April 4-7, 2024, Graphing of The Hillcats at Wood Ducks

The final Wood Ducks season started nicely this week, first with a meet the team event that i thought I was going to miss, followed by a three-game series against the Lynchburg Hillcats.  

I was out of town this week when the Woodies held an exhibition game against Lenoir Community College.  I was also supposed to be on my trip when the Wood Ducks were going to hold an open practice followed by the meet and greet, but weather postponed the event to Thursday, and I was back in time to catch it with my friend, Jesse.  We racked the Woodies who had cards, and I got a ball signed by 99% of the team.

The Wood Ducks that had cards were Gleider Figuereo, Danyer Cueva, Julian Brock, Chandler Pollard and Marcus Smith.  I also had a team set card of Thomas St. Clair that i picked up last season when he was in town auditioning to be a coach in the Rangers system. 

Before the season began, my friend, Ryan, informed me that former Oriole, Tony Arnold, was a coach on Lynchburg. I was glad to get another 1991 Crown Orioles card signed.

I had a few of my own cards of the Lynchburg guys, but did have to buy a few prior to the start of the series. A couple didnt even come in, in time.  Maybe when they cone back, the cards will be in.

I was glad that I got my multi-colored Tommy Hawke card signed that he sent back unsigned TTM.  My younger brother, Andy, came to town on Saturday and caught the game with us.  He actually went to the same high school as Hawke, so that was pretty cool. 

Jeison Chourio and Angel Genao were really tough.  I had some help getting extras of those guys signed.  Genao called out my brother Saturday by saying "I signed for you yesterday, I remember you." When Andy told him "I came down from Winston-Salem this morning", Genao said "Sure."  I guess Andy does look like me.  Oops.  It was still funny.

Ralphy Velazquez only has Elite Extra Edition cards, and one of my friends was reappy wanting his auto, so I dug out two of these 1994 Score Cleveland cards to get him on.  I figured that was good enough, and my friend is happy.

The very best part of this weekend was that Andy surprised me on Sunday by bringing my niece, Millie, to her first baseball game.  He was in the area this weekend to pick her up from her grand parents, who live on thr Outer Banks.  I thought they were going to make the hand off and he was going to head home.  Instead, he brought Millie to Kinston and she got to spend 7 innings at the game with Uncle Bill.  She did pretty well, and I hope she had fun!  That really made my day, today.

In all, I got the following autographs: Julian Brock x 10, Danyer Cueva x 8, Gleider Figuereo x 18, Chandler Pollard x 11, Marcus Smith x 5, Tony Arnold x 2, Jaison Chourio x 10, Angel Genao x 6, Christian Knapczyk x 13, Carlos Maldonaldo x 2, Jesus Moreno x 1, Brian Pozos x 1, Thomas St. Clair x 1, Alex Clemmey x 26, Tommy Hawke x 11, Jose Pastrano x 5, Alonzo Richardson x 9, Ralphy Velazquez x 2 and Jack Jasiak x 5 (146 total autographs).