I happened to have one day to spend in Ft. Myers this week, so I made sure to go over to the site of JetBlue Park, the new spring training home of the Red Sox.  It’s still 47 days until pitchers and catchers report, and we weren’t allowed through the gates, but I did get a good early peek at the complex.  All of the pictures below can be clicked to enlarge.

JetBlue Park as seen on 1/3/12. Click to enlarge.

There’s still a lot of landscaping to be done, but the stadium looks to be complete.  Look closely and you’ll see the replica Green Monster (with what looks like a roof over its seats for shade), a tall batter’s eye wall in center field, and green seats in the left field stands.  Behind the stadium are six practice fields, at least one of which has the same dimensions as the stadium (which itself has the same dimensions as Fenway) with yet another Green Monster for the players to practice on.

One of the practice fields at JetBlue Park has the same dimensions as Fenway, including its own Green Monster wall. Click to enlarge.

I also got a copy of a map of the complex.  With the stadium in the center, there’s a small paved parking lot to the right.  More parking is available on both sides of the ballpark on grassy areas that will double as soccer fields during the months when baseball is not taking place.  In the back are the practice fields, with the one closest to the paved parking lot shaped just like Fenway Park.

The layout of the Red Sox' new spring training complex, featuring JetBlue Park in the center, practice fields in the back, and parking lots/soccer fields on both sides. Click to enlarge.

I only had one day in the area (and as luck would have it, it was not only the coldest day of this year, but colder than any day all last year too) but it was fun to get a sneak peek at the place where I’ll be spending a lot of time in the coming years.  Two months from today the first games will be taking place against Boston College and Northeastern University.  I’ll be back for real when the weather is more spring-like, but at least now I have something tangible to look forward to.

Red Sox 7, Twins 6

Monday was my last day in Ft. Myers, and I had one last game to go to.  We arrived at 10:30, just as the gates were opening, and I went down near the Red Sox dugout to see if I could get any autographs.  The Red Sox were taking batting practice, and I had just pulled out my camera when I heard someone say, “Beckett looks hurt.”  I hadn’t even noticed him yet, but I found later that he was in the background of some of my pictures, on one knee and holding his head.  We heard later that Beckett had been hit in the head by a ball that coach Ino Guerrero had batted back toward the infield after shagging a fly, and had suffered a mild concussion.

Josh Beckett winces as he walks off the field after being hit in the head by a ball.

When batting practice wrapped up, we were able to call Darnell McDonald over for autographs.  After the Red Sox came off the field, we grabbed a bite to eat but then went back down by the dugout seats to wait it out, knowing that they won’t come back out until just before the start of the game.  When they did come out for their warmups, we called Lars Anderson and Clay Buchholz over to sign.

Darnell McDonald signs autographs before the game.

Daisuke Matsuzaka got his first start of the spring, and in the first inning he gave up a solo homer to Jason Kubel, one of the few major leaguers the Twins brought over for the game.  Dice-K walked a batter in the second, but other than that it was a decent outing, and he only needed 25 pitches for the two-inning stint.  Matsuzaka was replaced by Tim Wakefield in the third.  He gave up a home run to Luke Hughes, but all three runs the Twins scored off Wake were unearned due to an error by shortstop Brent Dlugach.  Wakefield’s second inning of work was less eventful, as he worked around a walk and a double to emerge unscathed.

Tim Wakefield throws a knuckleball during the third inning.

The Red Sox found themselves in a 4-0 hole heading into the bottom of the third, but with one out Jacoby Ellsbury singled and Dustin Pedroia walked.  Carl Crawford, playing his first spring game with the Red Sox, flied to left (he finished the day 0-3).  That brought up Big Papi with two on and two out.  He crushed a towering shot into right that actually went over the City of Palms Park sign and out of the park, bringing the Sox back within a run.

Big Papi got all of this one for a huge 3-run homer. He knows it, the catcher knows it, and the ump knows it.

Daniel Bard gave up two runs in his inning of work, but that was the last time the Twins would score.  Andrew Miller, the tall lefty who is now my personal choice for the last spot in the ‘pen, had an impressive 10-pitch inning which included two strikeouts, and Michael Bowden, Jason Rice, and Matt Albers also threw scoreless frames.

The Red Sox got some more runs in the bottom of the sixth, but it wasn’t an easy trip around the bases for Josh Reddick.  He had come on to pinch-run after J.D. Drew’s one-out single, and he had second base stolen – complete with a late throw and a safe sign from the ump – on Luis Exposito’s strike three, but for some reason he had to go back to first.  (Earlier in the game Ellsbury had gone down to first base after an apparent walk, and the next batter was even introduced before the pitch was changed to a strike and he had to come back to the plate.  He ended up grounding out.)  I missed why Reddick had to go back, but he was back at first and Exposito was out.  The next batter was Dlugach, and he drove one into the gap in left-center for a double.  Reddick came all the way around from first to score – except the ball had bounced over the wall and was called a ground-rule double, so Reddick had to go back (again) to third. Finally, first baseman Drew Sutton lined a single, and both Reddick and Dlugach were able to score.

