Sometimes I like to get as far away from baseball as possible, and yesterday was one of those times. Instead of watching the Yankees-Mariners game and contemplating my upcoming Beat The Streak selections, I went and saw a friend modeling in a fashion show at an obnoxious/overpriced club on West 27th Street.

Here's what the inside of the club looked like. Note the thin runway between the two rows of couches:



For the record, when I said the club was overpriced...how shall I say this? I really meant it. Check out the prices on their menu for bottles of alcohol, and note the selections on the lower right:



I don't know about you, but if I found myself on West 27th and happened to have that kind of money at my disposal...yeah.

The show didn't start until after midnight (and this was on a Thursday night, mind you), but it was worth the wait. Here are a few highlights/screenshots from the videos I took.

Nice:



Extra nice:



Umm...



Nice to the 6th power:



Good times, I tell ya.

In case anyone is wondering, I'll be avoiding major league baseball throughout the holiday weekend (but you never know, I might still find something to blog about). I'm heading upstate later today to spend some time with my parents, but I'll be back with a vengeance on Monday, July 6th. I'll be at Citizens Bank Park that day for a Watch With Zack game with Joe, and we have big things planned...

Ready for a quick blog entry about a lame day? Good, here goes...

Yankee Stadium opened at 4pm, and for the first half-hour, there was NO action:


Then the sky got dark, and it started drizzling, and the grounds crew began to clear the field. In the photo below, you can see one guy actually rolling the L-screen away:


Just as I was contemplating how to announce my permanent retirement from ballhawking, the sky cleared and the grounds crew rolled the screens back into place.

The Yankees eventually came out and started throwing. Batting practice was still 10 minutes away and the place was packed:


I got completely shut out during the Yankees' portion of BP.

Then the Mariners came out, so I changed into my Mariners gear and got Jason Vargas to throw me a ball in right field:


I was six rows back when he threw it. It sailed over everyone else's head and came right to me. It was my 4,100th ball. Yay.

I headed back to left field, caught a homer on the fly, got Garrett Olsen to toss one to me, and then caught another home run ball which I later gave away.

It was impossible to use the glove trick because the stadium was crawling with security guards. I saw one other kid attempt to use the trick, and he was stopped within 10 seconds.

I had some close calls on other homers, but luck simply wasn't on my side, and to make matters worse, I had to deal with a startlingly hostile fan. I deserve the Nobel Peace Prize for preventing an "incident" from arising. Let's leave it at that.

I ran into a fellow ballhawk named Alex who'd already been to Yankee Stadium more than a dozen times this season. We had some time to kill so we wandered into the bleachers, and since it was my first time in that area of the stadium, I took a bunch of pics. (At the new stadium, anyone with any ticket can go in or out of the bleachers.)

I started at the back of the bleachers next to the batter's eye in left-center field...


...and walked down to the front row. This was the view (of the visitors' bullpen) to the right...


...and this was the view (of Monument Park) to the left:


Ever wonder what's behind those shiny black windows? There's a restaurant, and when I pressed my camera against the glass, I was able to get a peek inside:


Here's the concourse that runs behind the bleachers: 


Left field...right field...it's all connected.

There's a "cafe" on top of the batter's eye. Here's one side of it...


...and here's the front:


Anyone can go there at anytime, and on the right field side, there's a nice view of the Yankee bullpen. Here's Andy Pettitte warming up:


The new Yankee Stadium is a glorious facility. There's no doubt about that. It's the team and the employees and the fans that ruin it.

As for the game...yawn. The Yankees won, 4-2, and five of the six runs scored on homers. I'm sorry but that's just not interesting baseball. I don't care that Griffey and A-Roid went deep. I was nowhere near either of those longballs so it didn't matter. At least it was a quick game and I got the hell out fast.

As I mentioned at the end of my previous entry, my good friend Leon Feingold was invited to try out for the Newark Bears, and he invited me to tag along. It was a tough decision at first because I'd been planning to go to Yankee Stadium (and really looking forward to it) but I realized quickly that the potential for once-in-a-lifetime baseball awesomeness was much greater with him. Remember when I got to sneak into Citi Field with him on April 16, 2009? Yeah, good things happen when Leon is around so I scrapped my Yankee plans and took New Jersey Transit with him to the stadium in Newark. (The photo on the right shows us on the train, and in case you're new to this blog, Leon is the one wearing black.) It was an easy ride. Seven bucks for a round trip from Penn Station. Two stops. Twenty-five minutes. Short walk from the station to the stadium.

A little background on Leon...

He's 36 years old, 6-foot-6 (if you round up), and 240 pounds.
He pitched in the minor leagues (in the Indians organization) in the 1990s.
He recently pitched professionally in the Israeli Baseball League.
He once ranked 12th in the world in competitive eating.
He's the vice-president of the New York chapter of Mensa.

...and I love him. As a friend, thank you. Perhaps even like a brother.

The Bears were scheduled to play a game at 6:05pm. We arrived at the stadium about five hours early and walked right inside the front gate:


There was no security. No one ever hassled us. It was the most laid-back atmosphere you could imagine--minor league baseball (or in this case independent league baseball) at its best.

This was the view to the right as we crossed the concourse behind the plate:


We headed to the left, and of course I took a photo of the incredible open-air concourse down the foul line:


I don't count minor league (or independent league) balls in my collection, but still, I appreciated the heavenly set-up for foul-ball catching.

This was my first time at the ballpark, officially known as "Bears & Eagles Riverfront Stadium." Leon had been here before and knew his way around so he led me inside though an official-looking reception area and into the media room:


Did you notice the backdrop on the right? We still had lots of time to kill, so Leon posed for a few pics against it:


That's not trick photography. He's not holding a miniature ball. Leon's hands really ARE that big, and as a result, he can throw a nasty split-finger fastball which basically moves like an 82-mph knuckleball. Every time we play catch and he throws it, I fear for my teeth, nuts, and life.

We wandered down some stairs and ended up here:


Down the hall to our left, there were Gatorade coolers and BP screens and other random pieces of equipment lying around:


Even though it wasn't a major league stadium, I was still thrilled to be there and just soaking it all in. In fact, I think it's better that it wasn't a major league stadium because if it were, there would've been security guards crawling all over the place. Instead, I was treated to a pure, uninterrupted, behind-the-scenes look.

Leon needed to change into his uniform, and since he didn't have a locker in the clubhouse, he changed in a storage room down the hall:


Look what was in that storage room:


There weren't any security cameras in there. I could've stuffed 20 balls into my backpack and no one would've known the difference. But I didn't do that. I had opportunities throughout the day to take balls, but I didn't pocket a single one. I just wanted to inspect them and photograph them.

I was surprised to find three different types of balls in the basket, one of which appeared to be autographed:


Any theories about whose signature that might be?

Leon and I were both invited into the clubhouse. Here's what it looked like:


At one point, there were about 15 players milling about, blasting salsa and later rap, playing cards, eating, swinging bats, and getting dressed. Armando Benitez walked by. Then Tim Raines, the manager. Then Shane Komine. And Willie Banks. And Keith Foulke. And Ryan Bukvich. And Alberto Castillo. And Tike Redman. These were ALL guys who had played in the major leagues. Some (like Komine) only had a cup of coffee while others (like Foulke) were World Series heroes. One guy (Leon thinks it was Charlton Jimerson) started changing right in front of us, without warning, and when he took off his shirt, I thought I was at a bodybuilding competition. I don't think I've ever seen such big arms up close, and it made me realize how tough it is to make it in baseball. You have to compete against guys like that just to REACH the major leagues. I suddenly felt a strong connection to David Eckstein.

I went and used the bathroom, not so much because I was dying to pee, but mainly just to check out the facilities. Pretty simple. Looked like a college gymnasium bathroom. There was half a sunflower seed shell atop my urinal. On my way back to the main room (where Leon was waiting for me), I passed the training room (where several players were sprawled out on tables) and a modest assortment of snacks: peanut butter crackers, Hostess cake-type sweets, etc. There were a few dozen boxes of balls that several players had already signed. The whole place was noisy and cluttered and somewhat shabby in spots--nothing as glamorous as the few major league clubhouses I've been lucky enough to set foot in, but far better than any locker room I ever got to use as an aspiring college player a decade earlier.

At around 2:30pm, half an hour after Leon had been told to arrive, no one had come for him. The clubhouse was clearing out, so we headed out too. We walked down the carpeted hallway, out through a tunnel behind home plate, and onto the warning track:


(Leon, if you're reading this, do us all a favor and get a haircut. I know I shouldn't be talking smack about your [or anyone's] hair, given the fact that I'm losing mine, but seriously, that bushy mess is starting to look like a mullet.)

