How I Spent My Summer Vacation July 2019 Part 3

7-8-19

Home Run Derby Day! It’s a party! Actually, it’s a double Derby Day! The MLB and Triple-A would both be conducting their home run contests tonight. As host for the Triple-A All-Star Game, El Paso’s Southwest University Park (that’s a mouthful) was home for the event and being broadcast over the radio on KROD. Home run derby over the radio? If there was video, I don’t where it was. There were just a couple of clips on the Chihuahuas’ Twitter feed.

Steve Kaplowitz brought his daily Sportstalk show live from the ballpark. I tuned in at work, after unburying myself from a pile of paperwork, and delightfully heard him interviewing the iconoclastic Cody Decker himself. He was there with his wife, Jennifer Decker (Jen Sterger). I just missed the reason why he was on the air: Cody was formally announcing his retirement from baseball. He’d hit a walkoff home run in his last at bat for the Reno Aces and decided to call it a career. Baseball, I think, will be poorer for his absence.

So, Cody will be moving on to a broadcasting career. No surprise there. Him and his wife will be hosting a national sportstalk show. Hopefully, we’ll have a local affiliate. The couple is also looking for a house in El Paso. Cody also plans on running a baseball sports clinic in town. So, he’ll be around the area. How do we get him up here to Las Cruces for an Aggie Baseball game?

Tim Hagerty came on later. Him and Steve were out on field to call the home run derby. They both had gloves with them in case anything came in their direction. The players for the event were on the concourse signing autographs. Oh man, as much as I wished I was there, now I really wished I was there.

I was working pretty hard while I was listening, but I finally got done and was able to retreat to the break room to take in the MLB Home Run Derby. I’d missed the first round. I wasn’t the only one missing. During the Rangers’ game on the weekend, the guys were breaking down the derby. Minutes later on TV, the crawl on the YES broadcast of the Yankees’ game, reported that the MLB home run leader, Christian Yelich, had pulled out of the contest with a “bad back,” which messed up the Rangers’ announcers picks. I’ll have a “hot take” on this in tomorrow’s ASG entry. I have to get some asbestos gloves to write it first. (You thought I just flamed Women’s Soccer? I got more some heat left.)

When I got to watching, rookie Vladimir Guererro Jr. was up there taking hacks that his free-swinging old man would be proud of. He’d pounded out 29 in his first round. Here in the second round, him and Joc Pederson were in an epic battle. They went to a third tie-breaker. Good thing somebody had planned for this. Vlad finally came out on top in the three-swing challenge, winning 40 to 39.

The final would be between Vlad and Pete Alonso. The player’s music was drowning out the announcers’ call of the action. I’m not sure if that was really an improvement. Of course, the commentary was inane (even without hearing “Back, back, back, back!), but the music was muted with the announcers sounding like obnoxious crowd chatter. Pete won it and was completely exhausted in the interview. Vlad must have needed oxygen and an intravenous drip afterward. He’d hit 91 home runs total, absolutely shattering the previous record. (It’s the balls, people.)

Back to El Paso, Ty France was representing the Chihuahuas for the contest and was wearing his Fourth of July Stars and Stripes jersey. He made it into the second round. Steve was chatting with former Chihuahua pitcher, Jay Jackson, during part of the contest. It was really interesting as Jackson talked about playing in Japan. Steve and Tim had already warned the audience that they weren’t going to hit-by-hit commentary on the competition. Given this was over the radio that was probably the way to go.

Tim took his glove and his phone to the outfield to shag flies with the kids in front of the green “seats” in center. The grassy knoll was filled as this was prime ball-catching territory. Tim took some heckling for missing a ball and proclaimed he was prepared to knock over a kid to get a ball. Former big leaguer, Yasmany Tomas, took on Ty France in one of the semi’s. “I got it! I got it!” Tim caught one of Yasmany’s balls. Afterward, he said that was the most fun he’d had at the ballpark in his career. I don’t doubt it; he sounded like kid out there having fun. Tim had had the option of taking today off. Instead, he’d come out and brought his family. Steve did make sure that Tim was able to spend some time with them during the broadcast.

Ty put on a show with some majestic shots, but just came up short, losing 20 to 19. After getting a drink, he came on afterward. Ty was completely gassed. He challenged anyone to swing that hard that many times in a minute and not get out-of-breath. Tomas would win it for the PCL over the IL in the competition. He had 59 homers total and came on afterward with a translator. Okay, this was all fun, except that these two events were basically on at the same time and I was at work. Also, I’m super jealous of anybody who went to the event in El Paso.