Impressive showing by the fans
The fans really responded to the call for a stadium “White Out” for last night’s game against Notre Dame. This shot was taken from the student section (actually it’s a panorama of 6 shots stiched together).
EDIT: Found another notable shot
One thing that is interesting about the shots is that they are taken directly opposite each other. It’s like each of the photographers were directing their camera at the other.
Reminder that you can click on the photos to see an enlarged version of each shot.
And one more for good measure (this one is already at max resolution).
Couldn’t leave out this one from Sports Illustrated
“Fear the Deer”
You might remember a post I made a couple of months ago about a blog that I was creating about the State College Spikes baseball team. The intention at the time was to just track the Pittsburgh Pirates draft choice to try to figure out which ones might get assigned to State College. Well that worked out so well that I decided to keep it up for the entire season.
Not surpisingly I’ve swizzled the blog a lot since I originally created it – I’ve changed the format a couple of time, added a few features, and actually renamed it “Fear the Deer” which is the team’s rally cry.
I occasionally add some editorial content but for the most part the blog is simply a collection of news stories, game reports, and box scores about the team. Even with no effort of my own to promote it, it’s generated a modicum of success:
- I’ve had over 7000 visitors to date and hope to hit 10,000 before the season ends.
- I’ve made my way to the first page of Google search results when you search for “State College Spikes”.
- WordPress.com listed me as #78 on their Blog of the Day Growing Blogs list a couple of weeks ago.
- Numerous baseball blogs have found me and included me in their links, among them are:
- “The Pittsbugh Lumber Company” includes me in their blogroll
- “Bucs Dugout” has me on their homepage in the Pirates Links section
- “Crawdad’s Blog” – a blog about the Pirates Hickory TN farm club has me in their blogroll
While it certainly hasn’t enjoyed the exposure my “Every Day is Valentine’s Day” exploit did, it’s really not doing all that bad – and I’m having fun doing it.
Carnoustie memories
Anyone watching the British Open today. It brought back a bunch of memories from my trip to Scotland with Tod Jeffers in 1984 when we actually played Carnoustie.
. Here’s a shot of us playing the 17th hole. I’m on the far right in the red sweater. Upon close inspection you will note that I am wearing knickers, which I wore for pretty much every round in Scotland (Tod remarked that my choice of apparel was like a guy from New York City wearing a rhinestone cowboy shirt in Dallas). Tod has the light pants on and the other guy and girl were a couple of newlyweds from the US who were on their honeymoon and were matched up with us (the guy played, the gal just walked along).
Here’s a piece of a map of the Carnoustie golf course that shows the finishing holes at the course. I’ve placed a red X on the may where our friend Glen Durso stood when he took the photo above. The direction of the photo is toward the upper right hand corner of the map. In the photo you can see the wall of the Barry Burn running along the forefront. From the map you can see how the burn snakes around on both sides of 17. On the photo at the top you can just make out the burn behind us. If you look close you can see the walk bridge across the burn on the left side of the photo and you can also notice that bridge on the map above.
If you watched the open today, you saw Ernie Els hit his approach shot fat on 18 and it came up short of the burn (notice on the map how the burn runs right in front of 18). That reminded me a little of my shot on the finishing hole. When Tod and I played it, the pin placement on 18 was in about the same location as today, i.e at the very front of the green, about 10 feet onto the green and maybe 10 yards past the burn. When I hit my approach shot, I thought I had hit it perfect but it came up about 10 yards short – I don’t know if I misclubbed myself or the wind got it but the ball came down in the burn – but only momentarily.
Here’s a closeup photo of the Barry Burn. Notice how the bank on the left is made by bricks that form a kind of stair step up the side. Remember playing stoop ball as a kid (I’m talking to the second generation here, I’m not sure the third generation ever played anything as unorganized as stoop ball 🙂 )? You would throw a ball against the steps and it would fly backward. Well that’s exactly what happened to my ball when it landed in the burn. It didn’t hit the water but rather came down against the bricks. That caused it to ricochet back down the eighteenth fairway toward me coming to rest about 20 yards short of the burn (if I remember correctly I got safely on and two putted from there).
The big hotel in the background of the above photo wasn’t there when Tod and I played the course. There was actually no clubhouse. There was a small shack that acted as a pro shop and a gravel parking lot where you could change into your spikes. Of course that meant we couldn’t roll of the course and have an immediate brew. So after we finished our round we headed back to St Andrews where we were staying.
