Daisuke Matsuzaka made his return from the disabled list, and pitched brilliantly against the Anaheim Los Angeles Angels (of Anaheim) to defeat John Lackey. Lackey was pulled with two outs in 8th inning, and the reliever promptly gave up a home run to David Ortiz. I really wanted Lackey to stay in there for the final out of the inning, and throw a complete game loss. I’ve never seen one of those in person. I spent the day walking around Boston before the game, and I’ll have another post about that, with pictures, of course. I then took the green line to Fenway, getting there a couple of hours before the game as usual.

I went to the game with Adam, a friend from college I haven’t seen in quite a while. It was good to get together and catch up, and Fenway Park was a great place to do it.

Of course, I had to get my souvenir ice cream helmet.

More pictures in the set, including Dice-k warming up, Wagner in a Red Sox uniform, Lackey with an insane pitch count, and more.

Thanks, jetBlue!

Monday was a travel day, leaving New York and heading for Boston. It was a quick and easy flight, and then some easy public transportation to meet up with Byron. The jetBlue terminal at JFK is incredible.

Byron brews his own beer. It’s good.

I took a short detour from baseball on this trip to go to a football game. How could I pass up the Giants season opener, when I was going to be in New York, anyway? The Giants kicked a field goal on the opening drive (though they should have had an easy touchdown), and won the game 23-17 over the Redskins. It was a great game. Brad was on the sidelines shooting, so we drove in together, and parked in the media lot. Unfortunately, his paper didn’t have a credential I could use to just be on the sidelines with him. I originally bought two tickets near the top of the upper deck, but then couldn’t find anyone who could go with me. I randomly checked the game on Ticketmaster, and found a single ticket at the back of field level. I bought that, and then sold my other tickets to some tailgaters (for my cost). I’m glad I did, my seat was great. Covered and out of the sun, and a good view of the game.

Before the game, I wandered around the parking lot through the tailgaters. It’s crazy before a football game.

The old and new stadiums are right next to each other.

The view from my seat was great.

I moved forward a little bit to get a picture where the lighting was good on both me and the field.

Of course, I did have to go up to the top deck to get my stadium shot, though. I wish I had done it a little later in the game when the sky was darker, but it still came out great.

No game for me today. Instead, Cheesecake Factory with family for my sister-in-law’s birthday.

The Mets continue to lose games I go to. We’re now up to 9 in a row, for a season record of 2-10. If you do the math, you can figure out that means I actually had a winning record of 2-1 at one point this season. It has been downhill from there. I decided to borrow my father’s car and drive to Philly instead of take the LIRR, Metroliner, and subway to get there. I think it was the right decision, as it was certainly easier than lugging all my stuff around with me between trains. A little traffic and rain made for a fairly relaxing two and a half hour drive. I got to Citizens Bank Park about three hours before game time, and took a nice walk around the place, and took a few pictures.

Then I went inside, and took some more. It was raining lightly but steadily all night. The tarp was on the field before the game, and there was no batting practice, but there were no rain delays, and the game played as scheduled. It’s a beautiful park, as are most of the newer ones these days. I like the bullpen location, though I should have gone back there again during the game for another shot.

I got my ice cream helmet, to add to my collection. The empty helmets are the souvenirs I am bringing back from each stadium. I’m going to be eating a lot of ice cream this month. In Philadelphia, they had soft serve Turkey Hill ice cream, not the Carvel they have in Yankee Stadium and Citi Field. It’s good, but it’s just not the same. Also had an excellent Tony Luke’s cheesesteak before the game.

I had some friendly Phillies fans (really, I swear!) sitting behind me, so I was able to get a picture of me at the park. Despite the rain, I was also able to get my standard stadium photograph, as well. The stands are unfortunately a bit empty due to the weather, but it’s a nice shot regardless.

The back of this shirt sums up the Mets this season perfectly, especially at a 4-2 loss where they had plenty of chances.

As always, more pictures in the flickr set for this game, and the baseball trip collection.

This is the only stadium on my trip I have already been to, though this game was only my fourth time there. I got there a little early, and walked around the stadium a bit, but it wasn’t quite the same experience I expect to have everywhere else. In fact, when I got off the LIRR, I thought maybe I should skip the game and go to the US Open instead. It’s not like I really needed to see the Mets lose another game. Which they did, by a final score of 13-4. A couple of times in the middle innings, they looked like they might have a shot to tie it up, but then it got out of hand. I didn’t even buy a Carvel ice cream helmet, because I already have one at home. The rain broke through a little bit later in the game, but not enough to stop play or bother me at all. After this game, my Mets season record stands at 2-9. Why do I keep going? Not that it matters if they don’t win any more games this year.

I did finally get a picture of me I’ve been wanting, though. That’s in the Jackie Robinson Rotunda by the main entrance to the park. Of course, the number 42 has other meanings for me than just being Robinson’s number.

I had my obligatory Shake Shack burger, and took a few other pictures. They can all be found in the set, and again all pictures from the trip can be found in the collection.

Last night, I kicked off the baseball trip with a game at the new Yankee Stadium. It turned out to be an amazing way to start. Derek Jeter had three hits to tie Lou Gehrig’s record of 2721 hits as a Yankee. He had one more plate appearance in the 8th inning, but worked out a walk. The Yankees were down 2-0 in the first, and didn’t score until the 8th. They scored 4 runs in the inning, capped off by a Jorge Posada pinch hit home run, and won the game 4-2.

…and of course, my signature shot:

More pictures can be found in the set, and all images from the trip can be found in the collection.

In a few hours, I’m heading to the airport to get started on my month-long stadium tour. In preparation for that trip, I started putting together a list of the bag and camera rules for all the stadiums I’m going to, so I’d know what I could bring to each. While I was at it, I just went ahead and did all 30 MLB stadiums, because it didn’t take that much more time. I figure this could be useful to some other people, though the rules aren’t necessarily enforced. I take telephoto lenses into Dodger Stadium all the time, even though it says they’re not allowed.

Anyway, here’s the list: MLB Stadium Bag and Camera Rules.

Time to finish getting ready to go…

I don’t know why I didn’t think to do it until yesterday, but I decided to listen to the radio broadcasts of my foul ball. No mention of the catch on the Padres broadcast, but they talked about it on WFAN! Click Play to listen.

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(People reading this in a feed reader probably have to click through for the Flash MP3 player.)