The new tradition known as the World Baseball Classic returns next spring. As reported earlier in the summer, San Francisco was chosen as the site for the finals, to be held March 17-19. The schedule is out now, if you want to plan for the event.

• Pool play: March 2-6 in Japan and Taiwan, March 7-10 in Puerto Rico and Phoenix, AZ.
• Second round (Double elimination): Pool 1 (Japan) – March 8-12, Pool 2 (Miami, FL) – March 12-16
• Semifinals: March 17-18
• Finals: Tuesday, March 19

Tickets are not yet for sale for the championship rounds. I’ll post anew when tickets are made available. All games will be broadcast on MLB Network. Some qualifying pool games have already been played, with two additional pools to commence mid-November.

Rod Carew Stadium in Panama City, Panama will host Qualifying Pool 3 starting on November 15. Image: Wikimedia Commons

During the last two WBCs, much attention was paid to ensuring that pitchers don’t get overworked, since spring training is meant to ramp their workload gradually. There are even rules to give pitchers an appropriate amount of rest between appearances. Rosters for the major contending teams aren’t expected to be set until winter. While the Giants appear to have numerous players who could appear on numerous rosters, it’s unclear what A’s might play in the WBC due to their relative lower profile. Yoenis Cespedes, who played in 2006 and 2009, can no longer play for Cuba due to his defector status.

Pitching concerns aside, the great thing about the World Baseball Classic is that it forces spring training to start a week earlier than usual. 2012’s spring training schedule started on March 3. In 2013 gameplay should start on February 23, with pitchers and catchers likely to report around Valentine’s Day as they did in 2009. The A’s first game is on 2/23 against the Brewers, only 117 days away from today’s date.

The inclusion of WBC games into spring training allows for a greater variety and schedule of games to watch in March, whether you’re in Arizona or Florida. Chase Field will hold First Round pool play March 7-10, while Marlins Park will stage Second Round games March 12-16. 2009’s semifinals games brought in 43,000 fans each while the final had over 54,000 announced attendance. The final rounds at AT&T Park should sell out as teams emerge from the elimination round. If 2009 is any indicator prices may be steep. Fans back then were encouraged to buy strips, just as they would for postseason games. That and the uncertainty regarding which teams would play slowed sales a bit, as pool play in Miami and San Diego last year frequently attracted fewer than 20,000 fans per game. Tickets for the 2013 WBC are expected to go on sale on December 3.

The first thing I did, upon learning that a work trip would take me to the land of Jai Alai, plastic pink flamingos and brightly painted bungalows with terra cotta roofs, was to look up the Miami Marlins schedule. When I discovered that my trip would coincide with a home stand my excitement was temporary and tepid, for I have seen the lime green fence, the epileptic seizure of a home run feature and the aquarium around home plate on TV and I was annoyed by all of them. The joint seemed to scream “schtick” to me and as a result I was prepared to be let down by the lack of “traditional” touches I have come to love in many cities. The brick facades, the dark green seats, the traditional architecture.

The view from the Home Plate parking garage photo courtesy of Jeffrey

As I exited my rented Ford Mustang and headed for the stairwell in the Home Plate Garage I was expecting to be let down but was surprised to catch myself staring in awe at the giant building in front of me. Being a Sci Fi geek of the worst kind, the building evoked in me images of the civilian fleet set adrift and under the protection of the Battlestar Galactica in the 2003 SyFy Channel miniseries. I was astonished to be impressed and amazed to not be missing the retro look of many other stadiums.

As I have traveled to many MLB ballparks, I have developed a pattern and approach to getting the most out of what is likely to be my lone visit. The pillars of this approach are:

1. Get to the park early and sneak to the expensive seats for a close look at the field.
2. Find my actual seat and then wander the concourses, finding some signature food item to eat along the way, until about 15 minutes before the first pitch.
3. Spend 3 Innings in my seat, watching the game and taking in the atmosphere.
4. Walk to one of the bars in the stadium, get a Jack and Coke, and then wander the concourses during the game to get as many angles as possible for 3 innings.
5. Watch the last 3 innings from a seat, preferably in some other part of the park than the one I purchased.

