Wildfire Season

There's a long introduction explaining the origins of the song...by singer Jobi Riccio. 

 

Of course one problem is that Wildfire Season is now 365 days in some places.

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Baseball Stadium additions

Globe Life Field, Texas versus Seattle Friday July 

I've seen professional baseball in dozens of ballparks -- many of them no longer open or even standing. My Dad and Mom took me to my first major league game in the early 1970s (I have not made an effort to pinpoint the game and my ticket stub collection is incomplete). It was in the old Municipal Stadium in KC so the game was probably in 1971 or 1972. Growing up in Kansas, this helped cement my lifelong fandom of the Kansas City Royals. In my youth, the team was terrific and George Brett was a huge star and eventual Hall of Famer. I attended his induction ceremony in Cooperstown. During college at Kansas, I occasionally made it to the park then known as Royals Stadium (now Kauffman, after the original owner). 

From 1984-1987 I lived within easy driving distance of old Memorial Stadium in Baltimore and attended many games while in graduate school in College Park. With friends, I also road-tripped to Philly, Boston, and New York -- seeing the Mets at Shea. I attended Yankee Stadium during the Cooperstown weekend. Two buddies from grad school also went with me to spring training 1987 and we saw 8 baseball games in 7 days, but these were all exhibitions in minor league parks or training facilities. 

While a doctoral fellow at Stanford I attended several A's games in the Colliseum and one Giants game in Candlestick. The next 3 years I lived in Chicago and went to numerous White Sox games at old Comiskey and a few Cubs games at Wrigley. I lived walking distance to the latter, but was an AL fan. From Chicago I road tripped to Milwaukee a couple of times to see the Brewers. 

On my honeymoon, my wife and I attended a Mariners game in the Kingdome. Before you say that is not very romantic, keep in mind that this was during the second week of that trip. On our 10th wedding anniversary, we went to Montreal for an Expos game at the Big O. 

Since moving to Louisville in 1991, I've seen the Reds in Cincy a number of times (2 different parks!) and have trekked to St. Louis to see the Cardinals (2 parks).  During trips to visit friends and family, I've seen the Nationals in DC (2 parks). On vacations over the years, I've managed to attend games in Detroit (2 parks), Toronto, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland (2 parks). On conference travel, I saw the Braves in Atlanta. Travel has also taken me back to Seattle and Chicago so I've seen new parks in those cities too. 

Earlier this month, I attended the SABR National Convention and added Texas's Globe Life Field to my list of parks (pictured above). Despite living in Waco for an academic year, and having a sister in Houston for many years, I never attended a Texas (or Houston) home game before.  In any case, the conference was fun and I had a chance to catch up with some old friends both at the conference and in the DFW area. My favorite panels involved a mix of former players, baseball journalists, and a former union lawyer-executive (Don Fehr). The players on these panels included Hall of Famer Ferguson Jenkins, former Expos pitcher Steve Rogers, and old knuckleballer Dodger-Ranger Charlie Hough. 

Adding Texas means that I've now seen 20 major league franchises in their home parks in 21 cities (Expos became Nationals). In August, I plan to make my first visit to Dodger Stadium to see LA versus San Diego. 

I'm not even going to attempt to list all the minor league parks I've visited over the years, but I've often blogged about those experiences. This summer I added Rochester where I attended a game on Memorial Day.  I've often organized minor league trips to see specific top-rated prospects who became future stars --  Bobby Witt was in Omaha when that team played Columbus in Ohio, I saw Vlad Guerrero Jr. (and Bo Bichette) in A ball in Lansing, Michigan, and Pete Crow-Armstrong in South Bend. The visiting team in Rochester this summer, Guardians affiliate the Columbus Clippers, featured Chase DeLauter. He homered. Remember that name even if he's not guaranteed to be a future all-star. 


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