Road Trip to Cooperstown: Syracuse to Fort Wayne
Wed, Dec 19, 2007
by Geoff Young
The following is an excerpt from the Ducksnorts 2008 Baseball Annual, scheduled for publication in February 2008.
I learned about toll roads on this day. Specifically, I learned precisely how confusing they can be.
After checking out of my room in Syracuse, I cruised west on I-90, which runs past Rochester and Batavia, and into Buffalo. To drive along I-90 you need a ticket, which you get from — actually, I’m not sure how that works because I never got one.
I exited the interstate in Buffalo and came to a toll booth, trying to think of excuses. Thankfully the operator had encountered clueless tourists before and was very patient with me.
“Where’s your ticket?” she asked.
“Um…”
“You didn’t get a ticket? Do you have a pass?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Where did you get on?”
“Syracuse.”
“Did you come up I-81?”
“I think so.” (I had no clue, but figured that being agreeable might work in my favor.)
“Was there anyone at the booth?”
“Maybe.” I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry; this is all very confusing to me. I’m happy to pay whatever; I just — we don’t have these back home.”
“I understand. That’ll be $5.25. Here’s your receipt.”
“Thank you.”
Later I would drive past Jamestown, birthplace of Lucille Ball, and I liked to think that she would’ve approved of my exchange with the toll booth operator.
Meanwhile, I had a wife waiting for me at the Buffalo airport. Sandra and I had spent a week in Toronto a few years earlier; as part of that trip, we’d visited Niagara Falls, which now was tantalizingly close but which we wouldn’t be able to visit thanks to a baseball game in Fort Wayne, Indiana, tonight. Still, I managed to catch part of a Teagan and Sara interview on a CBC station based out of Windsor, and it brought back fond memories of our jaunt to Canada.
I picked up Sandra, who had taken the red-eye from San Diego. She immediately passed out while I drove and clung to the Canadian airwaves as long as possible before our route took us too far south.
We stopped in Erie, Pa., for lunch at Cracker Barrel. Grilled catfish sandwich, french fries, cole slaw, and diet cola. I’d been along this stretch of road once before, in August 1988, when a friend and I drove from Utica, N.Y., to Dubuque, Iowa, through the night after visiting Cooperstown. It was all new territory for Sandra, though, and I enjoyed watching her experience this part of the country for the first time.
We continued along I-80, straddling Lake Erie as we passed places with names like Ashtabula and Painesville. We zipped through Cleveland and saw Jacobs Field — another in a long line of places I’d have loved to visit had time permitted.
I remembered that Rush had gotten one of their early breaks from a radio station in Cleveland. I thought of Kevin Rhomberg, the former Indians outfielder most known for his unusual compulsion of needing to touch anyone who had touched him first. The mind will wander when it has the opportunity…
From Cleveland, we moved on past Lorain, Sandusky, and Toledo before eventually hanging a left at I-69 near Angola, Ind., and continuing on down to Fort Wayne. Northern Ohio and Indiana were sparsely populated, and after driving through those parts for much of the afternoon, Fort Wayne’s relative bustle offered a welcome change of pace.
We drove straight to Memorial Stadium. As had become my custom, I snapped photos from outside and then bought tickets.
Sandra and I sat just off the first-base line and got our first look at Padres center-field prospect Cedric Hunter. We also spent much of the game chatting with a gentleman who happened to coach baseball at a local high school. He and his family filled us in on the Wizards, who were playing (and ultimately losing to) the Beloit Snappers this night.
I mentioned that we’d been to Cooperstown for Tony Gwynn’s Hall of Fame induction and were on our way back to San Diego. Our neighbor nodded.
“I visited San Diego once in the ’70s,” he said. “Never got to see the Padres — it was them or the zoo; I went to the zoo.”
I assured him that he’d made the right choice.
After the final out, we said goodbye to our neighbors, who wished us well on the drive back home. I bought several sets of Wizards baseball cards (including the 2000 set featuring Jake Peavy, who would win the Cy Young Award following the 2007 season) on our way out of the stadium. From there, we grabbed a quick bite to eat, bemoaned the lack of Internet access at our hotel, and called it a night so we could get an early start to Springfield, Mo., the next morning.
Hey, it was only another 590 miles down the road…
Picking up where last year's version left off, the Ducksnorts 2008 Baseball Annual provides in-depth analysis of and commentary on the San Diego Padres. Get your copy today.