There were a few guys playing catch in right field. I had my glove with me, just in case, and Leon asked if I wanted to throw. I was about to say yes when I noticed a couple batters starting to take early BP:


There was only ONE person shagging balls in the entire outfield, and it was a teenaged kid--one of the players' sons, I think--so I asked a few people if it'd be okay if I went out there and "helped" by shagging. They were delighted that I offered (less running for them) and of course I couldn't have been happier to be out there.

Leon surprised me by going in my bag and grabbing my camera and taking a few pics. Here I am out there:


After 20 minutes or so, the hitting stopped and the throwing started, so I headed back to the foul line and took some photos. Here's one that shows three former major leaguers (plus Leon):


Here's another shot from high up in the stands, just short of the foul pole...


...and here's one that shows Bukvich pitching to Castillo, with someone (not sure who) standing in like a batter:


Benitez wore headphones onto the field:


I guess you can do whatever you want in Newark when you have 289 big league saves.

After the throwing ended, several of the pitchers gathered near the foul line. You can see Leon on the right, and do you know who's standing with his hands on his hips?


Keith Foulke.

I shagged some more during regular BP (that must've lasted an hour) and I really felt like I was a player. I mean, I was standing in the outfield, surrounded by players, doing what all the players were doing: catching fly balls and scooping up grounders and firing them back in toward the bucket. At one point, I made a really nice running/leaping/over-the-shoulder catch and immediately looked around to make eye contact with everyone. I was all like, "Yeah! Who saw that?! Who saw that?!" but the answer was: nobody. In my world, it was a great catch. In their world, it's just...a catch.

This was the view from deep right field:


Did you notice those clouds? The visiting team (the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs) had started taking BP, but the sky got darker and the grounds crew began removing equipment from the field, and that was the end of that. I'm totally jinxed by the weather. I can't even get a full BP in the Atlantic League. (I should mention that when the visitors were taking BP, I didn't feel right about running all over the field with them, so I grabbed a seat in the front row down the right field foul line. During the next 10 minutes or so, three balls landed in the seats near me--all of which were sliced by righties--and I tossed them all back onto the field. I'm telling you, I didn't keep a single ball. Leon even walked over at one point and tried to hand one to me, but I wouldn't take it.)

Leon had disappeared for a while toward the end of BP, and I figured he was pitching in the bullpen. I could've walked out there (the 'pens are located behind the left field wall) and watched him, but I didn't want to intrude on his big moment. I'd brought a book. I was happy to just sit and read and look at the field. There's something about baseball fields--any baseball fields--that make me feel like I'm meant to be there. I'm most at peace with myself and with the world when I'm standing on a baseball field. I feel like I'm home, like I've reached the promised land, like I'm in a place that I've always dreamed of being. In my mind I've always been and always will be a major leaguer. There's no other way to describe it.

Eventually I caught up with Leon and a few older gentlemen near the 1st base dugout:


See that guy in the light gray T-shirt? That's Butch Hobson, who once hit 30 homers in a season in the major leagues. And the guy in the tan pants? Art Shamsky, who batted .300 for the '69 Mets.

It was right around that time that fans were being let into the ballpark. Any autograph collectors reading this? If so, I would suggest that you invest in a $7 train ride, go see the Newark Bears, and make yourself happy. All the Bears players seem to file out onto the field through that tunnel right behind the plate, and of course there's no security to stop anyone from going down into the seats alongside that tunnel. Seriously, go get some autographs. Carl Everett is even on the team. Who doesn't want Carl Everett's autograph? (Yesterday I never saw him up close, although I think I caught one of his fly balls during BP.)

While Leon was schmoozing it up, I wandered down into the dugout and inspected every inch of it. I peeked into the bat rack and noticed a pink slip of paper at the bottom of one of the vertical cubby holes. I bent down and grabbed it and had a look:


Yeah, I took it. Whatever. It had the previous day's date on it. It wasn't even the original--just a carbon copy. If the Bears wanted it, they would've kept it. I figured it would have a happier home with me than in some random landfill.

Then it started raining, and as I ducked inside the tunnel with Leon, I could see the grounds crew racing to cover the field:


What happened next?

A rain delay.

Ryan Bukvich passed the time by trying to putt golf balls into a plastic cup in the hallway outside the clubhouse:


Leon and I got to talk to him for quite a while, and what can I say? The guy is supercool. I told him about my baseball collection, and he told me that when he makes it back to the major leagues, he's going to look for me and hook me up with a ball. I told him about the list of players and coaches who've thrown me balls. Leon even pulled it up on his phone, and we all looked at it together for a minute. I gave Bukvich my card, and he gave me his email address, so hopefully we'll stay in touch.

Tim Raines walked by while we were out in the hallway. So did Ron Karkovice, who's also a coach on the team. There were players and coaches all over the place, and there I was, just hanging out with them and shootin' the sh*t like it was no big deal. In a way it wasn't a big deal. They're just guys. Most of them are in their 30s, just like me, and they all love baseball, just like me, so why should it be a big deal to hang out with them? I don't know, it just IS. I've been a huge baseball fan for such a long time, and as a fan, you're always kept on the outside. When there's a rain delay, you're either hiding in the concourse at the stadium or watching reruns of "Seinfeld" at home. You're never killing time WITH the actual players, so yeah, it was a big deal. Some of the players even recognized me after Bukvich told them that I was the guy who'd caught those home runs last year at Yankee Stadium and been on Leno, so in a way, I was famous to them, which was cool as hell, but mainly, *I* was the one who was honored to be in their presence.

Leon had to get back to New York City. I suppose I could've stayed and kept hanging out at the ballpark, but he was really my link to all the behind-the-scenes stuff, so I left with him and got one last look at the field on the way out:


I could've stayed and just sat in the stands and watched the game and tried to catch foul balls, but that would've felt like a major letdown after everything I'd experienced. I just wanted to go home, and of course I wanted to ask Leon all about his tryout.

As we rode NJ Transit back to the city, he told me that Alberto Castillo had caught for him with Tim Raines and pitching coach Mike Torrez looking on. (No pressure.) They didn't have a radar gun on him, but Leon thinks he was throwing in the mid-80s and *could* get back up to 90 with the right workouts and guidance. Speaking of guidance...the Bears did not offer him a contract, but they DID tell him that he can come back and work out with the team anytime, and that they'll continue to work with him and get him back into shape...which means they saw his potential, but he's not yet ready for game action. That was no surprise to Leon. He knew he wasn't ready. His pitches had sick movement, but his velocity was a bit down and he had no command.

That's pretty much it. Leon had some meeting to go to at 6pm, so as soon as our train pulled into Penn Station, we went our separate ways. I headed home and heated up some day-old General Tso's chicken (and pork fried rice) and watched the Yankee game. (There's really no point in watching the Mets anymore.) Good thing I didn't go. I heard that it had rained in the Bronx, too, and that BP was canceled early on.

You know why you haven't been hearing much about Gustavo Chacin lately? Because he's in the minor leagues.

He's been pitching on a team in the Phillies' organization called the IronPigs. How perfect is that? The name captures his personalty and his looks all at once.

Gustavo pitched last night and lost, of course, although I must admit that he didn't do THAT badly. He lasted five innings and allowed six runs, but only one of the runs was earned.

He's now 2-3 with a 3.48 ERA. Not great, not bad, and I don't care either way. If he pitches badly...well, he certainly deserves it for having stolen a ball from me on 8/1/06 at Yankee Stadium, and if he pitches well, then he might earn a promotion to the major leagues where the Hample Jinx will ensure that he fails on the biggest stage of all. So, either way, I win. (But no, the more I think about it, the more I like him earning a few thousands bucks a month in the minors rather than a few thousands bucks per day in the majors. Keep doing your thing, Gus.)

----------------------------------

In other news, my friend Leon Feingold has a tryout later today (June 30) with the Newark Bears, and he invited me to come along. I can't say no to that, but unfortunately it means that I might not make it to Yankee Stadium. Leon's tryout starts at 2pm. (No telling when it'll end.) Yankee Stadium opens at 4pm. The tryout is in New Jersey, but there's a train right near the ballpark that would get me to get to Penn Station in 25 minutes. From there it would take an additional 30 to 40 minutes to reach Yankee Stadium. What should I do?! Even though the Bears are an independent team, they have some big names on their roster including: Daryle Ward, Jay Gibbons, Michael Tucker, Pete Rose Jr., Carl Everett, Keith Foulke...and they're managed by Tim Raines. There's a chance I could meet some or all of these guys, so I'm tempted to stay at the ballpark as long as possible and see what happens.

