Beyond The Home Run Fence

Yesterday I mentioned there was no seating beyond the home run fence in Midway Stadium. I'm sure your wondering what is beyond the home run fence if there are no seats. Wonder no longer, there ain't much to see over the advertisements but trees, buildings and blue sky. Can you believe it rained shortly after taking this photo?

Midway Stadium

Jim of Terrel Daily Photo mentioned in his comment from my August 14 photo that my seats looked pretty decent. While this is very true, I thought I would show a photo that was panned back a bit to show more of the stadium. Midway Stadium in St Paul, home of the Saint Paul Saints is quite small in size. Not sure how many it holds, but there is no seating beyond the home run fence. The outfield seats are very limited and generally all of the seats sport a great view. If you look across the field and can figure out where the pitchers yellow hat is, that is a comparable area from where I am sitting taking this photo.

Saint Paul Saints

The Saint Paul Saints are currently the only professional baseball team in Minnesota that plays outdoors. This has been the main attraction for this American Association of Independent Professional Baseball teams. Starting in 2010, the Minnesota Twins will open an outdoor baseball stadium. The Saints have been a team in the Twin Cities for 10 plus years and this summer, I finally went to my first outdoor ball game. Despite the sunny weather in the photo, it rained shortly after taking this photo. Haha! Something to look forward to once the Twins start their play in their outdoor stadium.

Gophers Tubby Smith

The regular season for the Minnesota Gophers has come to a close. New head coach Tubby Smith in his first year brought the basketball team from a seven win team to a twenty win team. It was a very welcome improvement as the majority of the players were leftovers from the previous coach. Tubby was able to get them to play very well together, something the previous coach was lacking.

It's my shameless annual plug for my other website I run this time of the year. It is a free, online office pool that correlates with the NCAA Men's Final Four Tournament. Hope to see you in my final four pool this year. I also have blank brackets and printable brackets if you're in need of one.

My Website: OfficePool64.com

 

My Daily Photo Favorites: returning soon....

Interesting Links Of the Day: Final Four | Blank Bracket | Printable Bracket

Hats Off To The Gophers

This isn't a photo from this weekends games during the Big Ten Conference Tournament, it was from this past December when the Gophers faced off against Santa Clara. I took this photo from my seats and they easily won this game. The Gophers has mixed emotions this weekend with a memorable highlight ending shot by Blake Hoffarber versus Indiana Hoosiers. Threw across the length of the court to Hoffarber and sank the winning shot. It was a thing of beauty. Those of you that have never heard of Hoffarber before, you must watch his game tieing shot from the Minnesota State High School Tournament. This is the most amazing shot you'll ever see in your life, trust me on this. It also won the ESPN award for Play Of The Year. Two Miracle shots in ones lifetime! Have you ever seen such a thing before?

The Gophers were not so luck in Saturday's contest, losing to Illinois and should be out of the NCAA Final Four tournament. We shall see, there is a chance, a very slim chance they'll make it in, but honestly I can't see them going very deep into the tournament.

My Daily Photo Favorites: returning soon....

Interesting Links Of the Day: Hoffarber Game tieing Shot | Hoffarber Game winning shot

My Lens Is Bigger Than Yours

During the last Minnesota Gopher Basketball game with new head coach Tubby Smith, the photographer for the athletic department spent about five minutes in the empty seat in front of me. He had two cameras with him for taking photos. One with a shorter lens that he used when the play was on the near side of the court. A much larger camera and lens was used, the one shown in the photo, when the action was in play on the far end of the court. It was really interesting to watch, every time the the ball was on one side of the court or the other, he would seamlessly switch cameras. Though it's not quite visible in this photo, there was a remote trigger attached to the camera, when he snapped a photo, there was a quick flash of lights that was barely detectable to the fans in the crowd. But there it was, the guy who made the lights flash was sitting right in front of me taking photos for various UofM magazines.

Behind The Scenes

I took this photo from my seats at the last Minnesota Wild hockey game. Our opponent for the evening was the Vancouver Canucks. It's my favorite rivalry to watch and every game is a close one. The FSN North sports network has been broadcasting their shows directly behind my seats for the Wild games. It's kind of fun to watch and when the announcers are waiting for the period or the game to end, they like to stand behind my seats to watch the game. I've chatted with them a few times and they all like to kid around and seam eager to talk with you. The announcer you see behind the desk is Anthony LaPanta.

