So in a thinly-veiled attempt to get some recs (and also to see "where the future plays today") I took the two-hour drive to Bakersfield today to watch the Blaze take on the Visalia Oaks in "Historic" Sam Lynn Ballpark.

When pulling up to the stadium, this is the view you see:

via www.inkara1.com

There are also some for-hite batting cages on the other side of the parking lot:

via www.inkara1.com

I had a pretty good opportunity to check outt he beautiful scenery in the parking lot because I got there at 6 p.m. and they don't open the ticket booth until 6:30 for a 7:30 scheduled start. Somewhere between 6:15 and 6:20, a pizza guy showed up with a pair of 30-inch pizzas. (Remember this; it will be referenced later.) The ticket window actually opened about 10 minutes early, but the gate would only let people who had tickets to some sort of barbecue/party thing in before 6:30. It was just as well because the guy accidentally printed me a ticket for last Thursday's game against the Modesto Nuts. Once I noticed it, I was able to get it straightened out.

Upon entering the stadium, I headed to the Bullpen Store to get my card pack for the special price of $8... only the girl in there told me it's $10, but packs would be available after 7 for the reduced $8 price. Since the autograph session was from 6:30 to 7, I just paid the $10, grumbled a bit on my way out the door and headed to the autograph tables... where there was a box of card packs on sale for $8. I figured $2 wasn't worth bitching about at the store while losing valuable autograph time.

Autographed cards 1 - Josh Lueke, Daniel Sattler, Omar Poveda, Truan Mehl, Josh Giles, Evan Reed, Chris Gradoville, Zachary Phillips.

Autographed cards 2 - Beau Jones, Ryan Falcon, Kasey Kiker, Jordan Stewart, John Bannister, Grant Gerrard, KC Herren, Johnny Whittleman, Chad Tracy

Autographed cards 3 - Mauro Gomez, Marcus Lemon, Manny Pina

Autographed program cover - Tanner Roark, Jacob Kaase, Ian Gac. Those three didn't have cards in the set so I had them sign the program cover. Two asides: Gac's last name is pronounced "Jack," so he says; and the Blaze logo looks like a burning pot leaf.

Once I had autographs from everyone who was out signing, I headed to the concession stand and bought a "Wienerschnitzel" quarter-pound hot dog, bag of barbecue Lay's chips and 20-ounce Dr Pepper for $7.75. I put quotes around the Wienerschnitzel because the dog wasn't as good as the ones I usually get at a real Wienerschnitzel. It wasn't terrible but I'd hope for better for $7.75.

My seat was in Section 10, Row A, Seat 1. It's between the backstop and the dogout, below field level (so my butt was actually just below the playing field level, with my head and torso above field level). I'd call that a good seat for $9.

Game time was scheduled for 7:30, but they announced that it would actually start at around 7:45. Here's why:

via www.inkara1.com

For those unfamiliar with the park, some genius decided to make the batter's eye face west, right into the sun when it sets. This didn't become a problem until evening/night games started to be the norm. They put up a big wall in center field to block the sun a bit, but even so, games are scheduled for 7:30 instead of 7:05 or so. Center field is only 352 feet deep, while left is 325 and I believe right is too (couldn't see the sign from my seat). To make up for it, the outfield wall is really tall.

Left field:

via www.inkara1.com

Right field (I couldn't poke the lens through the fence to get this shot):

via www.inkara1.com

I put quotes around "historic" earlier because the place is more old than historic. A few good players have come through there, but otherwise, it's not terribly impressive.

At 7:40 or so, the managers exchanged lineups with the umpires.

Afterwards, the Blaze defenders took the field and Derek Holland took the mound.

The downside to the late start time is my pictures of actual game action are limited because it got too dark. Using the flash slows down the shutter so the bat is one big blur when being swung, but not using the flash makes the picture come out too dark to be usable. The solution is to buy a $2,000 lens that can go down to F2.8 and gather enough light to not need a flash. Anyone got $2,000 to spare?

Derek Holland delivers a pitch

Marcus Lemon fouls off a pitch

Renny Osuna fouls one off

Grant Gerrard watches a pitch go by

Truan Mehl swings through a strike

By the time any of the good action started happening, it was even darker than the Truan Mehl pic.