It's another battle in the quest for the Mayor's Cup, as the Sox take on the cross-town Twins at City of Palms Park.

Reddick came up again in the seventh inning with one out, a runner on first, and the Sox still trailing by a run.  This time he hit a home run out to left, giving the Sox a 7-6 lead and allowing for a much easier trot around the basepaths.

The Red Sox pulled off a nice come-from-behind win and evened the Mayor’s Cup series with the Twins at 1-1.  “Dirty Water” blared (only one verse, though, before they switched to the dreadful “Happy Trails”, which for some reason they played in its entirety) but as much as I love that dirty water, I wasn’t really looking forward to my 6 am flight back to Boston the next morning.  The Grapefruit League was just getting underway, but for me it was back to the land of snowbanks and black ice.  The next time I see see the Red Sox will be Opening Day.  It’s a little over a month away, and I certainly won’t be picking up a sunburn before the game like I did today, but that’s OK as long as the result is the same.

Twins 8, Red Sox 4

The Red Sox took on the Minnesota Twins in the first Grapefruit League game on a warm night in Ft. Myers.

After getting warmed up with the college games on Saturday, Sunday brought the long, grueling journey to the other side of Ft. Myers (and anyone who’s ever sat through those red lights knows I’m only half-kidding) as the Red Sox visited the Twins for the first of five Mayor’s Cup games.  We arrived early, as usual, and I found a spot at the end of the concourse that overlooked the visiting team’s parking lot.  I hadn’t known about that for my previous trips to Hammond Stadium, but I camped out there for a while to see who came in.  Terry Francona and DeMarlo Hale walked in first, and when someone shouted, “2011 World Champions,” Tito looked up and waved.  Some of the coaches, including Dave Magadan, followed, with Scott Atchison arriving a few minutes later.  I knew from previous years that when they play the Twins, the Red Sox warm up and take batting practice at City of Palms Park, and then just the players who are scheduled for that day’s game go over to Hammond Stadium at the last minute.  Eventually a bus pulled up with a bunch of the younger players, like Daniel Nava, Ryan Kalish, and Oscar Tejeda.  I figured the bus must be there for anyone who wants it, but the veterans must drive themselves over.  I waited until about 6:25 (for a 7:05 game) before getting something to eat and heading to my seat, but I didn’t see any of the other starters come in.

Terry Francona arrives at the game.

It was nice to have a nine-inning game played under normal rules, and as a result it was much easier to keep score.  Josh Beckett started and went two innings.  His first inning was quick and smooth, but he gave up some hard hits in the second.  There was a double and a triple, and only a great ranging, leaping catch of a line drive by shortstop Jose Iglesias prevented further damage.  Clay Buchholz took over after that and had a really good two innings, with three popups, two groundouts, and a strikeout.  Hideki Okajima got knocked around (four runs on five hits, including a bases-loaded triple), and Dan Wheeler’s debut did not impress (he gave up a homer and a double, but was helped by another good play in the field – Daniel Nava to Iglesias to Mark Wagner – to throw a runner out at the plate).  After a quick, efficient 1-2-3 inning from Atchison, Brandon Duckworth allowed another two runs in the eighth.

Clay Buchholz had a strong outing.

On the offensive side, Mike Cameron beat out an infield hit and stole a base after reaching on a fielder’s choice.  It’s good to finally see what he’s capable of when he’s healthy, because we never got to see that last year.  There wasn’t much else going on early in the game while the Red Sox fell in a 6-0 hole.  But the subs gave us things to cheer for late in the game – Lars Anderson and Mark Wagner both homered, Oscar Tejeda hit a double, and Josh Reddick drove in a run.  Ryan Kalish also stole a base.

Mike Cameron had a good night at the plate and on the basepaths.

While the game resulted in the Twins gaining an early advantage in the Mayor’s Cup, the night wasn’t a total waste.  We did get to see some good pitching, a couple of good defensive plays, and good hitting by the prospects.  And we even got two free grapefruits when we left.  (That’s a promotion the Twins do every year at their first game.  But all the other times we’ve gone to their first game, all the grapefruits were gone when we left at the end of the game, given away to the people who bailed early while we who always stay to the end got nothing to show for it.  I was prepared this time to once again be a victim of what I’ve dubbed “The Great Minnesota Grapefruit Scam,” so I was pleasantly surprised that they had enough for everyone this time.)

Game 1 – Red Sox 6, Boston College Eagles 0

On Saturday, it was time for the first games of the new season.  Of course, it was two seven-inning games against college teams, but it was baseball (or at least something closely resembling baseball) and, considering it’s still February, that was good enough for me!

