Notes From The Nat

Now, this is interesting…

The Vancouver Canadians Baseball Club is set to hold an open tryout for their vacant color commentator position.

The Canadians will open their doors this coming Saturday June 2nd starting at noon to all the public, and hold a one-time audition to try and discover that one person, regardless of experience who can come out and help us showcase the team this season.

" I think it’s great. To invite people out to the stadium, put a microphone in their hands and see what they’ve got, who knows? Maybe you do find that diamond in the rough" says Rob Fai, play-by-play voice for the club this season.

The Canadians have 26 games this season to be aired on the TEAM 1040 and are giving one fan, the chance of a lifetime to join Rob Fai (F-eh) in the broadcast booth to cover a handful of those games this summer out at Nat Bailey Stadium.

"We would welcome a person that was passionate about the city, the team and the game of baseball." adds Fai.

All I can say is, if this is a paid position, I’m busting out the demo reels.

Which is probably as good a time as any to segue into the news that my weekly radio show on CJSF 90.1FM has just been moved up from the old Sunday morning slot to the prime time Thursday night slot of 8-10pm.

First show in the new timeslot happens this coming Thursday, so be sure to tune in, or listen online at CJSF.ca

UPDATE: From the comments, the C’s have released the following YouTube clip to give a little more info.

Still no mention on whether the spot is paid…

I received an email today from the Vancouver Canadians front office. It was a general media release, the kind of which I’ve seen many times previously, but this one (at first) had me thinking, "How odd."

VANCOUVER CANADIANS CONGRATULATE GIANTSON MEMORIAL CUP VICTORY
Giants win over Medicine Hat a treat to watch for all local sports teams

Nat Bailey Stadium ( Vancouver ) ? The Vancouver CanadiansBaseball Club was thrilled to watch and enjoy the Giants march to this year?sMemorial Cup Championship.  Over the past six years, the Giants havebecome a template for what  team?s should strive for when they mapout success.  Sunday?s win on national television was also enjoyedby most of the C?s front office.

CanadiansVice President Delany Dunn spent thefirst few seasons with the Giants as their public address announcer, andremembers those times fondly.  ?I remember how passionate the fanswere about this team and the direction they were heading in.  No doubtthere were growing pains in the early days, but it?s nice to see it allpay off the way it did Sunday?.

CanadiansPresident Aileen McManamon [pictured above with co-owners Jake Kerr and Jeff Mooney] on theGiants run to the Cup:  ?The effort on the ice is to be commended,as well as what Ron Toigo and his staff achieved off of the ice as well. The 2007 Memorial Cup was the talk of the town for the past few weeks, anddeservedly so, it was a treat to enjoy?.

The Canadianstip their cap to the Giants and encourage them to take it all in as achampionship is a special moment in any team?s journey.

Now, the reason I thought it odd was I’ve never seen a release from the Canadians about something that didn’t involve them first hand. That is, I’ve never seen ‘official comments’ about a non-baseball story released to the press like this before by the C’s.

I like it. It’s smart marketing - get radio stations and newspapers used to having you associated with any sporting success and maybe they’ll start seeing you on the same level as the Giants, or the Whitecaps, or even softball (which gets more ink in the Province than baseball, for some unknown reason).

By why this is REALLY worth noting is what came with the release:

MP3 Soundbite from Delany Dunn, VP Fan Experience
MP3 Soundbite from Aileen McManamon, President

Outstanding stuff - the C’s have finally caught on to the power of the Content Release.

Last year (and for three years prior), I regularly moaned that the C’s needed to create their own highlights packages and get them to the press after each game so they could be included in that night’s sports package, and the reason why is because if you make it as easy as ‘cutting and pasting’ for a sports editor, they’ll actually use your stuff.

On the other hand, ask them to send out a camera crew, do their own editing, and then put together a report on last night’s game by midnight that night, and they’ll likely find something easier to do with their time.