Five random things...

1) I got a nice email the other day about my second book, Watching Baseball Smarter. Check it out:

Hey Zack, my name is Dan, I'm a SSgt in the US Air Force. I just read your book Watching Baseball Smarter; what a great read! I've played ball for about 15 years as a pitcher, so I thought I knew ALOT about the game, and I learned a few new things, and this book helped me explain the game to my wife, (who is a Boston fan, I'm all Tribe), she finally understands the infield fly rule. Anyways, thanks for the book, and I plan to get your first book next; I've been to about 500 games at the Jake, and have never caught a ball, so I guess I need help. Later!

2) Earlier this week, a fellow ballhawk in Toronto named Danny sent me a short article in the "Toronto Star" that mentioned me. (The article is pictured here on the right.) He asked me if I'd already seen it, and the answer is no. I was never interviewed for it. I had no idea I was gonna be in the paper, so that's pretty cool.

3) I'm still holding onto 1st place in Erik Jabs' ballhawk league. You can see the standings and the Week 11 stats here.

4) I uploaded a few pics to my profile on MyGameBalls.com, and it looks like all my main stats on that site are finally up to date. If you've EVER snagged a ball and you haven't yet joined this site, what are you waiting for? It's free, and it's a great way to connect with other ballhawks.

5) I hadn't heard from Heath Bell for a while, but he recently texted me to say hey. I texted back and asked him if he could bring the WBC ball he's been saving for me to Philadelphia on July 23rd (when the Padres will be there for a makeup game), and he said he would. So...it's ON.

On 6/17/09 at Kauffman Stadium, I was interviewed live on FSN during the 3rd inning. Unfortunately, because MLB is so strict about not letting anyone do anything with any of their footage anywhere or anytime for any reason, I can't put the interview on YouTube. So it's now on my own web site instead. The only problem is...it's a really big file (about 66 MB) and it's in .mov format, so if you're using a PC and you want to watch it, you might need to download QuickTime. But I think you can get it for free. I don't know. And if you're using a Mac, the file will likely take several minutes to load, during which time you should see the blue QuickTime "Q" (pictured here on the right), so please be patient. (Thanks to Bob Buck for recording the interview and getting it to me in a digital format.)

As for the interview itself, I had been told that it would take place in the top of the 3rd inning, and since Zack Greinke was pitching, I assumed it'd be done three minutes later. I just KNEW he was going to retire the Diamondbacks in order...and I was right...but luckily (and totally unexpectedly), just after the third out was recorded, I learned that my interview was going to be extended into the bottom of the 3rd.

Anyway...

HERE IT IS

It was sunny when I bought a $22 ticket (including fees) off StubHub yesterday afternoon, cloudy when my No. 7 train emerged from the underground tunnel in Queens, and raining by the time I reached Citi Field:



So, I turned around and went home. That's how much I hate Citi Field. Without batting practice, it's absulutely not worth being there. (Even WITH batting practice it still sucks.)

Maybe I'm just bitter because it has rained 20 of the last 23 days in New York City. Or because I tried to sell the ticket on craigslist and there were no takers. Or because I get cranky when I have to go a whole week without snagging baseballs. The Yankees will be at Citi Field this weekend, and despite the offers I have received for free tickets, I will not be in attendance. I don't DO the Subway Series. I like watching it on TV, but not being there...HOWEVER...I'm planning to attend a couple Yankee games next week, weather permitting.

Remember my blog entry from 6/17/09 at Kauffman Stadium? I talked about playing catch with Kyle Farnsworth, and I just put the video on YouTube. Check it out:



BTW, I finished reading the book "Miracle Ball" and loved it. Easy read. Very engaging and suspenseful. Consider this my official recommendation.

Another day with Jona at my new favorite stadium...


The weather was perfect--no complaints there--but I wanted to kick someone when I ran inside and saw this:


The Royals weren't taking batting practice, and they clearly weren't in any rush to start:


It really killed me. I pretty much had the whole stadium to myself, and I could feel my opportunities slipping away.

Finally at about 4:45pm--fifteen excruciating minutes after the gates had opened--the first batter stepped into the cage, and it didn't take long before I got on the board. Kyle Farnsworth was shagging in right-center, and as soon as he fielded a ball, I shouted for it.

The following four-part photo (starting on the top left and going clockwise) shows what happened next. The three vertical arrows are pointing to the ball in mid-air:


Yeah, that's right. The damn thing sailed over my head, and since I was trapped against that railing in the middle of the walkway, I couldn't move. If I'd been able to run to the back of the walkway, I probably would've been able to make a leaping catch, like an outfielder robbing a home run, but instead I could only watch the ball splash into the fountain.

No problem.

I whipped out my trusty water-retrieval-device...



...and fished out the ball before it had a chance to sink. (The photo above is blurry because it's a screen shot from a low-quality video. The video itself isn't worth sharing because the ball was never in view. It floated right below me and hugged the concrete wall, and Jona wasn't able to see it from her angle. The fan in the background is named Garrett. I wrote about him in my previous entry, and you'll be hearing a lot more about him in this one. Also, FYI, the water is a bit murky, but since it's only a few feet deep, you *can* see balls that sink to the bottom, but those balls seemed to be cleared out daily.)

I was in such a rush at this point to run over toward the bullpen and try to get Roman Colon to throw me another ball that I neglected to pose with the one I'd just snagged. Why is that a big deal? Because that first ball had extended my consecutive games streak to 600--a streak dating back to September 10, 1993, during which I've snagged at least one ball at every single game I've attended.

Oh well. I got caught up in the moment. What can I say? At least I got Colon to show me some love. Here's a photo that shows the ball in mid-air:


Perhaps I should've drawn a red arrow pointing to myself. In case it's not clear, I'm standing just to the right of the fan in the red shirt.

It's obvious why the Royals are struggling: their pitchers suck. Farnsworth had airmailed me and Colon's throw fell three feet short. Luckily it traveled just far enough that I was able to reach over the railing and make a back-handed catch:


I used the glove trick to snag my third ball of the day off the warning track in left field. Yeah, security had told me twice the previous day not to do it anymore, but this was a brand new day. Maybe the rules had changed overnight, and even if they hadn't, I didn't have anything to lose. This was my last game at Kauffman Stadium. I was done with all my TV interviews. I was going to be flying back home to New York City the next day. If I got ejected, so be it.

In the following photo, you can see me going for the ball. The vertical arrow on the left is pointing to a man who was leaning over the wall to see the balls below because he, too, had a device. The other arrow is pointing to the kid who caught that random ball flying through the air:


Even while I was doing my thing, there were still lots of other balls to go around. Keep that in mind as you continue reading. I don't want you to think that my snagging prevented other people from getting balls. That wasn't the case at all. I missed out on countless balls because they were tossed to kids, and that's how it should be.

Coco Crisp hooked me up with my fourth ball of the day in left-center field, and then I used the glove trick to pull two balls out of the gap behind the center field wall. Here's a close-up photo of the first ball in my glove...


...and here's a shot of the second one, taken by Jona from the other end of the gap:


Both of those balls were BP homers by Billy Butler, but whatever. Do you see all the other balls that were sitting down in that gap? GAHHH!!! It was maddening to see them and not be able to reach them. The photo above doesn't even show all the balls that were down there. There were like...twice as many. It was insane. They'd been there for two days, and I'd asked several different ushers about them.

How often do the balls get cleared out?
Who actually goes and retrieves them?
What would happen if I jumped down in there?

No one had a definitive answer. One usher said that the groundskeepers probably retrieve the balls, but he wasn't sure. It was strange, and it had me thinking, although I didn't really know what to think. There was still one more ball down in there that I could reach with my glove trick, so I started going for it, and that's when security shut me down. The guard didn't threaten me or confiscate my glove or eject me. He simply made a polite request that I stop. He even apologized and insisted that the order had come from his supervisor. How could I argue with that? It was frustrating, of course, but at least I'd gotten to use the trick three times on this final day.

As I began untangling the string, the kid standing next to me inspected my glove...


...and then asked me for a ball. That annoyed me. First of all, he didn't even have a glove (which indicated that he wasn't serious about snagging), and secondly, as a general rule, I never give balls to people who ask. The way I see it, other fans should focus on getting balls from the players and not from...other fans, especially during BP when there are tons of opportunities. Therefore, I politely told the kid that I was not going to give him a ball. Instead I gave him a few pointers to help him snag one on his own, and wouldn't you know it, less than two minutes later he grabbed a home run ball that landed near him in the seats. I congratulated him and then saw him snag FOUR more balls after that!

