Game #27-Nationals Park-Washington Nationals vs. San Francisco Giants

We made it to Washington DC a day later than expected due to a flight cancellation. Flying this summer has had many challenges for us with delays and cancellations. Thankfully only two of our “Field of Dreams Tour” games required flights. This is an exciting game for both Jim and I as we will have both been to all 30 parks in our lifetime after this game, not all in the same year that will come in August. There was much anticipation leading up to this game as the Nationals will be playing the Giants who are coming off of two losses. We stayed in a hotel right next to the ballpark which worked out very well. We had a view of the ballpark from our room window and a fantastic view of the ballpark from the rooftop bar at the hotel. We walked the few short steps to the gate when the park opened at 5:30pm. We were amazed at the number of Giants fans in attendance. Nationals Park is very beautiful and sits along the Anacostia River in the Navy Yard neighborhood of Washington DC. The stadium opened in 2008 to the Washington Nationals who moved to Washington DC in 2005. The team was established in 1969 as the Montreal Expos until their move to Washington DC when they changed their name to the Washington Nationals. Once the Nationals moved to Washington they had a slow start to earning titles but that changed in 2012 when they won their first NL East title and then again in 2014, 2016 and 2017. In 2019 the Nationals became National Champions winning the World Series as a Wild Card team. The Nationals have only retired one number which is #11-Ryan Zimmerman in 2022. All MLB teams have retired #42-Jackie Robinson. When the team was the Montreal Expos, they retired #8-Gary Carter, #10-Andre Dawson and Rusty Staub, and #30 Tim Raines. Interestingly, the Nationals have put the Expos retired numbers back into circulation. We noticed several names on the stadium near the press box with a G or a W in front of their names and asked the usher why the names were there. He at first did not have the answers but was kind enough to research it and let us know that these players were inducted into the “Ring of Honor”. In 2010 amid much controversy, the Nationals put up a “Ring of Honor” celebrating players from the Washington Senators, Negro League Washington Homestead Grays and the Montreal Expos. The big controversy comes from players being recognized who never played in Washington DC. Most National fans would like to keep it just players they grew up with like the Washington Senators. I say you can’t make everyone happy so they should recognize the Expo players, otherwise they would be baseball orphans with no place to be recognized for their contributions to baseball. While we were on our walk of the stadium we experienced many great patio areas in the upper decks that overlook the ballpark. These areas do not have the very fancy seating like some baseball parks have but they have great views. While we were at the top of the stadium we took several pictures to showcase the parks beauty. We had a very kind usher Jill, in the upper deck take our picture. If fact, it is the picture shown in this blog. From the right field upper deck you can see the Washington Monument and US Capitol. If you are looking for a discount price to attend a Nationals game you can wait until 2 1/2 hours before the first pitch and purchase tickets in the left field upper deck for $5.00 each. Now that’s a bargain! As game time drew near we retreated to the lower deck towards our seats. Don’t tell Jim but these seats I bought were NO bargain. I wanted to be as close as possible to the Giants dugout so I bought seats just 16 rows back….NOT $5.00 each! It’s only money right? Along our path to our seats I noticed a sign that read “Sensory Room.” I asked the gentleman standing outside the front door if I could go in and see the room. As an educator I know first hand how important it is to have spaces for children with unique needs. This room provides a safe and quiet room where guests can decompress if they are feeling overwhelmed or overstimulated. The room has several sensory activities, soothing lights and soft bean bags. This definitely is an asset to some who would not be able to go to a game if they did not have this outlet. Well done Nationals! Additionally, for those kids who need to get some energy out they have a children’s playground that was full of active children before the game. Now on to the food, as we skipped lunch to prepare for the extra calories and our bellies were empty. Through our research and questioning of other fans we found the hot dog for Jim’s review should be the Nats Dog from Haute DOGS & Fries. The