Seventh Inning Heaven

Were you wondering about how it was that the clouds dissipated late Friday afternoon and the rain stopped, making the Father's Day weekend's weather the Best-Summer-Weekend-Before-Summer-Even-Starts in the history of summer?

Not bragging or nothing, but you're welcome. Kidding, of course. Your other choice is to believe it was coincidence, which you are welcome to do. But is it also coincidence that the kids get out of school, at least in Norwich, this Friday and the Connecticut Tigers open up their first long home stand of the 2013 New York-Penn League season on Sunday?

Talk about perfect timing. School's out for the summer and the sport that says summer like no other, Abner Doubleday's gift to the American people, baseball, is just getting interesting up the hill at Dodd Stadium.

The turnout for this season's home opener against the Lowell Spinners Monday night was the best in Tiger's history which will sound even more impressive when the Tigers have been here in Norwich for twenty years. But those days are still ahead of us.

The Single A Short Season which is the baseball we in New England have for many good reasons to include April snowstorms and Arctic temperatures, and yes I am guilty of being a baseball fan, is a perfect introduction of professional players, just starting the travail and travel they hope will lead to The Show, the Major Leagues, to fans in the stands who, after a hard day, want to sit in the cool of the evening, perhaps with the family and perhaps with an adult sparkling beverage, and watch the joyful boys of summer play a game that's so easy to play but so hard to play well.

There's a lot to like about the Connecticut Tigers at Dodd Stadium. The Tigers, affiliated with those so similarly striped in the Motor City, have provided and continue to provide, talent to the parent club every season and this year will be no exception.

There's the value for your dollar with reasonably priced admission for games in a facility with almost perfect sight-lines (= not a bad place to watch a game), terrific fan giveaways all season long, great prices and variety on food and refreshments and between innings entertainment that's good fun in its own right all in a ballpark that's in our backyard.

I'm told that for the price of four people to make a day of it at Fenway Park or Yankee Stadium you can put one or more children through college (and complete their doctoral studies) I just made that statement up and have no way of checking its accuracy.

But having enjoyed Major League Baseball since there were only ten teams in each of the two leagues, I'd note that even an old bench rider gets excited watching youngsters who less than a month ago were probably still playing college baseball and are trying to make their big league dreams come true.

As a fan whose favorite team is the Yankees, and whose second favorite is whoever is beating the Red Sox, the CT Tigers are my home team and I'm as happy when they play well and win as I am if I were to do the same. And from the safety of the seats there's no drag bunts to have to learn and no trying to remember the infield fly rule (it has something to do with "i before e" as I recall).

This is a limited time offer-the Connecticut Tigers' home season ends on August 30th and that gets closer every day. There's a plethora of ticket options (lots of choices) that are best explained on their website, by calling 860-887-7692, or stopping in at the box office to talk them every morning from ten o'clock. You might want to take the catcher's mitt off before you call them, or you could end up talking to Sydney. Sydney, Australia, that is.
-bill kenny