City of Palms Park on a beautiful afternoon.

But even something like a warm, sunny afternoon of pressure-free baseball (actually, is that an oxymoron?) wasn’t easy.  Every year I register for the drawings to be able to buy tickets to Yankee games, Green Monster seats, and Right Field Roof seats, and most of the time I lose.  I’ve won the Yankee game drawing a couple of times, but I haven’t been picked for Monster seats since 2004, and I always have terrible luck on the phone with the other non-winners.  So this year I was excited to finally win the Monster seat drawing… until I saw that the sale started at noon this Saturday, a day that I had tickets to both the 1:00 and 6:00 games.  We decided to bring the laptop along, hoping there’d be a wireless network at the ballpark like there is at Fenway.   Our seats were behind first base, all the way in the back row, with a wall to our left and our seats all the way in.  It actually made for a nice private spot to boot up the laptop.  I did find their wireless network and sat in the virtual waiting room for about 20 minutes.  When I got through, my first choice for tickets – the Cubs series in May – was already sold out, but I did find a Sunday afternoon in September that I didn’t already have tickets for, and got Green Monster standing room for that game.  I’ve been on the Monster plenty of times during batting practice, but I’m excited to be able to see another game from there!  The timing was perfect, too.  I finished up and was able to shut down the computer at 12:30, just in time to be ready to keep score when the game started at 1:00.

Seeing Dustin Pedroia back in action made me want to jump for joy, too!

Stolmy Pimentel, one of the top Red Sox prospects who spent last season in high A Salem, started the game, and he threw two perfect innings, striking out two and throwing (by my count) only 17 pitches.  the best part of the game was when the Red Sox came to bat and the guys who were injured last year – Marco Scutaro, Dustin Pedroia, and Kevin Youkilis – got back in the lineup.  Scutaro and Pedey both walked, and then, after they moved up on a groundout by David Ortiz, Youk drove one into right field and off the base of the light tower just over the fence for a three-run homer.  Order has been restored to the universe!

Kevin Youkilis is congratulated at the plate by Marco Scutaro and Dustin Pedroia after his three-run blast.

When Pimentel was done, he was followed by one inning apiece from Michael Bowden, Jason Rice, Clevelan Santeliz, Matt Fox, and Randy Williams.  Together, they didn’t allow a baserunner until a one-out walk in the fifth, and the only hit of the game for B.C. was a single in the top of the seventh.  The Sox tacked on two more runs in the third on a single by Ryan Kalish and a sac fly by Lars Anderson.  Alex Hassan, up from minor league camp for one game, also had a sac fly to drive in the sixth run of the game.

Jason Rice, who spent last season as the closer for the Sea Dogs, pitched a perfect fourth inning.

The other highlight of the first game was batting practice pitcher Ino Guerrero’s annual at-bat.  The 49 (or so)-year-old coach, whose official title is “Major League Staff”, came to the plate in the bottom of the sixth with no outs and runners on second and third.  He walked on four pitches, and stayed in the game to run the bases, although nothing else happened in the inning where he would have had to show off his speed.

Batting practice pitcher Ino Guerrero warms up in the on-deck circle before his at-bat. Behind him on the bench is Dustin Pedroia, in street clothes with his afternoon already done, who came back out to trash-talk during the at-bat.

The worst part of these college games always ends up being the scorekeeping.  I enjoy keeping score when I go to a game, and I’d feel lost if I had to just sit and watch a game without my scorecard, but the college games are next to impossible.  The teams substitute liberally, and we have to keep checking every inning to see who’s on the field.  The substitutions are not always announced, and if they are it may be an inning or two late, and it’s almost never spelled out on the board when they do announce it.  I’m pretty familiar with the Red Sox organization, even the minor leaguers who aren’t in major league camp, but I don’t have any idea who the college players are.  But this year, the B.C. game really threw me.  I had written down the lineup as it was posted and announced before the game, but when the guys came to the plate their names didn’t match up.  I figured there had been a last-minute change to the lineup before the game, but when they went through the order the second time, they all seemed to be batting in different spots.  At least one player started the game as a catcher and ended as a pitcher, but I think he disappeared for a few innings in between, because I had someone else written in as having pinch-hit in his spot.  Looking at the box score on my smartphone didn’t help either – except it did confirm that a couple of position players came in to pitch, and that the batting order was changed around.  (Like, how could Dowdell have “grounded out for Prohovich in the 4th” if Prohovich really “struck out for Laufer, D. in the 5th”?  Meanwhile, Prohovich was in the published lineup batting third, but he came up as the first batter of the second inning after a 1-2-3 first.  I have Dowdell listed as batting in the top spot during the 4th.)  I can see guys switching to different positions – even coming in to pitch – but they shouldn’t be able to come back into the game after being taken out, or switch where in the batting order they are.  I joked that Tito should call them on batting out of order and play the rest of the game under protest… until my mother pointed out that if a protest is upheld they’d have to replay the game.  I know I can’t sit through that again!

