We had our first rain out of the season last night. The night before there was a short rain delay
to start the game. Welcome to the
Florida State League! Hopefully, Mother
Nature will be kinder to us than she was last season. Not only is it tough on the team, but the
staff has to endure seeming endless tarp pulls and prepping the field for
play. It affects the ticket sales,
attendance numbers and concession sales as well. Not to mention us fans! For those who missed it last season, one of
our media moguls, Michael West, created a great video called “Tarp, The Movie
trailer”. You can check it out on
YouTube or by clicking here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pft7ufdKQ7U
The first series of the season didn’t go as well as I hoped
for. We finished the Brevard games 1-3.
The bright side is the 3 losses were by 1 run each and our win was by a
score of 13-2! I believe this is a very
strong team and once they get acclimated, we will see great things out of this
club.
Due to yesterday’s rain-out, tonight is our first double
header. We will be going up against the
Dunedin Blue Jays. We faced them in the
Division Championship last year and they had a tough team, despite losing most
of their prospect during the year. Most
of the players on their team have had at least some experience in FSL play. In
addition they have a strong coaching staff which includes Manager, Omar Malave and my favorite active pitching coach, FSL Hall of Famer Darold Knowles. One of the things I love most about minor league baseball is that we get to know players, coaches and their families on a much different level then in the big leagues. I count knowing Darold and his beautiful wife Lynne as members of my baseball family and a great blessing. It is apparent that they love baseball, life and each other!
As a side note about Darold, the first time I actually met him was in 2007. Growing up, I was a huge fan of the Oakland A's. My dad taught me a love for baseball, but he was a pretty traditional guy. Being the rebellious sort, I dubbed the A's as my team, primarily because of the colorful uniform and colorful players. As I recall, they were one of the first teams to sport long hair and facial hair. I loved them and it drove my dad crazy. When I was 13, I had a collection of tropical fish, all named after A's players. I had 2 blue fish, one named Odom and one named Vida. A catfish named...Hunter, and a beautiful red tailed swordfish named Darold. I told him the story about my fish and he looked at me a bit strangely (to say the least), but he signed a baseball for me and I went along my way. That same year, Daytona hosted the FSL All Star game and Darold was the pitching coach. I bid on and won his jersey at the auction held during the game. I wasn't able to get it signed that night, but I took it with me the next time Daytona visited Dunedein. I went up to him before the game and asked him to sign my jersey. He replied...Hey, your the fish lady! (I blushed and said I was) and he signed my jersey. Since that day, I always made it a point to stop and say hello to him whenever Daytona played Dunedin. Before long, I started seeing him at League events and I met his wife, Lynne a couple of years later and we have become friends. They are some of the many wonderful friends I have met through baseball.
But tonight, after greeting Darold and welcoming him back to Daytona with a hug, I will cheer on my boys and root for our bats to rough up his pitchers and hope we end up with a W at the end. I'll keep you posted!
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