Once the Diamondbacks started hitting, I changed into my red D'backs shirt and got Eric Byrnes to toss me my seventh ball of the day in center field. In the following photo, you can see the ball in mid-air against the dark green batter's eye:



A minute after I got the ball from Byrnes, I saw Tom Gordon walking toward a couple balls on the warning track in right field, so I sprinted around behind the batter's eye and hurried down to the lower level of the Pepsi Party Porch, and I got him to toss one of the balls to me. Then, back in left field, a home run landed in the fountain. It was time once again for the water device. The four-part photo below shows me getting it ready and swinging it out...



...and here I am reeling it in:



That gave me nine balls on the day, and it didn't take long for me to reach double digits. Some righty on the D'backs (no idea who) launched a deep line drive toward the seats in left-center. I bolted through the empty walkway behind the four rows of seats and watched the ball take a series of unlikely bounces. It's hard to describe exactly what happened so I took a photo later on (which you can see here on the right) to help illustrate this story. Do you see the concrete ridge that extends perpendicular from behind the walkway into the fountain? Somehow, this home run ball ricocheted out of the seats, landed on the ridge (which is only about a foot wide), caromed off the back wall of the fountain, landed back on the ridge, took a couple small bounces, and squeezed back through the railing into the walkway. It wouldn't have mattered if the ball had fallen into the water because I still would've snagged it. In fact, I was kind of disappointed that I didn't get to use the water device, but it's probably just as well that the ball stayed dry. Anyway, yeah, crazy bounces, and I grabbed it.

It was a challenge to keep up with my notes...



...but I had to find moments here and there to keep a list of how I was snagging all my baseballs. Otherwise, I never would've remembered. (In the photo above, the guy wearing the long black pants is the one who gave me a hard time about the glove trick the day before. Watch out for him if you plan on using a device at Kauffman Stadium.)

About 10 minutes later, I caught two homers on the fly in the walkway behind the "102" sign in straight-away left field. I'm not sure who hit the first one, but I know that Byrnes hit the second. I caught them back-to-back within a 30-second span, and it had the whole section buzzing, but really there was nothing to it. Both balls came RIGHT to me, and okay, the seats were a bit crowded by that point, but so what? It really doesn't get any easier than that.

At the end of my previous entry, I mentioned that I saw Diamondbacks pitcher Clay Zavada in Denny's after the game. Remember? Well, I'd been hoping to get a ball from him for three reasons. First, his last name begins with a zee, which we all know is the best letter. Second, he has an awesome moustache. And third, after reading that New York Times article about him, I became an instant fan. The only trouble is...he's not the most outgoing person. Over the previous two days, my few ball requests directed his way went ignored, but on this third day, I had an angle. I waited until he was about to pick up a ball in left field, then raced down to the front row and yelled, "Clay!! I saw you in Denny's last night but didn't want to bother you!! Any chance you could hook me up with a ball, please?!"

He ignored me, so I waited for him to chase down another ball and then I shouted something similar. It worked. He turned right around and spotted me and flipped it up, and let me tell you, it felt great to have gotten inside his head for a moment.

Toward the end of BP, I had another noteworthy interaction with a Diamondbacks pitcher. This time it was Esmerling Vasquez. At one point, a bit earlier in the day, I'd asked him for a ball in Spanish. He turned around and smiled but didn't throw me the ball, so I responded with a crude but common curse in Spanish. As soon as he heard that, he whirled back around and looked at me and dropped his jaw in an exaggerated manner as if to say, "I can't believe you just said that, and I hope you're joking." I immediately smiled and made a gesture to indicate that I was only messing around, and he seemed to appreciate my playful attitude. Later on, when the D'backs were close to wrapping up BP, Vasquez jogged over to the warning track in left-center to retrieve a ball. I walked down the steps and got his attention and asked him for it in English.

"In Spanish," he said so softly that I had to make sure I understood.

"You want me to ask you for the ball in Spanish?"

He nodded, so I made a dramatic request with lots of prayer-like gestures and a few English words sprinkled in. It went something along the lines of: "Por favor, señor, da me la pelota. Solamente una pelota and then I will cállate." The English translation of that ridiculousness is: "Please, Sir, give me the ball. Only one ball and then I will shut up." That's pretty much all I know how to say in Spanish. (Well, that and a lot of bad words, courtesy of an all-Dominican baseball camp staff that coached me for three full summers in the early 1990s.) But it worked. Vasquez smiled big and tossed me the ball--my 14th of the day--and that was it for batting practice.

Just before the D'backs left the field, I gave my heavy backpack to Jona and raced to the 3rd base dugout and got some equipment guy to toss me a ball as he was dumping all the balls from the basket to the ball bag. Hot damn. I'd snagged 13 balls at my first game of the series, 14 balls at my second game, and now 15 balls at my last game. BEST. STADIUM. EVER. And finally, it was time to explore it. I'd heard all about the $250 million renovation. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

Just as my stadium tour was about to get underway, I ran into Garrett and asked him if he wanted to wander with me. It was 40 minutes 'til game time. There wasn't anything else to do, so he came along. We started by walking into the spacious tunnel that leads to the dugout concourse...



...and I was very impressed with what I saw at the other end:



I just felt bad that such a nice stadium was so poorly attended, but hey, from a ballhawking perspective, the low attendance was great.

Garrett and I walked through the main concourse behind home plate...



...and headed up to the upper deck. Gorgeous! Look at the concourse:



The whole stadium was clean and spacious, and there was lots of natural light, and best of all it was understated, unlike a certain new ballpark--ahem, in the Bronx--that's sickeningly grandiose.

We climbed up the steps to the top row of the upper deck, and I took a few photos to make a panorama:



Below are four more photos of the upper deck...

TOP LEFT: The huge "tunnel" that leads from the concourse to the seats. Brilliant stadium design. That's all I can say about that. No other upper deck, as far as I know, has anything like it. People tend to appreciate light and air and space to move around. Kauffman Stadium delivers it. TOP RIGHT: The open-air portion of the concourse along the RF foul line. There's nothing wrong with simplicity. BOTTOM RIGHT: The front row. Nice. More simplicity. There's no reason for an upper deck to have two or three different tiers of seating. BOTTOM LEFT: A chain-link fence at the back of the seats. One word: quaint. All the architects out there can take their fancy facades and shove 'em. I prefer watching baseball in ballparks, not palaces or malls or museums:



I couldn't stop raving about Kauffman Stadium. Garrett got a kick out of that.

We headed down to the main concourse...



...and made our way around the outfield. Here's the view from the top of the fountains in right field:



The outfield concourse has an inner and an outer area. (Another great use of space.) The following photo was taken between the two...



...and when I walked into the outer area, I couldn't believe how much stuff was back there. The following SIX-part photo shows it all, starting on the top left and then going clockwise: 1) A concert stage. 2) Miniature golf. 3) A playground and carousel. 4) Batting cages. 5) A baserunning challenge. 6) A small baseball field.



I loved these kid-friendly attractions because they weren't in the way. You know what I mean? They were essentially hidden at a far edge of the stadium. I'd been at The New K for two days and didn't even know that any of that stuff was there, so my point is: it doesn't interfere with the baseball experience. It's just there in case people want to go and check it out, but if you're a true baseball fan and you're glued to the game and you don't want to be bothered with anything else, it's not in your face. Most of the games back there cost a bit of money to play. You have to buy tokens. I'm not even sure where you'd buy them or how much they cost. I didn't have time to investigate. The game was almost set to begin, so I hurried over to the 3rd base dugout and stopped along the way to take a photo of the cross-aisle that runs through the field level seats:



Anyone can walk through this aisle at any time. It doesn't matter where your ticketed seat is.

The stadium is so pretty and simple and laid-back. I was in heaven.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a ball tossed to me after the pre-game throwing (I picked the wrong end of the dugout), so I headed to the outfield just in time for the first pitch. I was dying to catch a game home run, and it seemed that my chances here were as good as they'd ever be at any game in any stadium. Look how much room I had out in left field in the top of the first inning:



(Normally the ushers don't let people stand in that walkway during the game, but they made an exception for me.)

Look how much room I had in right field in the bottom of the first:



OH MY GOD!!! This stadium was built for ballhawks. The only problem was that there was SO much room to run that I ended up running nonstop and got completely sweaty. Embarrassingly sweaty. Just like the day before. Check it out: 



I didn't realize until I saw the photo above that I was still wearing my D'backs cap. I didn't want to offend the locals (not that anyone cared what I was wearing) so I gave it to Jona and got my Royals cap back from her. Here she is after we switched caps--this is where she sat during the game:



Did you notice all the balls sitting in the gap behind her? Here, have a closer look:



AAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!

