PLAY BALL!

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Today spring training games start in the valley. There will be games in Mesa, Tempe, Maryvale, Peoria, and Surprise. When you include Tucson there are nine spring training stadiums in the state. There are not games today at all the stadiums but there will be as we move on into spring.

I have loved baseball since I was a boy. Charlotte and I used to lay in bed in El Monte, California and listen to the Dodgers on the radio. We were just catching the last innings and we always said when Duke Snider came up to bat, “He just may knock a home run.” Guess what----many times he did! How exciting. It became a game for us---“He just may knock a home run.”

Barry Bonds didn’t play last year but the year before we saw one of his spring training games at Scottsdale Stadium. We took a group from the church with us and I told them that he probably would knock a least one home run. “Oh, how do you know Clif, he doesn’t always hit a home run.” Well guess what. He did!

I can’t tell you which park has the best hot dogs. I know this comes as a surprise to those of you who know me and my eating habits. Hot dogs and baseball go together like Mom and apple pie but I have never made it around to all the stadiums and therefore have never sampled the different dogs. I can tell you that if you are at Peoria Sports Complex for a game and you don’t fill up on hot dogs and you are hungry you should head over to McDuffys Grill just across the street. They have a big menu with something special every day. Friday is all you can eat fish and chips. It’s great. You should try it.

The truth about hot dogs is that I love to eat them at home. You can almost always get a hot dog at my house. I would tell you the different ways I fix them but I don’t want to write that much today. Maybe some other time.

SPRING TRAINING GAMES BEGIN TODAY. PLAY BALL!