door to the mall while they finish them. No big deal right? I pass out everyone's keys and tell them what's going on. Get back to the front and she says that two of the rooms haven't even checked out yet and apologizes over and over. The two rooms? Tim Hulett, the manager of the team, and mine. Brutal! At least there was a mall next door.

Here are a few pics of the room here. We aer staying at a Red Lion.





Last, but not least, here is a picture of the TV in the room. Somehow doesn't fit in.


That's all for now. Bus at 4:00. We won again last night. New winning streak continues tonight.

Salem Day 5/Hotel

Finally the last game here in Salem-Keizer is tonight. Sorry Keizer, I haven't been giving you enough credit for being boring along with your partner city Salem. I finally got to sleep in today now that I found that "do not disturb" sign. I got up about 10:30 and at about noon went with JT to grab a bite to eat. We decided on Taco Del Mar because the other options were Denny's (tired of that place) or Panda Express (JT's tired of that place). I had the burrito/taco combo. Decided on chicken burrito and steak taco. The chips and salsa were surprisingly good. I would definitely recommend that salsa, tasted like home. Overall, it wasn't bad, I'd eat there again. After that we walked next door to Wal-Mart and walked around a bit. I had to pick up a few fantasy football magazines. Got a few upcoming drafts to prepare for. I figured I should do a little bit of research before I head into those things. Then we came back to the hotel.

This hotel is a pretty nice one. Over the years I have generally figured the nicer the hotel, the less there is to do near it. (Examples: Jackson, MS-Great Doubletree Hotel, not too many food options and no taxis. Savannah, GA-Brutal Days Inn, mall across the street and tons of fast food and restaurants. Same with Birmingham, AL.) That kinda fits with this one. We are staying at a Comfort Suites. It is clean, nice, and the staff is friendly. The only gripe I have is the hiding of the DND sign in the closet! Seriously, when have you ever seen that? Brutal. Here are a few pics of my room. I finally got the camera working again. The only cost was ALL the pics I took at Nike.


Above is a view from the door looking in. The back half has a nice, big bed with the TV and the a/c. The room is separated by that little half wall thing. In the front half is a desk, couch, chair, table, and desk which you can see below.

Right when you walk in that door the bathroom is to one side and the other side has the closet along with a small fridge and microwave. It is a small room, but it has a nice layout and is comfortable. On the road, depending on the game time, we will have a bus between 3:15 and 4:00. It is pretty important to have a comfortable hotel and/or something to do near it because we spend the majority of the day there.

It's 3:30 and we have a 4:00 bus. Gonna do most of my packing now. We have an 8:00 am bus tomorrow for Tri-City, WA for a 3 game series.

I will try to get some pics of the mascots here tonight and put them up. Pretty interesting to say the least.....

Salem Day 4

I got nothing.

This place is pretty uneventful. Maybe if I had a car it would be better. I went to the gym this morning and did some treadmill and stair climber. Came back and walked to Costco with Ed for lunch. It was a cheap lunch.

It was overcast with a slight breeze for the game tonight. Our winning streak finally ended at 6. Lost 3-1. Now I'm sitting in my room waiting for the Domino's dinner.

Adios

Salem Day 3

I'm kinda pissed right now. We spent the morning at the Nike World Headquarters in Beaverton, OR and I took tons of pics. Well, I just tried to download them and none of them worked. And I can't figure out what's wrong. I decided to copy all of the pics on my memory card to my computer and then I'm going to reformat the card. Hopefully that works. If not then I don't know what to do.

On to the good part. We left this morning at 9:00, which is pretty early in baseball time, to head over to Beaverton. There were about 20 guys who decided to wake up and go. First we headed to the employee store where they have plenty of good stuff for up to a little over 50% off the retail price. Between all of us, plenty of money was spent in there in a little over an hour and a half. Almost everyone got shoes and the rest from running gloves and hats all the way to a full new golf ensemble along with new clubs. I got myself a few shirts, some sweats, and some Nike+ running stuff for the iPod along with new headphones. I also got Mia 3 pairs of shoes and a few nice little outfits and Toni a jacket, workout pants, a few sportsbras and a watch. All in all a great visit. Can't pass up the discount!

Next we went over to the Nike campus. One of our pitchers, Matt Thompson, has a cousin, Heather (Thanks for everything!), that took us on a great tour of the place. It is the place to work! They have 2 daycare centers, a full cafeteria, and tons of places to workout. As long as you get your work done, it seems like they encourage all of the employees to stay fit. They had soccer fields, sand volleyball, swimming pool, putting green, tennis courts, rock wall, running trails, and the standard gym. I think I saw more people excercising than working at that place! She said that they have 6,000 employees there. Sorry there are no pics, but the campus is beautiful. All of the buildings are named after one of their elite athletes. The ones that I can think of are Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan, Nolan Ryan, Mike Schmidt, Ken Griffey Jr, Dan Fouts, Jerry Rice, Pete Sampras, Mia Hamm, Lance Armstrong, Steve Prefontaine, and a few other guys. I will try to get pics from some of the other guys that took some. Hopefully they had cameras that worked.

We also won tonight's game 6-2. I don't know if it was the meeting that turned us around or the blog. I'm guessing it was the blog.....

Here are a few cool pics from last night's game. The moon was in a cool spot and thought I would try a pic. They are from my phone, so not that great quality, but you get the idea.