What in the world was going to happen to all those balls?

In the top of the sixth inning, I was hanging out on the RF porch with my new friend, Bob Buck, when Gerardo Parra lined a home run into the bullpen. Naturally I ran over to see what was going to happen to that ball, and to my surprise, no one bothered to pick it up. It just sat on the ground, right in the middle of the bullpen, as various players and employees walked back and forth:



It's like they were all trying to tease me. The ball sat there for a full inning! I couldn't leave, and I was worried about missing other opportunities elsewhere.

Finally I shouted at the Royals' bullpen catcher and got him to toss it up, but he flung it lazily and didn't really AIM for me, and as a result, the ball sailed five feet to my left. Bob was standing to my left at the time, and he managed to get a hand on it, but there were a bunch of other people also reaching for it, and they all bobbled it, and the ball dropped right down into the aisle at our feet, but I WAS BLOCKED and couldn't reach it. I'm sure there are some people who would've just plowed everyone over in order to grab that ball, but that's not my style. All I could do was stand there helplessly and watch some gloveless fan snatch it. That really hurt.

In between innings, Bob asked me to sign a ball, and then his wife Kathi took a photo of us:



(Two questions: Do you like my farmer's tan? And...on a scale of 1 to 10, how much does Bob look like Alec Baldwin?)

In the top of the eighth inning, Eric Byrnes hit a home run into the D'backs bullpen down the LF line. When I ran over to see where it went, an usher told me it had rolled right into the bathroom. Another fan started shouting at Jon Rauch for the ball. Rauch was the closest one to the bathroom, so what did he do? He got up and closed the bathroom door and sat back down. What a guy.

My frustration was mounting. I'd been putting up huge numbers in BP, and I was doing EVERYthing it took to put myself in the perfect position to catch a game home run, but it just wasn't happening. There was a grand total of three homers hit during this series: none the first day, one the second day (which I nearly snagged even though it landed a full section over from where I'd been standing), and two on this third day, both of which landed in the bullpens. Unreal.

In the middle of the ninth inning, just after I'd changed back into my D'backs gear, an usher came running over and told me that a ball had just landed in the fountain. WHAT?! I hadn't seen a ball land there. Was he messing with me? I knew that the ball wouldn't float long, so I didn't question him. I just ran over and took a look...and sure enough, there was a ball bobbing in the water. I pulled out my device, flung it out, and reeled in the ball on the first shot. Here I am with it:



It was my 16th ball of the day, and I learned later that it was Parra's warm-up ball. He had thrown it to some fans but his aim was way off and the ball sailed all the way over the section and landed in the water. Bad for the other fans. Good for me. At that point, I was thinking that I still had a chance to get few more balls. Maybe three more? Maybe even FOUR more? Whoa...it occurred to me that I had an outside shot at reaching 20. I'd only snagged that many three times before, so this was a big deal. I wasn't sure if it was possible, though. Since the D'backs were going to win the game, and since the umpires exit the field on the third base side of the dugout, I figured I could get a ball from the home plate umpire (that would be No. 17), then race back to the home plate end of the dugout and get a ball from one of the players or coaches (that would be No. 18). Maybe I could get one a couple minutes later from the guys coming in from the bullpen? That would be 19. And then...get this...out in that center field gap, there were two balls that were reachable with the glove trick--one on the left side of the gap and another on the right side. I wasn't sure if I could get away with using the trick after the game ended, but it was something I'd been considering all night. I figured I'd have to wait until security was gone, or wait 'til they weren't looking...but this was a major league stadium. Someone is ALWAYS looking. (I learned that the hard way on 9/2/08 at Dodger Stadium.) I was getting ahead of myself. First things first. I got into position near the dugout and waited impatiently for the game to end. Final score: Diamondbacks 12, Royals 5. (The Royals are absolutely terrible, BTW. They have a glorious stadium, but most of their starters wouldn't even be on the Yankees roster. I don't like the Yankees. I'm just sayin'. It was like watching college baseball. The defense was indecisive and clumsy. But I digress.) I wasn't sure who the home plate umpire was. (I learned later it was Dale Scott.) Jona had my bag, and she was waiting for me in the outfield...and in my bag was a complete MLB umpire roster. Damn! And then, to make matters worse, three kids ran down to the spot where the umps were going to walk off the field. I watched as the ump handed balls to all the kids, and then I said, "Hey, Blue, how about a ball for a big kid?" He looked up at me, took one last ball out of his pouch, and flipped it into my glove. Yes!

I raced to the other end of the dugout, just as I had planned, and right after I got there, someone on the team (I think it was Rauch) flung a ball well over my head and deep into the section. Crap. I turned around to see who it had been thrown to, only to realize that the seats were empty! I was trapped in the middle of a row, so I had to climb over the seats. There was one other guy on the aisle who was also running for the ball, and he beat me there easily. That deflated me. Now, even if I somehow managed to get both of those balls out of the gap (which seemed highly unlikely), I'd still fall short of 20.

Hmm...

I headed back through the cross-aisle toward the outfield. A security guard stopped me and told me I had to leave. I told him that I need to meet up with my friends in left-center field, and it was true. Jona, of course, had my backpack, and Garrett was out there too, along with Bob and Kathi. They all wanted to see how this was gonna play out.

My eyes lit up when I approached the left field bullpen. For some reason, the Diamondbacks had left TWO balls sitting on the mound, right below the overhang of the front row of the seats, but how was I going to use the glove trick and not get caught? A groundskeeper appeared out of nowhere and started walking toward the balls. There were a few little kids standing right near me, so I was pretty sure I was screwed. No way the guy was gonna toss one to me. I just knew it, and sure enough, the first ball was tossed up to the kid on my right. Somehow...miraculously...the ball fell short and bounced off a railing and trickled along a little concrete ledge, right toward me, on the center field side of the bullpen. That's where I was standing. It's kind of hard to describe, but anyway, I lunged over the railing, and scooped up the ball in the tip of my glove and immediately handed it to the kid. I don't think I even took it out of my glove. I just reached over and opened the glove and let the kid reach into the pocket and grab it. Even though the ball wasn't intended for me, and even though I didn't end up keeping it, it still counted. It was my 18th ball of the day. After that happy twist of fate, I really felt like I had a chance, and then another miracle happened: the groundskeeper left the second ball sitting there. The other fans had asked him for it, but he said he couldn't give it away (sure), so most of them left. It was just me and Jona and Bob and Garrett and Kathi and a couple other people who were still lingering. I moved over to the front row of the overhang and quickly unleashed my glove trick. Way off in center field, I could see a yellow-shirted security guard walking toward me.

"Form a wall!" I yelled at my friends as my glove dangled 15 feet below. "Form a wall and block his view!"

Jona and Bob both moved to the side edge of the bullpen, and they both took photos of me as I went for the ball. In both of the photos below, you can see that I wasn't even looking down at the ball. Instead I was looking off to the side to keep an eye on the security guard...



...and I managed to pull up the ball when he was less than 50 feet away. Phew! I had my 19th ball of the day. Just one more! I quickly coiled up the string and used my body to shield the glove so the guard wouldn't even see it, and then he walked us all up the steps to the main concourse in deep left field. Once we all reached the top, the guard just walked off. He didn't tell us we had to leave. (He just assumed that we would, I suppose.) So we found a bench and sat down and contemplated the next move.

There were still a FEW other fans milling about at that point. Mostly, though, there were just concession workers and seat cleaners passing back and forth. No one stopped to ask us who we were or what we were still doing in the stadium. No one told us to leave. At one point, we noticed a security camera mounted high across the concourse. That made us a bit nervous, but no one ever came out to confront us.

Deep breath...

