6/3/08 at Citizens Bank Park

It’s hard to call this day “a waste” considering I snagged 10 more balls, but that’s pretty much how I feel.

Once again, I drove from New York City to Philadelphia (this time by myself) to try to catch Ken Griffey Jr.’s 600th career home run–and once again, the aging superstar wasn’t in the
starting lineup. Of course I didn’t find this out until the lineups were announced prior to the first pitch, but I knew something was wrong because Griffey never came out for BP.

Speaking of BP…
I snagged three balls in the first 20 minutes by using my glove trick in left field. I had to lean way out over the flower bed for all three, and if you forget what that looks like, check out my last entry.

A little bit later, while the Phillies were still on the field, I caught two home runs on a fly in a one-minute span. The first might’ve been hit by Pedro Feliz. I’m not sure, and it was fairly routine. I moved down a few steps, cut to my left through the empty third row, and reached up for the easy grab. My second catch,
however, would’ve made every highlight reel in North America if it happened during the game. Pat Burrell launched a deep fly ball that was heading about 10 feet to my left, so I got in line with it by moving into the middle of my row. At first, the ball appeared to have the perfect distance, but as it began to descend I realized that it was going to sail a bit over my head…so I took my eye off the ball for an instant and climbed onto a seat and looked back up and spotted the ball and waited ’til the last second and timed it perfectly and then jumped high in the air. I made the back-handed catch high over my head in the tip of my glove and then (thankfully) landed back on the seat. The whole section erupted with cheers and applause. One kid shouted, “You are the MAN!!!” Everyone high-fived me and kept buzzing about the catch for quite some time, and I have to say it felt pretty good. Sometimes I make fun of people for congratulating me on catches that just aren’t that difficult (some people are so unathletic that they think ANY catch is a great catch), but this one was truly awesome. Sorry for bragging, but seriously, I wish you could’ve seen it. The more I think about it…this might be the best catch I’ve ever made. Obviously I can’t remember them all, but at the very least, it’s in the top three.

The most frustrating moment of BP was when I saw Burrell launch another ball into the last section of the “200 level.” It was frustrating because the seats were empty, and I knew the ball was going to sit there for another hour or two, and I wasn’t allowed to go up there, even though my ticket was in the much better “100 level.” How dumb is that? I hate the fact that stadium security is always so strict about guarding the club/suite level. Why would anyone want to sit there anyway?

The last round of Phillies BP was worthless because every batter was left-handed, and the rest of the stadium wasn’t yet open. There was no reason to be in left field, so I headed around the batter’s eye and waited impatiently behind the barricade in right.

Finally, at 5:35pm, I was allowed to run down the steps, and I quickly used the glove trick to snag my sixth ball of the day off the warning track.

Ball #7 was an Adam Dunn homer that landed in the partially empty seats.

Ball #8 was tossed by the always friendly David Weathers.

Then I spotted a ball lying on the warning track all the way across the stadium near the left field foul pole…so I ran back over, got it with my glove trick, and later gave the ball to a kid as he entered the stadium with his family. I basically just walked up to him and asked if he was hoping to catch a ball.

“Maybe,” he said shyly, perhaps a bit embarrassed that he had a glove and that a stranger was asking him about it.

“Well, here,” I said, holding out the ball. “You want this one?”

The kid must’ve thought it was a trick question because he just stared at me and then eyed the ball suspiciously.

“Thank you so much,” said his father before urging his skeptical son to take it.

“I happened to get a few baseballs today,” I said to the kid. “I have an extra one to spare, and it’s all yours if you want it.”

Finally, he reached out and took the ball and disappeared into the crowd with his family.

If there’s a point to all of this, it’s that I prefer to give baseballs to kids who don’t ask, and I absolutely refuse to give balls away when people (usually ushers and rude fathers) demand it. Earlier in the day, after I’d been using the glove trick, I called out to Jayson Werth and asked for a ball on behalf of a kid who was standing nearby.

“Why don’t you just give him one of yours?!” snapped Werth before firing the ball back toward the infield.

Because, you shmuck, despite the fact that you’re not any better than me at judging fly balls, you ARE a major leaguer which means any kid would appreciate it 100 times more if he got a ball from you.

Anyway, my final ball of the day was a BP homer to straight-away left field that bounced off some guy’s bare hands and landed near me in a half-empty row. And by the way, all five of the balls I got from the Reds had the word “practice” stamped on the sweet spot. In the picture on the left, you can see how I numbered the balls. (The ball on the top left, in case it’s not obvious, or if you’re new to this blog, was the 3,418th ball of my collection…and so on.)

After BP ended, I had that sinking feeling that Griffey wasn’t going to play, and sure enough, after the national anthem was sung (badly by a group of 6th graders), the Reds starting lineup was announced:

No Griffey. Unbelievable.

I decided to stay for the game. Sat on the third base side. Tried to catch foul balls. Came about 10 feet from one. Blah. Griffey pinch hit in the 8th inning and walked on four pitches, and that was a good thing because I was nowhere near the outfield:

The Phillies won, 3-2, and I decided I was done with Citizens Bank Park for at least a few weeks.

STATS:

? 10 balls at this game

? 81 lifetime games with at least 10 balls

? 19th time snagging 10 or more balls in back-to-back games

? 145 balls in 18 games this season = 8.1 balls per game.

? 514 consecutive games with at least one ball

? 117 consecutive games outside NYC with at least one ball

? 840 lifetime balls outside NYC

? 3,422 total balls…moves me ahead of Honus Wagner (3,415), Cap Anson (3,418), and Carl Yastrzemski (3,419) for 6th place on the all-time hits list. Next up is Tris Speaker (3,514).