We started the trip Friday night after we left the Wood Ducks game, making our way to my parents' farm in Yadkinville. From there, Saturday morning, we went to see the Rocket City Trash Pandas at the Tennessee Smokies. We got to the Smokies ballpark early, and tried some graphing outside. We were able to get a few players from both teams outside, since there is a breezeway from the clubhouse to the building that houses the batting cages. Jordyn Adams had just been called up to the Trash Pandas, and was really nice when we met him. Outside, I also got Torii Hunter, Jr. and Bryce Ball.
When we got inside the stadium, we were able to get a couple of the Trash Pandas pitchers, including Sam Bachman on a couple nice cards.
We moved to the Smokies side when the Trash Pandas pitchers went in the clubhouse pregame, and got a few players over there. We were focusing on the Smokies, since I had a night at Trash Pandas stadium planned later in the week.
I missed getting a couple of the cards signed that I really wanted, like my gold 2019 Pro Debut Cole Roederer, but I had reached out to someone on Instagram who gave me some tips on graphing the Smokies, who also had agreed to take some 50/50s.
I barely remember getting all of these Smokies cards signed, since so much happened since the beginning of the trip, but we did get limited, because the game drug on, and we really needed to get on the road.
So, instead of graphing outside by the clubhouse post-game, we opted instead to go ahead and shave some time off of our ride to our next stop on the trip.
One cool thing about seeing the Smokies was that former Wood Duck CD Pelham is on that team. He remembered us, and Chris sat by him during the game and caught up. It was really cool that he remembered us.
The original plan for the trip was to graph in Hickory on Saturday, then go on to the Smokies on Sunday. Since I had just seen Hickory a couple weeks prior, I skipped them and did Tennessee a day early. The intention was to get to our destination a day early, to allow more time for either graphing there, or an extra day in another of the cities we had planned to get to.
The problem was, I had mapped out the schedule thinking I would be seeing the Arkansas Travelers on Monday, July 4. Our new schedule put me in Little Rock a day early. No big deal; I did a quick glance at the Travelers schedule and saw they were playing Tulsa, so I quickly got some Tulsa cards pulled and prepped. We got to their ballpark on Sunday, when I realized, this place was dead. I went to buy my ticket and got the unfortunate news that the Travelers were playing Tulsa... AT Tulsa. Oops. So, I booked a hotel in Little Rock, took Chris to dinner, then we finished the latest season of Stranger Things. It ended up working out.
Now, though, we were back on schedule, with the Springfield Cardinals visiting the Arkansas Travelers on July 4th. I did get one of my goal cards signed at that game, the above Emerson Hancock relic card from Panini Elite Extra Edition. Graphing there is a little tough; there is one small area you can stand (with several other graphers) and try to get the attention of players from both teams as they walk toward the dugout.
If a player hits in the cages pregame, you are kind of screwed there, because that player will walk from the cages in center field toward the dugouts. Too far away to come over and sign.
We got only a few guys pregame, and missed most of the Cardinals guys, but post-game, Chris and I learned that you can stand on the middle level by the stairs that the players come up and call them over. That worked a lot better for us, and we were able to knock out a bunch of stuff. Except I missed the two biggest guys on Springfield, Jordan Walker and Masyn Winn.
Good thing, though, we had a second day in Arkansas planned for our return trip home. Knowing everything I had found out the first game, we were in much better position later in the week to rack some of the guys.
Jordan Walker was one of the guys I got the second time in Arkansas; he was a strict one-per, so I had Chris get a second 2021 Heritage Minors card signed for a friend of mine.
I didn't have a whole lot for Springfield to begin with, but I was happy that my friend had reminded me that Malcom Nunez was on the team and I found his cards pretty quickly.
Even with the limited amount of stuff that I had, I did fairly well. I was glad to get several 2021 Heritage Minors cards signed. That has become one of my favorite sets to get signed lately.
For some reason, I only could find two Masyn Winn cards to get signed, but thankfully, I got them both done. You can't graph outside in Arkansas; we learned that pretty quickly, since the clubhouses exit into a gated lot, so once the game was over, Chris and I were back in the car and on our way to our next stop.
