United States of Sports

I was trying to plan my Easter vacation trip and often my Easter vacation trip revolves around some Major League Baseball.  This year, I didn’t have any Major League Baseball games I wanted to go to since I’ve been to all 30 current stadiums (after my Easter vacation trip to Texas last year).  So I decided to combine my trip to Notre Dame with a trip to see minor league baseball in a state where I had never been to a sporting event before.  Of course, I’ve already seen a sporting event in most of the 50 states, but I still had 11 to go.  It seemed easiest to combine a Notre Dame trip with a sporting event in another Midwestern state.  The only Midwestern states where I hadn’t seen a sporting event yet were Iowa and South Dakota.  The schedule worked out for me to go to Des Moines to see the Iowa Cubs.  I last spent time in Iowa nine years ago when I visited the Field of Dreams.  I was also very briefly in Iowa when I went to Omaha six years ago (to get from the airport to the city, you have to drive through a sliver of Iowa).

The game was the Iowa Cubs against the Toledo Mud Hens (the Tigers’ triple-A affiliate).  Triple-A is fun because there will be players that you’re familiar with.  Pete Crow-Armstrong played 13 games in the Majors for the Cubs last year.  Somehow I remember him even though he didn’t play against the Dodgers.  He led off the game with a home run for the Cubs in the bottom of the first.  He scored from second base on a passed ball in the seventh when the pitcher didn’t cover home quickly enough.  And then he had an RBI double in the eighth inning (he got credit for one RBI there and a second run scored on an error).  The Cubs won 5-1 and they played that ridiculous Go Cubs Go song.  The box score listed the attendance as 3,025.  I don’t know how many people paid for tickets, but the actual number of fans at the game was much closer to 325 than 3,025.  It was a Thursday night in April with a game time temperature of 56° and it felt much colder than that as the game went on.

This was my view at the start of the game.

I zoomed in for a better view of the Iowa State Capitol beyond the center field wall.  It was my second favorite golden dome during my Easter vacation trip.

The Cubs play at Principal Park.  I had mixed feelings about the stadium.  The beer selection was excellent.  There was a concession stand with a wide variety of craft beer from Iowa.  There were three that I was interested in.  One was a stout that I think was the beer I had from Iowa when I was in Omaha.  Another one seemed much too summery for the early April weather.  So I ended up having a CTRL ALT Bier, an amber ale from the Singlespeed Brewing Company.  It was excellent.  Since it was my first baseball game of the year, I had to go with a hot dog.  I got a grilled dog that was very good.  But it was the Midwest, so sadly they only had yellow.  I put yellow on the dog because that’s better than ketchup, but the Midwest needs to learn about real mustard.  Later in the game, they did a thing where they were shooting hot dogs into the stands in between innings and I got one.  It wasn’t grilled so it wasn’t as good as my first dog.  I wasn’t too hungry so I just took a couple of bites.  I almost ended up with a foul ball.  It landed two rows in front of me and there was nobody else around, but some kids ran over so I let them get it.  I still haven’t ever gotten a foul ball at a game.  I thought the scoreboard display was very good.  The negatives of the stadium were that the concourse didn’t go all the way around the stadium and it was underneath the stands.  I always like being able to see the field from the concourse.

My first baseball/outdoor beer of 2024 was a good one.

I watched a little bit of the game from way down the right field line because it was warmer there while the sun was still out.

I assume this was for kids to play in when it’s hot.  I felt bad for the employee who had to sit there and keep an eye on it.

It was good to be back at a baseball game.  Hopefully it will be much warmer at all the other games I go to this season.

The only thing I wanted to do in Iowa other than the game was to get food from a place that was featured on Man v. Food.  Both the Adam Richman and Casey Webb versions of Man v. Food had a Des Moines episode.  Both episodes had a place that was within walking distance of my hotel.  Adam went to the High Life Lounge for broasted chicken.  Casey went to Fong’s Pizza, which is like an Asian pizza fusion place.  As somebody who lives in the Pizza Belt, I’m hesitant to get pizza outside of the pizza belt.  I would have done it if I didn’t have another easy option.  But the High Life Lounge was right there.  So I got some broasted chicken with sweet potato tots and beans.  Broasting combines pressure cooking and deep frying.  It just seemed like some regular fried chicken to me, but all the food was very good.