Here are the notes from my 5 point observation plan on Marlins Park:

My pregame stroll started with a tough decision. Marlins Park had many, many food options that featured local favorites scattered throughout the place. The problem was that I had been to Mango’s in South Beach for dinner the night before and I was in the mood for more traditional baseball fare. One thing to note here is that the concourses in Miami feel like Parisian Boulevards, wide and bright. They are painted with various accent colors, giving each section of the park the feel of a separate neighborhood. Upon dressing my dog and taking a bite, I instantly regretted my choice. The dog was somewhat dry and the bun was a little soggy. I suppose it served me right for skipping the fired shrimp and potatoes or Cuban food.

Two other things jumped out at me on this sneak to the good seats and pregame stroll. The first was that the team hasn’t quite figured out how to manage the playing surface. There was a patch of grass behind third base that was particularly troubling with multiple sections of dying sod interwoven with not too healthy looking grass. The second was that the park had an “unfinished” feel, best represented by the backside of the monstrous HR feature.

(from top left and going clockwise): Crappy hot dogs, unfinished backside of the HR feature and dying grass

These are relatively minor quibbles. It could have been a bad night in the concession stand for hot dogs, the “unfinished” feel could soon be rectified and they will eventually nail managing the environment so that the grass looks healthier. And suffice to say, these quibbles were far outweighed by the positives of the stadium, starting with the aforementioned concourses. But the one underlying aspect that made this stadium so enjoyable can be summed up by saying, “It was quintessential Miami.”

(from upper left then clockwise) The Clevelander, The A’s section of the Bobblehead Museum, Free WiFi, The Orange Bowl wall

One of the first things I noticed on the stroll was a huge column painted with a history of the site’s former historic resident, the Orange Bowl. This added a nice slice of history to the most modern looking ballpark built since 1992. Another highlight was the Bobblehead Museum with All Star like representation for all of MLB’s franchises. Being the fan of libations that I am, I was also happy to see a bar situated above both Left and Right Field with great views of the playing surface.

When I finally arrived in my seat, gushing at all the awesome that was contained in the stadium I was surprised to see that the park included one last tiny slice of awesome in that it had free WiFi for the guests. Admittedly, this is an aspect that some would not be heralding as “awesome.” I am not only a Sci Fi geek, but a consumer technology geek as well. I love me some Facebook and Instagram and Twitter…. They all work better on the WiFi. Another highlight of the time in my seat was a Jose Reyes HR that set off that insane fish sculpture in Left Center. It didn’t seem half as obnoxious in person as it had on TV.

My second, and in game, stroll included several discussions with fans. Many of whom, upon learning of my affiliation with the Green and Gold, were effusive with praise. It may have just been this particular night, but there was a vitriol for Marlins ownership that more than rivals anything you might hear in the Right Field bleachers of the Coliseum. The two most common things I heard was “You guys do it right” in reference to Billy Beane and “Hanley will be your problem come tomorrow” in way that hinted he was a problem they still wished was theirs. My favorite interaction was with a man from Fremont, he hugged me as he finished recounting the previous nights A’s and Blue Jays game with an emotional “Moneyball is back!”

One bad thing on this stroll, I tried to sneak into the Clevelander, a club tucked inside the Left Field fence but was thwarted (the usher had never heard of newballpark.org and didn’t care that I just wanted to take a picture). One of my favorite places to watch a game in San Francisco is from inside the Right Field fence, the Virgin Loft. I would have loved to compare the two experiences because from what I understand, the guys in Miami elevated the inside the fence club concept to a new level.

In summary, this stadium is a real treat and much better than I expected after seeing it on TV. I hope that the folks of South Florida start basking its glory with more frequency because it is a shrine to all things Miami. I would gladly take it, or something similar in the Bay Area in which our Green and Gold heroes could ply their trade.