That next stop was the only minor league game on the schedule for Tuesday, July 5, the Las Vegas Aviators at Oklahoma City Dodgers. I had seen that the Dodgers were the only game on, and they were only 3 hours from our destination city, Wichita, so I worked my schedule around that.
Graphing in Oklahoma City was similar to Durham. You can get the away team as they arrive at their entrance, but one difference is that the home team exits behind the stadium in a gated lot. So, thanks to those tips from a fellow grapher, we knew where to stand and get some of the Aviators. As always, arrival is tough because I am terrible at recognizing faces. We still did decently, and were even able to get the Dodgers' Marshall Kasowski as he came outside to pick up his Door Dash (and I actually recognized his face).
Inside the park, we picked a side (Oklahoma City) and graphed next to the dugout pre and post-game. We did really well, considering this was AAA, and also cleaned up on Shea Langeliers, since he was hanging out by the net at home plate (around where we had been stationed) after the game. He was super nice, and signed everything on the page.
Speaking of not being able to recognize faces, I was able to recognize hair, and it was easy to spot Grant Holmes. I was glad to finally get him to sign some of my cards that I had in my for for a long time.
Jake Lemoine didn't recognize Chris and I from his Wood Ducks days, but he did stop and sign for us outside pregame.
I was really happy to get all of the cards signed that we did from Shea Langeliers. He was really nice outside when we met him, and was again nice to Chris when he saw him inside.
I ended up with a few cards unsigned of Langeliers, but I didn't want to push my luck. I was super sasitfied with what we got done; I don't need to keep a bunch of extras that won't go into my album.
I do use the extras for trades and care packages, but even that is wearing me out lately, so I was ok with limiting what I got done. We also wanted to get on the road to Wichita, so we could sleep in Wednesday morning, so we didn't do any graphing outside post-game.
Wednesday put us in Wichita, and with a 7PM game, Chris and I slept in, watched a couple episodes of Shameless in the hotel room, then went to the botanical gardens and walked around to get some steps in. The gardens were really nice, and gave us a little non-baseball activity to do.
Wichita is a brand new stadium, which is really nice. We tried graphing by the home dugout pre-game, but were told by an usher that we weren't allowed to "bother the players" prior to the game. Still, we were able to get Andrew Bechtold by the net as he walked out to the bullpen.
Not wanting to get ejected from the ballpark, we tried, instead, to go by the away dugout and see if we could get some of the Amarillo Sod Poodles to sign. No ushers bothered us there, and we were able to finish off most of the Sod Poodles cards that I had brought.
We had also met a few fellow graphers in the stadium, an old man who was visiting from Tulsa, a woman who routinely graphed the stadium (and gave me a Brandon Pfaadt card, since I didn't have one) and a pair of brothers who knew all of the outside graphing at the stadium. We were able to stand with those guys outside and clean up, which was nice.
Wichita had their team sets out, so, I bought one each for Chris and I. That ran my signature numbers up, but it was a nice-looking set, and I was glad to get a chunk of it done.
There are still cards left unsigned from the team set, but we did pretty well with it. I befriended one of the brothers who was there, and he agreed to take my leftovers and try to get them signed for me.
Kevin Merrill was a little tough; Chris missed him initially, and he was signing one-per, so Chris took this card and was able to get him to sign it outside on the sidewalk.
Here is the Brandon Pfaadt card that I was given by the woman inside. I could have sworn I had plenty of these 2020 Bowman Draft cards, but there were none in my box.
The main reason Wichita was on the schedule was that Chris picked the team as our destination. He is a big fan of the Laughing on the Sidelines podcast, and turned me onto the show, as well. One of the hosts of the show, Derek Alders, is the PA announcer for the Wind Surge. The second day that we were there, I was able to work it out to where Chris would be able to meet Derek.
We were escorted up to the booth, and were able to meet Derek. It was really cool to meet him. He is a comedian and won the "Funniest Person in Wichita" award for 2021 at a comedy show. He even texted one of the other hosts, Scotty Germann, to let him know we had come all the way from NC to meet the guys.
It was really cool that Derek ended up calling Scotty and telling him our story, Scotty made a point to come out to the game and meet us.