The route back to our hotel took us through Dundee, a working class town on the River Tay. It was about a 30 mile drive and by the time we got to Dundee we were a little thirsty. I was driving and spotted a bar just off the road. I pulled over and Tod ran inside to get a six pack for the road (how times have changed? – you just wouldn’t think of doing that these days). A couple of minutes later Tod comes out of the bar laughing his head off.
While we were in Scotland we had been trying all sorts of different beers. Since we didn’t have a clue what most of the brews were we’d simply ask the bartenders in each of the establishments we’d hit, what their recommendation would be. So that’s exactly what Tod did when he went into the bar. The bartender responded (imagine a thick Scottish brogue “Ahh, we’ve got this great imported beer – RRRolling RRRock.” Tod could not keep a straight face and was still laughing as he came back out to the car (and no, he didn’t get the Rolling Rock).
I have bunches of other stories but I’ll save them for another day.
Thinking about coming out of retirement
No not that way.
But, after getting out and exercising for four straight days, I’m getting the urge to get into competitive shape again. Unfortunately, the Phi Psi 500 no longer exists. But there is another possibility:
The Beer Mile is a unofficial worldwide competition where competitors drink a beer, run a quarter mile, then repeat three more times.
A friend of mine here in State College, Kevin Becker is one of the organizers of the local version of the competition. In fact, there is a YouTube video of the 2005 State College Event (it’s held every Labor Day). The event is nothing like the Phi Psi which drew about 2000 entrants and 10,000 spectators. The State College Beer mile draws maybe a dozen entrants and another couple of dozen spectators.
You can see the SC Beer Mile video by clicking here. My buddy is the guy with the shaved head that appears several times in the video. He won the event that year (you can see him cross the finish line at about the 4:30 point in the video – he’s also the guy doing the cartwheel/moon at the end of the video).
While I don’t feel I can be competitive with Kevin (he trains a lot, runs marathons and triathlons, and even ran a 50 mile race two years ago), I certainly feel I can be competive in my age group. I just went to the beer mile records page and I see that, while there’s no official 60+ record only a super-Masters group that starts at 50, the fastest time for a 60+ entrant worldwide is 9:54. While it would be tough to get to that level this year, I certainly don’t think that number is out of my reach in another year or so. The best time for a 62 year old is 10:35 and that’s not out of the realm of possibility (I would have to alter one of my strategies though – in the Phi Psi, I always forced myself to throw up – in this race, if you ralph, you run an extra lap).
Bergquist Blasts thru Battle Creek…
…and wins the Fall Family Cup! Unfortunately, having the humble husband that I do, I have few other details. And I don’t think we’re going to get the usual blow-by-blow, hole-by-hole write up that Steve F. usually gives (for two reasons; he lost and his computer crashed)! I do know that Steve B. also came in 3rd for the entire Battle, apparently blowing his chances for 1st place on one hole (with a score of 15 on that hole).
I think there will be a challenge by Brian very shortly. Steve and he actually played golf two weeks ago and Brian beat the pants off Steve. He is very anxious to play his father again…especially if he can win the “Cup”…any interest Steve and Ron?
Oakmont Memories
Watching the US Open being held at Oakmont Country Club just outside of Pittsburgh brought back a TON of memories the last few days and I’d like to share a few.
The 1978 PGA Championship was held at Oakmont while I was living in Pittsburgh. At the time my buddy Tod Jeffers was working at WMAJ a radio station in State College. Tod and I had quite a scam going. Tod was the sports director for the station and he would write to the PGA and USGA for media credentials to some of their golf tournaments and he would regularly get two (one press and one photographers – oddly enough, they never asked why a radio station needed a photographers pass). The 1978 tournament at Oakmont was one of the first where we pulled this little act (btw – they have wizened up and no longer give out press credentials to radio stations outside of a 50 mile radius of the tournament site).
The access that the credentials provided us was incredible. Not only could we enjoy the numerous benefits of the press tent but we also had access to the course. The way that most media covered the tournament was to sit in the media tent and watch the tournament on TV (more on that later). Then, following competition of their round, each player would come into the interview tent and handle and questions by the media. Rarely did they venture onto the course. Not Tod and I though. We would spend the day on the course walking along with the players.