Game 2 – Red Sox 13, Northeastern Huskies 2

I spent the time between games trying to sort out my scorecard from the first game, and then we re-entered the park for the nightcap.  This time our seats were in the last row back behind home plate.  And this time keeping score was a lot easier.  Northeastern made the standard substitutions, and even had one pitcher who got the final two outs of the fourth inning bat in the DH spot starting in the fifth, but nothing my scorecard couldn’t handle.

The second game of the doubleheader ended up as eventful as the first.

At first it looked like Northeastern was going to give the Red Sox a run for their money.  Third baseman Ryan Maguire homered to left off Kyle Weiland on the first pitch of the game.  They extended the lead to 2-0 in the fourth off a shaky Rich Hill, who is experimenting with a side-arm delivery this spring and was very wild in this outing.  But in the bottom of the fourth, the Huskies gave the game away.  Four walks, two errors, a wild pitch, and just two singles gave the Red Sox a 5-2 lead, and they never looked back, piling on two runs in the sixth and six more in the seventh.  The big blows for the Sox were Jose Iglesias’s 2-run single to give them the lead, David Mailman’s double, and Peter Hissey’s triple.  Northeastern finished the game with an incredible seven errors: a dropped fly ball by the right fielder in the second, a grounder through the legs of the first baseman in the third, a double error by the first baseman in the fourth (a bobble followed by a bad throw), a grounder that clanged off the glove of the third baseman in the fifth, a bad throw by the catcher in the fifth, and a bad throw by the third baseman in the sixth.  Add in 12 walks, and it only took seven hits for the Sox to score their 13 runs.  But by the end of the night, I had seen 48 players from all levels of the Red Sox organization.  And some of them are the same guys I’ll be watching from atop the Green Monster at Fenway in September.

Friday morning brought the final Red Sox workout of the spring before games start up.  And with a new stadium and practice facility set to open across town next spring, it meant this was my last day ever at the current player development complex at the end of Edison Rd.  The workout was scheduled to end an hour earlier than usual so that the players could take part in a charity golf tournament in the afternoon, and as a result they started about a half-hour earlier.

Jonathan Papelbon and Kevin Youkilis share a laugh on the way out to practice.

On the way out, we got Felix Doubront, Stolmy Pimentel (whom I was able to wish good luck in his start in Saturday’s game), and Daniel Bard to sign autographs.  While Bard was signing, Lou Merloni, the former Red Sox infielder who now works for Comcast Sports Net, came over to chat with him.  I didn’t catch the beginning of the conversation, but Lou thanked him for doing an interview yesterday, and the two joked about how Bard looks like a member of some band (didn’t hear who) and how the rest of his teammates were teasing him about it and saying he’d have to make a decision soon whether to pursue baseball or music.  These glimpses into the players’ lives and the clubhouse dynamics is what makes the workouts so special, and I hope the closeness and accessibility that the current place affords is not lost when they move to the new facility next year.  It was kind of fitting to see Merloni and Bard together this morning.  Bard ended up being the last autograph I got at the old complex, and Lou was among the first I got on my first trip to spring training back in 2003.

I can't wait to see Jacoby back in the lineup (not to mention in the field and on the basepaths) this year!

After the players did their stretching, I went to Field 1 to watch the outfielders because I hadn’t seen their drills yet this year.  After some long-tossing, they formed two lines, one in left field and one in center.  Using a pitching machine, first base coach Ron Johnson shot balls into the gap.  The fielders ran in from left and center yelling “I got it, I got it!” until the catch was made, and then switched lines so they could practice going from the other angle.  I’m happy to report that everything went smoothly with this set of fielders, and no one ended up with broken ribs.

Big Papi was his usual merry self.

When fielding practice was over it was time for an abbreviated batting practice.  I went over to Field 5 to watch the starters take their B.P., and got more chances to see the team chemistry and light-heartedness at work.  First of all, Dustin Pedroia really is as loud, confident, and funny as he seems.  When he first walked onto the field, a photographer was crouched down, clicking away.  Pedroia joked, “Hey, what are you doing taking all these pictures without looking at the camera?  You just got a picture of my shin!  Where’d you go to school to learn how to do that?  Arizona State?”  But the photographer got the last laugh.  He said, “It makes you look taller if I shoot from down here.  You’re going to look like Paul Bunyan.”  (In fact, his teammates like to give all the trash-talking right back to him.  All week during fielding practice when Terry Francona was hitting grounders to him to field, Tito would yell, “OK, Pee-Wee, here it comes” before each one shot Pedroia’s way.)  Pedey then turned his attention to Kevin Youkilis, who had just hit a ball a long way to left where it got knocked down by the wind and died on the warning track.  Dustin shouted, “That’s OK, there’s only a few people who can hit one out into a wind like that…. And I’m one of them!”  Meanwhile, when Youk finished taking his swings, he spied J.D. Drew sitting on a water cooler awaiting his turn.  This is the final year of Drew’s contract, and some of the papers have recently started speculating whether he will retire or seek another contract.  Youk started teasing, “J.D., where you gonna play next year?  The St. Paul Saints?  Washington Nationals?  Now batting, J.D. Drew!”

