May 18th, 2009: The Love of the Game

Typically on opening day I like to write a post about how amazing baseball is. I missed that opportunity as opening day has come and past. In fact, my team, the Cleveland Indians, have been sucking it up for a month and a half. Still, while I am very excited about LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers run, baseball will always be my first love. I have been to dozens, possibly hundreds of baseball games in my young life. The biggest game I ever was at was the infamous “Bug Game” between the Cleveland Indians and the New York Yankees in Game 2 of the American League Divisional Series in 2007. It is called the “bug game” because a swarm of midges took to the infield and were so annoying to Joba Chamberlin that they cause him to allow a run. Words can’t really do it justice, look at the picture on the right.
 

I have been to other big games as well. I saw a no-hitter where the pitcher who threw it lost back in 1992 in the old Cleveland Stadium. Mostly though, I just love being at the baseball stadium. I have been at the Cleveland Indians former AAA team, the Buffalo Bisons as well as their AA team, the Akron Aeros. I have seen their High-A team play the Potomac Nationals just 15 min south of me in Woodbridge, VA. I saw for the first time the A team, the Lake County Captains, at Municipal Park vs the Hagerstown Suns this year.
 

In terms of MLB Stadiums, I have been to the following:

In addition I have been to the following minor league parks:

I have a long term goal of getting to all the major league parks in baseball. I am driving back to Cleveland for a wedding early next month, and I plan on stopping in Pittsburgh in order to add 1 more MLB stadium to my list. I found a man who has kept such great track of all the places he has been that I wanted to show him to all of you here. He has been to 990 professional baseball games, including 340 different professional baseball stadiums. He in fact rates every single one, which is really neat. I saw his web site and decided I wanted to do the same thing, so even though I have not tracked all the games I ever saw, I start this year. Here are my 1^st seven this season.