Anyway, it always threw me off. What was the Arizona Fall League? Tell me more baseball card! The card was silent, as cards tended to be back then before singing birthday cards. Back when the world was right.
Eventually I became aware of what it is, which is 6 teams, containing a number of representatives of each MLB team, the representatives being minor leaguers who are showing some potential or need a bit of additional rounding out. This year it really occurred to me to follow along, mostly concerning some players in the Marlins system, and thankfully the MLB has graced us with box scores and Gameday casts from their website, mlb.com.
The Miami Marlins, previous of Florida (still of Florida), has been my favorite team since pulling a baseball card (my entrance to baseball along with my parents' fanaticism for the postseason) of Jeff Conine in a Marlins uniform. The bright teal that turned so many children away pulled me in. I was excited, a new team! Here they were, they were mine, and it's been that way since, despite our various quarrels and the various front office fiascos and fire sales that have defined life as Marlins fans for so many.
ANYWAY. Back to Arizona.
So the first day seems to have been one of high scores, potentially with the mishmash of AA and AAA players, there is no doubt going to be some imbalance. My people are on the roster of the Salt River Rafters, which played against the Scottsdale Scorpions. The Scorpions posted up 7-4 today against Salt River. Two home runs were hit on the day, one from Greg Bird (NYY) for Scottsdale and the other from Peter O'Brien (ARI) with Salt River. And hey, one of my folks got a start, at 2B Austin Nola! Who went 2-4 with a run and a triple! Not too shabby, all things considered.
That was the last game of the day. Earlier in the day we saw two others, the Mesa Solar Sox at the Glendale Desert Dogs, and Peoria Javelinas at the Suprise Saguaros. Or well, if you were Arizona and at the games you saw it. If you're like me and live elsewhere in the country or you work, you sat around waiting for the games to end. The MLB is rather involved in this league, and there will be some games broadcast... in November on the MLB Network. So up til then? Nope.
Glendale ended up coming out 9-3 over the Solar Sox. Mesa took an early lead in the 2nd inning, but that was quickly dispelled and then overcome by Glendale with homers from Jason Esposito (BAL) and Nick Ramirez (MIL), as well as an impressive performance from Puerto Rican RF Steven Moya (DET) who went 3-5 with 3 RBI.
Meanwhile, the Peoria Javelinas (which have one of my favorite sport team names ever) edged out the Surprise Saguaros. The Saguaros had held onto the lead until the 8th with a solo shot from Patrick Kilvehan and runs spotted throughout the game, backing up 4 innings and 5 Ks from Taijuan Walker. Hunter Dozier (KAN) made the difference for Peoria with a 2 run double in to pull the Javelinas into the lead.
I feel like there has to be at least some private broadcast, radio, something of these games. It's amazing that there's not, and at the same time, the MLB does have that stranglehold on these kind of games. It is their league, I suppose. There'll be some experimentation with pace of game, so that'll be interesting to see how that goes.
Internationally speaking, because I love to talk about international baseball, most of the guys are hailing from the States, though there are a fair number of Dominican players that played today, a few Puerto Rican players, two representatives of Venezuela, and lone reps of Mexico, and Canada. I was little sad to see no European players, but then realized we'll probably see them later this month when the Australian Baseball League kicks off.
We're always playing baseball.
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