Batting practice itself was really short, and then the players came in.  It’s a little sad that the workouts are over now, but I’m excited to get the games underway tomorrow.  It’s all taking me one step closer to Opening Day!

Bonus pics from the past three days of workouts:

On Thursday, representatives from various shoe companies visited the clubhouse to demo their wares for the players.  Adrian Gonzalez kept switching between a couple of different pairs of cleats.  In this photo, D’Angelo Ortiz returns with one pair of Gonzo’s shoes, while Adrian switches to another.  (On Friday we saw that he had chosen to go with the gray ones.)

Li'l Papi has some big shoes to fill.

Also on Thursday, the relievers got comfortable in one of the staff’s golf carts during a break in the action:

Daniel Bard (left), Dan Wheeler (in back), and Jonathan Papelbon (right) make themselves comfortable while waiting for the next drill to start.

On Friday, NESN was concluding their two-week coverage of Red Sox workouts.  I had been watching their shows at home before I flew down, and each night they would ask the players they interviewed to participate in the “Second Base Cup”, a golfing competition to see who could hit the ball closest to the second base bag from the NESN desk in right field.  I haven’t had access to NESN since I’ve been in Florida, but when I left Kevin Youkilis was the leader.  After practice on Friday, we saw Tom Caron presenting a trophy to Youk, and I quickly figured out that he had been crowned champion of the Second Base Cup.  (Here’s the link to the video they were filming.)

Kevin Youkilis is the winner of NESN's Second Base Cup. Let's hope that in October he's hoisting an even bigger trophy!

My second day of Red Sox workouts again began early in the morning.  We were in good position to watch as the players took the field, and I successfully called both Bobby Jenks and Lars Anderson over to sign.  One thing I was happy to see was that Big Papi was joined by his 6-year-old son, D’Angelo.  I’ve seen D’Angelo hanging out with his father’s teammates during batting practice at Fenway before, and my parents had told me how he had posed for pictures with fans and signed autographs (he writes “D34”) at some of the earlier workouts before I flew down.

Bobby Jenks signs autographs on his way out to practice.

As usual, after they stretched out, the players split up to the different fields to work on defensive drills.  I headed over to where the infielders were taking ground balls.  But everywhere I went throughout the day, D’Angelo was the star.  He was dressed in full uniform (road grays today) and followed his father around from drill to drill, joining in whenever possible.  He stretched with them on Field 2, doing all the different exercises, and then went over to Field 3 where the players were practicing running the bases as if scoring from first base.  The following video shows the players as they each cross the plate, and then cheer on a grinning D’Angelo as he makes it all the way around.

When Big Papi and the rest of the hitters in his batting group got settled on Field 5 for some live B.P., D’Angelo sat nearby to watch.  It’s so cute the way he carries himself – he walks like his father, talks like his father, and thinks nothing of standing and chatting with fans.  Everywhere he went, he was the star of the show.  And just like his father, everyone is drawn to him.  The fans all flock to him, and the other players jump right in and include him in whatever they’re doing.

Big Papi and Little Papi take a break during batting practice.

I was standing at Field 5 near the small dugout late in the morning, when I started wondering if maybe I should head back up to the front of the complex in case any of the minor leaguers were coming off the field and might be signing.  Most autographs that I get come from being in the right place at the right time, and I didn’t want to miss out.  But I decided to stay a little longer and watch the rest of the B.P. session.  That’s when a woman with two small girls in Ortiz jerseys called D’Angelo over.  She started to talk to him in Spanish, but he said he only speaks a little Spanish.  She asked where in the Dominican Republic he was from, and told him her family was from Santo Domingo, the capital.  D’Angelo said he lived for a while “in the capital in a big apartment,” and then later they lived in a village, but, after pausing thoughtfully, he said he couldn’t really remember all the places he’s lived.  The woman asked if she could take a picture of him with her kids, and then said, “You should get your Dad to come over here for a picture too.”  D’Angelo ran off to tell Papi this, but he was in between rounds of B.P. and I figured there’s no way he’d come over in the middle.  But when D’Angelo returned a minute later he said, “My Dad will come over in a little bit, but it won’t be very long.”  When the woman asked if he had told them they were from the Dominican he said no, but then ran back onto the field to deliver the additional tidbit.

D'Angelo Ortiz reflects while watching his father take B.P.

All of a sudden, in between turns in the cage, Big Papi himself strolled over to the end of the dugout with a big grin on his face.  “So,” he asked his son, “Where are these new friends of yours from the Dominican?”  He came over and posed for pictures with the woman and kids, and then signed a couple of balls for the others who were standing in the area.  The spot I was standing in was right next to them, and I just happened to have brought a picture of me with the 2004 and 2007 World Series trophies, which I take out of its frame every year and bring to Spring Training with the hopes of getting autographs from members of the ’07 team.  I still didn’t think he was going to sign anything other than the balls that the Dominican family had, but he saw my picture, reached for it, and signed.  I even got to tell him how the trophy picture had been taken at a food drive he had sponsored at a Stop ‘n Shop in Plainville, MA, to benefit victims of flooding in the Dominican a couple of years ago.   He probably only signed about a dozen things total, and then returned to take his turn at B.P.  Being able to talk to one of my all-time favorite players has made my entire trip to Florida complete, and it’s only my second day!

Bonus pic: The top four Red Sox starters look on during drills.

By the time I did get back up to the front of the complex, the other players had all come in, so if anyone else had been signing I missed them.  But I didn’t care – I had definitely been in the right place at the right time!

Today was the first day of the 2011 season for me, as I had the chance to head to the Red Sox workouts and finally get a look at the team I’ve spent all winter talking about and pining for.  As usual, we left early and arrived with the first bus of fans.  That gave us a good position to watch the players as they came out to take the field for practice.  The veteran players rarely ever sign autographs on their way out to the field, but the younger players seem happy to sign for people who actually know who they are.  So I was able to call over Michael Bowden, who we know from his time in the majors last year and spring trainings past, and Kyle Weiland, whom I recognized from last year’s PawSox Hot Stove Party and my annual Sea Dogs game.  Both players signed, and I even got to wish Weiland luck on Saturday, when he’ll be starting one of the college games.

I got Michael Bowden's autograph in the morning, but he came back at the end of practice and signed for quite a long time.

After the players stretched together on Field 2, they broke up to work on defensive drills.  I watched a little Pitchers’ Fielding Practice and then checked out the infielders.  After that they broke into different groups for live batting practice.  I watched as John Lackey threw to Big Papi, Carl Crawford, and Kevin Youkilis.  It is a little conflicting to watch, because I’m rooting for both pitcher and hitter to do well.  As expected, none of the hitters really got ahold of any, and Lackey did have Crawford flailing at a couple of pitches.  Next up were Rich Hill and Stolmy Pimentel (who was named the starter for Saturday’s other college game), who threw to Jacoby Ellsbury, Marco Scutaro, Dustin Pedroia, and J.D. Drew.

Yoooouuuuk!

Carl Crawford smiles before taking B.P.

When live B.P. wrapped up, Ino Guerrero and the other coaches came out to throw some nice big meatballs so the players could take their swings in regular batting practice.  As that wound down, we headed back up to the front of the complex to see the players as they came back off the fields.  There, I was lucky to get Adrian Gonzalez and Kevin Youkilis to sign.  While I’m having the others sign a photo of City of Palms Park that I took last year, I got Youk’s on a picture of me with the 2007 World Series trophy that I’ve been carrying around with me ever since trying to get members from the Championship team.  After all the other players had gone in, Mike Cameron came back out and signed for quite a while for all the fans who were left.

Bonus pic:  I normally try not to use two pictures of the same player in a single post, but this one cracked me up so I had to share.  Is it a Jedi master?  Nope, just Youk signing autographs after a hot practice.

May the force be with Yoooouuuuu....

It was great to see baseball starting up again after a long and particularly snowy winter, and it was even better to see my favorite players who were injured last year back in action.  Topping it off was the perfectly warm and sunny weather, and we took advantage of that by spending the afternoon on Ft. Myers Beach.

After a long, snowy winter, the time finally came for me to report to the Fort!  My first stop was the site of the new Spring Training complex the Red Sox are building for next year, which is located on Daniels Parkway not far from the airport.  The new complex will contain the stadium and practice fields together in one location instead of two miles apart like they are now.  Plans also call for the stadium to have a replica Green Monster in left field so that new players and prospects can practice fielding The Wall before they get to Fenway.  (Of course, its true intricacies won’t really be captured by a replica unless they also add a ladder, scoreboard, and garage door.)

For now, there’s not much to see at the site of the new complex.  Dirt piles were being moved around and large pipes were stacked off to the side.  Here’s an obligatory shot of the construction site:

Construction is underway for a new Spring Training home for the Red Sox.

What I found interesting was  the sign at the entrance to the site that had a drawing of what the stadium will look like when it’s finished:

A drawing of what the new stadium will look like.

It will be interesting to see how it looks when it opens next year.  But for now, I’m excited to be heading to the current practice fields for tomorrow’s workouts.  Stay tuned for the rest of the week for photos and updates from the Red Sox’ workouts and games.

I just got back from the opening doubleheader for the Red Sox.  Both games were fun, and I got to see a total of 14 pitchers and 33 position players from the Red Sox organization.  (It’s really hard trying to keep score during a college exhibition game, so all numbers are approximate.)

My flight home is early tomorrow morning and I still have to pack, so check back Thursday evening for my full post including my pictures and stories from both games.  Until then, I’ll leave you with video of batting practice pitcher Ino Guerrero’s second at-bat (wearing Papi’s #34 but batting from the right) in Wednesday afternoon’s game against Northeastern.

Update:

Game 1 – Red Sox 15, Northeastern University Huskies 0

We got to the park early, and I was able to get autographs from Mike Cameron and Fernando Cabrera before the game.  It was chilly by spring training standards (62° announced at game-time, but I think that thermometer’s in the sun, and it remained at 62 all day, even throughout the night game.  I’ll go with the 58° reported by the Globe as more reasonable) but at least the sun was out.

Top prospect Casey Kelly was starting the game, but his outing was so quick I didn’t get many good photos.  He looked strong, and ended up with two strikeouts and a groundout on only 10 pitches.  He was followed by Manny Delcarmen (one hit, but the runner was erased on a double play), Adam Mills, Felix Doubront, Dustin Richardson (all three of whom threw perfect innings), Ramon A. Ramirez (the new Ramon Ramirez, not the one who was with us last year), and Robert Manuel.

Ramon "New Guy" Ramirez struck out two in his inning of work.

On the offensive side, we got to see Jacoby Ellsbury, Bill Hall, Victor Martinez, David Ortiz, and Jed Lowrie – all coming soon to a 25-man roster near you.  Ellsbury walked twice, and Martinez hit a double.  Big Papi blasted a two-run homer over the right field fence in his second at-bat, which was great to see.  Once Papi went into his home run trot, it finally felt like baseball was back!

The Red Sox take on Northeastern University on a sunny afternoon in Ft. Myers.

Lowrie also walked and singled, but most of the offensive firepower came from the prospects at the bottom of the order.  Che-Hsuan Lin, who started in center field and projects to open the year at Double-A Portland, had two singles and an RBI, and only a diving catch from Northeastern’s centerfielder prevented him from a third hit.  Gil Velazquez, the infielder who played a handful of games with the big league club in ‘08 and ‘09, was 3-for-4 with two doubles, including a bases-clearer which drove in the first three runs of the game.  (Waving all three runners in was Tim Bogar’s first big decision as third base coach, since switching from his position as first base coach last season.)  Catching prospect Luis Exposito also had two doubles and added 4 RBI.

One of the highlights, in what is now becoming an annual tradition, was seeing major league staff member/batting practice pitcher Ino Guerrero get two at-bats.  He came out wearing Papi’s #34, and grounded out both times.  I almost didn’t realize it was him in the on-deck circle, because I had just noticed Dustin Pedroia in the dugout.  He wasn’t playing until the night game, so I was busy trying to zoom in with the camera to see if it was really him, and saw Youk there too.  It wasn’t till he stepped in to bat right-handed that we realized it was Ino, and that’s why the early-arriving players for the night game had come out onto the top step of the dugout.

City of Palms Park on the afternoon of the annual college doubleheader.

Game 2 – Red Sox 6, Boston College Eagles 1

The nightcap was being broadcast on NESN, so one of the first things we did when we re-entered the park was seek out Jerry Remy’s autograph.  The NESN booth is behind the last row of seats (under the Oakland A’s logo), but it’s so high that we can’t see into the window once we’re standing in that row, so the trick is to go down a couple of rows, catch Remy’s attention and ask him for the autograph, and then climb up on a seat in the back row to hand the photo up to him.

It was great to see the Rem-Dawg back in the NESN booth.

Boof Bonser, who had pitched with the Minnesota Twins for years (he gave up Big Papi’s record tying 50th home run in 2006) and was now with the Sox as a possible long reliever/spot starter, started the game.  Like Casey Kelly in the afternoon, he also made swift work of the college lineup, retiring the side in order on two groundouts and a strikeout and needing only 9 pitches.

For the night game, we got to see the whole major league infield as it will look on Opening Day: Kevin Youkilis at first, Dustin Pedroia at second, Marco Scutaro at short, and Adrian Beltre at third.  Unfortunately the pitchers (Bonser was followed by Michael Bowden and Junichi Tazawa) were so quick and efficient, that there wasn’t a whole lot of work for the infielders to do.  There were a couple of 4-3 putouts and a 3-unassisted, but nothing that involved the new guys.

Adrian Beltre and his teammates in the infield didn't get much action other than their warm-up tosses.