This was delicious.

So that was Iowa.  I tried to come up with a list of all the different kinds of sporting events I’ve seen in 40 states plus Washington DC (in the order that I've been to each place, not necessarily the order I’ve been to each state for a sporting event).  It’s entirely possible that I’m forgetting something, but here’s the list:

1. New York- Mets, Yankees, Knicks, Nets, Rangers, Islanders, college football, college basketball, college hockey, minor league baseball, independent league baseball, college baseball, collegiate summer league baseball, NBA G-League

2. New Jersey- college football, Jets, independent league baseball

3. Connecticut- minor league baseball

4. Pennsylvania- college football, Phillies, Pirates, college basketball, curling

5. Ohio- Indians, Reds

6. Florida- Marlins, Rays, college football

7. Massachusetts- Red Sox, Celtics, college football, college hockey

8. Delaware- minor league baseball

9. Maryland- college football, Orioles

10. Washington DC- Nationals, college basketball

11. Virginia- minor league baseball

12. Indiana- Notre Dame football, basketball, hockey, baseball, fencing, minor league baseball

13. Illinois- White Sox, Cubs

14. Kentucky- minor league baseball

15. Tennessee- minor league baseball

16. Georgia- college football, Braves

17. Michigan- Tigers

18. California- Dodgers, Padres, Giants, Angels, A’s

19. North Carolina- college football

20. Nevada- minor league baseball

21. Arizona- Diamondbacks

22. Colorado- Rockies

23. Wisconsin- Brewers

24. Texas- Astros, college football, Rangers

25. Washington- Mariners

26. Missouri- Cardinals, Royals

27. Arkansas- minor league baseball

28. Oklahoma- minor league baseball

29. Kansas- minor league baseball

30. Utah- Jazz

31. New Mexico- minor league baseball

32. Alabama- minor league baseball

33. Minnesota- Twins

34. Iowa- minor league baseball

35. Nebraska- college baseball

36. North Dakota- independent league baseball

37. Montana- minor league baseball

38. Idaho- minor league baseball

39. Louisiana- Pelicans

40. South Carolina- minor league baseball

41.  Alaska- collegiate summer league baseball

I’ll list the states where I haven’t seen a sporting event with the sporting event that I would most want to see in each state.

1. Rhode Island- Providence basketball

2. New Hampshire- minor league baseball

3. Wyoming- Wyoming football

4. West Virginia- West Virginia football

5. South Dakota- independent league baseball

6. Oregon- Oregon football

7. Maine- minor league baseball

8. Vermont- wiffle ball at Little Fenway, Little Wrigley, and Little Field of Dreams

9. Mississippi- Ole Miss or Mississippi State football

10. Hawaii- Hawaii football

What I would most like to see in each state is not necessarily what I would be most likely to see.  Going to a college football game in a state that’s far away to see anybody other than Notre Dame is not very likely for me.  Minor league baseball is probably the most likely option in any state that has minor league baseball.  The two hardest states to do are going to be Wyoming and Hawaii because of distance and lack of options.  It’s doubtful that I would ever be in either of those states for a college football game unless I waited until I retired.  I guess Hawaii does play some Week 0 football games so maybe that’s not out of the question someday (I mean, I did see Hawaii play a Week 0 game in Australia).  A Hawaii baseball game during my Easter vacation might be more likely.  Wyoming doesn’t have minor league or college baseball.  They do have a collegiate summer league team in Casper, which seems like it would be very difficult to get to.  Hopefully I can knock out those New England states over the next few years.  A baseball game in South Dakota could be combined with a trip to Minnesota at some point (Sioux Falls has a team).  Oregon is very doable when combined with a trip to California at some point.  West Virginia isn’t that far away, but it’s not the easiest place to get to.  Minor league baseball in Mississippi could be combined with a future trip to the South.  We’ll see how many I eventually get to.  I’m hoping to do at least one more this year.

