First Day of Regular Action (Mon., Feb. 2)

(Written by Meg Goldsmith on behalf of Kerry)

Kerry’s team won the championship game 6-4.  This was the first time Kerry has played for a team that has won anything, and it was sweet even if it was “just” the Veteran’s Tournament.  (For many of the campers, the Veteran’s Tournament is more important than the regular tournament.)  Kerry pitched 2 scoreless innings and went 1 for 2 at the plate with two walks, two runs scored and an RBI.

On the way into the clubhouse after lunch, Wayne Gross spotted him and said, “I finally got you this year.”  Obviously this took all the suspense out of the draft announcements which were to follow but Kerry was pleased to be playing for Gross’ Grizzlies since he’d never played for Wayne before.  Dave Ford was their coach.

The Grizzlies got off to an 0-1 start in the regular tournament, losing to Glen Gulliver’s team, The Travelers, 5-4 in the bottom of the sixth inning on a bad throw by their pitcher.  Kerry described the play as follows:  In a tie game with a runner on first and one out, the batter hit a tapper between third and the mound.  The pitcher airmailed the ball well over their first baseman’s head, to the point where the guy didn’t even bother to attempt to jump for it.  Instead, as soon as he saw how high the throw was, he took off running.  But this allowed the runner to go all the way around to score the winning run (the ball ended up far down the right field line and all the way against the fence).  Kerry went 2 for 3 at the plate with two runs scored but he tweaked his left hamstring going from first to third on a single. 

Weatherwise, it got into the 70’s and was sunny.  Very good baseball weather for all the guys and the fields really dried out from the weekend rain.

The evening’s activity was the Q&A with Orioles co-GM Jim Beattie.  It should be noted that Beattie flew down to Sarasota specifically to do this for the camp participants.  Prior to the Q&A session, Gross took the entire Grizzly team out for dinner so they could get to know each other.  This is the first time Kerry’s been on a team that has done something like this.  (Kerry’s note:  Well, he didn’t really take us out to dinner.  We met at one of the hotel restaurants and everybody pitched in to pay the bill.  The point of the exercise was to get to know one another a bit and build some team camaraderie and it did serve that purpose.)

One question Kerry asked Jim Beattie was whether or not the Orioles viewed it as a problem that their major league and minor league spring training complexes were not mixed in together.  Kerry said Beattie was adamant that the Orioles considered this to be a serious problem.  For one thing, they would like the minor league players to see just how hard major league ballplayers work in order to keep their jobs.  Plus, they want them to see what kinds of skills are required to get a major league job.  The Orioles are trying to address this issue and hope to have a combined complex or their own complex in the near future.



The Stat Line--Batting

Date, Game AB H 2B 3B HR TB R RBI TBB SO HBP SH SF BA OBP SLG
1/31, G1 1 0         2 1 2 1       .000 .667 .000
1/31, G2 1 0                       .000 .000 .000
2/1, G1 2 1         2   1         .500 .667 .500
2/1, G2 3 1         1 1 1 1       .333 .500 .333
Championship 2 1             1         .500 .667 .500
2/2, pM 3 2         2             .667 .667 .667
TOTALS 12 5 1 0 0   7 2 5 2 0 0 0 .417 .588 .500

The Stat Line--Pitching

Date, Game G GS IP H R ER HR SH SF HB TBB SO W L Sv ERA
1/31, G1+G2 2   2 1 2 0         1 2       0.00
2/1, G1 1   1 0 0 0           1       0.00
2/1, G2 1   2 1 0 0         1 2       0.00
Championship 1   2   0 0                   0.00
2/2, PM 0                             0.00
TOTAL 5 1 7 2 2 0 0 0 0 1 2 5 1 0 0 0.00

 

Previous Reports from 2004 Fantasy Camp:

Sun., Feb. 1-- Veteran's Tournament Day 2

Sat., Jan. 31-- Veteran's Tournament Day 1

Fri., Jan. 30 -- Preparing for Camp