I grabbed an extra Sharpie from my backpack just in case, then left my bag with my friends in the concourse and began my solo mission. I had to go alone. One person was less likely to be seen/caught than five, so they waited, out of sight, as I walked briskly down the steps, proceeded through the walkway behind the seats and headed to the edge of the gap on the left field side of the batter's eye. I was there. No security in sight. So far, so good. It was showtime...like playing golf. No competition. Just me versus the course. I struggled for a couple minutes with the first ball. Not good. It was a few feet too far out for me to have a straight shot down, and it was also trapped up against a small rock. Still, I couldn't figure out why I wasn't able to get the ball to stick inside the glove. This was the absolute WORST time for a malfunction. I'd used the trick hundreds of times. Why was it giving me a problem now? I had no choice but to raise the glove back up and readjust the rubber band. Maybe it was too loose? That had to be it, so I took a look, and nearly had a panic attack. The rubber band had broken and was dangling off the glove! It's a good thing it hadn't fallen into the gap because I stupidly hadn't brought an extra one with me down into the seats. I had half a dozen bands in my backpack, but as I mentioned, the bag was with my friends in the concourse. I thought about hurrying back up there, getting a new band, then going back down into the seats, but that seemed insane. It's like I would've been ASKING to get caught, so I took the band and tied the broken ends together. It was my only shot. And then I lowered the glove back down into the gap. Well, it took another minute or so, but then I got the ball to stick inside my glove! Twenty balls (with twenty exclamation points)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I thought about just getting the hell out of there at that point, but that one last ball was too tempting, so I headed up the few steps, walked quickly behind the batter's eye, and headed down beside the right field edge of the gap. There it was, my potential 21st ball of the day, sitting there, looking up at me, waiting to be rescued. I hoped that the rubber band would hold...and it did...but once again, the ball was a few feet too far out from the wall, and in my attempt to knock it closer, the Sharpie fell out of my glove. Extra Sharpie! Thank God I'd brought it.

I didn't know it at the time, but Bob had crept out of the upper concourse, just far enough that he could see me way off in the distance, going for this ball. This was his view:



Did you see me in the photo above? Here's a closer look:



After another minute (during which I must've cursed about 20 times), I managed to snag the ball. Woo! Twenty-one!

Upon my return to the concourse, I posed with balls No. 20 and 21 and felt invincible:



I needed a moment to recover...to just sit there and label my last two balls...to add to my long list of notes...to think about what I wanted to do next. There weren't any other fans in the ballpark, but there were still a few employees walking around. After a few minutes, we saw an entire group of people in yellow shirts walking out the gate in right field. It was the security guards! They were all leaving!

What to do...

I was thinking about those balls in the gap. There were still ELEVEN balls down in there, and it occurred to me that I might be able to get away with climbing down in there and grabbing them and then running like hell. Meanwhile, it was getting late. Bob and Kathi had to take off, so we said our goodbyes, and then it was just three of us: me, Jona, and the 17-year-old Garrett.

For the past two days, I'd been talking about climbing down into the gap, but it was more of a fantasy than a reality. I had to do TV interviews, and I didn't want to jeopardize that by getting in trouble, but like I said before, this was my last day. My last night. There was nothing to lose. Well...if I got arrested and thrown in jail, that wouldn't have been good, but it's not like I'd be running out onto the field or vandalizing any property. It was just about the balls. And about the charity. And about doing something daring. And about breaking my one-game record! I had managed to snag 28 balls in one day on 4/10/08 at Nationals Park. I didn't think that record would ever be broken, but now I actually had a chance to do it...and not just squeeze past it by a hair, but actually surpass the 30-ball plateau. If I climbed down into the gap and grabbed all the balls and managed to get away with it, would my record be tainted? Would it have an asterisk? I wasn't sure, but I knew for a fact that several legendary ballhawks on the west coast, like T.C. and Lee Wilson, had snuck down after games into the gaps behind the outfield walls and grabbed actual game home run balls that they counted in their totals. And I know that some of the all-time great ballhawks in Chicago, especially Moe Mullins, used to climb down into restricted areas of Wrigley Field to do the same thing. I thought about all the balls I'd snagged that I didn't count for various reasons, and I thought about all the balls that security had prevented me from snagging over the years. I thought about the guard at Shea Stadium, back in the mid-1990s, who would stand on the field, right in front of me in foul territory during BP, and kick the foul grounders away before I had a chance to reach over and scoop them up. I thought about the on-field guard at Yankee Stadium who once jumped up and swatted a ball out of mid-air that a player had thrown to me, simply because he didn't like me and didn't want me to catch it. I thought about every single injustice that I had ever experienced inside a major league stadium, and I thought, "Here's my chance to make up for it."

But wait, how was I actually going to pull it off? Would I go alone? Would Jona and/or Garrett come with me? Would I need help climbing back out of the gap? How would I carry all the balls? Would I take my backpack? Would I have to climb out with that heavy thing on my back? What about labeling the balls? Would I actually stop and mark each one as I grabbed them? Or would I put them into different pockets and pouches and try to remember which one was which? If I actually managed to climb down there and grab the balls and escape without getting caught, would I then talk about it on my blog? Could I get in trouble after the fact? I had reasons to go for it. I had reasons to chicken out. I had an endless array of questions and--

"I really wish you would just do it already," said Jona.

Okay.

I was GOING to do it. I made up my mind. Now I just had to make some quick decisions about how it would all go down. First of all, I decided to turn my shirt inside out. That Mario logo was way too eye-catching. Secondly, we all decided that the three of us would go back down into the seats together. Garrett would toss my backpack down to me after I climbed into the gap and then he'd meet me on the other end and I'd toss it back up. Jona would follow us and film the whole thing. I didn't know what I would ever do with the footage, but I knew it had to be documented. As for the issue of labeling the balls, I decided that I had to sacrifice that part of my process--that I just had to throw the balls in my bag as quickly as possible and get the hell out, but I knew I had to keep the last ball separate. I needed to know which ball was THE final ball...the record-establishing ball.

And just like that, we were off.

The following images are all screen shots from Jona's video.

Here I am with Garrett, heading through the walkway at the back of the LF seats. The ground was wet because the fountains were overflowing, presumably on purpose as a way to clean the section:



Here we are heading down the steps next to the gap:



Then I climbed down into the gap:



Garrett tossed me my backpack, and I reached up to catch it:



I hurried to the middle of the gap and picked up the first ball:



Fist pump:



Every time I grabbed a ball, I kept counting: twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine! Then thirty. I decided to stick that one in my right front pocket. Then thirty-one. That went in my left front pocket. And finally thirty-two. That went in my back right pocket. If I'd remembered, I could've grabbed the Sharpie that had fallen out of my glove 20 minutes earlier, but my mind was elsewhere.

Here I am climbing out of the gap:



There were metal beams on back of the outfield wall, so I stepped on those and hoisted myself up without Garrett's help. Ahh, to be young and fit! I normally take it for granted, but now I finally appreciated it and realized that when I'm 90 years old, similar shenanigans will be much more difficult.

Jona headed up the steps and hurried behind the batter's eye to catch up with us...



...and then we walked through the upper porch in right field...



...and headed up the steps...



...and ran like hell through the concourse...



...and made our way out the open gate...



...and walked around to the back of the stadium:



We did it!

I had snagged THIRTY-TWO baseballs!

This was my reaction:



Here I am with Garrett and the 32nd ball:



My God.

I hope I don't get busted for blogging about this after the fact. In my defense, I was doing it for charity, and also, the way I see it, I did the Royals a service. Not only did I risk my own life, free of charge, to climb down in there and clean out the balls so that one of their employees wouldn't have to do it, but I've simultaneously encouraged baseball fans all over the world to visit Kauffman Stadium. No joke. I've gotten at least a dozen emails this week from people who've told me that after reading my blog entries and seeing my photos of the place, they're dying to go there.

Don't you love my logic?

Two of the balls from the gap caught my eye. First (pictured below on the left), there was my 30th ball of the day, which had a really cool series of streak-like markings on it, and second, there was a ball (one of the eight that I didn't label, pictured below on the right) that was rubbed up and un-scuffed, just as a game-used ball would be:


So the question is: Is it possible that I grabbed a game home run ball and don't even know it? When I first entered Kauffman Stadium on Tuesday, June 16th, there were already half a dozen balls in the gap. Who knows how long they'd been there? Why couldn't a game home run have landed there? Does anyone know if any players hit homers to dead center field in the days before June 16th? It would be interesting to know, and if the answer is yes, I might need to recruit a forensic scientist to determine if there are woody fibers on the ball that match the fibers on that player's bat.

My 32nd and final ball of the day was not interesting in comparison to the two pictured above, but obviously it was the most meaningful, and I had to find a special way to photograph it. At first, this was the best I could come up with...



...but then Garrett had an idea. He told me and Jona to get in his car, and he drove around to the other side of the stadium. It was well past midnight by this point. He had to be at work at 6am. Jona and I were exhausted and starving. I was tempted to take a few quick pics of the ball and go back to the hotel, but when I mentioned the option of using the balls to actually spell out the number 32 (aka "balligraphy"), Garrett convinced me to do it.

Here I am, setting them all up in the middle of the road...