Notre Rain

It had been two years since I was on campus at ND when I was there for Jon’s wedding.  My last sporting event on campus was outdoor hockey at Notre Dame Stadium in January 2019.  I thought about going last year during Easter vacation, but I wanted to see the Rangers in Texas and it was a lot easier to combine that with a minor league game in Oklahoma City.  I wasn’t going to any Major League games during Easter vacation this year so I decided to go to Notre Dame for baseball and then combine that with a trip somewhere for a minor league game.  I decided to spend two days on campus just to have some extra time on campus, but also that would allow me to see the baseball team play Michigan State and the softball team play Michigan.  Neither of those games happened.

I had been paying attention to the weather for a week or so and the forecast wasn’t looking great.  There were times when it looked like it would be okay and times when it was looking really bad.  It turned out to be really bad.  Pretty much everything is on the table when it comes to weather at Notre Dame in April.  Anything from 30° to 70° is equally likely and you can add 10° on both sides of that range as possibilities. I got the bad weather.  When I left for my trip, the games were looking very questionable, but still possible.  My route to Notre Dame was New York to Atlanta to South Bend.  When I got to Atlanta, I saw that the baseball game had been canceled.  I was still holding out hope for the softball game the next day.  Anyway, I got dinner at Bru Burger Bar.  My beverage choice did not match the weather.  I had a Sunlight Cream Ale from the Sun King Brewery.  They have a location in Sarasota, Florida, and several breweries in Indiana (including Mishawaka).  The beer was fine, but nothing special.  The burger I had was pretty good.

After dinner, I was pretty tired from waking up early for my flight, but I figured I should get on campus.  I went to the Grotto and walked around campus for a little bit.  It was good to be back on campus.  As it turned out, they probably could have played baseball.  Conditions were not good for baseball, but it was playable.   The high was 57° and the rain had pretty much stopped by dinner time.  I guess they decided to call the game early to save Michigan State a trip down to Indiana.

As bad as the weather was, this is always a good sight.

The next day, the weather was supposed to get worse as the day went on.  When I woke up, I saw on Twitter that the softball game had also been called the night before.  There were no indoor sports happening while I was there.  So I wasn’t going to get to a sporting event on campus.  In all of my traveling, I’ve never completely missed out on an event because of the weather.  I missed a baseball game in Cincinnati because of a very delayed flight (I did get to an Indians game and the Pro Football Hall of Fame on that trip so it wasn’t a complete miss).  I had a game rained out when the Blue Jays were playing in Buffalo, but I purposely planned on going to two games in case that happened.  But I was at Notre Dame for two days and I was going to go to two games and neither one happened.  Oh well.  If I was going to completely miss out, that was what I would want to miss out on.  Just being on campus was more interesting than going to a baseball game or softball game.  So it was disappointing, but whatever.

There would be no sporting events, but I had another day to spend on campus.  I tried to get to the Grotto while it was still dark because it looks great with the candles all lit up in the dark.  I left my hotel before sunrise, but with my long walk from my hotel to the grotto (1.4 miles according to my phone), it was pretty bright by the time I got there.  I spent some time there.  Then I went back to my hotel for breakfast.  Then I went back to campus for the 11:30 Mass at the Basilica.

This picture gives you some idea of how dreary the weather was.

Hopefully Jesus will see us score many touchdowns at Notre Dame Stadium this season.

I took this picture after the 11:30 Mass.

Lots of good times were had in St. Edward’s Hall.

I had forgotten that Muffet McGraw got a statue on campus.  It is well deserved.  Hopefully Micah Shrewsberry and Niele Ivey will have statues someday also.

I had a view of the Linebacker from my hotel room.  I remember going there with Kyle for his first ever beer in 2006.  He didn’t finish it.