I don’t know if any Vancouver radio stations used these clips in today’s sports round-ups, but I LOVE the fact that we’re seeing this level of forward thinking from the team leading up to season 2007. If they actually take the step of putting together a video editing bay for preparing highlights packages, I think I may well just lose it with glee.

And hey, congrats to the Giants. They really do run a solid outfit out there, and their Memorial Cup success has been a long time building.

The subject line above is apparently the only thing you’re allowed to write about former A’s minor league toiler Mark Kiger, or else his wife, a former Kits girl who calls herself "Bedhead Barbie", will post obscenities about you on her MySpace page.

Ah, where to begin this tale of joy?

Well, let’s start by warning those with tender constitutions that some of the language gets a bit raunchy below, and though that’s not my choice, it is necessary to keep it uncensored. So if you don’t want to deal with that, or the inherent trashiness of a public internet feud, I’d suggest skipping to the next post.

Otherwise, click the ‘more’ link and watch what happens when you start a fight you’re ill-equipped to finish.

I posted a few days ago that I hoped the old Nat Bailey scoreboard would be restored and maintained in the new outfield wall as stadium upgrades take place… Alas, that ain’t to be.

Today, Bob Mackin of the Vancouver free daily rag, 24 Hours, found a gap in their usual wall-to-wall Nicole Ritchie coverage to announce the end of an era:

The most famous "face" in Vancouver baseball is retiring.

Nat Bailey Stadium’s hand-operated scoreboard will be gonebefore Vancouver Canadians’ June 19 season opener. A new ground level,hand-operated unit is being embedded in the fence as part ofstadium-wide renovations.

The 12-foot by 45-foot scoreboard was born in Sick’s SeattleStadium. It was used during Seattle Pilots’ only American League seasonin 1969. It moved to Nat Bailey in 1978.

Canadians’ vice-president Delany Dunn hopes to sell it as a charity fundraiser.

"It’s going to benefit Little League to some degree and we’re going to honour the heritage of that scoreboard," Dunn said.

Society of American Baseball Research member Dave Eskenazi ofSeattle said the ideal home would be Safeco Field’s new museum. ALowe’s home improvement store is on the site of Sick’s Seattle Stadium,which opened in 1938 but was demolished in 1979.

I know that, pragmatically, it makes perfect sense to lose the old scoreboard because it’s old and rickety and less than functional, but emotionally… this sucks.

I watched a game from the old scoreboard in 2004, as Tomo and Tomo Jr ran back and forth dropping numbers in the windows, and it’s an experience that I wish every fan had been able to share at least once. It was the best seat in the house.

Granted, in order to get up there, you had to climb a shaky ladder stretched out to its maximum length and tilted at a near-horizontal 25-degree angle, since the ground under the scoreboard was too muddy to provide safe footing.

And the warning sign (seen left), hanging on the last of four rusted screws, that told you that the scoreboard may well kill you… that was a nice bit of rustic heritage that I’m sure dissuaded many a passer-by from attempting the climb.

And yeah, the ground was littered with the corpses of old numbers past, as well as the occasional broken bottle and weeds aplenty. 

And once up there, it was all nails and wood and rusty pig-iron and sharp corners and coathangers unfurled and turned into number-holders… But I’ll tell you, it was also baseball paradise. 

First, because it’s the best view in Vancouver - soaring panoramicmountain views, a red-soaked sunset, and a ball game happening right infront of you? You can’t beat that.

And it didn’t hurt any to be able to see, up-close, the look on Javier Herrera’s face as he tracked down a deep fly or three, either. In fact, whenever he did so, he and the Tomo’s would share loud exclamations in Spanish, as Herrera had taught them earlier in the season how to cheer him on in his native language.

Alas, the old dear is a goner. Another slice of our past makes way for a very much needed future.

Thanks for the memories, old girl.