Friday was the first day that we hit the course. I took a vacation day from work. Because hosting a major championship in town was such a major deal many of our office sales team took customers to the tournament so there were a lot of fellow IBMers at Oakmont. Early in Fridays round Tod and I decided to follow Jack Nicklaus. After Jack’s tee shot on two, Tod and I are strolling up the second fairway about twenty feet behind Jack and his caddy when I here this voice yell “Yo Fall”. I look over and there’s the IBM Branch Manager, Scotty Theissen, behind about five rows of spectators lined up along the fairway. Scotty was about 6’6″ so he stood out from the crowd and could get a good view from behind the others. As soon as I see him, Scotty says “you’d better write a good story” (the press credentials back then were a little different than today – today you hang a placard off of a belt loop, then you had a yellow armband that said PRESS – so Scotty was obviously commenting on the armband). My first thought was “I hope he isn’t upset that I took a day off to come to the tournament”. When I got to work the following Tuesday (more later on why I wasn’t in on Monday), he called me into his office and his comment was “How did you pull that off? I’m impressed.” I think his opinion of me jumped a couple of notches that weekend.
What Tod and I would do for the most part was tag along with the official group that walks along with each golfer. Normally, you’ll have 2-3 golfers, their caddies, a scorer, a standard bearer, a rules official, and maybe a few photographers. The group of us would walk just behind the golfers, and when we got to the green we’d find a spot near the exit walkway and kneel down so we wouldn’t block anyone’s view. We’d do the same thing on the tee when the golfers would tee off.
During one of the rounds, Tod and I were following Tom Watson. We walked up to the 15th tee and before we even got a chance to kneel down a guy standing directly behind me started mouthing off to his friend next to him “Goddamn press. I wait here for hours to see Watson tee off and they come stand right in front of me”. Without hesitation, and with a totally straight face I turned around to him and said “Hey buddy, you’re out here having fun. I’m out here trying to make a living. Cut me a break.” Jeffers had a hard time keeping a straight face.
I mentioned the press tent before. It seems like nothing today with the way that modern technology has advanced but I was really impressed with the IBM computer systems at Oakmont. Remember, there were no PCs then and computers ran in heavily air conditioned back rooms – also there was no such thing as wireless access. At Oakmont though, IBM had wired the entire course. A data entry person would sit just off of each green and they would enter players scores as they completed each hole. That would be immediately transferred back to the main computer that sat in a refrigerated trailer just outside of the press tent. In the press tent there were a series of terminals hooked into the mainframe so that the press could check on the stats at any point in time.
One of the afternoons, Tod and I were in the press tent when we heard a roar go up out on the golf course. A hole in one roar at a major tournament is different than any other. It was immediately obvious that someone had sunk one somewhere out on the course (actually from the direction it came, we were reasonable sure it was hole #8. I walked over to one of the terminals and typed in the request for current stats for #8. Sure enough within seconds, up popped a 1 next to Gil Morgan’s name (the eighth hole is the one that’s playing at around 270-280 for this tournament – Morgan dunked his tee shot on the fly for his one with the hole playing at 242). At the time that absolutely amazed me. Of course, with today’s technology, the exact same data, and much, much more, is instantly available to everyone around the world via the internet but in ’78 that was quite impressive.
By Sunday, Tod and I pretty well had the course mapped out. We knew exactly where to stand to get on camera – and we did. All the TV shots came from fixed cameras on the tees or behind the greens – there were no roving fairway cameras then. Since we could walk with the players, we would make sure that we stood behind the players so that they were always directly between us and the camera on the hole. That meant that we got on MANY times. There was one memorable shot that I can remember quite well.  It came on #3 when Johnny Miller put his shot onto one of the mounds between the church pew bunkers.  Johnny stood on top of the mound to take his shot and Tod and I were directly behind him.  Because the camera shot was a telephoto from behind the green it looked like we were about two feet from him when the reality was we were a good 20-25 feet.
About an hour or so after the tournament was over I got a phone call from Mother and she went on to repeat the following conversation she had with Dad to me.
DAD (from the TV room watching golf): “Eileen – get in here!”
MOM: “What? Why?”
DAD: “I think I just saw your son on TV”.
MOM (now in the room with him): “Where?”
DAD: “Wait a second until this guy tees up. He’ll be standing right behind him.”