Chris is usually very low key with his emotions (not like me, for sure), but he was very excited that he was able to meet these guys. The show is very funny, and I haven't missed an episode since Chris introduced me to it when we were on the ferry to Okracoke back in December. Scotty even gave us (especially Chris) a shout out today on this week's episode, which was really awesome. If you want to listen to an adult, comedy/sports podcast, give them a listen on Apple whatever and Spotify (I'm an Android user, so I don't know what the Apple listening tool is called).
I'm also a big fan of alternate jerseys, so I was really happy to see the Wind Surge playing Thursday's game as the Wichita Turbo Tubs. The jerseys are really funky, and I bought one for myself.
One thing that I didn't really do prior to planning this trip was to look ahead at the weather. We were very lucky throughout the week weather-wise. We got rained on for a few minutes in Tennessee, and the rest of the trip was HOT. However, when we got to our final stop on the trip, the Rocket City Trash Pandas (in Madison, Alabama), there was a storm brewing. The clouds were ominous, and it did rain for a bit, but it afforded us a little extra graphing time pre-game.
The Trash Pandas stadium is set up a lot like the Columbia Fireflies and Fayetteville Woodpeckers. You can graph by home plate at the railing; both teams come out this way and turn toward their respective dugouts. If you stand on the home side of the dugout, you can get both teams by reaching across; you can't do the same on the other side, if that makes sense.
Because of the impending weather, the Trash Pandas players were taking their time in the batting cages, which are viewable right as you walk into the stadium. You are separated by a fence, but you can stand there and watch, and talk to the players. It was there that I was able to get Kevin Maitan, Dann Bilardello and Jeremiah Jackson. I was really happy to get Maitan on the above green parallel from 2019 Pro Debut. This card has been in my box for a while, and I had thought that I would never get it signed.
Maitan signed everything that we had, which was nice. I had some of his cards for a very long time, and I was really glad to not have to put them back in the box.
We saw Jordyn Adams again, and got him to sign a few more of the cards I brought.
I was also able to finish off what I brought of Sam Bachman and Jose Gomez. The 2020 Pro Debut insert looked really cool when signed.
Here are a couple more 2021 Topps Heritage Minors cards that I was able to get signed. There was only one card that got damaged due to the rain drops falling pre-game, an Allan Cerda that kind of jacked up my marker. Maybe someone would be cool with taking that one in a blind trade (most likely not).
In all, we got the following autographs on our road trip to five different stadiums:
Bryce Ball x 4, CD Pelham x 4, Andy Weber x 1, Cole Roederer x 9, Chase Strumpf x 10, Cristopher Molina x 1, Sam Bachman x 4, Torii Hunter, Jr. x 1, Luke Murphy x 1, Jordyn Adams x 8, Collin Cowgill x 5, Taylor Featherston x 1, Emerson Hancock x 4, Joe Rizzo x 7, Braden Shipley x 7, Riley Unroe x 5, Nick Dunn x 2, Malcom Nunez x 3, Vince Fernandez x 4, Jake Lemoine x 3, Grant Holmes x 4, Shea Langeliers x 18, Miguel Vargas x 4, Jacob Amaya x 1, Marshall Kasowski x 2, Yadier Alvarez x 2, Blaze Alexander x 5, Bryce Jarvis x 1, Blake Walston x 2, Andy Yerzy x 7, Andrew Bechtold x 5, Steven Cruz x 2, Kody Funderburk x 2, Edouard Julien x 2, Dashawn Kiersey, Jr. x 2, Steven Klimek x 3, Kevin Merrill x 2, Bryan Sammons x 2, Cole Sturgeon x 2, Louie Varland x 2, Matt Wallner x 14, Derek Alders x 2, Scotty Germann x 2, Windy x 2, Ramon Borrego x 2, Leobaldo Cabrera x 2, Blayne Enlow x 2, Chris Williams x 2, Brandon Pfaadt x 1, Jose Leger x 1, Jordan Walker x 2, Justin Toerner x 3, Masyn Winn x 2, Dann Bilardello x 1, Jose Gomez x 3, Jeremiah Jackson x 4, Kevin Maitan x 9, Allan Cerda x 2, Ivan Johnson x 3, Matt McLain x 1 and Mike Siani x 4 (220 total autographs).
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