With the recent news that Justin Duchsherer has been added to a very crowded DL, giving Oakland’s crack medical staff (seen left) a chance to work their magic, it might be a good time to see, right here in print, the horror that is Oakland’s health situation:

Chris Denorfia - 60-day DL
Justin Duchscherer - 15-day DL
Rich Harden - 15-day DL
Bobby Kielty - 60-day DL
Mark Kotsay - 60-day DL
Esteban Loaiza - 60-day DL
Mike Piazza - 15-day DL
Chris Snelling - 15-day DL
Huston Street - 15-day DL

And here’s the day-to-day guys, who aren’t on the DL, but are either not playing at present, or who are playing injured:

Nick Swisher
Milton Bradley (still!) Now on the DL
Travis Buck (two injuries!)
Eric Chavez (a two-year old injury!)
Connor Robertson (after just two MLB innings!) Now on the DL

If there’s a silver lining on all this, it’s that the wholesale slaughter of Oakland players has forced the A’s to find interesting, cheap options to replace them all.

Hiram Bocachica gets his shot in the outfield after tearing up AAA ball, ex-Vancouver Canadian Ron Flores is holding together a hurtin’ bullpen after being kicked upstairs from Sacramento, as has Lenny Dinardo, 2004 C’s pitcher Dallas Braden has had a handful of starts, Danny Putnam got to jump two levels of ball and get a major league cup of coffee, and who could ignore the form of long derided 2002 V-Town slugger Dan Johnson and the oft-ignored AAAA legend (but now legitimately Major League) Jack Cust?

Yes, right now the Oakland A’s are barely able to get a team out on the park, but think about this for a second… should they actually get healthy, with all these new guys ripping the cover off the ball, won’t that make for a great second half run at the Angels?

Meanwhile, just for the heck of it, here is my selection for the team to be known as the All-Injured Oakland Athletics, made up entirely of players who are unfit.

LF: Chris Denorfia
CF: Mark Kotsay
RF: Milton Bradley
SS: Travis Buck
3B: Eric Chavez
2B: Bobby Kielty
1B: Nick Swisher
C: Mike Piazza
DH: Chris Snelling

SP: Rich Harden
RP: Esteban Loaiza
RP: Connor Robertson
RP: Justin Duchscherer
CL: Huston Street

Admittedly, this team would be a little weak on middle infield D, but otherwise this is a pretty darn good lineup. That the A’s can stay competitive while losing an entire Major League team to injury speaks highly of them.

UPDATE: Milton Bradley just went to the DL. Sixth time in two seasons. Is it time to call Billy Beane’s latest ‘underappreciated asset’ (players of suspect health) a failure yet?

UPDATE II: Another day, another DL candidate: Connor Robertson has a broken thumb, so he’s out for a month minimum.

Thanks to an interested reader who would like to remain unnamed (let’s call him Sammy Hagar), we have finally got a series of good pictures of the long-awaited outfield wall redevelopment happening at Nat Bailey Stadium in preparation for the 2007 NWL season.

The first change that you might note when passing by Ontario and 32nd is the outside of the stadium proper: gone is the baby blue, and in its place is a monochrome grey color scheme that looks like it’s right out of a 1950’s photo postcard.

NOTE: I LOVE THIS!

If the team is going to do what has been promised, and make the long-held NFTN belief that those squares should be used to house pictures of old ballplayers a reality, then the color is perfect to give folks a real sense of retro throwback appeal. 

With the retro plans taking place on the concourse inside the stadium, we can now see where the new team owners are going with all this: it’s baseball the way your granddad used to watch it, and that’s so perfect I could wet myself. 

One caveat: From what I’ve been told, it seems the players to be put on those squares aren’t necessarily going to be all ex-Vancouver players. I’d love to see it restricted to only ex-V-Town guys who made the Majors, but if that’s not going to be the case, at least this’ll be a vast improvement over the old look.

On to the outfield wall - anyone who thought that the plans to shift the wall closer to the plate would result in a homerun avalanche, EG: Everett, Denver, or anywhere in the California League, better not hold their breath.

Rather, it looks like the wall will be shifted about 15 ft in from right-center to left-center, with no work visible on the corners (for now). If the corners DO move in later on, that would give the field a real semi-circle outfield, which would make right-center and left-center tough places to get the ball out of the park, while making the corners a bit of a homerun porch. This I would like to see.

