This is the game I was telling you about on Thursday.  Gotta love that crazy hop and the walk-off!

Friday was a washout and they will play now today.

So, this morning, during breakfast, my son and I are watching the baseball highlights from last night on Quick Pitch. And, they were showing the Cubs game.

As we are viewing it, he says that Wrigley Field looks nice.

To this, I tell him that they mostly play day games there, and, until somewhat recently, they used to play only day games at Wrigley.

He was surprised to learn this – and it makes sense that it’s news to him since he’s only 8-years old.

Seeing his reaction, I told him that night games were not always played.  I explained that they started, for the most part, when Grandpa (my father) was a young boy.  And, that back when Babe Ruth played, all the games were played during the day.

His eyes got wide when I told him this and he said “That’s cool.  I wish it was like that now.  You know how I can’t stay up and watch the end of the game now?  I would never miss a game if they were all played during the day.”

When he said that, I then explained to him that it would not be as nice as he thought since the games were played when people were in school or at work.

His answer?  “That’s O.K. – because I could still watch the replay.”

As you can see, we were not done here yet.  After his comment, I then explained that there were no games on T.V. on a regular basis back then – and that having them televised, on a regular basis, is something that’s only like 50 years old.  “Back when they played all the game during the day,” I told him, “the only way people found out about the game was listening on the radio or reading about it in the newspaper.”

“Yeah, but, I could still get the scores on my iPod” was his answer to my information.

At this point, all I could do was laugh.

The Cubs fan made me laugh out loud.

It’s Section 3 champ Robbinsville against Section 1 champ Ridgewood.

I have seen both of these teams play, against Livingston, and was impressed by each squad.

Either way, New Jersey is going to have a deserving 11U Champ after this contest.

Kudos to Phil Phillips for having his song featured in the trailer…

This is so cool.

My 8-year old son has been asked to play for a 8U Travel Baseball team – starting this Fall.

From all reports, the organization he’s been asked to join is very good.  In fact, they went undefeated this past Spring and have not lost a game yet this Summer (to date).

He’s very excited to be asked to play for the team.  So, I am extremely happy for him.

But, at the same time, I am wondering if there’s more to this than I am aware?  I know that it’s a commitment.

Anyone out there have any experience with being on a travel team, or as a parent of a player on a travel team, that they are willing to share?

My daughter is 10-years old and my son is 8-years old.

We’ve been taking them to baseball games since they were very young.

And, we have some games still on our schedule for this year.

As a family, we’re making a trip down to Camden Yards (for the first time). We also have a Somerset Patriots game next month.  And, my son has two Yankees games coming up – along with a Trenton Thunder game (TBD). My daughter has another Yankees game coming too. (I only have two seats for the Yankees. So, the kids have to take turns going with me.)

I just did a tally of the games that they’ve seen, so far, in person – not including the games that they have coming up. Here it is:

On average, they’re doing about 5 or 6 games a season.

I suspect that my son will start to take a larger lead in this race.  He loves playing baseball and watching it is his second passion.  We even go to the local Little League to watch the tournament games.  (We’re like the only ones there sometimes who doesn’t have a family member or friend playing in the game.)  If it were up to him, we would go see a game in-person every week.

My daughter used to be into it.  At one point, I had her keeping track of the game using a scorecard.  She was good at it. There was a time where she would root at the games and insist on not leaving our seats until the final out was made.  But, now that she’s ten, she’s losing interest in it.  As such, I think it’s going to be my son and I going to games – and then my wife and daughter will do something else.

She still likes to go if it’s a fireworks night or if there’s some nice give-away.  But, she’s not really interested in watching the game for a full nine innings – whereas my son is locked into what’s happening on the field.

We did all go to Yankees Stadium, as a family of four, the day that Derek Jeter got his 3,000th hit.  (I bought those at StubHub.)  That’s a game that we’ll never forget.

I have a ticket stub saved from every game that they’ve ever attended – even if it’s a printout of one that I bought on-line.  I would like to keep doing that until they start going to games on their own without me.

Now, that will be a happy and sad day for me.  It will be nice that they will want to attend a game – even if I am not there.  But, it will also somewhat sting a little as well (being left out).  But, I have some time before that will start to happen.

I didn’t attend my first pro-game until I was 10 1/2 years old.  (Don’t blame my parents – I wasn’t interested until that time.)

How about you?  When did you start going to baseball games?  And, if you have kids, when did they start going?

