Not my practice blog, by Scott Knaster

Minor league baseball in Reno

Minor league baseball returned to Reno this year in the form of the Reno Aces of the Pacific Coast League. Reno built a brand-new ballpark for the Aces. Barbara and I love ballparks, minor league baseball, and road trips, so we drove to Reno last Saturday to watch the Las Vegas 51s play the Aces. The ballpark is gorgeous, and the Aces are very popular: an hour before game time, when the ballpark gates opened, thousands of people were already lined up to get in on a blustery night. The ballpark is downtown, near Harrah's, wedged nicely between the train tracks and the Truckee River. There is no parking at the park: fans park at downtown casinos and office buildings, then walk over. There's a big retail development under construction next to the ballpark, and a riverwalk is also being built. It's a great scene and I hope it will be even nicer in a year or two when the surrounding area is built up.

The most unique and bizarre ballpark feature shows up during the 7th inning stretch. A giant inflated talking baseball rises up over the hitter's eye in center field, holding on with giant inflated hands, and proceeds to talk to the crowd -- as his mouth moves -- and lead the fans in the traditional singing of Take Me Out to the Ball Game.

This is just as bizarre and wonderful as it looks.

The huge outfield led to numerous fly ball doubles.

Outfield berm seating. Lights are drag race theme, with flags of other Pacific Coast League teams. When the Aces score, the lights flash and strobe.

Hockey Day in Canada

Hey, hockey fans and other owners of televisions! Next Saturday it's time again for Hockey Day in Canada, a coast-to-coast, 13-hour event that includes zillions of little local features about hockey plus 3 all-Canadian NHL games. This year, those of us in the U.S. can watch the whole thing on NHL Network. If you like hockey or you just want to gain some insight into a fundamental element of Canadian culture, check it out, especially the first 3 hours that take place before the first NHL game starts.

Switch-hitter faces switch-pitcher

In baseball, switch-hitters are common, but switch-pitchers are practically non-existent. When switch-pitcher Pat Venditte joined the Staten Island Yankees of the New York-Penn league, he inevitably faced a switch-hitter. Here's what happened.

Man helps octopus

For the past 50 years or so, fans of the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League have maintained a tradition of throwing an octopus onto the ice during the team's playoff games. Recently, a man who says "I have never liked sports in my life" saw the octopus business on TV and was outraged. So he filed a lawsuit, on behalf of all octopi "in the oceans of the world". More about this here and here.

Conversation at Prudential Center

Last Tuesday, my son Jess and I saw the San Jose Sharks play the New Jersey Devils at Prudential
Center in Newark. We sprang for club seats, which come with free food (buffet, pizza, cookies, soda, etc.). We were just about the only guys in the club wearing Sharks jerseys, prompting some hostile stares from the local fans.

Me (taking free pizza): This is just like eating at Google!
Jess: Except that everybody wants to kill us.

Madison Square Garden, waiting for Sharks

When you go to a hockey game as a fan of the visiting team, there's strength in numbers. One of my favorite times is the pre-game skate. Fans of the visiting team are allowed down near the team entrance to the ice (even if their tickets are in the nosebleed seats) and hang out together, chat, and watch their team warm up. After the skate is over, everybody scatters to their respective locations, conspicuous once again by wearing the colors of the visiting team.

Ancient Rose Bowl ticket

Check out this cool 1933 Rose Bowl ticket. $1.65 to get in? Outrageous!

(Thanks to Marshall Clow for the image.)

Outdoor hockey on New Year's Day

The National Hockey League is getting ready to play another outdoor game. This one will be Buffalo vs. Pittsburgh at a football stadium in Buffalo on New Year's Day at 1:00 PM EST, and NBC will televise in the United States. 73,000 people are expected to attend. (Tony, this one's for you.)

Airships at indoor hockey games

The San Jose Sharks of the National Hockey League have several small shark-shaped airships, called Air Sharks, that fly around the arena during intermission. It's pretty cool to watch them go -- as my son says, it makes you feel like you're in an aquarium.

There are a bunch of other airships in the NHL, including a flying taco in Phoenix and a flying burrito in Dallas.

In Denver, I believe they have a flying Coors can. Of course.

Photos courtesy of Sharks Hockey Odyssey.

Teddy bear toss

Some minor league hockey teams have a wacky holiday tradition: fans bring teddy bears to a designated game, and when the team scores, the fans toss the stuffed bears onto the ice. The team then collects the teddy bears and gives them to a kids charity. Here's what it looked like in Portland a few days ago:

Never mind that the referee actually waved off the goal right after the puck went in. Once the first person started with the teddy bears, it was all over. The team says more than 20,000 bears were collected. You can find a bunch more of these highly entertaining videos on YouTube.