I've joined the MLB Blog network

Thought I'd try to do my game posts on a MLB Network blog. Here's the address.

http://fallingLEAVes02.mlblogs.com

There'll be posts from the games I've gone to, along with pictures. And some other baseball related things. I've just recently started posting. So far I've posted with each game I've gone to this week. Maybe while the Dodgers are away, I may backtrack to the beginning of the season and catch up. Or maybe not. We'll see.

Dodger signings this weekend

Friday, May 22
Jonathan Broxton at Sam's Club
4901 N. Santa Anita Blvd., El Monte, CA 91731
12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m.
*I called. This is a membership only store, which I already knew. So the signing is for members only. Bummer

Saturday, May 23
Cory Wade at Super A Foods
5250 York Blvd., Highland Park, CA 90042
12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m.
I called. The line should start outside. They open at 7. I don't know what time I'll be there yet. Don't think Cory is that popular of a player yet, like Beimel. For Beimel's, no one started showing up till ten. I was there at eight.

Saturday, May 23
Will Ohman at JONS Marketplace
5211 Santa Monica Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90029
12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m.
I'm probably not going to this one cuz I don't know if I'll make it on time. Since I haven't even started this year's scrapbook, I don't think I have anything for him to sign.

What a crazy game!!!

I was at the game tonight and could've believe it! We had just as many hits as the Mets had errors! It seemed like every time I looked up at the scoreboard, they were putting another error up. Randy Wolf did awesome! He left the game with a 2 - 1 lead, which was blown just shortly after. He got a rousing applause which he responded by taking his cap off to the crowd. We scored our first two runs in the first ... and didn't score again till the ELEVENTH! Though there were about three errors scattered between the first ten innings, and two more in the eleventh. The craziest thing happened in the top of the eleventh. I was so thankful to have a little radio with me. The funny thing is, I don't really bring my radio to the game. And if I do, I don't always have it on. But a little birdie said to turn the radio on during this game. I might need it. Well, in the top of the eleventh, Angel Pagan with one on and two out, hit a triple that would score the winning run. Next thing we know, Pagan's on third, Church had scored ... and the inning was over! I heard Charlie Steiner on the radio explain what hapened. I jumped up and down, started yelling/screaming at the top of my lungs (probably because the radio was loud and so was the atmosphere at the stadium). CHURCH MISSED THIRD BASE! Yup. Ryan Church as he rounded third to score missed the base. Mark Loretta called for the ball, the umpire called the play, and the run was taken away. Then came the bottom. Starts off with a walk to Mark Loretta, then Xavier Paul doubled. Then they intentionally walked JUAN PIERRE. You got that right. They intentionally walked him to get to Rafael Furcal. Who made an out. Then came Orlando Hudson. By then, they pulled in Carlos Beltran to have a five-man infield. How often does that really work? After all, the Pirates tried that two years ago and guess what? They didn't need a five-man infield because there was no way they were going to catch Russell Martin's walk-off grand slam. Orlando Hudson hit the ball to Reed, who you thought would get the for sure out at home. That's where another error comes in and guess what? Casey Blake was probably relieved that he didn't need to be the hero of the night. Because Mark Loretta scored and game over! LOL I told someone in the bottom of the ninth that we were going to win off a walk-off walk. Well, a walk-off error is good enough for me.

Randy walking off the field after a fine performance

Andre's amazing catch

Russell rubbing Loney's head for good luck. It worked

Casey Blake saying something to Loretta, wonder what it was

Wisdom Tooth

So, on Friday, I got my wisdom teeth pulled. Well, just two of them. I got my lower left and upper left pulled. About two or three weeks ago, my lower left wisdom tooth started to really hurt. So, I gave in and finally went to the dentist. Before I could have my wisdom teeth pulled, they had to do a deep cleaning. I also got some Amoxicilin and Peridex to help me with my gum inflammation. I was awake while they were pulling my teeth. The top one came out pretty easily once it was loosened. The lower one took longer. They had to crack it and break it into several pieces before it could come out. Two days later, I want to eat regular food. But I'm still limited to soft and easy to chew foods. It took me 30 minutes on Friday just to each a mashed potatoe bowl. It was that hard to chew even a little. Now, I can handle foods better. My jaw is sore the most, but that's about it. My friends were surprised that I wasn't that swollen. Let's see hw this progresses.