Today at the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, the CIF North Coast Section will have its finals. As I understand, tickets are $9 and cover the whole day – four games of championship high school baseball. By now, the Division IV game has finished, leaving only the Divisions I-III games. If I wasn’t in LA for the weekend, I would’ve gone up to the Coli to check it out.

Decent crowd for the final game of the night

The California Interscholastic Federation is comprised of 10 regional sections, including four city-specific sections: San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles, and San Diego. (Late-growing cities such as San Jose and Sacramento are part of regional sections.) The SF and Oakland city championships were held at AT&T Park and the Coliseum,  respectively. LA’s city championship is being held now at Dodger Stadium. I still had a couple of days on my Amtrak California Rail Pass to kill, so I decided on a whim to head down to LA to catch the Southern Section championships. Honestly, I wasn’t prepared for how incredible the experience would be.

Also held at Dodger Stadium this year, the Southern Section championships covers just about every school that’s in SoCal but isn’t in either LA or SD. That makes for a very competitive playoffs, and it showed last night. The Division II final between Orange County schools Aliso Niguel and Pacifica (Garden Grove) was a masterpiece, with the latter winning 3-2 in 10 innings (7 is regulation). The D I final was no slouch as Newbury Park upset powerhouse Mater Dei coming in and outlasted Corona to win the title.

With a starting time of 1 PM, many fans at the D III final, given the choice, sat underneath the short overhang. Note the infamously narrow aisle.

My chief motivation for going was simple: having no rooting interest as a parent or alumnus of any of these schools, I simply wanted to catch a ballgame (or three) in some of the best seats at Dodger Stadium. And it was fabulous. Only the infield part of the lower deck was open for seating. The club section behind the plate was closed and off limits, a policy which created tension later as some kids from one of the winning schools climbed over some walls and through the club sections to jump onto the field. The closures effectively limited the capacity to around 5,000, which didn’t matter much as nearly all of the schools provided solid supporting sections. It was fun to see and hear small, vocal groups of fans on either side of the plate rooting against each other juxtaposed against the soaring backdrop at Chavez Ravine. Nothing quite prepared me for hearing pep bands at baseball games, a practice which I have to say – painfully as a former pep band member – should be banned.

My view for the D I and D II championships

I managed to get a seat in the front row of Section 2 behind the plate. Somehow I felt extremely fortunate as I had never sat this close (single game price for a Dodger game: $115) before and probably never would again. One of the nice, unexpected baseball fan treats was that the starting pitcher for Newbury Park threw with a three-quarter delivery (Eck, Huston Street, Rod Beck), so his arm angle was right in my line of sight. It made his breaking pitches look that much more outrageous.

Concessions were half-price, although only three stands were open, leading to long, concourse-clogging lines. Still, a half-price Dodger Dog is about the right price IMHO. The lower concourse, stands, and restrooms were properly renovated (waterfree urinals, no troughs), but with no space to widen the concourses, circulation was as cramped an affair as ever.

Towards the end of the Division I final with fog having descended on Dodger Stadium

I’ve been to a few games at Dodger Stadium in the past at different times during the season and both hot and cool weather. I didn’t expect the ballpark’s transformation as day turned to twilight and then into nightfall. Unlike AT&T Park and the Coliseum, where you can easily see the fog coming in as a sort of gloom settling over the place, when I sat down low here the marine layer seemed to sneak up on the me. It was almost as if someone flipped a switch for a fog machine. As would be expected, the moist, cool, dense air knocked down fly ball after fly ball, including a couple of shots that should’ve been homers. At the same time, San Gabriel Mountains receded into blackness and the whole game seemed to be played in a hazy mist, a halycon dream. The picture above doesn’t do it justice, and it’s hard to appreciate from the upper levels of the park, where I had almost always previously sat. The fog created a magical, movie-like quality to the event, similar to what I felt during the on-location filming of Moneyball two years ago – except not constantly interrupted by the process of filmmaking. The crowds were boisterous, the players intense and yet all too human, the coaches animated. I soaked up the whole thing, and when it was over at 10:30, I was sorry to leave. Now I finally see why Hollywood shoots here so frequently. They couldn’t have dreamed up this environment with a billion dollars of CGI and their wildest dreams. The new Dodger ownership group would have to be absolutely insane to even entertain the thought of leaving this place.