One thing worth noting is that the wall has NOT been lowered. In fact, it remains at the same height, one would presume so that half the crowd doesn’t see the game for free from Little Mountain every night.

I’ve heard Jake Kerr say he plans to make part of the outfield wall see-through, so that kids could watch from the outside, but it makes sense that such a thing should be a small attraction that allows kids in the surrounding park to see an inning or two, knothole-style - not half a mountainside that allows 500 folks to avoid buying a ticket.

Here’s the back of the stadium. Note the precarious scoreboard that Tomo The Japanese Wedding Planner used to have to hang off.

I’m hoping against hope that the scoreboard, as ratty and non-technological as it is, will be salvaged and put to good use. At present it is partly obscured by the new wall, so if it will be saved, it will have to be raised or shifted entirely - no easy task. But it’s worth doing, since this is a piece of MAJOR LEAGUE history, salvaged from Sicks Stadium, the former home of the Seattle Pilots.

Yes, the stadium really does need a nice new high-tech, bells and whistles, screaming video kind of scoreboard, but it would be great if in making the ballpark functional, we don’t lose the REAL history of the place and while manufacturing fake history…

Thanks Sammy. The next beer is on me.

Ryan from the most excellent Oakland A’s fan blog, A Minor Consideration, visited the Kane County Cougars (otherwise known as the 2006 Vancouver Canadians) this past weekend, and posted a great report that covers Scott Deal’s progress (complete with interview), Craig Italiano’s skull fracture, and detailed notes on the other players in the lineup.

Here’s the portion that most interested me:

If pressed, I?d have to say that the defining characteristic forthis year?s Kane County team is that they hustle. A team of singleshitters will have to do that, but Kane County hustles smart, if you?llforgive me for briefly sounding like Ozzie Guillen. They don?t run intoouts, but instead try to beat out high-percentage plays, and seem togive full effort on everything.

• Larry Cobb [seen left] dove into first base in the only circumstance that callsfor it; when the first baseman is pulled off the bag by a high, widethrow and is trying to tag him.
• Jermaine Mitchell beat out two close plays by getting out of thebatter?s box as quickly as I?ve seen on what looked like routine groundballs, forcing a young shortstop to double-clutch.
• Cobb, whose game resembles David Eckstein?s, though that comparisonturns my stomach, scored from third on a sac fly? to the third baseside of foul territory. He caught the outfielder not thinking, and beatout a rushed throw to the plate.
• Todd Johnson stole second on a marginal passed ball to the catcherwith two outs and a runner on third. If he?s out, the inning?s over,but if the throw is late, a run scores.
• Mitchell, showing some wheels, steals second on a bounced ball thatthe catcher gloves immediately, but can?t make the throw. In myobservations, Mitchell has the kind of long-legged, elusive lopingspeed that Vince Young has in the NFL.

He also goes on to point out Mike Massaro’s sudden explosion of hot form, which has him batting .341 (good for 5th in Midwest League overall hitting stats), which is great news for Michiro fans.

In seven years living in this town, I’ve never been to the Vancouver Museum.

But that’s about to change, after seeing this:

Levelling the Playing Field
Legacy of Vancouver’s Asahi Baseball Team
May 19 - November 4, 2007

From 1914to 1941 this talented team of Japanese Canadian baseball playerscompeted and won in the Vancouver senior leagues, instilling enormouspride in a community faced with racial prejudice and inequality. TheAsahis played baseball like no others. They were lengendary and had adream until banished to internment camps during WWII.

Levelling the Playing Fieldfocuses on the stories of Japanese Canadians from the early years ofthe community in the Powell Street district of Vancouver?s Nihonmachi (JapaneseTown) until 1942. Personal voices and experiences of the Asahi teammembers, their families and fans are featured. The exhbitiion [sic] relivesthe great moments and struggles of the champion Asahis with rareartefacts, photographs, histories, statistics, and baseball triviaspecially gathered for this show.