Fire!!!!

Yes, folks, it's fire season. Starting off with the blaze in Santa Barbara. Well, I got a phone call from my friend Sherisse at ten till midnight. She told me to step outside and look. There's a fire in the hills above our neighborhood. It's the same hill that Dodger Stadium sits on the other side of. It's a fair distance away, so Dodger Stadium should be safe, if the fire is contained. As of now, a quarter till one, it looks like the fire is out. There's still a helicopter outside, shining light onto the burn area. Guess to make sure it's completely out. Here are few shots of the fire.

The pictures are in reverse order.



Here's what it looked like earlier.

May 7, 2009

Matt Kemp hits a grand slam, third of his career, second one this year.
I wasn't taking photos of the hitters yet, but I had a gut feeling about this at-bat.

I WON!!!!

If you listened to tonight's Dodger Talk, did you catch the tail end of the show??? Especially the part when Josh and Ken announced who was the winner for the night????

If you don't listen to Dodger Talk, lately they've been giving away free Dodger ticket(s) to who they picked as the best caller of the night. I called in because I had a few things to say. I had no intention or expectation of winning any ticket. I was completely stunned and shocked when they announced my name. Wow.

If you didn't catch the show tonight, here's a run down of what I said.

First, I told them "this is what happens when you put me on hold too long." They were talking about fan attendance and how small tonight's crowd was and mentioned the Royals' game. So, while I was on hold, I pulled up all the games from today and looked at their attendance. Only three other games had attendances higher than ours (Red Sox vs. Yankees, Giants vs. Cubs, and Phillies vs. Cardinals). There were four teams who had 13000 (I'm not rounding up by the way), I think two or three with 19000 (I didn't mention them), one team wtih 11000 (Reds vs. Marlins), and the lowest attendance of the day goes to... Brewers at Pirates with a paid attendance of 9,775!

The next thing I talked about was the All Star Ballots. I told them how last year my friends and I sat in the top deck and punched out 191 ballots! They said the team should fly us out to St. Louis for punching out that many ballots. The final thing I said was that I am not afraid to tell people how long I've been a fan, and it hasn't been that long. You wouldn't know it by talking to me, but I haven't been a fan as long as other people have been. They asked me about why I've been a fan since the specific date I said and I told them why. They asked me why did I become a fan, and I told them I went to my first game and got hooked.

What was funny too, the caller after me said he's been a fan much longer than I have (and he even called me by my name). Another caller called and talked about fans jumping on the bandwagon and how he didn't like it. Josh and Ken mentioned me and how fans like me come to their first game and instantly become fans. Out of curiosity, I listened to the rest of the program to see who won. I just about fell out of my chair when they said my name! I couldn't believe it. Half and hour later, I was still in shock and stunned about it. Wow. I wasn't even planning on going to tomorrow night's game. I was just about to write in the date of my next game in my scrapbook and thought, "Maybe I should wait and see if I win. I probably won't, but you never know." Oops. I just looked and I already wrote in the date for Thursday. Oh well. It will just have to be out of order! I can't believe it!

Mannywood! Here we come!!

A month of baseball

Okay, so the day is now May 2 and the first month of baseball is over. Well, it hasn't been 30 days yet. But April has gone by. Instead of doing individual posts of each game, I shall just summarize it on here. I may have to split it into two posts if it gets too long. We shall see. I'll post the pictures up on my other blog and link it up to here.