Here’s the story.

Dave Studeman is a good guy, from my dealings with him in the past. I wish him well with this transaction.

Andy Griffith passed away today.

Condolences to Buck Showalter.

My eight-year old son asked me about this today.

In his Little League game last night, he was playing first base.  On one play, there was a somewhat errant throw.  He eventually corralled it with the glove – but he was stretched out on the ground when it happened.  And, the only play he had at that point was to tag the base with his throwing hand.

Of course, the batter/runner was out.  But, he asked me about it today – wanting to know why it was O.K., and the batter was out, when he tagged the base with his hand that did not contain the baseball.

I explained to him that this was no different than if he had caught the ball and tagged the base with his foot – as he would normally make the play at first after catching a throw.  And, that the only time that there was no “electricity” (to borrow a term from my youth) allowed was when you were tagging the runner (and not that base).   In order to retire a runner, you had to tag him with the ball, or, tag him with your glove while the ball was inside it.

Yet, afterwards, when I was alone, I thought about this some more. 

Yes, there is a difference between forcing someone out at a base and tagging them out between the bases.  And, yes, it would be very awkward to have to tag the base with the ball every time you had a force play there.  But, why not allow that “electricity” rule when tagging a runner since it’s acceptable when “tagging” a base? 

Maybe it goes back to the days of soaking (or plugging) the runner – where you could retire the player if you hit him with a thrown ball?  Perhaps that’s where the ball on runner contact was established?

I don’t know.  And, I am not saying that retiring runners without a ball tag should be allowed.  I’m just curious why it’s required on a tag of the runner but not on the tag of a base.  And, it’s funny that I have never thought about this in the forty years that I’ve been a baseball fan – until asked today about it by my son.

Via Peter Kafka:

Bleacher Report and Turner, which have been circling each other for months, are edging closer to a deal. People familiar with both companies say they haven’t agreed on final terms, but are now negotiating exclusively and have agreed on a price: If the transaction goes through, Time Warner’s cable network unit is set to pay more than $200 million for the sports site.

The logic for the deal is that Turner has a small presence in online sports — it manages sites like PGA.com and NBA.com, but doesn’t own them — and Bleacher Report’s nine-million-plus visitors will help fix that.

But it’s worth nothing that, up until this spring, Turner used to have a much bigger presence in online sports, via an arranged marriage that didn’t seem to make either participant very happy: For the last couple years, Turner managed Sports Illustrated’s Web site on behalf of Time Warner’s Time Inc.

Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes is famously uninterested in corporate synergy, so I’m not quite sure why he thought having the cable guys sell ads for the print guys would work. And from what I could tell, no one on either side liked the deal. The guys who made the content for the site thought the ad guys didn’t do a bang-up job, and vice versa*.

But that pairing ended in divorce this quarter, and Turner’s sports group has said it was going to create its own “branded digital destination.”

Perhaps they’ve decided that buying is easier than building. As it turns out, Bleacher Report’s traffic matches up almost precisely with SI.com’s, according to comScore.

Hey, Turner, if you’re interested, you can have this site for…well…make me an offer.

Great story in case you missed it.

Donna Summer – Last dance (Thank God It's Friday) by mickeynold

Another icon passes.

Nice try Devils.

If anyone knows of any places that buy/sell or consign used sports team-wear in the NJ/NY/CT area, please let me know. I have a friend with a huge collection of caps and other things that they may be looking to move.

What has he not been in?

Funny.

Funny stuff.

And, he’s been doing it for a while now.

Craig Carton had a good point this morning – Has there ever been a QB to win two Superbowl MVPs where his team was the underdog in both games? And, Mike Francesa had a good point this afternoon – There’s only one QB in the history of New York football to win two Superbowls and his name is not Namath or Simms.  It’s Manning.

And, Eli is his name.

I know it seems like a cliché. But, it will be a close game determined by turnovers and the ability to protect the quarterback.

The team that does the best job in those two area will win the game.

Here is the story.

Always very sad when someone thinks things are so bad that it’s not worth living.

Gotta be in it, to win it, right?

He really looks unhappy here.  Then again, I would probably have the same reaction.

This is very funny.  The end – after the credits – is pure LOL stuff.

Better than A-Rod!

Maybe the Packers can use the time off now to go get some haircuts?

I want to say it was around 9 years ago that Baseball Prospectus was huge.  But, does anyone visit that site and/or read their books any more?