The Staten Island Yankees want you to come out and buy tickets on Saturday, April 12th.
From 10 a.m. – noon, former Yomiuri Giants star (and 2009 World Series MVP for the New York Yankees) Hideki Matsui will sign free autographs for fans who purchase tickets to any Staten Island Yankees game in 2014.
The concession stands will have snacks for sale at a discounted price, and the Fairleigh Dickinson Knights will play the Wagner College SeaHawks at 1 p.m.
You can follow Paul’s Random Baseball Stuff on Facebook or Google+, see my photos on Flickr and Instagram, and follow @Paul_Hadsall on Twitter, where I talk about about a variety of things in addition to baseball.
The Trenton Thunder announced their preliminary 2014 promo schedule today. Seventeen fireworks dates are planned – pretty much one per weekend that the team is home, with a few “bonus” ones thrown in for fun.
I’ve probably just been to too many minor league and independent league baseball games, but hasn’t the novelty worn off by now? One ballpark fireworks show pretty much looks the same as another, and at this point I only stay to watch them if they fall around the 4th of July or maybe Memorial Day.
There are four “regular” bobblehead giveaways – Mark Teixeira (May 30), Hideki Matsui (July 11), David Robertson (July 25) and Boomer (August 8). – and one mini bobblehead featuring a player to be determined on May 9. Texieira had a rehab assignment with Trenton last May, and the team honored Matsui and had him throw out a ceremonial first pitch last August, but Robertson’s inclusion is a bit of a mystery. (Maybe somebody at giveaway sponsor TD Bank is a big fan?)
More interesting are the players who had rehab assignments in Trenton last year that didn’t make the list: Curtis Granderson, Alex Rodriguez, Kevin Youkilis, Michael Pineda, Eduardo Nunez and David Phelps. A-Rod is a bit toxic, Youkilis had a bobblehead last year and Pineda, Nunez and Phelps are not exactly household names for most casual fans… but the only knock against Granderson I can see is his current free agent status.
Baseball card team sets will be given out on June 20, a statue of a player to be determined is slated for August 29, and replica championship trophies are planned for Opening Day, April 3.
The giveaway that I want (and won’t get) is an OYO Sportstoys Minifigure of a Trenton Thunder player to be determined that will be handed out to the first 1,000 kids between 5-15 on June 1. (Think of the not-quite Lego mini-figures you’ve probably seen near the register in your favorite team’s give shop.)
If the goal of cutting off Megdal’s access to the clubhouse before and after the game and to the field during batting practice was to punish him, it’s not going to work. He hardly needs access to Mets players to keep writing about the team’s finances. Moreover, Megdal managed to use this “story” to get mainstream media members and at least half of the Mets bloggers to mention him and his book. If you’re a Mets fan and you hadn’t heard about “Wilpon’s Folly” before, you have now.
In the Bronx, it looks like Raul Ibanez could be wearing pinstripes this season. I wanted to see the Yankees bring back Hideki Matsui – mainly because I don’t think he ever should have been forced out – but Ibanez could be a useful piece for the Yankees in a limited role.
PaulHadsall.com 