We're coming up on my second blogiversary. I'm overdue for a post since I haven't posted since baseball season began in the United States, but first I have a two-part rant about last night's Dodger game:
1. I watched nine and a half innings of last night's twelve-inning game, which apparently ended after 3:00 in the morning east coast time. I'm normally not one to complain about umpires (I don't like replay, I think we should live with some crappy calls like we did for well over 100 years), but I thought Mike Winters was terrible behind the plate last night. It seemed like all of the borderline balls and strikes calls were going in favor of the Giants. However, that's not the reason Kenley Jansen blew the save. There were plenty of calls I didn't like, but I can't think of any in the bottom of the ninth. Jansen didn't get the job done.
2. Juan Uribe has gone from being easily my least favorite player on the Dodgers (perhaps second only to Andruw Jones as my least favorite player ever) to being probably one of my five favorite Dodgers currently on the team (Kershaw, Ethier, Kemp, and Ellis might be the only players I'd put ahead of him). He was the best player on the field for the Dodgers last night (a triple short of the cycle, the only two runs of the game for the Dodgers, and excellent in the field). So it totally wasn't his fault that the Dodgers lost, but his performance made me think of an issue I have with the stat head community. They like to say that RBIs don't matter. That's just silly. You win games by scoring more runs than the other team. As I said, Uribe played a very good game, but I would trade the home run and double he had for a double in another at bat. Let's take out extra innings and go through his at bats. During the first nine innings, Uribe hit a solo home run in the second, struck out with the bases loaded in the fourth, doubled and later scored in the seventh, and grounded out in the eighth. If Uribe goes 1-4 and doubles with the bases loaded, all three runners probably score and if everything else stays the same, the Dodgers win the game. Baseball is a situational game (probably more so than other sports). The stat heads ignore context when they say RBIs don't matter. Ordinarily, you'd take a home run and a double over just a double. But if Uribe had just doubled with the bases loaded and not had the two hits that he actually had, that's probably the difference between a win and a loss. Again, my complaint is with the stat heads and not with Uribe.
Anyway, it's just one game and you can't overreact to an April game in a 162-game season. But I do hate losing to the Giants. Which brings me to what I really wanted to blog about, continuing my quests to get to every Major League Baseball stadium and all 50 states. A week from Friday, I'll be in San Francisco. San Francisco is full of dirty, smelly hippies that like Barry Bonds. I really don't know how to feel about this. AT&T Park is one of the most well-liked stadiums in Major League Baseball. And my least favorite team plays there. Hopefully I'll get to see the Giants lose. What I'm probably more excited about is going to Los Angeles again. I was thinking about going to San Francisco and realized that it wouldn't cost that much more to add a stop to Los Angeles on the trip. So I'm starting in Los Angeles on Thursday. This is kind of like last year when I combined Opening Day in Los Angeles and Milwaukee into one trip.
It's going to be a productive spring and summer. I don't have to worry about missing the Celtics in the playoffs, but I still would like to watch as much NBA Playoffs as possible and I'll get into the NHL Playoffs if the Rangers make a run. In May, I'll get to Canada and SkyDome for the first time. And I'll be pretty busy in the summer.
I'm confident that I'll be able to finish the Major League Baseball stadiums in 2015. Actually, I'll have two left. I'm not going to Oakland or Tampa until those teams have new stadiums (they both play in dumps). And in a few years the Braves will have a new stadium. If Dennis is still living in Atlanta whenever that stadium opens, maybe I'll make another trip down there. But I'd like to finish with a bang. If I could get a bunch of people involved in my last trip, that would be pretty cool. I'll have three stadiums left and I could make each one into a big trip:
1. Target Field. It's the second newest stadium in the league. I definitely won't be going to Minnesota for outdoor baseball during my Easter vacation next year so I'm thinking this will be during the summer. I have an ambitious plan for this trip. Fly to and from Minneapolis. Rent a car and cross off a few states. The Field of Dreams in Iowa is something I'd definitely want to see. And I could also go to Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota. Omaha and Fargo both have minor league baseball teams (if I can't think of any other things to do in Nebraska and North Dakota). Going to Mt. Rushmore would be awesome, but it's in western South Dakota, which wouldn't really be feasible on this trip. South Dakota might just have to be a drive through state.