Then I just kind of hung out on campus for a while.  I went to the bookstore.  I didn’t buy anything, but I did notice that the best stuff there was the Champion stuff.  We have this big deal with Under Armor and they don’t make stuff that looks good (except for the stuff they give to Marcus Freeman, but they only recently made some of that stuff available to buy).  Most of our uniforms are not very good.  Football is okay, but not wearing gold pants for two games this past season was really bad.  Hockey isn’t too bad (except for the Big 10 logo on the jerseys since we’re in the Big 10 for hockey).  The basketball uniforms aren’t very good.  Some of the baseball uniforms are terrible.  What’s really bad is the green uniforms for most of the sports.  Under Armor insists on doing green jerseys with blue numbering and lettering outlined in gold.  It looks bad.  They finally improved the green football jerseys this year by changing the numbers to white outlined in gold (the reverse would be better for football), but they messed those up with the green pants.  The best green item available at the bookstore was a sweatshirt with Notre Dame and the ND logo in gold outlined in white (made by Champion).  I already own that one.  But that’s what they should be using for green uniforms.  If you’re using green, don’t use blue.  Just go with green, gold, and white.

These jerseys are terrible.

These jerseys are better, but the pants make us look like Marshall.

These are excellent.

Change the number on the sleeves to the interlocking ND and these would be perfect.

Get rid of the blue if you’re wearing green.

The Celtics don’t wear these anymore.  Notre Dame should just steal them.

It’s not just the green basketball uniforms that are bad.  These uniforms need some blue.

I might add some white to these, but they are pretty good as they are except for the ridiculous Under Armor logo.  It should be smaller and not right in the middle.

Again, get rid of the blue.  But more importantly, get rid of the green pants.

Get rid of the blue pants.  Baseball pants should be white or gray.  We do have baseball uniforms that aren’t terrible.  We should just wear those.

A.J. Pollock was tied with Mookie Betts for most home runs in the regular season on the 2020 World Series Champions.  And in this picture he shows you what a Notre Dame baseball uniform with a green jersey should look like.

I ended up going to the new art museum on campus, the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art.  It was being built the last time I was there.  When I was a student, there was the Snite Museum of Art.  I don’t know if I ever went there when I was a student.  Apparently the new museum replaced the old one.  It was free and I wasn’t going to the softball game so it was something to do.  There was some good religious art there.  I wasn’t too interested in the other stuff.  There was a chapel in the museum.  It looked like they might have Mass there, but I couldn’t find a schedule.  The last thing I did on campus was go to Chick-fil-A.  I saw it the last time I was there, but I didn’t eat there.  I didn’t have any fast food during Lent (except for a Shamrock Shake for St. Patrick’s Day) so Chick-fil-A at Notre Dame was a good way to celebrate the Easter season.

There were several depictions of the visit of the Magi in the museum.  This one was my favorite.

Fr. William Corby grants general absolution during the Battle of Gettysburg.

This wasn’t part of the museum, but here’s the statue of Fr. Corby granting general absolution.  The same statue can be found in Gettysburg.

This is the chapel in the museum.

They could have played baseball on Tuesday, but Wednesday was bad.  It ended up being pretty much the worst possible weather.  The high was 39° and it was wet all day.  At one point before my trip, the forecast was calling for more than four inches of snow.  I would have been totally fine with that.  I got snow in February 2016 and it was cool to have snow on campus.  It looks beautiful and it brings back memories of being a student that you’re probably not going to get when you go to a football game.  But no, it ended up just being cold, windy, and rainy.

Despite the weather and the games being canceled, it was good to be back on campus.  I’d love to get back in the fall for a football game, but we’ll see about that.  We’re playing Army at Yankee Stadium and Navy in the Meadowlands.  I’ll most likely go to the Army game.  I like the history of Notre Dame playing Army at Yankee Stadium.  I most likely will not go to the Navy game.  I’ve been to two games at that stadium.  It’s the most boring stadium imaginable and it’s difficult to get to so I’m totally fine with just watching football on TV at home that day.  Maybe I’ll see our basketball team play St. John’s at Madison Square Garden.  Oh wait, we’re not in the Big East anymore.  As always, my dream is to rejoin the Big East.  Anyway, it’s always good to be back on campus and hopefully it won’t take me two years to get back again.