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Monthly Archives: March 2000

Mar 28 2000: Comeback Dreams

Tom Pagnozzi announced his retirement today. About a week ago Tim Raines did the same. You may not know who both these guys are, but their stories are similar. Both were players who were sidelined by injury or illness last year (Raines by the immune system disease lupus, Pagnozzi by a shoulder injury that required […]

Mar 26 2000: Thoughts of Spring: Little League

Spring has come to Boston, and I don’t just mean the temperature got warm. We’ve had some 65 degree days here and there since February, but this weekend people really started taking it seriously. Or, maybe seriously isn’t the right word, because damn it looked like people were having fun. The first thing I noticed […]

March 22: Right Place, Right Time (Blue Jays at Yankees)

Another day, another trip to Legends Field, right? Wrong. Because this time the weather finally turned clear! It was still chilly for Florida, but the sun was bright and the breeze snappy as we pulled into the parking lot a good three hours before game time. Surely there was no excuse for the Yankees to […]

Mar 24 2000: Autograph Hounding 101

Well, there’s one surefire way to get an autograph, and that’s to buy something pre-signed. But where’s the fun in that? The point is not to have the autograph, so much as to have the record of having been there, in the same place at the same time, as the player himself. That’s why people […]

Mar 23 2000: Does Every Fan Secretly Wish…?

So I learned about an amazing thing today. Women’s Major League Baseball. Right here in New England there’s the WNEBL, Women’s New England Baseball League, and according to American Women’s Baseball League there are women’s leagues/teams in fourteen states, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, New Jersey, Ohio, […]

Mar 19 2000: What To Tell Your Friends Who Think Baseball is Boring/Wimpy

Alright, if you’re one of those people who doesn’t understand baseball, who thinks it’s boring and nothing ever happens, here’s what you need to know if you’re ever kidnapped and forced to watch a game and would like to at least try to enjoy it. George Carlin aside, if what you need to get hooked […]

Mar 17 2000: Spring Training Day Five – Day Without Baseball #2

So, as mentioned above, we couldn’t get Braves tickets. And as with the Red Sox game we missd,the Yanks creamed ’em (this time like 24 to 7 or something). Apparently, the Braves had a split squad day, and sent all their rookies to Legends Field. Steinbrenner reportedly went “ballistic” over the dis, but hey, the […]

Mar 16 2000: Spring Training Day Four – Sarasota

After the game in Clearwater, we dropped Dad off at the airport and he went back to New Jersey (he’d already been on vacation when we met him, playing golf in Orlando, so we had to let him get back to work). That evening we were supposed to pick up corwin (my significant other) and […]

Mar 15 2000: Spring Training Day Three – Clearwater

Among the games we did NOT see in our week in Florida were the Red Sox game in Fort Myers and the Braves game at Legends Field. Despite my best and earliest efforts, both games were sold out before I could get tickets. So technically, Day Three of our vacation was a Day Without Baseball, […]

Mar 14 2000: Spring Training Day Two – Legends Field

On March 7th we got up early with the intention of getting to Legends Field in time to see morning batting practice. We really didn’t know what to expect, only that we’d heard that practice started 3 hours prior to games. So we pulled our rental car on the gargantuan parking field adjacent to Raymond […]