Nets Dog is topped with chili, mambo slaw and mustard. Once we had the goods we found a spot that would highlight the stadium in the background. A very nice usher Taylor let us stroll down to a section that would be fitting. Jim gave the Nats Dog a 7.0. He said it was good but not he was not a big fan of the Mambo slaw. I tasted it too and felt it was good but very messy! I probably would not order it again but then again I probably would not order a hot dog unless forced to do so. In our walk around the park I noticed the taco stand and boy I love me some tacos! I had two street chicken tacos from Bullpen Tacos. The tacos had chicken, onions, cilantro, pico de Gallo, feta cheese and lime sauce. YUMMY! Now on to those pricey seats. Our seats were wonderful and we were surrounded by Giants fans. We had many conversations with those around us as to their ties to the Giants. One fan said he was making it his lifelong goal to see the Giants play in every ballpark and he has about 10 left to go. Sitting right in front of us was a young 20 something year old girl and her father. She bought tickets for him for his birthday. It so reminded me of my very special times attending the Giants games with my father who passed away just one year ago this month. Sigh! It’s so interesting to learn everyone’s stories. The National Anthem was sung by a military group which was spectacular. One thing is for sure the Nationals celebrate our military. It was great to have “God Bless America” and “Take Me Out To The Ballgame” both being sung in the 7th inning stretch. As the first pitch grew closer all of a sudden they began to play Tony Bennett’s “I Left My Heart in San Francisco”. Jim and I thought that was odd that they would play such an iconic song for the opposing team. It was not until the next morning we would realize they did that to honor Tony Bennett as he passed away that very day. What an incredible man he was and what a very nice gesture given by the Nationals. The entertainment at the ballpark was very good with the President’s Race being the highlight. The President’s Race features the likeness of former Presidents: George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt. They have very large foam caricature heads and have a race at every Nationals home game in the 4th inning. They were hysterical as they pushed and shoved their way to win the race. The mascot Screech is a bald eagle who was hatched in 2005. A 9 year old fourth grade student won the contest on designing the mascot. She said the eagle was a great mascot because it was “strong and eats almost everything.” The first pitch was delivered at 7:05pm with a crowd of 26,062 in attendance in a 41,376 capacity stadium. I was so hopeful for the Giants but clearly it was not their night as Alex Wood was out pitched by Nats rookie Jake Irvin. The Giants struck out 12 times and just could not get it done at the plate. The first inning started off great with JD Davis hitting a homer. Score Giants 1 - Nats 0. Very quickly the Nats answered back in the 1st inning with Lane Thomas hitting a homer. Oh I was hoping we would not hear that submarine horn that celebrates Nats home runs and wins. The Nets use the submarine horn as a tribute to their relationship with the military and the stadium’s proximity to the Navy Yard. Score Giants 1 - Nats 1. Then Wood would walk two batters bringing up Keibert Ruiz who hit a double and drove in a run. Score Giants 1 - Nats 2. As if I had not heard enough of that submarine horn in the bottom of the 2nd inning CJ Abrams would go yard. Score Giants 1 - Nats 3. The top of the 3rd Giants Brett Wisely walked with Casey Schmitt coming up to ground into a double play. With two outs LaMonte Wade Jr. hit a single before Joc Pederson smashed a homer. Just before Joc came to the plate I was complaining about his performance as of late when Jim announced stop your crying he is going to hit a homer and he did! Score Giants 3 - Nats 3. In the 4th inning poor Alex Wood continued to struggle hitting Stone Garrett with a pitch. Next up was Micael Chavis who hit a line drive for a double scoring Garrett. Score Giants 3 - Nats 4. The best defensive play came when Patrick Bailey picked off Michael Chavis on a throw to third base for the third out. I might have been standing up screaming and cheering by that point. The 5th inning came and after CJ Abrams hit a single Gabe Kapler made the call to pull Alex Wood and replace him with Ryan Walker. Walker was able to manage the next two batters when Joey Meneses came to the plate with two outs and a runner on 3rd. Joey Meneses had Ryan Walker’s number as he sent a ball sailing on a sharp line drive scoring the runner. Score Giants 3 - Nats 