April 6. Opening Day. I bought my tickets about a month in advance. I figured, it would be easier to get tickets to the Dodgers' season opener than it would be to the Dodgers' home opener. Well, I was right. I bought two tickets in mind, thinking either JoAnna, Sherisse, or someone would be able to go with me. As it turned out, I ended up taking a friend from church (Jeffrey) who is moving to Arkansas this summer. He has been wanting to go to a Dodger game, since he has never been to one before. The game started at 4, so we left L.A. around 10:30. Silly me took the 5 and we had traffic all the way to Anaheim. I think it took us about an hour to get that far. Just as we were getting close to our lunch stop, I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. It was a car full of guys. Nooo it wasn't the guys who caught my eye. It was the blue caps they were waving at us! Too bad we were just about to get off. We stopped in San Clemente at Pedro's Tacos for lunch. I recommended the carne asada tacos. Jeffrey ordered his, I ordered mine. We were puzzled why he was charged more than I was. Turned out, he got carne asada burritos (which were HUGE) instead of tacos. We got back on the road for the last leg of the trip. Just as we were approaching the city of San Diego ... Jeffrey fell asleep! Too bad, because he woke up as soon as we got off the highway. We drove around for a bit, looking for a place to park. We got to the Stadium. It was crazy! They had a huge block party for Opening Day. Had I known they were going to do that, we might have left earlier. When we finally got to our seats, it was nice to see a few Dodger fans in our section already there. Turns out, Mauricio and I went to the same high school. He graduated twenty years before I did though. He brought some friends who were Giant fans. Now that it's almost been a month since the game, there's what I do remember. I was most annoyed by the guy in the row behind us. His daughter was cute. But I was concerned about her leaving marks on my brand new jersey that I was wearing. I could feel her hands on my back and then hear the mom telling her to leave the lady alone. The dad would say "get this clown out" or call whoever the Dodger up to bat was a clown. Apparently everyone was a clown to him. Either that, or "clown" was the only word in his vocabulary because he used it practically all the time. Thankfully it was "clown" and not some other X-rated word that I couldn't mention on here. During the first part of the game, when the sun was beating down on us, I noticed my knees were starting to turn red. When we were in the shade, it went back to its normal coloring. If I remember anything else, I'll add it in later in italics.

April 15
Jackie Robinson celebration night. As well as opening night. Sherisse called me that morning to let me know that she got the day off work. I had planned on taking the bus, walking to the stadium, and meeting her there. Our plans changed. I got to sleep in, pick her up, and we found a spot on the street to park. While we were waiting for the gate to open, this car pulls up in front of us and shows us that they skipped the "parallel parking" section of their education, test, and gave us a good laugh at their lack of ability to parallel park. Sherisse and I went in an went to my usual spot where I hang around during batting practice. JoAnna shows up and tells me about Opening Day and the dove getting stuck in the Dodger Vision screen. While we're talking, we hear someone call out Jo's name. We look and I see Cat in the very front of the field level. I call her name, she calls mine, and we greet each other like lifelong friends who haven't seen each other in forever. She is the sweetest thing! She showed us pictures of her newest relative, Caitlyn (not sure if that's the right spelling) who is absolutely adorable (as most newborns are) !!!! Later when I went back to Sherisse, she was chatting with someone else. They had ask her if she knew them (me, Cat, and Jo) and Sherisse told her she only knew me. Cat had two seats that day, and offered us one since she was sitting in a better section. Well, since there were two of us, we were hoping that the people in at least one of the seats wouldn't show up. Just our luck. Everyone showed up. So we had to abandon our seat (much to the chagrin of the people sitting there). I think I over heard one of them call us "stupid". It was the same people who I offered to take their picture for them. Okay, so I had the ticket for one of the seats, which I could've stayed in if I wanted to. But I didn't want to leave Sherisse alone. Long story short... the game was quite exciting. Kershaw struck out a career high 13 batters, striking out the side for his final three. Everyone stood up for the final batter, anticipating his 13th strike out. And who says a walk-off walk isn't exciting? It's certainly nerve wracking. You wait and anticipate with every pitch, every swing. Is it a strike? Is it ball? James Loney finished the night with no hits, with three RBI's. How? He had a bases-loaded walk, a sacrifice fly, and another bases loaded walk that brought home Manny Ramirez, the game winning run! It was great seeing JoAnna and Cat again, after a long offseason.

In the month of April, I have gone to four games. I have seen

Go ahead. Call me a nut. I am. Let's hope my May stats can be an improvement from this. I am projected to go to the following games:
May 4 - against the Diamondbacks
May 20 - against the Mets

Possibly
May 7 - against the Nationals
May 18 - against the Mets
So, probably not as many games. We'll see about that :-)