Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Thundering down the stretch!!

Three days,three towns and unexpected bonuses highlighted the last three days.
I will still be doing vacation trip posts,but I wanted to rattle off this first...

I had planned on a Sunday trip to Williamsport with Derreck Chupak,Doug Hopkins and Bill Cover,but circumstances mixed things up for Monday and Tuesday and for the better...

Our trip to Williamsport came right after a night of work and we ran right into rain for most of the day.
I'll have more of a recap of Bowman Field,the home of the Williamsport Crosscutters after I make another trip there next week,but from my first visit,the Crosscutters were less than customer friendly,but I'll move on....
We ate at a neat older place called the Kast Hotel that literally is in a former hotel that I bet is well over 100 years old.
The Kast is a basic place that doesn't look like much,but the food was very good.
The rain continued to fall as we sorted Williamsport team sets under a pavilion after we had a really hard time obtaining them.
I am not going to be specific on the things that I didn't like about the Cutters because I'm going to hope that the hectic scramble of the day as the team attempted to make the field playable after the rain forced a bad day.
Hopefully,I'll get a better feel for things after next Tuesday....
Lots of laughs,a team set and a decent run on autographing-Much better access for the visitors (done by Derreck and Doug) than the home team (me and Bill),but still well over 60 cards signed,so despite the bad weather-a good signing day....

A last second decision took away an off day and instead sent me to Harrisburg for one card-Tyler Glasnow's top 100.
Glasnow was making a rehab start with Altoona and gave me a chance to add a card that I wasn't sure was going to get finished.
We weren't sure that Glasnow wasn't going to pitch and go,so after a few innings,Fred Landucci and I waited near the clubhouse for Glasnow,Bill Cover would come down later.
What we got was good company and very little Glasnow as he stayed in the clubhouse.
I would get Glasnow on the card and make the evening a success as the only other card I got was a West Virginia card signed by Kevin Newman.
It was a fun night hanging out for what truly was an all or nothing evening on the graphing end...

Last night came with a visit to the Frederick Keys with the Winston-Salem Dash and their number one pick Zach Collins.
Collins quickly raced by us as the first player out of the clubhouse with a shout on the run "Maybe I'll get you after the game".
Reports say that Collins did sign one after the game,but we weren't there for that.
We spent the evening with the lovely Cherie's best friend Christine Hinkle and her husband Doug with of course Derreck Chupak and our little buddy Nate.
Doug was discovered to be a rabid Ohio State football fan,who will likely be looking for a place to watch the Buckeyes on the next occasion that we see each other.
A fun evening that ended after innings of badgering from Derreck about Mariano Rivera being in Hagerstown.
These rumors had flown all year about Rivera,but this one was true as Derreck's son had a picture of Rivera at his place of employment (Under Armour),so we knew he was really in town.
After six innings,we raced to Hagerstown and caught the last inning before being lucky enough to snag the Sandman on a heritage card,but the real hero was the lovely Cherie,who adeptly snared another card for the collection-she's pretty cool...

The season is ending soon and I still have lots of stories to tell,but these three are fresh in the mind and I wanted to rap these out while I can.

No comments: