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| Ready for some Spring Training baseball |
Being in Florida in March, it seemed like a good idea to
make our way to West Palm Beach for a Spring Training baseball game – World Series
Champions Washington Nationals vs the Baltimore Orioles.
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| The team outside their training building |
The Nationals share the Fitteam Ballpark training facility
with the Houston Astros.
It is a huge
complex with a stadium and buildings in the middle, and 12 practice ball fields
of various sizes around the outside.
Each
team uses 6 of the fields.
The facility
is roughly divided in half with the Nats practicing on one side and the Astros
on the other.
There is a paved parking
lot for players, staff and press.
There
is an enormous grass parking lot for fans attending the games.
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| All those practice fields |
The stadium is small and intimate, seating 6,500 people.
For about the price of an outfield seat in
Nationals Stadium, we had seats peering through the safety net on the first base line, very near home plate, four
rows back from the Nationals dugout.
We
were right at the stairs into the dugout, so we could see the faces of the
players when they returned at the end of the innings.
We could hear the crack of the bat and the smack of the baseball into the catcher's mitt.
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| Nice small stadium |
It is safe to say there isn’t really a bad seat in the
stadium. If you want, you can purchase
inexpensive tickets and sit on the grass berm under the palm trees in the outfield. We saw several families with school-aged
children there – the parents watching the game and the kids running up and down
the hill.
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| Lest anyone forget who won the 2019 World Series |
All around the stadium are photogenic spots with Nationals
World Series iconography:
a huge replica
of the trophy, a large sign you can stand in front of, etc.
There is some representation of the Astros World Series victory in a previous year, but that had been relegated to a side wall.
The “Team Store” sells both Nats and Astros fan-clothes as
well as Grapefruit League shirts and hats.
There are the usual abundance of stadium food eateries and beer joints,
and guys hawking water and beer.
One guy
shouting,“Cold beer and water here,” and another responding, “Colder beer and
water here.”
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| The end of the President's Race - think maybe Herbie won ?.?.? not sure who won. |
There was a President's Race between Herbie Hoover, Bill Taft and Cal Coolidge.
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| Scherzer pitching |
It was a picture, perfect South Florida day, 80 degrees,
cloudless blue sky, light breeze.
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| The line-up |
As we entered the stadium, we saw the hand written starting line-up
posted on the wall, and Scherzer was pitching!
During the first few innings we saw familiar players like Scherzer, Suzuki,Trea
Turner, Cabrera, Juan Soto. We saw Michael
Taylor make an amazing catch in the outfield.
In the third inning, Soto doubled with the bases loaded which would bring
in the first two of five runs that inning.
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| It's a Soto swing... |
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| ... and a double |
Later in the game, we saw a new pitcher each inning, and
many unfamiliar faces/names in the field and at bat. That is what Spring Training is all about,
though. A chance to try out new players
and give everyone experience working/playing together again.
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| Another Curly W for the team |
The final score, Washington 5, Orioles 3. It was a pleasant and relaxed way to enjoy
baseball.
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