5. I thought the 7th inning there might be some magic about to happen for the Giants. Michael Conforto hit a single, then Mike Yastrzemski lined out, and one of my new favorites Patrick Bailey struck out swinging. Hey at least he swung! With two outs Blake Sabol came to the plate and hit a single moving Conforto to third base. The Nets thought it was time to sit the rookie Jake Irvin down and brought in a new pitcher, Jordan Weems. Wilmer Flores came to the plate with two outs and runners on first and third. Weems walked him and I flew out of my seat with the bases loaded and the possibility of scoring so close. Casey Schmitt who was playing shortstop in place of Brandon Crawford who is on the injured list with left knee inflammation came to the plate. Unfortunately the rookie Casey Schmitt would strike out on a foul tip. I don’t know who was more disappointed Casey or myself. It just hurts to leave the bases loaded. The 8th and 9th innings would be three up and three down making the final score Giants 3 - Nats 5. I’m not crying no I’m not, as there is NO CRYING IN BASEBALL! Well the Field of Dreams Tour record now is 12 WINS for the Home Team and 15 LOSSES for the Home Team. We will head back to California to finish our Field of Dreams 2023 Tour we will be seeing the Dodgers vs. A’s at Dodgers Stadium on August 2, Padres vs. Dodgers at Petco Park on August 7 and our finale on Jim’s birthday August 23 at Angel Stadium where the Los Angeles Angels will play the Cincinnati Reds. We have many friends and family that will be joining us on that special day as we celebrate 30 in 2023! Until next tine PLAY BALL!

Game # 26-Toronto Blue Jays vs. San Diego Padres.....WE ARE BACK!

We have arrived in Toronto to visit ballpark #26 on Wednesday, July 19 after a month long break from our Field of Dreams Tour. Let’s just say it was not an easy or restful break as we bid farewell to Jim’s mom who passed away in Houston and then we spent a busy but glorious week in Lake Tahoe with 6 of our 10 grandkids. We are happy to be continuing our baseball journey and look forward to the last few ballparks. It is a little bittersweet getting this close to the end of this adventure. In the initial planning of this trip as we worked all the teams schedules we just could not make it work to visit Toronto in our RV because while we were in that vicinity the Blue Jays were on the road. Jim’s first thoughts and words were, “Oh well we will just skip it.” Very quickly he saw the look on my face and knew that was not in the plan. So from early on we planned a flight back to Toronto after we parked our RV back at home. As I always do I planned for every moment of our baseball trip with a few side adventures along the way. We took public transportation to the downtown area of Toronto to visit the CN Tower prior to the game. The CN Tower held the record as the tallest free-standing structure for 32 years until 2007. Currently it is the tenth tallest structure in the world with 147 stories. You can view pictures of our visit to the tower on our Instagram @ourfieldofdreams2023. Let’s just say Jim is NOT fond of heights and I must say it was a bit frightening venturing out onto the glass floor 147 stories up. After a very thrilling experience to the top of the CN Tower Jim and I took a long walk around the exterior of the ballpark. Rogers Centre does not have very much to see on the exterior other than the commissioned artwork above the northeast and northwest entrances called “The Audience.” It is a collection of depictions of larger-than-life fans in various acts of celebration. Please see our Instagram for pics. As we were walking around the stadium we noticed Blue Jays fans were already lining up at various gates with three hours until gates opened. They are professionals as they all came with small pop up seats or blankets to sit upon while they waited the three hours for the gates to open. The Blue Jays fans are passionate and go to great lengths to support their team which we discovered when we saw the Blue Jays play at three other ballparks. Once in the ballpark and through security (that darn hot dog hat!) we spent about an hour walking the inside of the ballpark. At the very top of the stadium we asked a very nice usher to take our picture…..in fact the one on this post. Rogers Centre has a retractable roof which was closed when we arrived to the park. It takes 20 minutes to open the roof so we assumed as it got closer to game time it would remain closed. We were wrong in our assumptions as during the third inning the roof began to open. We could not believe they did that during the game! We visited the Corona Rooftop Patio, Park Social and WestJet Flight Deck. These are all very