I'd rather be sitting in a ballpark.

Growing up as a Cubs fan, in the pre-lights era, I attended more than a few doubleheaders at Wrigley. Whether scheduled, or as part of a makeup. they always fit them in before dinner. One of the joys was watching on Channel 9, WGN. Jack Brickhouse would often offer an abbreviated 10th inning between the…

Heading into Sunday’s series finale between the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers (TRats) and the Quad Cities (River) Bandits, the outcome seemed preordained, except for two things. The Bandits were 6-2 and looking to win their second series after sweeping Peoria the previous weekend, and the TRats (3-5) hoping to salvage a split. The first thing preventing…

While the Quad Cities are made up of four river cities, Bettendorf and Davenport (Iowa) and Moline, and Rock Island (Illinois) minor league baseball and the QC have meant Davenport since 1931 when the team began play at Municipal Stadium. In 1971, the ballpark was renamed John O’Donnell Stadium for local sportswriter of the same…

For those of you who know I traveled this past weekend to see my first baseball game of the young season, thanks for your patience. I’m having issues locating the photos I took and seemingly stored online. I don’t wish to post about the pics or add them later. I’m really not surprised that I’m…

It’s still difficult to process that former ML pitcher, Octavio Dotel was one of nearly 200 people to have perished in a night club tragedy in the Dominican Republic. From the half a dozen baseball accounts that I’ve seen the past couple of days, the writers didn’t appear to have ever seen him pitch, which…

In less than 24 hours the UConn women will battle South Carolina for the NCAA women’s title, and unknown to 130% of knowledgeable sports fans, the Nebraska and Central Florida men will be competing for $300K and the College Basketball Crown. Here I thought today was all about the men’s Final Four (Florida v. Auburn…

This early in the season (anytime through early May in the Midwest) one risks a rainout or snow out if you hope to attend a baseball game-especially a minor league game. For the past 10 days I’ve been following the weather forecasts for the next couple of days in Wisconsin and Michigan. Instead, I should…

Initially, I thought I’d be oh so clever in dissecting what happened this past weekend, but since I wasn’t sitting in any ballpark, I decided on discussing the hopes and dreams (crushed or positive) after some pretty unexpected results. I had a fun discussion with a Cubs fan this morning after the Cubs throttled the…

It’s 1:50 p.m. and ESPN is talking about the Steelers and the NFL. Thankfully, they’re finally showing an interview with former Yankee, Juan Soto. First pitch is less than 15 minutes away, and the station isn’t talking Brewers or Yankees. I have no idea who is producing this game, but it’s an embarrassment. The fact…

First impressions and opening day aren’t the same thing. At least the Cubs hope that’s true having started out 0–2 in Japan. Of course, some of us are taking the two losses more personally. We also look for tendencies, overlooking the negatives and digging deeply for positives. It’s all we have. The only comic strip…