The game:

Both pitchers, Holland for Bakersfield and Barry Enright for Visalia, were perfect through two innings, with Holland racking up two strikeouts and Enright getting four. I didn't have access to a radar gun, so I don't know pitch speeds or locations (since I was off to the side roughly halfway between the mound and the plate), but it looked to me like Holland needed an inning to get going, sort of like what Eric Hurley does.

In the second inning, Tracy and Gac both struck out looking on three pitches, and neither were very happy with the umpire about it. Kaase, shortstop and No. 9 hitter, broke up Enright's no-hit bid in the bottom of the third with a single and Lemon followed up with a double before Osuna struck out to end the inning.

Holland gave up a hit with two outs in the top of the fourth to end the perfect game bid, but got a flyout to left to end the inning. Gac and Whittleman got back-to-back two-out singles in the bottom of the frame, but Mehl grounded out to end it. Whittleman's single almost knocked the clothing off the base umpire Charlie Brown-style.

With two outs, Gac couldn't come up with the ball at first base, and the next batter put a real charge in the ball, to the right-center wall to score the unearned run before being thrown out trying to make a double into a triple. 1-0 Oaks.

In the bottom of the fifth, Gradoville flied out to right, then Kaase singled for his second hit of the game and stole second before scoring on Lemon's double to tie the game. Osuna flied out to left, then Gerrard singled to score Lemon. Tracy was then hit by a pitch and Gac singled to score Gerrard. Unfortunately, Gac went too far towards second and the cutoff man threw to first to pick Gac off there to end the inning. 3-1 Blaze.

From then on it was a tight game through the top of the eighth. Holland struck out the final five batters he faced and looked to have more velocity in the eighth than in the second. He finished with 99 pitches in eight innings with two hits, one run (none earned), nine strikeouts and no walks.

He might have gone out for the ninth inning, except I'm guessing how long the bottom of the eighth lasted made them decide not to send him back out. Visalia sent out Jorge Perez and he got absolutely lit up. Bakersfield sent 13 batters to the plate and scored eight runs on six hits, two walks (the first two of the game for either team) and a hit batsman. 11-1 Blaze. There was no action in the Visalia bullpen the entire time, making me wonder if the manager just didn't want to go home or something or if Perez was taking a Dusty Tits in Boston-style beating to save the bullpen.

Stewart came on to pitch the top of the ninth and allowed two hits and one run in his inning of work.

Final score: 11-2 Blaze.

Lemon ended up 3-for-5 with three doubles and three RBI, scoring two runs. Kaase quietly had a nice day at the plate, going 3-for-4 with two runs scored. Gac had an up-and-down day: he went 2-for-5 with two RBI but had the only error for the Blaze and also made the first and second outs of the eighth inning. Whittleman went 3-for-5.

Visalia score sheet

Bakersfield score sheet

Some names are probably spelled wrong, since the lineup sheet they passed out had a few names spelled wrong. I caught "Whitleman" at the game, but I didn't catch "Enlight" until after I had gotten home and already scanned the score sheet.

Because the Blaze scored three times in the fifth inning, everyone in the park got a coupon for buy one meal, get one free at either of the two Bakersfield Marie Callender's locations. Then, because Holland struck out the side, everyone got $5 off at Great Clips. When I got to my car, I found another buy one get one free Marie Callender's coupon under my windshield wiper.

During the seventh inning (about 9:40 p.m.) one of the members of the "Fun Crew" walked through the stands with a 30-inch pizza for a free pizza giveaway. Remember how I mentioned seeing two big pizzas delivered at 6:15? I hope that wasn't the same one, 3 1/2 hours later.

The stands int he stadium were between 1/3 and 1/2 full. I was expecting a bigger crowd than that for some reason.

The game started at 7:50 p.m. and ended at 10:15, for a duration of 2:25 even with an eight-run inning.

My car got 31 miles to the gallon for the trip (2002 Chevy Malibu V6). I was happy about that since it's rated 21 city/29 highway and that was the first real long trip I'd taken it on since buying it in April.