December 19, 2007 at 8:20 am
Man I feel for you Geoff. On our Cooperstown trip, we logged about 24 total hours in the car, but that’s probably a fifth of the time you spent in the car.
I was only a half-hour away from Jacobs field for several days and I didn’t manage to catch a game. It was the Indians or Cedar Point, and Cedar Point won easily.
December 19, 2007 at 8:41 am
Cedar Point is the $HIT!
December 19, 2007 at 8:48 am
Nice narrative, Geoff. Looking forward to reading more.
December 19, 2007 at 8:53 am
Interesting article by Ken Rosenthal about Mark Prior and the LF job:
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/7581498
He’s not the only one who says that Prior’s most logical spot is San Diego, one of the BP writers said the same in a chat. Obviously he’s worth a gamble as he’s been great in the past — his 2003 season was nearly as good as Jake’s last season. The chances of replicating that are slim but I think his potential is worth gambling on. Rosenthal also says that Hairston and Headley will be the left fielders next season as the Padres don’t want to go above $75m in payroll and the Edmonds trade put them pretty close to it.
December 19, 2007 at 8:56 am
Re: 4 I have them at $62.6M at the moment (not assuming any incentives)
I forget where I read it this morn but I guess SD is low balling Prior hopping he will take the SD discount…
December 19, 2007 at 9:00 am
Re: 5 oops I mean 68.5
December 19, 2007 at 9:13 am
The chance to work with Jake Peavy, Greg Maddux, Chris Young, Bud Black, Darren Balsley and top that all off with the luxury of throwing in Petco Park would seem too good to pass on if I was Mark Prior. Not to mention you get to play in your home town and the place you still live. I don’t no what the Padres might offer but I imagine he could squeeze 2 years and maybe 4-6 million + incentives out of KT.
December 19, 2007 at 9:28 am
During my trip back east for the HoF induction, I rented a car in NYC and, afterwards, drove to DC and back, and both times I got flumoxed on the New Jersey Turnpike … mostly because I got confused between it and I-95, which does actually run thru Philly … and I really wanted to stop and get a cheesesteak in Philly … so it was very worth the frustration of trying to get off the Turnpike on my southbound trip … and then trying to get back on it for my return … toll roads … bleh …
December 19, 2007 at 9:39 am
My wife worked with a woman who had to drive from Carlsbad to Costa Mesa a few times a week on business, using the 73 toll road. We were at happy hour one night and she says “I don’t understand why all those people stop at the toll booths, if you stay in the left lanes you can just keep going.” Being the ever-considerate and kind man that I am, I said “You mean the lanes reserved for people who have the special electronic pass?”
A couple days later she got a nice letter from CalTrans or whoever runs that road. Her traffic fines were well over 1,000 dollars.
December 19, 2007 at 11:35 am
Actual book-related commentary:
It’s actually “Tegan”, not “Teagen” according to Wikipedia. I once dated a Tegan who spelled it “Tegan” in case you’re mistrustful of Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tegan_and_Sara
What is your goal with the Road to Cooperstown chapters? What do you perceive to be the focus of the trip? Your entry covers a lot of territory (which isn’t bad), but I’m curious to know if this matches up with the general structure of other chapters or not. Have you considered doing a narrative portion with sidebars or callouts for things like “Random Facts about Lucille Ball” or “The Fort Wayne Wizards - Where’s Dumbledore?”?
Because I’m a bad DS’er, I haven’t read your 07 annual and I’m not sure if it’s pure text or how creative you’ve gotten with your pagination.
I would also suggest cutting the paragraph about Rush since it doens’t really fit in with the rest of the chapter, but again, that depends on how you want your chapters structured. Right now, it seems very narrative-driven with fits of stream-of-conciousness. I’m also not sure how the “Road to Cooperstown” section compares to your other portions in the book, so something a little less analytical might be a nice balance.
December 19, 2007 at 1:00 pm
10: I’d like to add that none of that is intended to be negative. It’s just the opinions of someone who respects the hell out of you for managing to pull this off.
