Bristol Pirates

Greeneville Astros

Elizabethton Twins

The Annual Cow Milking Contest

1.  Go see the E.Twins before the M.Twins pull the plug at the end of the year.
2.  The City Council has finally agreed to put 1.5 million into the park and I hope it's not too little too late.
3.  Once again, I made it to the annual cow milking contest - Bluefield won this year - they had a ringer - although the cow showed her displeasure with Bluefield by having a quick evacuation as the players leapt away.
4. As has now happened 18 out of the 19 years they've had this contest, the team that won the milking contest won the game (Bluefield pretty much stomped 'em).
5. I love the old codgers yelling "Throw it over his head!" - "No, throw it in the dirt!" - "No! Throw it over his head!" at the opposing pitcher.
6. The older lady you can hear in the video was yelling all sorts of helpful advice to the players and coaches. At one point she really wanted the ETwins pitcher pulled and her voice rang out clear as a bell while she spent most of the inning telling the coach. Finally, another older lady turned from another part of the park: "Mary, if you want him gone so bad, why don't you go out there and pitch!"
7. Elizabethton is a great place to watch a game. I hope the Twins stay and I hope they don't screw with the layout out the fans' part of the stadium.

Kingsport Mets

Throwing the wrong way.

Get that ball.

1.  Shade over the seats on the first base side and blazing sunlight on the third base side. So, there are better seats behind the visitors dugout then the home.
2.  Because of the way the stadium is built, kids were able to put the players in the dugouts under siege begging balls and bats throughout the entire game. The KMets players in front of me handled it well.
3.  Fireworks on a Monday night. Not sure why.
4.  The KMets were slamming the ball and the game was never really in doubt.

Johnson City Cardinals

The Cool Kids

 

Who's getting married?

Just a little outside!

1.  I like the improvements to the stands. They've removed the chain link fence and replaced it with a net you can actually see around.
2.  Not a big fan of the astroturf field.
3.  The souvenir shop still doesn't sell anything you can hang on your wall.
4.  They had a great all-you-can-eat buffet for a few extra bucks. I ate about $15 worth of hot dogs and hamburgers (sans bread) and popcorn. I don't know if they do this every Wednesday, but if they do it's a good deal.
5.  The Cardinals lost to a Bristol Pirates team which kept putting in a run here and another thre until it ended at C0-P5.

Bluefield Blue Jays

Birdie

Orange Seats at the Blue Jays (were Orioles for over 50 years)

1. 600+ people. A pretty good size crowd for the Appalachian League on a Sunday night.
2.  The Bluefield Blue Jays were playing the Princeton Rays from 20 minutes down the road so there were fans from both sides.
3.  First time I've been to this stadium and actually seen people sitting in the formed plastic "box seats." Every year I come back expecting these to be replaced with at least folding wooden chairs - not that it matters much to me because they won't sell box seats to outsiders.
4.  The fans were having a fun night and the kids were chasing Birdie around the park all night.
5.  Both sides kept putting up a few runs here and there, but the Blue Jays also made a couple errors and lost by two in the end.

West Virginia Black Bears

Water pooled on astro-turf field getting ready to be squeegeed.

Cooper (the mascot) wearing the jersey they were auctioning off.

1.  The game started an hour and five minutes late because of rain.
2.  Water pooled on the astroturf and didn't sink in after the rain ended. They had to go over the field with push brooms and squeegees to spread it out to evaporate.
3.  The coach for the Black Bears looked like he took some real convincing before he agreed to play on the field.
4.  The Black Bears were struggling until the 6th inning when the Batavia Muckdogs fell apart. Passed balls, absolutely missed easy infield pop-ups, and just nightmarishly bad play all around led to 6 runs and a permanent lead for the Black Bears.
5.  The crowd was over 2,300 and they stayed for the hour delay and had a blast during the game.
6.  The Black Bears ran away with a 9 - 3 win.

Lake County Captains

"If you do right, is no defense."

And there it goes.

There must have been a different logo once upon a time.

1.  Self serve beer.
2.  Claimed attendance was over 3,100, but I'm not sure where 2,600 of them were.
3.  I sat in the outfield at the picnic tables, which was a pretty good spot.
4.  The game went back and forth, but the hometown heroes fell short by a run.
5.  I have now seen all the professional baseball teams in Ohio. The list now includes Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama (it had included North Carolina until two new teams were relocated there).
6.  And, of course, after two days of blessed silence, fireworks start up again.

Cleveland Indians

Who knew the Indians play in Gotham?

1.  Yes, I know that these Indians aren't a minor league team, but I needed them to get all the professional teams in Ohio.
2.  This is a great stadium. My experience with MLB stadiums is limited, but this is my favorite so far.
3.  That is one monster huge scoreboard.
4.  The Indians staff and fans were having a blast and the people running things were doing an amazing job ramping everyone up. The monster huge scoreboard was great for this.
5.  There were only 19,000 people present for the game, but it felt like there were many, many more.
6.  "Club Seats" were a rip off. They were good seats, but I feel like I probably could have gotten just as good seats elsewhere without the extra price. The limited access concourse for the club area had carpet so that it was quieter, but it was just as or more slammed than the regular concourse concessions. There was no service at your seat and the only concessionaire who walked through was selling cotton candy. The Cincinnati Reds' "Scout Seats" do this better at a cheaper price.
7.  Other than the fact that I didn't know enough about the stadium to buy the correct seats for myself, this was an all around great experience. It felt a lot like a minor league experience except outsized and increased in fun because of the size of the stadium and crowd. There were local traditions and cheers that everybody knew (the OHIO song was loads of fun) and there were war drums playing throughout most of the game. At first I thought this was over the speakers and then I realized there was actually a guy out in the outfield bleachers playing them.
8. They almost entirely ignored the movies. Then in the 9th they played "Wild Thing" when San Diego subbed out its pitcher.
9. Go now! Just drop all your work and start driving to Cleveland. You won't regret it.