...and here's the fruit of my labor (and of Jona's patience):



Cool.

In case you're wondering, the three balls on the right are in Ziploc bags because those were the balls I fished out of the fountain. They were soaked to the core, so I kept them sealed until I could properly dry them out. And of course there are only 31 balls in the photo because I gave one away.

Thursday, June 18, 2009: wow...



• 32 balls at this game

• 59 balls in three games this week at Kauffman Stadium = 19.67 balls per game. (My notes for all these balls are pictured on the right.)

• 279 balls in 31 games this season = 9 balls per game.

• 600 consecutive games with at least one ball

• 166 consecutive games outside of New York with at least one ball

• 107 lifetime games with at least 10 balls

• 47 lifetime games outside of New York with at least 10 balls

• 4 lifetime games with at least 20 balls (all of which, surprise-surprise, were outside of New York)

• 4,099 total balls

CHARITY STATS:

• 110 donors (click here and scroll down for the complete list)

• $24.16 pledged per ball

• $773.12 raised at this game!

• $6,740.64 raised this season for Pitch In For Baseball

A few final thoughts...

1) It occurred to me that I probably would've snagged more than 35 balls if I'd been going for foul balls and third-out balls all night, but I did what I had to do. I was in a home run haven, and I stuck to my game plan, never even contemplating my one-game record until the very end.

2) It also occurred to me that this is the first time I've ever out-snagged my age. You follow? I'm thirty-one years old, and I managed to snag thirty-two balls. I'd have to say it's pretty rare for anyone to out-snag their age. Think about it. How likely is it that a five-year-old could snag six balls? Not very. How likely is it for anyone to snag 15 or 20 balls? Or 30? Again, not likely. I'd say the only people who have a real shot at out-snagging their age are probably young teenagers. By the time someone is 13 years old, he (or she) is just getting big enough and athletic enough and strategic enough to be able to make some good plays and outsmart the competition. Have YOU ever out-snagged your age? I think we might have a new category here--something ultra-rare, like hitting for the cycle. I wonder if I'll ever do it again.

3) This blog entry, for those keeping score at home, is 7,714 words and has 83 photographs (if you count the collage pics separately). These too, are records.

The End.

I expect to snag at least 10 balls at every game. I talked about that in my previous entry, remember? I also said that something has to go wrong in order for me not to snag that many.

Well, yesterday, something nearly went horribly wrong at the start of the day, and then I had to deal with two unexpected challenges soon after.

Speaking of the start of the day, here I am outside the left field gate:


The stadium opened at 4:30pm--two hours and 40 minutes before game time--and soon after I ran inside, I nearly sprained/broke my ankle. What happened was...I stepped onto a little concrete ridge on the upper concourse, not realizing that it WAS a ridge. I thought it was a platform that extended out at that height, so when I took a step forward, my right foot rolled off the edge, and as a matter of instinct, I gave with it and nearly fell down in the process. The right side of my ankle hurt a little bit right after, and I was scared out of my mind. It seemed to be okay, but I wasn't sure if there was going to be a delayed reaction of pain, or if it was going to get worse as I kept running around.

Jona was with me (she's the one who took all these photos) and she told me to "be careful" and "take it easy," but those are phrases that mean nothing to me when I'm inside a major league stadium--especially one as awesome as the New K--so I just started doing my thing and running all over the place as if nothing was wrong. Somehow, thankfully, the slight pain in my ankle actually went away.

I started off by running out to left-center and peeking over the outfield wall to see if there were any balls on the warning track:


Nope. Nothing. And I should probably mention the first of my two challenges: the Royals hadn't started hitting yet. The previous day, when I ran inside, batting practice was already in progress, but this time the place was dead.

That turned out to be a good thing.

I headed over to the lower level of the Pepsi Party Porch in right field... 


...and ended up playing catch with Kyle Farnsworth for more than five minutes! I'm not exaggerating. I just asked him straight-up if he wanted to play catch, and he tossed me the ball he was holding. Then, after I caught it, he held up his glove to indicate that he wanted me to throw it back. (Normally, when I ask guys to play catch, they'll toss me the ball and then just let me keep it right away.)

Here's a photo of Farnsworth throwing the ball to me...


...and here I am firing it back:


I didn't have much room to work with; after every throw I had to make sure not to follow through all the way so that my hand wouldn't whack the metal railing.

I managed to avoid getting hurt, and all I can say about the whole thing is...it was amazing. Jona switched her camera to movie mode and got several minutes' worth of video. When I have more time (perhaps this coming weekend), I might put it on YouTube. I don't know yet, but anyway, I've played catch from the stands on many occasions, and the only time that rivals this one was the Heath Bell Experience on 9/29/05 at Shea Stadium. THAT was awesome because Bell was shouting playfully at me and crouching down and calling balls and strikes, and there was a small audience of fans that gathered near me in the seats...but this throwing session with Farnsworth was great because it was calm. Once we started, he and I never talked. We were just two guys throwing the ball back and forth. Nothing needed to be said. Baseball was our common, silent language.

As I expected, we stopped throwing as soon as BP started and of course he let me keep the ball.

I headed to the upper level of the Porch and got Luke Hochevar to throw me a ball:


His aim, however, was off and the ball sailed over my head and landed in the fountains. No big deal. I just pulled out my little water-retrieval-device and reeled it in.

The four-part photo below (starting on the top left and then going clockwise) shows how it all went down:


Someone left a comment on my previous entry and asked if it's possible to reach over the railing and grab baseballs out of the water. As you can see in the photos above, the answer is no...although at one point, over in left field, a fan climbed over the railing and sprawled out on that green/gray concrete ledge, and he grabbed a couple balls out of the water before I had a chance to snag them with my device. Security wasn't around when he did that. That's how he got away with it. I don't recommend climbing over. I talked to a few different ushers who said that fans who go in the water are punished just like fans who run on the field: a night in jail and a $1,500 fine. It's not worth it for a BP ball, but for a walk-off grand slam? I'd consider it.

Back to the Hochevar ball...

After I reeled it in, I put it in a Ziploc bag so it wouldn't soak everything else in my backpack:


See the plastic shopping bag in the photo above? First of all, it's a Fairway bag. Best food market ever. There's one right near me in NYC on Broadway and 74th Street. Secondly, I brought it with me to the stadium so that I could keep the device from leaking all over my backpack as well. Water management is key.

My ankle was totally fine, and I ran nonstop all over the place:


Back in left field, I got Coco Crisp to toss me my third ball of the day. You can see it in mid-air in the following photo:


Just a few minutes later, Ron Mahay tossed me Ball No. 4, and then I headed back to right field to use my glove trick.

Remember those two challenges I talked about earlier in this entry? The second challenge was security. There was one guard in particular who wasn't too fond of the trick, and he hurried out to the Porch while my glove was dangling:


At some stadiums, like AT&T Park, fans are allowed to bring all kinds of crazy contraptions inside, and security doesn't care AT ALL if people pluck balls right off the field. I realize, however, that not every owner/stadium/city is as cool as San Francisco. If security doesn't want fans to take balls off the field, fine. I still don't think it's "stealing" but whatever. They have a right to draw the line somewhere, so I wasn't too upset (or surprised) when the guard came over and made me stop. What DID make me mad was when he stopped me from using the trick five minutes later for a ball in the gap in dead center field. There's nothing in that gap. You know those seven balls that were there the day before? They were STILL there. No one goes back there. There's no camera. No equipment. Nothing. I strongly feel that fans should at least be allowed to retrieve balls from gaps like this. The guard's explanation? He didn't want ME to lower my glove on a string because it would encourage other fans to do it too.

Well, guess what. I have news for that guard: his job is about to get way more stressful. Not only did FSN film me using the glove trick the previous day, and not only did they broadcast that footage for the whole world (okay, maybe just Missouri) to see, but there's also this wonderful invention called the Internet. And then there's this blog. And then there's a whole blog entry I wrote a few years ago that shows people exactly how to use the glove trick. Want to see how to do it? Click here. Then take your glove trick to Kauffman Stadium and wreak havoc and tell 'em Zack sent you. (You might need to specify that it was Zack Hample and not Zack Greinke. He's still the more famous Zack, but I'm working on it.)

The outfield seemed worthless to me at that point, and I seriously thought my day was going to end with a grand total of six balls, so once the rest of the stadium opened at 5:30pm, I headed to the Royals' dugout on the 1st base side:


The Royals were about to finish their portion of BP. I thought I might be able to get someone to toss me a ball on the way in. (In the photo above, do you see the other fan walking through the seats with the white Greinke jersey and the blue backpack? His name is Garrett. More on him in a bit.) What I didn't consider was finding a ball in the seats:


Did you notice how sweaty I was?