December 19, 2007 at 1:30 pm
Check out the Padres second base rankings last season:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/.....id=3160407
December 19, 2007 at 2:06 pm
10 … re: Tegan … now *that* is good knowledge … and at the right price
11 … well said … in addition to doing the humongous work of writing a daily blog *AND* an annual book, I think the thing about GY that impresses me the most is his genuine openess to any/all feedback … he sure seems to know what he wants … and he wants it to be good … and he knows that all that can come from feedback is improvements … the end result, in Ducksnorts and the Annual, is something that I, as a Padre fan, *really* enjoy … do I say *THANKS* often enough? Prolly not … but that the next thing on the list of things I like about GY … he doesn’t seem to need my pat-on-the-back / atta-boy’s
December 19, 2007 at 3:16 pm
12: Those rankings are terrible but they don’t take into account the Petco Park effect. The unwillingness of people to take into account a players home park is infuriating. Everyone talks about how the Padres problem last year was their lack of offense when in reality it was their pitching. I heard some old goat talking to the Coach on his radio program earlier today saying the same thing and how the Padres outfield doesn’t hit enough and how they can’t match up with the Rockies because of Hawpe and Holliday, blah, blah, blah. Put Hawpe in San Diego and Hairston in Colorado and see who ends up with better stats.
One of the reasons the Rockies have always sucked is that they’ve never been able to build a competent offense — mainly because the stadium makes crappy hitters look awesome. It doesn’t seem like a pitchers park has the same negative effect on pitchers.
December 19, 2007 at 3:35 pm
14: True.
You are preaching to the choir. Padres hitters are better than Padres hitters, as far as their road ranks last season. But most people are unwilling to accept this as fact.
December 19, 2007 at 3:38 pm
15: The most striking example of the home/road curse is Khalil. If he played anywhere but Petco for 81 games, he would probably be a perennial All-Star.
December 19, 2007 at 3:45 pm
re: 15
Darn. Padres hitters are better than Padres pitchers, it should say.
December 19, 2007 at 3:46 pm
16: Yeah, he would be Derek Jeter without those “postseason intangibles,” but he is a much better fielder.
December 19, 2007 at 4:24 pm
16: Wow! I don’t think I’ve looked at KG’s Home/Road splits before. Hard to believe he is that much better on the road while walking even less: 11 fewer BB’s in 33 more PA’s. But he still hits for 52 more points of BA on the road, and of course the SLG is drastically impacted.
December 19, 2007 at 4:35 pm
Hooray for Ashtabula!
I grew up there, didn’t expect to see it in this posting.
December 19, 2007 at 5:16 pm
19: Geoff has posted an in-depth analysis on this topic before, but if you look at the numbers, Khalil is basically the best road shortstop in baseball.
December 19, 2007 at 5:19 pm
21: This is the thread I was talking about.
http://ducksnorts.com/blog/200.....ntage.html
December 19, 2007 at 5:51 pm
I heard those callers. Listening to Kentera while driving (on the 215, no less) is dangerous. I finally heard him utter the name Podsednik. He’s a pretty good hitter and ballplayer. Why? Cuz he stole a lot of bases a couple different seasons. If I hear one more “how many WS championships has a ‘Moneyball’ team won?” I is going to snap. I changed the station, actually.
December 19, 2007 at 6:05 pm
23: The 215 is never good times. Where in the IE do you live?
December 19, 2007 at 6:31 pm
I was coming home from Mountain High. I live in San Marcos.
December 19, 2007 at 6:32 pm
25: Ah, right on. I wasn’t sure how many other DS’ers like me had to deal with living squarely in Dodger territory.
December 19, 2007 at 8:17 pm
I’m just starting a new blog.
http://modernrooters.blogspot.com/
Check it out if you’ve got some time and let me know if you’d want to exchange links.
December 20, 2007 at 10:34 pm
Chiming in way late on this, but better late than never:
#3: Thanks, Pat! Glad you enjoyed it.
#9: Hilarious. Unless you’re her, I guess.
#10: Thanks for the spelling correction. I knew that at one point but forgot. As for the “Road to Cooperstown” chapter, it’s a little… problematic. It’s very different from the rest of the book, but I wanted to do some straight narrative — along the lines of the Barfield home run chapter in last year’s book. I will look at the Rush reference again; I think it refers back to something earlier in the chapter, but like I said, this one has been tricky to nail down. Anyway, thanks for the feedback!
#11, 13: Thanks, guys, that’s how I took it.
#21, 22: I’ve been working on a section of the book about Khalil with updated numbers. If you look at his stats from 2004 to 2007, he’s roughly Kevin Elster/Dale Sveum at home and Alfonso Soriano on the road. That’s a pretty glaring difference.