It’s been a while.
I’d been hoping to go to a Chihuahuas
game earlier in the season with Ron and some co-workers. Our schedules haven’t worked out, but maybe
later this season. This Saturday, my
place of business paid for a group outing to the ballpark. They’ve offered this before, but this was the
first time I took them up on it. (Though
it’s not the first time I’ve attended a business picnic at the park,
8-23-15. That was with Ron’s
previous job.) Ron hadn’t been
interested in going with me until this year.
Since he was fired by my workplace a few years ago, that’s not surprising. Enough time has passed to where he’s over
it. For my part, I needed him for a
ride.
I should discuss some the new pace-of-play rules changes
in Triple-A this season. There’s been a pitch clock for a few
years. Now to go with that, batters can
only step out of the box once in an at bat and pitchers can only step off
twice. The strikezone is now called by
the Hawkeye system, so no more
arguing with the home plate ump (though the fans still boo them). As soon as these changes fully kicked in,
they made a difference in game play.
Games are now closer to two-and-a-half hours than three or more. One road game I listened to earlier in the
season, they actually delayed the start of game so that it would be more likely
to be dark for the fireworks when it finished.
I kind of wish I’d been blogging about the Chihuahuas this
season. Unlike last years’ losing
season, this has been an interesting year.
I’ll just mention a couple of items off the top of my head. Robinson
Cano joined the team for a while and played well enough to get his contract
purchased by another team. The team has
hit well. A couple of players have been
called up to the Padres, but the
pups keep swinging. I got to watch a
game over the Internet when it was featured on MLB.TV. Broadcaster, Tim Hagerty’s, son commentated with him
for an inning, since it was Father’s Day.
(It was cute.) The Chihuahuas are
carrying a knuckleball pitcher.
In play, I’ve heard a game where the Chihuahuas hit two
grand slam home runs. (That was a win,
but the final score was uncomfortably close.)
The team had the Sports Center
play of the day with a diving catch into the netting. There was a dispute on a Chihuahua home run that
was close to foul pole. The opposing
manager charged out on field to protest while the batter was still rounding the
bases. After a conference by the umps
confirmed the homer (no replay in the minors, thank goodness) the manager and
the opposing pitcher were ejected for their subsequent emphatic protests.
This week on Thursday, the Chihuahuas were down by four
runs twice to the Round Rock Express
in the game, but still won in the tenth inning.
On Friday, the pups went down six runs early, but won it in the ninth. It’s been like that a lot this season. I was feeling good about going to this game.
Ron picked me up pretty early. There was some bad road construction going on
El Paso, but the traffic was reasonably light.
We got there about when the gates opened an hour before the game. We strolled along the concourse and watched
some very pretty girls walk past. The
team shop was a bit disappointing on their lack of selection. We passed on the food since there was
supposed to be food provided for the picnic.
I still wanted a bag of kettle corn.
I made the mistake of not buying one, because I didn’t want to carry
around a big bag of popcorn. There was
supposed to be popcorn at the picnic, but there wasn’t. I forgot to get some on the way out.
It was UTEP
night at the stadium. The hat looks
pretty sharp, but I didn’t see any at the stadium. I’m also not sure if they were giving away
the hat or selling them from reading the ad, which was being handed out at the
gate. There were tables set up at the
main gate with a few UTEP athletes there.
As an NM State fan, I’m not
that interested in UTEP, but I do listen to some of their games at times. (Unlike other Aggie fans, at least I don’t hate the Miners.)
I didn’t expect to get some Volleyball girl autographs at a Chihuahuas game, but I did. It’s a nice big glossy autograph card,
too. I feel like taking this to an Aggie
game and finding AD Mario Moccia and
showing this him. There were three girls
there. I chatted with them about Coach Wallis for a minute and betrayed
my actual allegiances. They signed for
me anyway. I regret not going by the
other athletes, basketball and football players I think, to get their
autographs. They all looked miserable,
like animals on display in a zoo. Worse,
they were probably volunteers for the duty.
Ron and I found the El
Paso Locomotive team shop (who also play at the stadium) on the way to the Santa Fe Pavilion. I wanted a t-shirt. I don’t expect to go to a game any time soon
and they don’t show their games on local TV anymore, but I still wanted a
shirt. The store closed. I asked an attendant later, and he said they
were only open during Locomotive games, which seems like at least one lost sale
(me) and probably more. I got to look in
through the window when we were leaving stadium. They had a bunch of nice t-shirts there.
Our pavilion was on top and was mostly empty when we got
there. I saw one co-worker, who was
there before us. There wasn’t any food
available at the time. We did have
access to the club next door. There was
food there, but we weren’t sure if it was available to us. In any case, you couldn’t really see the
field well from the club and there was glare on the windows. It might be better after the sun goes
down. We went back outside.
The field looked in good shape, which you can see well
from the outfield seats. There’s been
lots of rain in the area lately. The
field has taken a beating from hosting soccer matches. Ron pointed out a nice WWII memorial behind
the stadium featuring large-scale statues of soldiers in action. Strangely, the nearest TV monitor to our
seats showing It’s a Wonderful Life
on a sports channel. Later, it switched
to Dodgers and Angels. Our game was on
another monitor further away, which I couldn’t see until the sun went
down.
After the game started, suddenly, the pavilion was full of
co-workers. One of them as a new one, Melika Ofoia. She was the catcher for the Aggie Softball team this season and had
graduated. I felt a bit bad that I had
given up on the team this year. She
showed me her championship ring from last season and it was impressive. (And I felt worse in that I didn’t even
realize they’d won it until I noticed the new wall banner at the start of the
season.)
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