I felt great after finding that ball and then I got Roman Colon to toss me my 6th of the day a couple minutes later:


After that, I changed into my Diamondbacks gear, headed out to left field, and snagged two more balls within the next ten minutes or so. The first was tossed by Chad Qualls near the foul pole, and the second was a Mark Reynolds homer that landed in the last row in straight-away left field and then conveniently plopped right down at my feet. There were a bunch of other fans out there at that point, so it's a good thing the ball didn't ricochet elsewhere.

Then I heard Jona shouting frantically to get my attention. I was way over near the batter's eye, and there was a ball that had landed in the fountain. I don't know how I missed it. It must've been thrown because I was paying close attention to the hitters.

I ran over to the ball, knowing that it might sink at any second...


...and then I lowered my device into the water...


...and got it!

Moments later, another ball landed in the water (it was a home run and I don't know who hit it), and I fished that one out as well.

Hoo-haaaa!!! Just like that, I had reached double digits.

Toward the end of BP, Blaine Boyer tossed me a ball in left-center...


...and then I used my water gadget to fish another ball out of the fountain. It was a home run that I absolutely would've caught on the fly, but some guy (who had no business even thinking about catching it) bumped into me at the last second, and the ball deflected off my glove as a result.

That gave me 12 balls.

Garrett, who had recognized me the day before from YouTube, asked me to sign his scorebook, and then we took a photo together:


Cool guy.

As soon as BP ended, I hurried to the restaurant at the upper concourse in right field and met up with a few guys from the FSN crew. It was time for my pre-game interview. I was drenched in sweat, so I changed into my Royals shirt and hoped that the camera wouldn't see the embarrassing sweat stain on my butt:


The sweat stain actually went all the way around my waist, several inches below my belt, but the shirt was just long enough to cover it. You have no idea how hot and humid it was, and how much running I'd been doing during BP. I think I drank three 20-ounce bottles of water during BP, and I never had to use the bathroom. My body just absorbed all that water and sweated out the rest.

The photo above, by the way, was taken as I was being led to the interview location on the left field side. The guy walking next to me (in the black shirt and light tan pants) is named Nate Bukaty. He's the one who interviewed me. Here we are, right before we went live, down in the camera well next to the bullpen:


Here's a photo that Jona took during the brief interview itself:


I was so amped up at that point (from running around for two hours and snagging a dozen balls and playing catch with a major leaguer and being reprimanded by stadium security) that I ended up being all jittery in the interview. It also didn't help that I was told right beforehand that the whole interview was only going to last 90 seconds. There was so much I wanted to cover. I wanted to talk about how I'm snagging baseballs for charity, and I wanted to mention my books, especially Watching Baseball Smarter. At the time, I just thought I was being all energetic and fun, but now that I've had a chance to watch the tape, I really REALLY don't like how I came off. In fact, I'm downright embarrassed by my performance. I just needed to stand still and slow the HELL down, and I've been interviewed enough by now that I should've had the presence of mind to take a deep breath and step back from it all for a moment and just...collect myself.

Oh well. The other interview I did during the third inning went better. But before that one took place, I signed a few more autographs...


...and got Diamondbacks coach Glenn Sherlock to toss me a ball along the left field foul line:


(No red arrows in the photo above. You can figure out what's happening.)

I ran back and forth from right field to left during the first two innings, and of course there weren't any home runs hit.

Then it was time to make my way over for my in-game interview. For some reason, the TV announcers (Ryan Lefebvre and Frank White...yes, THE Frank White) weren't doing the game from up in the booth. Instead, they were set up on the Pepsi Party Porch near the right field bullpen:


It's really a shame. I was looking forward to getting a media credential and then wandering all over the stadium as soon as my interview was done, but because all of my interviews took place in the stands, there were no credentials to be had. Still, it was a total thrill to get to be interviewed during the game. I can't count the number of in-game interviews I've seen where some lucky stiff gets to put on a headset and stand between the announcers and talk about his charity or whatever. Now, for the first time in my life, *I* was going to be that stiff. HA! And unlike all the other stiffs, I was actually going to be fun. I just knew it.

Here's a look at the announcers from above...


...and here's a view from the side:


That's Frank White shielding his eyes from the sun. He won eight Gold Glove Awards. Wow.

Here's a shot that Jona took of me from above, right before I went on the air...


...and here I am, being interviewed during the actual game. DAMN it was fun:


I was told that I was only gonna be interviewed during the top of the third inning, and of course, just my luck, the invincible Zack Greinke was pitching. I was sure he was gonna mow down the D'backs one-two-three, and that I'd be told to take a hike as soon as FSN went to a commercial break.

My prediction was half-right: Greinke DID retire the side in order...BUT...two good things happened:

1) Felipe Lopez had an eight-pitch at-bat to lead off, and Justin Upton worked a full count two batters later. So...the three outs took a bit longer than usual.

2) As the third out was being recorded, and as my heart was sinking faster than a baseball in the fountain, Lefebvre said ON THE AIR that I would be sticking around for another half-inning. That came as a total surprise, and I was ecstatic.

It gave me a chance to be a human being and discuss ballhawking without having to rush through my talking points. During the interview, I could hear some producer's voice in my ear. He was making occasional comments and suggestions to all of us. At one point, he told Lefebvre what to ask me, and another time, he pointed out the fact that I'd been turning my back to Mister Frank White. We were in a commercial break at that point, so I turned and faced White and put my arm around him and offered a sincere apology and told him that since his partner was asking all the questions, I had just been facing him out of instinct. White wasn't offended, and we laughed about it, and then during the bottom of the inning, I made sure to look at both guys as I told my various stories. Another thing that I did during my interview was...whenever the ball was put into play (or when someone struck out), I had to stop talking and give Lefebvre a chance to do the play-by-play. No one told me to do this. I wasn't coached at all for this interview. I just did that because I've seen enough interviews to know that's how it's done.

Here's another photo taken during the interview:


Lefebvre and I were both wearing our gloves. White didn't need one.

"Mine are all made out of gold anyway," he said. (Awesome.)

The bottom of the third saw five men come to the plate (yay) but two of them hit the first pitch (boo). So...it wasn't THAT long of an inning, but at least I had a little extra time to do my thing.

Here I am with Lefebvre and White after the interview:


No, I didn't ask for White's autograph. I probably could've had him sign all 12 of my balls during the commercial break, but I just didn't care. I've become less and less interested in autographs. It was the experience the mattered. I got to shake his hand three times. Yes, I counted. Yes, I have since washed my hand. And yes, I meant to say "12 of my balls" and not 13; I forgot to mention that after the pre-game interview, I gave away one of the balls to a man in a wheelchair. Normally I only give balls to kids, but this guy was wearing a glove, and he had a leg missing. I couldn't NOT give him a ball.

For the rest of the game, I kept running back and forth for potential home run balls. Jona sat next to the batter's eye and held my backpack:


Mark Reynolds was the only guy who went deep. I should've gotten the ball but I was playing him too far toward left-center and he hit it to straight-away left. The ball didn't reach the walkway. It landed in the second row, so it would've been tough, but I still feel like I should've had it. And that was the only action for me during the game.

Greinke was very hittable. He struck out nine guys in 6 2/3 innings, but he allowed six runs--four earned--on eight hits and two walks. Not great, but his ERA is still dazzling at 1.96.

Final score: Diamondbacks 12, Royals 5.

I raced to the D'backs dugout with two outs in the bottom of the ninth and:

1) Got coach Jeff Motuzas to toss me my 14th ball of the day

and...

2) Found a crumpled up dollar on the ground as I headed up the steps.

An hour after the game ended, I was in a Denny's restaurant near the stadium with Jona, and who walked in? Clay Zavada.

The end. Gotta run back to Kauffman for my third and final game. I'll get those interviews up on my site at some point soon so everyone can see them. (I'd put them on YouTube, but MLB would take them down for copyright infringement. Duh. I need to have a word with Mister Selig about that...)

SNAGGING STATS:

• 14 balls at this game

• 247 balls in 30 games this season = 8.23 balls per game.

• 599 consecutive games with at least one ball

• 165 consecutive games outside of New York with at least one ball

• 106 lifetime games with at least 10 balls

• 46 lifetime games outside of New York with at least 10 balls

• 4,067 total balls

CHARITY STATS:

• 110 donors (click here and scroll down for the complete list)

• $24.16 pledged per ball

• $338.24 raised at this game

• $5,967.52 raised this season for Pitch In For Baseball