2. Globe Life Park. I know, you have no idea what Globe Life Park is, but that's the new name of the stadium where the Rangers play. If Jon and Kyle want to make up for not going to the Shamrock Series at Jerry World and hanging out with Wilhelm in his native habitat, they're welcome to come. I'll just have to hope that our government is running so that this time I can get to the George W. Bush Presidential Library (although the museum at Dealey Plaza was really good, I'm glad I got there). I'm sure there are other cool things to do in Dallas as well.
3. Angel Stadium. It's now the fourth oldest stadium in baseball (Fenway Park, Wrigley Field, Dodger Stadium, tied with whatever that horrendous stadium in Oakland is called). I love southern California. I wish I had friends that lived there. There are so many things I'd want to do there to mark the conclusion of my quest to get to all these stadiums. Obviously, if I'm in Anaheim, I'd want to schedule it so that I could get to a Dodger game as well. Disneyland would be a thing I'd want to do also (I've been to Disney World a handful of times, but never Disneyland). It would be fun to take a trip down to San Diego and get to Petco Park again (one of my favorites). And I'd really like to get to the Reagan Presidential Library (with that and the Bush library, I'd balance the political parties of the presidential libraries I would have been to). The Reagan Library is 74.3 miles northwest of Angel Stadium, so that's doable.
So if you like the United States, baseball, and Jim (or at least two of those three things), you're welcome to join on any of those trips. I'm fairly confident that they will happen in 2015.
So I'm going to finish the baseball stadiums. How will I finish the states? Here's the map of states I've been to. I really need to get to the three closest states I haven't been to: Vermont, Maine, and West Virginia (I've been to all five states that border West Virginia, but not West Virginia). Vermont has Little Fenway and Little Wrigley. It would be really really cool to play wiffle ball at either of those places. Portland, Maine has a minor league stadium with the Maine Monster (they're affiliated with the Red Sox). That would be cool to see, and it's not that far from my friend John in Massachusetts. I've got nothing for West Virginia. I still want to get to Gettysburg. That's not too far from West Virginia.
But how about the other states I haven't been to? I'll just go through some of the ones I have a hard time picturing myself going to in the not too distant future. Ideally, Notre Dame will make it to the Sugar Bowl for a playoff game on January 1, 2015. If I was ever in New Orleans, I'd have to take a drive through Mississippi and into Alabama and knock off those two in addition to Louisiana (New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama are like two hours apart).
Hawaii and Alaska would both be really cool to go to. I like to think that Hawaii will happen someday, but I have a hard time picturing myself actually booking a trip to Alaska.
Five states out west will be tough. If Notre Dame does indeed play BYU in Provo, that could easily be my trip to Utah. If I did that, I might just have to take a drive to Idaho (although I my former roommate Nick lives in Boise and has offered to host me if I ever go there). Montana is named after Joe Montana so that's cool (relax, I'm not being serious, but I would name a place after Joe Montana). If I ever got to Mt. Rushmore, I might have to take a drive to Montana. Oregon has a college football team that wears horrendous uniforms. If Major League Baseball ever takes my expansion plan, maybe there will be a stadium for me to visit there. If not, I guess I could just go to see a Trail Blazers game or something. And New Mexico? I've got nothing. It might win the award for state I have the most trouble envisioning myself going to. Congratulations, New Mexico.
So I definitely won't be finishing off all 50 states any time soon, but I'll try to keep making progress. Notre Dame could really help me out by making the Sugar Bowl this season. Go Irish!
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