Levelling the Playing Field will present material in three languages: English, Japanese and French.

I love the story of the rise of the Asahi. Faced with great discrimination and racism in Vancouver, the Asahi played such great baseball, and won so handsomely and so often, that they actually turned around perceptions of the Japanese for many in this city during the pre-war years. Audiences of Asian fans and white fans alike gathered in great numbers to see them play, and the team built an empire on bunting, base-stealing, and lightning speed.

Sadly, as always seems to happen in these kinds of things, it all went to hell when the ’security first, brains last’ crowd decided to intern every Japanese citizen through the war years. Once the war had ended, the released Asahi players had little interest in baseball, much less baseball in this town.

Go have a look at the exhibit. And never forget.

The ongoing Rob McGowan cancer fundraising story just gets better and better.

From his most recent blog post:

June 15 can?t come fast enough. People are now just walking up to me and taking my photo.

It?slike it didn?t take only 18 months to get to this point; it could verywell be this length again by Christmas 2008. Oh sure, I?ll be living ina van down by the river, after my currently-still-understanding wifethrows me out, but at least I’ll be free to tour with Whitesnake.

Atthe end of two full weeks of fundraising, I have to say I?m blessedwith generous friends, co-workers, Brothers and acquaintances. Alltold, with 29 days to go, the grand total raised now sits at?$3886.67.

Correction: As of the time of writing, it now sits at $4,086.67 - over double the original target, and less than a grand from the revised goal.

You often hear the phrase "one person can make a difference", and if you’re like most people, when you hear that you assume there’s a Sandra Bullock film running on the TV, and you go get a beer and play Halo until it’s over.

But in all seriousness, Rob McGowan is but an average guy who decided to grow his hair to ‘Slapshot extra’ proportions, and then turn that hair into not just a wig or three, but also a big fat check for the Cancer Society, and rather than be happy with couch change and guilt money from close friends, he’s stepped up to the fundraising plate in a major way and asked for cash from just about anyone and everyone he’s ever known - from realtors to bank managers to students to mothers-in-law.

But because Rob is Rob, and not a couch-sitting mouth-breathing douchebag, instead of filling a jar with pennies, the goodwill he’s built up over the years has come back in bundles of twentys and hundreds.

I don’t know how many wigs will be created using Rob’s fundraising money, but I do know this - there’s no sadder sight than a room full of kids, not yet even ten years old, who have not known a year of their existence without seeing the inside of a hospital ward. If you’ve ever walked through the Childrens Hospital, you know what I’m talking about - it’s a brutal, heartbreaking experience. It makes all your worries seem like petty crap.

Well, this week, while most people have spent a few hours watching celebrities do the cha-cha, or bad singers pretending to be rock stars, or Jim Belushi pretending to be funny… Rob McGowan instead got to work; the work of helping kids avoid an early death.

Dude may be a beerhawker in his spare time. He may be a teacher during work hours. But he’s also a god damn rock star, 24/7. Tip of the hat to you, brother man - may Tawny Kitaen (the 80’s version) straddle your Chevy and grind it hard.

And another tip of the hat to Backbone Technology, who threw a THOUSAND BUCKS into the pool. Go look over their website and consider doing business with them - they deserve at least that much from us.

And finally, the biggest props of all go to the people who have dug deep and sent money. Dedicated C’s fans, friends, people who just like beer, folks who read about it on the blog and felt like jumping aboard… thanks.

Let’s keep it coming.

Have you ever wanted to own a jersey of a future Major Leaguer?  2004 NWL MVP Javier Herrera?  How about former Pepperdine Wave Steve Kleen?  Hey, what about "Tum-Tum" Boyd?  Anthony Recker? (Hence girl who sniffed his butt in 2005 while he was at 2nd base!) Well here’s your chance.  The Stockton Ports are holding an online auction this week to sell game-worn jerseys from the teams game this Saturday against Bakersfield.  The Jerseys (Left) are Pink in honour of breast cancer, and all proceeds from the auction go towards the St. Joseph’s Foundation benefiting the Mobile Mammography Fund.  All jerseys will be autographed by that player that wore the jersey.