Pedroia and Youkilis put two hits together to drive in a run in the first, and another run came in the back door on a double play in the third.  Phenom Jose Iglesias came in to pinch-run in the third and played shortstop for the rest of the game.  Like the other infielders, he didn’t have many chances, but he did get in on one exciting play, applying the tag when Jason Varitek gunned down a would-be base-stealer in the fourth.  Iglesias had more of an opportunity to impress with his bat.  With the bases loaded in the fourth, he swung at the first pitch and smashed a double into left, driving all three runners home.  He hit the ball hard in his next at-bat too, but it was a line-drive snared by the Boston College second baseman.  Centerfielder Ryan Kalish had a good day at the plate, too.  He singled, walked, scored two runs, and drove in a run with a sacrifice fly.

The Red Sox faced Boston College in the nightcap.

My one pet peeve is that the substitutions aren’t always announced, and some of them are announced but are clearly wrong.  Even if I wasn’t trying to keep score, I would still be interested in knowing who I was watching.  It sounded like Carl Beane, the real Fenway Park P.A. announcer, but even if he was given bogus information, it only took a quick glance at the field to see that they weren’t the people he was saying they were.  We knew from going to these games in the past that the first and third base coaches don’t usually do both games, and we had seen Tim Bogar and Ron Johnson in the first game.  Two different guys wearing different numbers came out for the second game, but they were announced as Bogar and Johnson.  I correctly surmised that Torey Lovullo, the new Pawtucket manager, was coaching third, and when the announcement was finally corrected a couple of innings later, we learned it was special assignment instructor Alex Ochoa coaching first.

It also made it tricky when some of the kids called up from minor league camp for the second game wore numbers the same as guys in major league camp.  In the second game there was a #71 who caught the ceremonial first pitch, and then came in to pinch-run for Jason Varitek before moving to left field for the rest of the game.  In big league camp, #71 is Ramon A. Ramirez, whom we had just watched pitch in the first game, and the announcer called this obviously-different guy Ramon A. Ramirez.  But unless he had changed his stature, position, and ethnicity in between games, it was clearly not Ramon A. Ramirez.  (We joked, “How many other Ramon Ramirezes did they find?” and decided to call him Ramon Q. Ramirez until he came to bat a couple of innings later and was finally revealed to be Daniel Nava.)  There was also a #60 who looked nothing like the real #60, Gil Velazquez, who had played in the first game.  He never got an at-bat, so I had to wait till I got home and watched my recording of the NESN broadcast so see that the #60 in the second game was Oscar Tejeda.  But if Don Orsillo and Jerry Remy can be provided with the correct info, why can’t they do the same for the announcer?

With Kris Johnson on the mound for the Red Sox in the sixth inning, Boston College used two singles and a stolen base to score their only run of the game.  The whole team rushed out in front of the dugout to congratulate the kid who scored the run as if he had just hit a walk-off homer.  The Red Sox wrapped up the 7-inning game with a 6-1 win, and we got to hear “Dirty Water” as we walked out.  (They only played the first verse before switching to “Happy Trails”, but it was still good to hear.)  My flight home was scheduled for the next day, exactly a month before Opening Day.  I’ll be there that night, and it will probably only be a little colder than this game was.  I only hope the ending is as sweet!

On Tuesday morning, we knew there was a chance of rain which was predicted to come through in the morning just as workouts would be getting underway.  And if it did, the players would work out in the clubhouse and batting cages and the workouts wouldn’t be open to the public.  We planned on going in a little later than usual, so that we’d get there when the players took the field instead of an hour and a half early like we had on the previous days.  It was raining and windy when I woke up, and just before we left we read on Extra Bases that the players were indeed staying indoors.  That saved us a trip to Ft. Myers, but it was quite the bummer, because I already missed out on one workout when my flight was delayed a day, and now I was missing another.

When the final workout of the year was rained out, it was time to move 2.6 miles down the street to the stadium and get the games underway.

Around 10:30, just as the Red Sox would have probably been wrapping up their abbreviated workout if they had had one, the sun came out and it was  a warm, beautiful Florida day.  I was even able to wear shorts for the first time all week.  I joined my parents on their daily 2-mile walk and we planned a trip to the beach in the afternoon.  But after lunch, a cold front came through, and the temperature dropped and the wind started up.  We drove to beautiful Siesta Beach in Sarasota, but by then it was completely overcast and so cold it wasn’t worth staying very long.

Now that the workouts are wrapped up, it’s time for the games to begin.  I’ve got tickets to both college games tomorrow.  For those of you in New England, the nightcap is on NESN at 6:05.  Boof Bonser is starting, so don’t miss it!

I’ll leave you with some additional pictures I took during the past three days of workouts which I didn’t get to post at the time:

Saturday: Mike Cameron was all smiles as he practiced with his new team.

Sunday: J.D. Drew prepared for an interview with NESN's Heidi Watney.

Monday: Victor Martinez greeted Big Papi as he joined the group for batting practice.

Monday: Marco Scutaro chatted during B.P.