6/9/09 - Orange County Flyers Opening night - 8 balls - (Independant Minor League Baseball)

Tonight was my wifes birthday and since sheis friends with a pitcher on the Orange County Flyers (an Independant Minor League team) we decided to go to their home opener. The Flyers play at Goodwin Field on the campus of Cal State Fullerton. This is also the ballpark that the Cal State Fullerton Titans play in. Here is a shot of the field from the street as you walk up. Notice the backside of the scoreboard with the message board that hasn't worked in at least 10 years! This is left field and as you can see even though there is a net it can still be a Ballhawks paradise! When a ball hits the net it generally falls straight down and is easy to grab.

The right field side backs up to the Fullerton Aboretum which can also be very nice for a ballhawk. It was back in 2006 when a few of the World Baseball Classic teams worked out here and I did quite well grabbing 38 baseballs in 3 days! That haul included 11 from Ichiro and 7 from A-Rod!! Here is a look over the right field wall from the Arboretum........

Batting practice started around 4:30 which only left about 15 minutes where if a ball was hit into the arboretum that someone could go in and get it. Of course while the gates to the arboretum were still open no one hit a ball in there. Then about 10 minutes ater the gates were close ........ you guessed it ....... someone hit a ball and there it stayed!

The little white speck on the path just under the tree trunk is the first baseball that was hit into the Arboretum. Here are the first 3 balls that I grabbed via video and a photo at the end of all 8 balls. It will keep this post to a minimum for sure!

The game itself was not very exciting other than back to back home runs by Flyers catcher Nick Guerra and former Major League All-Star, from the Detroit Tigers, Robert Fick.

It was the night where the Flyers got their Championship Rings. It was a complete fiasco because as has become a custom at Flyers games the staff was completely UN-ORGANIZED. The game was slated to start at 7:05 and they didn't even start the ring ceremony until 7:10. The game finally got started at 7:45 and ended around 11ish with Fireworks that I am sure the surrounding neighborhood was not happy with on a Tuesday night.

In the 7th inning they had someone from some lifetime series sing "America the Beautiful" and because of technical difficulties she had to start the song over after missing her entry point the first time.

I guess they are trying to film some "reality" show for TV based on or around the Flyers. They were again unprepared for opening night with the PA announcer trying to get his stuff set up just before game time. Fortunately for him it was not his fault because he had evidently asked for it to be done the night before which obviously it didn't.

The concessions prices are ridiculous, the atmosphere is simply not fun, the between inning promotions are mediocore at best and no one seemed to be on the same page with some of the on field stuff causing a delay of the game.

Oh well I guess that is just INDY baseball for you ........... the one thing that was not cool was the fact that the teams GM, who is also the owner, was sitting in the stands drinking a beer!