nice venues with unique seating areas that overlook the outfield. While we were in Park Social we sat in one of the swings they have and listened to a guitar player for a short time. Really a great concept to have these areas for social gatherings at ballparks. Another unique feature of this ballpark is that the Toronto Marriott City Centre Hotel is connected to the outfield with 70 of its rooms windows a backdrop to the field. These windows are two-way windows which in some instances have given fans a little more than baseball to watch leading to nicknames for the ballpark of “SexDome” and “Exhibitionist Stadium”. If you are interested you should Google some of the shenanigans that have taken place. Now the hotel has guests sign a contract that they will not perform any lewd acts within view of the stadium. Switching gears, I will move on to the history of this ball club. The Toronto Blue Jays came in as an expansion team in 1977 so their history is relatively short in baseball terms. The Blue Jays have been playing at Rogers Centre formerly the SkyDome since 1989. While looking for the Blue Jays display of retired numbers I only saw two, one was #32-Roy Halladay and #42-Jackie Robinson. I wondered where #12-Roberto Alomar’s banner was and then I looked it up and found out he was banned from baseball following allegations of sexual misconduct in 2021. It is so sad a player with his accomplishments choose to take this path. The Blue Jays removed Alomar from their Level of Excellence and his retired number banner. Unfortunately he is not the first professional ballplayer nor the last who will do something so ignorant to ruin their legacy. It has been 30 years since the Blue Jays have won a World Series and the fans are hungry for another title. The Blue Jays were back-to-back World Champions in 1992 and 1993. They have won 6 AL East Division titles and 3 Wild Card berths with the last one in 2022. All of the banners are displayed proudly between the Canadian and American flags. The next thing we notice was a huge sign that indicated it was National Hot Dog Day. Can you believe Jim the Hot Dog Man did not even have that marked on his calendar? We originally wanted to attend a Tuesday game because they have “Loonie Dog” night where all hot dogs are a loonie/dollar. The record for number of Loonie Dogs was broke the day before our arrival on Tuesday, July 18 with 75,173 Loonie Dogs sold! With 42,680 fans in attendance that is 1.7 dogs per person! All this talk of hot dogs sent us quickly to the hot dog stand where Jim selected a Poutine Hot Dog. It is a classic Schneiders hot dog topped with hash brown potatoes, cheese curds, and gravy. Jim gave that dog a rating of 8.5. I tasted it too and it was really good! As game time approached we went to our seats to be present for the opening festivities and both National Anthems. With the stadium roof closed and our seats located right near a large overhead speaker the sound was almost unbearable. The Blue Jays have great entertainment throughout the game with a female DJ and Blue Jays cheerleaders or “J FORCE.” The J FORCE made their way all over the stadium dancing and entertaining the fans. Another great dancer is their mascot Ace who really got the crowd going and was very entertaining. The game began at 7:07pm with 42,948 in attendance of a 49,282 capacity stadium. That is a pretty full house for a Wednesday evening game. It was a pitching battle the first several innings of the game with Jose Berrios on the mound for the Blue Jays and Yu Darvish on the mound for the Padres. Both pitchers were putting them down in order or close to it. Then in the 5th inning Berrios struggled to find the plate walking Trent Grisham and hitting Ha-Seong Kim with a pitch. With runners on first and second Fernando Tatis Jr. came to the plate luckily Berrios would strike him out but not before both runners would advance by stolen bases. With runners on second and third Berrios intentionally walked Juan Soto to load the bases in the hopes of a double play. Manny Machado was next to the plate and hit a two-run single with a broken bat that nearly took out Blue Jays shortstop Bo Bichette. Score Padres 2 - Blue Jays 0. That would be the only score of the night as this game had some outstanding pitching and fantastic defense. Unfortunately it did not go the Home Team’s way tonight and this makes it 11 wins for the Home Team and 15 losses for the Home Team. Next up we fly to Washington DC to make up the rainout we had for the Nationals back on April 28. Lucky for me the Nationals will be playing the San Francisco Giants! So I will NOT be routing for the Home Team. Here is hoping for a W for the Giants. Until next time PLAY BALL!