MOM (with the camera now on us): “Well. I don’t know. That sort of looks like him – I guess it could be… Wait a minute. That’s definitely he’s friend Tod next to him so it must be.”
My own mother doesn’t recognize me but recognizes Tod.
John Mahaffey won the tournament in a three-way playoff with Tom Watson and Jerry Pate shooting a 276. Mahaffey made up 7 strokes on Watson over the last 14 holes to take the title. Tod and I followed Watson around for the final nine but not didn’t hang around for the playoff.  In those days, tradition called for dropping the ropes behind the final group as they came up 18.  The fans who rushed in behind the players were quite careful to respect the players space but they had no such concern for us “media” types. It was too much work fighting our way through the masses to get inside the ropes coming up 18 and we knew it would be the same way for the playoff so we bailed (in those days the playoffs weren’t set up just for TV either – players went right onto the first tee and played from there – the didn’t follow any of the weird playoff formats we have now).
So while the tournament ended on Sunday for most of the participants, it didn’t for us. Another tradition for the majors is that on the Monday following the tournament, the host course is open to the media for free play. THAT was an opportunity that Tod and I were not about to pass up. Unfortunately, Mother Nature did not cooperate. Come Monday and it was pouring rain. We went out and tried to play anyway but it was just too much and we had to quit after nine. Still it was an incredible experience, one that I would love to repeat sometime.
Tomorrow, I’m going to be able to relive part of it but it won’t quite be the same. Randy Woolridge and I are headed to Oakmont to watch the Sunday round. The bad news is that we don’t have press credentials.  The good news is that we have VIP privileges (Randy got the tickets from a big time banker friend in Pittsburgh) which includes access to the Pittsburgh Steeler corporate hospitality tent located just off of the eighteenth hole. I’m looking forward to the experience and will report back on Monday.
State College Spikes – Season 2
The State College Spikes are a short season Class A baseball team – short season meaning they don’t start play until the end of June. Major League Clubs support short season teams so they have a place to stock the players whom they sign through their draft which takes place after high school and college regular seasons are complete.
Today is that draft day. It will begin at 2PM and the first few rounds will be televised for the first time (ESPN2 is carry the draft).
Since I have time on my hands, I’ve thrown together a website to track the Pittsburgh Pirates draft choices (the Pirates are the major league affiliate for the Spikes team) because the Spikes roster will be primarily populated with kids from this draft. This provide a way for friends of mine, who actually have jobs and have to work, to actually follow the draft today and get a feel for who might be playing for the Spikes this year.
I seeded the site yesterday with those Pirate players whom minor league baseball currently lists as being owned by the Pirates but not yet playing with a Pirate minor league team (they are primarily holdovers from last years short season team who didn’t get promoted to a higher level team this year – some of them will be cut before the short season play starts June 20th). During the course of the draft today I will be updating the site in real time as the Pirates make their picks.
Here’s the link to the site.
And here’s an RSS feed that will be updated as each pick is made.
FOLLOW-UP: While the blog turned out pretty good for a quick and dirty deal, I ran into some Blogger issues (WordPress has spoiled me) when I tried to put some bells on whistles on the blog.  So I’ve converted the blog to WordPress and here’s the link to the current version.
Look what I stumbled upon!
in my never ending crawl through the depths of the internet I occasionally find a gem – and this is one of those times.
Here are the original rules for the Fall Family Cup competition at the Battle of Battle Creek.
Thanks go to Gary for the wonderful header photo (and me for sanitizing it).
Not your average high school
Last night, I was chatting with Danny Morrissey, an UncleLar nephew and shooting guard for Penn State’s basketball team. Danny went to prep school at the Pendleton School in Bradenton FL. Pendleton is part of the IMG Academies, a world renown collection of training academies for youth athletes. Some of the academies you have undoubtedly heard of – the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, the David Leadbetter Golf Academy, the Chris Evert Tennis Academy.
Pendleton creates a unique educational environment where kids go to class in the morning at the prep school, then attend training sessions at one of the academies in the afternoon. As Danny described it “This was not your typical high school. Taurean Green (starting guard for two time national champion Florida) was my point guard, Maria Sharapova (world renown model/tennis player) was a classmate of mine, and Freddie Adu (soccer phenom) lived in the dorm room below me.”
All of a sudden my high school experiences seemed quite boring.