Day 2-Hickory

After a lousy nights sleep at the poor accommodations at Days Inn, we awoke for the approximately 1-hour drive to Hickory.
First, let me say this, I usually do not mind Days Inn, but this one was awful.
A hole behind the door, the faux' stucco on the ceiling falling down in the shower and the smell of the lovely scent mix of Rain and Cat Urine that was then closed up for a week were some of the highlights of this stay.
If anyone ever decides to go to Asheville, Avoid the Days Inn by the airport.
While on the road thus far, all of us agreed that KFC was a good idea if they had a buffet.
The 2 KFC stores in Hagerstown do not have a buffet, so as a result I rarely go there.
I love KFC, but with the cost of the chicken pieces that I like, it really is not cost-effective to eat there often.
We found one with a buffet and ate there.
The food was quite good, but within a few hours, all 3 of us were not feeling well.
None of us would eat all that much for the remainder of the trip.
I don't think it was the food as much as the relentlessly hot weather, as both Hickory and Greensboro set heat records on the days we were there and I think Asheville came very close.
We were able to spend the day shopping and traveling around Hickory in our only non-baseball or traveling part of the trip.
Hickory was a larger city than I expected-the 2000 census had Hickory at 37,222 and had a terrific 2 story mall as a shopping centerpiece.
Bob wanted to see the Dale Jarrett museum (Jarrett is a Hickory native) and on our way there, we stopped and looked at the Hickory Motor Speedway.
The employee there graciously allowed us to walk around and do whatever we wished other than walk on the track.
That would have been the last thing that I wanted to do when one considers that the temperature was over 100 degrees and the Sun was beating down on an asphalt track!
Think I would have passed on that one, even if allowed!
HMS is only .360 of a mile around and has the type of short track racing that as a casual at best NASCAR fan, I always liked to watch.
In fact, HMS hosted a Busch series race every year until 1998.
For you non-NASCAR fans, the Busch series is the NASCAR equivalent to Triple-A baseball.
We then went to the Jarrett museum, which actually is in an area roughly the size of a car showroom.
My father likely would have quite enjoyed himself here, as Jarrett is his favorite driver in NASCAR.
Hilarity ensued as Battlin' Bob entered an actual Jarrett race car to "drive" in a video game.
Watching Bob getting in and out of the car along with his choice words during the race was priceless as always!
After a stop at Jack in the Box for a shake (I wished my stomach was not bothering me, always see their commercials and wanted a burger.), we began the process of trying to find
L.P.Frans Stadium.
The stadium is located near the Hickory airport and tucked towards the back of what I would call an industrial park.
L.P Frans was the fellow who donated the most money to help build the stadium and he was the local Coke bottler/distributor.
Ironic that over the outfield fence is the local Pepsi distributor, I am sure L.P or his successors were thrilled with that!
Entering the field we saw the oddest ant that I ever saw in this large ant's full red body with a black back tip.
Neat looking for sure, but I sure was not going to touch it!
After a stop at the gift shop to grab Crawdad stuff, mainly team sets for Ryan and I, a shirt for Battlin Bob, a hat for yours truly and shirts for Cherie and Rachel, we were off to hit the signature trail and allow me to tell you this-despite the results of this night,Hickory is a permanent stop for future trips.
Besides being a Pirate affiliate, the access for signatures is tremendous and deserves to be a stop on its own merits.
The clubhouse is down the left-field line and then there is a short stone path from the clubhouse to the field that the players walk down, the grounds crew drives the mowers, etc.
Now at every other field that I have ever been to this area is closed, but not at Hickory.
Fans are allowed to be in the actual area and get autographs etc.
Great access and kudos to the Crawdad management for allowing this type of access, it has to be nothing but helpful to them as far as fan response goes.
The visiting Columbus Catfish were kinda tough, Nevin Ashley was signing 1 card per person, Jeremy Hellickson was signing 3, Desmond Jennings was a good signer and former Rice star Wade Townsend signed 2 for me before he ran to the field.
Ironically Townsend would be back soon enough.
The Crawdads were signing and the access was there, but the error belonged to the author.
Readers from way back, in the beginning, will remember my 4 games in the stands here talking with the Hickory pitchers in freezing temperatures in the season bow in Hagerstown.
