Beavers On The Road: Baseball In Tucson
March 31, 2011
Tucson, Ariz. – You know it’s already going to be a good day when your destination has a temperature that’s nearly 40 degrees warmer than the place you are leaving.
That’s what awaited the Oregon State baseball team on Thursday morning as the club set out for its annual trip to Arizona. This year, it’s Tucson, home to the University of Arizona, where Oregon State is set to open its Pacific-10 Conference slate Friday night at Jerry Kindall Field at Sancet Stadium.
The club had a relatively early departure from Corvallis this morning; 8:15 a.m. Normally, the team is able to leave around noon, but this trip is a bit different. In 2009, the team flew from Phoenix to Tucson after landing in Arizona. In some respects, it’s nice to fly that distance but in the long run, there’s no difference between doing that and what the club was scheduled for Thursday; busing.
You figure that you have to be in the airport for an hour before the flight anyway, so this year, OSU bused the hour and a half drive to Tucson. Since there is that 90 minutes you have to account for, the team had to leave early, catch an 11:30 a.m. flight on US Airways, and land at 2 p.m. before getting on the bus. They say it’s a hard life right? Hey, just means the club got down to Arizona for a couple extra hours of 90-degree weather. For those fans who are headed to Arizona, pack light. It’s going to be warm all weekend.
Thursday marked what will be the team’s longest flight of the Pac-10 season. We’ve discussed it before, there’s no easy to way to pace the time. Well, unless you are on JetBlue and those TVs allow for a two-hour flight to feel like 20 minutes. So, on go the headphones, books get opened up, some studying is done and the lucky few who can sleep on a plane get a nice nap in. It’s a rather monotonous thing to be on a plane as much as the team usually is. It feels like the Beavers just got back from Long Beach.
The team practiced for about 90 minutes under the lights at Kindall Field. The park is situated on the opposite side of campus from where the team is staying, a Marriott across the street from campus. It’s arguably the best hotel situation for the club. It’s a five-minute drive to the park and is located near a ton of restaurants and eateries. That will make it an easy opportunity for the guys to get lunch before Friday’s game and dinner after Saturday’s game. It’s amazing how a location that has a bunch of places to eat nearby can make the biggest difference on a road trip.
With the team playing at Kindall Field, you certainly can’t forget to mention the man for whom it is named after. Jerry Kindall is the former head coach at Arizona and guided the team to a couple national titles during his tenure (their celebrated on the outfield wall at Kindall Field). I’ve had the pleasure of working with Jerry in the past as he’s been the color man for Pac-10 TV broadcasts. He’s no longer doing that but has done some recent work with the Big Ten Network. He was always a great person to work with. Last season, in fact, he happened to see the Beavers on TV when FSN Northwest and KEZI 9.2 aired a couple games (and the broadcast made its way on to the FCS channels). He liked the broadcast so much, he called my cell to offer up some positive compliments on the job Steve Andress and Jim Wilson were doing on the air. First class he is, to say the least.
The Pac-10 is known for its current crop of top-notch coaches. That appears to certainly be the case in the past as well.
Before we end the blog, we want to offer a hearty congratulations to outfielder Jacoby Ellsbury, infielder Darwin Barney and left-handed pitcher Joe Paterson, who all opened the 2011 Major League season with their respective big clubs. Ellsbury is with the Red Sox as usual (and tore through the Astros last night in a game live on the MLB Network) while Barney and Paterson made the opening-day roster for the first time. We all know that Darwin had a great end of the season with the Cubs, and his spot is well deserved. Same can certainly be said of Joe, who, when he pitches in his first game, will make his MLB debut. Here’s the plus for Joe: he’s a Rule 5 selection, so if at any point in 2011 he is send to the Minors by the Diamondbacks, he has to be offered back to the Giants for $25,000. The Giants were certainly disappointed in losing him in the offseason.
Congrats again, Joe. If you haven’t seen it, check out our online e-mag on osubeavers.com. Joe was able to make it to the Diamond Dinner in late January, and he, along with some other former Beavers, was nice enough to sit down for a few minutes and go on camera and offer up his experiences about being a Beaver.
You can also visit some of our webisodes, which we have produced thus far. These are great looks into the program and what it’s like to be around a college baseball team.
For now, Go Beavs! Remember, first pitch is scheduled for 6 p.m. Friday night (Arizona is now on Pacific time so it doesn’t matter if you are in Oregon or Tucson). Be there, support your Beavers and here’s to a great start to the 2011 Pac-10 season.
Hank Hager
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