By bidding on this pink jersey, you?re helping fight breast cancer! All proceeds will go to the St. Joseph?s Foundation benefiting the Mobile Mammography Fund.

The Ports are holding a week-long auction that will culminate on Pink Day (Sunday, May 20th). All website auctions will be frozen at 11:00 am on the morning of Sunday, May 20th, and will resume in the stadium during that day?s game. Attend the game to make sure your high bid isn?t challenged by another fan! The auction will officially end after the 7th inning of the May 20th game.

This jersey has the number 3 on the back and is an authentic jersey created for Pink Day.

Winning bidders will be given their jersey by the player who wore it at the game and will have it autographed (if worn by a player). If winning bidder is not present, the jersey will be autographed (if worn by a player) and mailed to the winning bidder (shipping charge is $7).

Please note that players on our roster do change, and we cannot guarantee that this jersey will be worn by the player who currently wears this number during the game, nor can we guarantee the jersey will be autographed by that player. All bids are final. Having the highest bid on the website does not guarantee winning the jersey ? higher bids may be placed in person during the game.

The jerseys range from 50$ up to 75$ already with guys like Herrera’s jerseys only at 50$ as I type this.  Hey C’s, could we be seeing this in the future?  *Crosses fingers*

A few weeks back, I wrote a piece about how UBC baseball had managed a bit of a coup by grabbing an ex-major league hitter, former Angel and Phillie Chris Pritchett, as a part time hitting coach. 

At the time, it seemed like a very nice bonus for the Thunderbirds - Pritchett had met a Vancouver girl when he was here playing AAA ball, and so once his pro playing career was over, he came back to settle down. And, of course, since he was here, why not help out the ‘birds a little?

But there was something else that loomed on the horizon… that big, empty, yawning, vacant Vancouver Canadians hitting coach position, that remained empty even after the head coach (Rick Magnante) and pitching coach (Craig Lefferts) had been named for season 2007. 

Well, it didn’t take too long for the powers that be to catch on; today it was announced that Chris Pritchett will be the C’s new hitting coach for the coming NWL season.

Official press release, take it away!

Canadians newest coach has history at the ?Nat?

Chris Pritchett joins club as hitting coach for ?07 season 

Vancouver , B.C.  -  TheVancouver Canadians are pleased to announce that former Canadiansslugger Chris Pritchett will be back out at the ?Nat? this season asthe teams hitting coach.

Chris recently moved to Vancouver and had been helping out with the UBCThunderbird Baseball program prior to receiving his assignment from theOakland A?s.

Pritchett?s pro career had him spend parts of four (4) seasons with apair of organizations, California/Anaheim (1995; 1998-99) andPhiladelphia (2000) finishing with a .221 batting average, three (3)home runs and eleven (11) runs batted in.

Chris to locals may best be remembered by his days out at Nat BaileyStadium as he played with Vancouver for parts of five (5) seasonsdating from 1995-99.  Pritchett hit 16 home runs back in 1996 while with the C?s.  Thereason that stat may be interesting, the fact that last season here atNat Bailey, home and away teams combined for 12 home runs the entireseason.

Pritchett makes his professional coaching debut this season joining manager Rick Magnante and pitching coach Craig Lefferts on this years staff.

So let’s see: Vancouver’s coaching staff for 2007 will include a World Series pitching hero, a slugging major leaguer, and a national team coach from the World Baseball Classic… Ya think the next crop of draftees might have some stars in their eyes when they turn up to V-Town?

Rob McGowan update: The lost Hanson brother is now at $2700 on the cancer cut fundraising - that’s blown right by the initial target of $2k, and over halfway to the adjusted target of $5k! If you haven’t thrown in your $5 or $10, think of the cancer kids weeping in their emergency room beds at your scrooge-like cheapskatery, and get your donation in!