Last Wednesday, my dad and I flew in to Phoenix for Spring Training. It was our second year in a row of watching baseball that doesn’t matter in the Valley of the Sun, and this year’s trip was even better than the last. Of course, the outcomes of the games don’t mean anything. The players we know only play four or five innings a game (if at all) and the mid-day heat of the Arizona can bother even the most ardent of fans. But none of that is important to us as we spend a few days in the sun enjoying not only the game we love, but also the return of spring and the hope of another Rockies playoff run—all of that adding up to what my brother Sean (himself not even a baseball fan) appropriately calls “The Baseball Feeling”.
The trip started with a visit to the Rangers’ facility in Surprise. Although driving in stop-and-go traffic up dreaded Grand Avenue was an ordeal, the Rockies won a wild and wacky game over the defending AL champions, 11-10. Among the unsurprising portions of the game were a towering blast by a minor-leaguer off of former Rockies closer Franklin Morales, a wild Rockies comeback in the late innings, and not one but two instances of poor baserunning by Eric Young Jr., one of the fastest but also one of the poorest baserunners in the game. With the winning run at the plate in the ninth, the Rangers hit into a game-ending line-drive double play to seal a bizarre win for the Rockies.
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June 9, 2011
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Posted by Mike Rosenbaum
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