Stockton’s leaders may make the toughest decision in the city’s history next Tuesday. Drowning in debt and scrambling for ways to restructure or forgive that debt, the city is expected to decide whether or not to enter Chapter 9 bankruptcy. Chapter 9 is an avenue set aside by the federal government for municipalities, and was most prominently almost twenty years ago when Orange County’s debts soared to an unsustainable level thanks to criminally poor fiscal management. Already, a $35 million building bought to be utilized as the next City Hall has been repossessed.

View across the channel from Weber Point toward ballpark (center) and arena (right)

A downtown bar featured in a LA Times article in March has closed. As I walked around during a weekday morning, I felt as if tumbleweeds were going to blow across the streets. Storefronts were frequently empty. The movie theater complex had little activity. The only places that felt alive were the local Starbucks, and, as I would find out within an hour, the ballpark.

The foul pole is a scant 300 feet from home plate.

The day game I attended was nearly sold out thanks to a number of elementary and middle school children who were in attendance. They were treated to the Ports’ 15-3 shellacking of the San Jose Giants. The win halted a Stockton 12-game home losing streak. The section I was in got coupons for In-n-Out Double Doubles thanks to a Max Stassi double, and the whole crowd got a free meal at a local Denny’s because of Chad Oberacker’s grand slam. I don’t know when I’ll be in Stockton again to redeem the vouchers. That’s life.

The only entrance to Stockton Ballpark/Banner Island Ballpark

Stockton Ballpark, as it’s officially known, was built by Swinerton and Frank M. Booth, the same company that built Raley Field. It’s very intimate, with 12-16 rows throughout the grandstand. Wedged between the channel and the arena, the left field foul pole is only 300 feet from the plate. There’s no second deck, no suite/press level cantilevered over the single concourse, and only a small club section. This was done to keep costs under control, which is a net positive in the end. There are plenty of concession stands down the first base line, very few down the third base line. A design quirk has an elevated bridge connecting the outfield berm area with the grandstand in the RF corner. To allow for service vehicle clearance, the bridge requires fans to take a flight up steps up and down. The berm wraps around to center, where it meets a Kinder’s BBQ stand. The bullpens and a seated picnic area are in left.

Exterior of arena facing channel

A road winds between the ballpark and the arena, connecting both to the waterfront. The 10,000-seat Stockton Arena is a clean, tidy affair, with decent concourse space and an auditorium-style layout for concerts. The side facing the water is glass, the other sides are concrete, metal, and wood panels, the latter of which are having their protective film fraying. No matter, it’s a decent looking building even if it towers over the ballpark and looks somewhat out of place in downtown Stockton.

As the City continues to fight for its future, there’s a lingering question of whether Stockton’s redevelopment efforts were worth it. California is unique in that it has a few cities that are the size of major league cities elsewhere in the country, yet places like Stockton, Fresno, Riverside, and Long Beach don’t get the kind of attention Cleveland, Buffalo, Milwaukee, or St. Louis does. Stockton saw a gravy train of new residents looking for cheap exurban housing and didn’t see the collapse of the housing market immediately behind it. They paid inordinate salaries and benefits to public employees, which put Stockton in the financial straits it’s in today. No one knows how exactly Stockton will get out of it, and what Stockton will look like when that happens. Chances are that the arena will be there. The ballpark will be there. And Dallas Braden will be there too by all rights. That can’t be all bad.