The first Hickory player out of the clubhouse was starting pitcher Bradley Clapp.
We waited for Brad to sign, I was 4th in line and as he signed for others, I waited.
He took my cards and signed and as he handed mine back, he looked at me with a look of recollection.
I said, "you remember me"?.Clapp replied sure "the snow games!".
I talked to Brad for roughly 5 minutes before he had to start warming up and this became the trend.
I would spend time catching up with 4 of the "Hickory 5" and as a result, not getting a damn thing done.
Thanks to Ryan and Battlin' Bob for carrying me this night-without them, I would have gotten next to nothing.
Anyway, next was Eric Krebs. Krebs was a starter earlier in the season, but an injury cost him some time and now is in the bullpen.
Eric is not in the Hickory team set, so most did not ask him for anything as he walked along unobstructed, but he glanced over and saw me, ran over with a handshake and talked about the season and the changes involved in moving to the pen.
After a few minutes with Eric, he went to loosen up and coming out of the clubhouse was
Jared Hughes, he hollered out "hey, Shawn" and offered his hand.
Hughes has the hardest handshake that I have ever received, Guess that comes with the territory when you are 6'7!
After a few minutes with Jared ( I would talk some with him after the game), Mike Crotta came out in street clothes to chart the game.
Crotta too stopped, talked and was agreeable to me asking a few questions during the game.
By this time the game was beginning and I had contributed little to the cards tonight.
So, to the people that I was supposed to help with Columbus and Hickory-My fault.
The other failures were a different story, but I will take the heat for this night.
I am not going to get into the game much. Columbus took the win 11-5 in a slowly played and uninspired game, which I can understand considering the conditions.
Both Asheville and Hickory have pitch speed clocks on their outfield wall, but neither seemed to be especially accurate.
I asked Mike Crotta about this and he said that every team that does this in the SAL usually clocks slower than the actual speed except for Asheville.
The gun at McCormick Field registers FASTER than actually thrown.
I chuckled when Mike told me this as I knew when I saw a Tourist throw a "95 MPH" Curveball that this was the case!
I also asked Mike about his remembrances of the Hagerstown series and he quickly responded "the snow! I am from Florida, I'm not used to that stuff!".
He also added that he still has his photos from the snow on his cell phone.
I asked if Hagerstown had the worst facilities in the league and he replied that Hagerstown and Savannah were neck and neck, giving Hagerstown the edge with the field, while Savannah had the better clubhouse facilities.
I also asked what the difference was between the last place Crawdads of the first half and the division leaders of the second half considering that personnel-wise there was not a huge difference.
Mike thought that it was more of the team beginning to jell a bit and the starting pitching improving greatly in the second half.
I also asked about his 1 start for the Altoona Curve earlier this season and he talked about how great Blair County Ballpark was and how he looked forward to pitching there down the road.
Thanks to Mike for answering some questions for me, I had more, but I was sidetracked by a wild conversation 1 row behind me with 2 scouts that brought up topics ranging from Pirates blogs (the good and bad ones), US, Wilbur Miller and the Pirates organization and how they do things...
This was such a wild one that it will be a post all by itself on a slow day coming up soon!
I regret that Ryan and the Battler were not there to see this, they had already moved to the dirt path to get a player or two that they had missed.
While I was in the stands, Ryan had won a jar of Duke's Mayonnaise.
Every inning, there was a trivia question and the winner got a jar of Duke's.
Battlin' Bob had been on fire all night on these but was either unable to get to fan services or was too late.
Apparently this time, they were there on time.
Bob answered incorrectly, Ryan followed up with the right answer and that led to light-hearted grumbling and Mayonnaise talk for the rest of the trip~!
Upon meeting up with them and talking to Jared Hughes some more, we trudged back to the Days Inn in Conover NC, where we were thrilled to find a much nicer room than the one in Asheville and due to the kindness of the fellow behind the desk,were allowed to take a swim during the off hours.
Now, this Days Inn-I recommend highly!
In closing-Hickory is a solid place to watch a game, I would say upper to the middle of the pack, but for the autograph collectors out there-I give Hickory about the highest marks that I can give.

Until tomorrow-with day 3!

Photo Credits
Ryan Heimberger