My Daily Photo Favorites: Minneapolis, Minnesota | San Francisco, California | St Paul, Minnesota

Let's Go Green, Let's Recycle

It was the homecoming theme for Park of Cottage Grove this past October. There was a parade to kick off the football game that was played later that evening. I really enjoyed the homecoming parade and how many of the students dressed in accordance to the theme. The theme was Go Green, Recycle The [Visiting Team]. Their name escapes me at the moment. You can see in today's photo some of the dress that resulted in the theme. They had fun dressing up, the boys football team won their game. It was quite the event for the community.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Minneapolis, Minnesota
West Sacramento, California
Phoenix, Arizona

Wee Pees In Action

From one of my sons football games a few weeks ago. I've been having a bit of trouble getting out and taking photos this month. I say month because, there has been rain on 17 of the 18 days in the month of October. We were very lacking in rain during the summer months, now it's complete opposite. We are about to set a record for rainfall in a three month time period. Today is the 19th day of the month....I'm betting on rain today

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Port Vila, Vanauta
Barcelona, Spain
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

A Night Of Smiles

Just panning back a bit to show all of the teams that participated in the half time show that I mentioned in yesterday's posting. Eight football teams in all, with 18 to 19 third and fourth grader per team, about 140 kids in all. Now times $6 dollars admission fee, by the number of the parents there to see their child during the half time show. The football players all get in free. The stands were very full that night as you can imagine.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Selma, Alabama
Boston, Massachusetts
Melbourne, Australia

Half-Time Entertainment

It was a proud moment for me and wifey a couple Friday's ago. As part of the half-time entertainment, my son and his football team showed their talent and skills on the field for the Park of Cottage Grove high school football game. He was so thrilled to be out there on the real football field. The squad did very well considering the hundreds of people watching them perform. My son is in the Wee Pee division which is for 3rd and 4th graders only.

If you are wondering which one is my son, he is in the red uniform, on the front offensive line. His left foot and left hand are touching the yellow circle painted on the turf. He is the only one visible that is touching the yellow line.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Palm Springs, California
Torino, Italy
Wellington, New Zealand

Under The Lights

I'm finding night photography can be a challenge, especially when there is movement involved. Throw in a lack of a tripod and to me this is a so-so photo. I'm so new at night time photos, so for me, this is on the job training. Try a a setting, see how they turn out, tweak the settings, see how it looks now. It's coming around, photo by photo. The darkness adds in so many elements to discover. Those of you who are familiar with nighttime photography, I'll take any advice I can get.

Any way, today's photo is from the same game as yesterday's football photo between Cottage Grove and Woodbury. This time, the sun has dropped below the horizon, the lights are on, and Zentmrs of San Diego, California, formerly of Woodbury, Class of 1984, Woodbury Royals are victorious. I graduated from St Paul Humboldt, so this doesn't bother me all that much.

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Jakarta, Indonesia
Miami, Florida - little older, but a great football photo
Detroit, Michigan

Cottage Grove Wolfpack Football

Last Friday, the Wolfpack of Cottage Grove played host to rival city Woodbury Royals [the city directly to the north]. Despite the Wolfpack leading at halftime 21-10, they couldn't hold off the Royals in the second half and lost, 22-21. My son plays his first football game tomorrow morning, he's in 3rd grade football. The boys on the team are encouraged to attend the varsity team play on Friday nights. So last Friday was the first high school football game I had been to in 20 years. The school pride by both schools was a bit over the top for me, but again, it's been a while since I had gone to a high school game.

My 4 Daily Photo Favorites:
New York, New York
Van Buren, Arkansas
Brighton, UK
Selma, Alabama

Fantasy Football Season 2007

It is that season once again, Thursday, September 6 kicks off the new NFL season and the Fantasy Football craze begins. These photos were captured at the football draft that I host with a few of my friends about a week ago. There are 12 of us in the league and everyone one of holds on to the hope of winning it all at seasons end. I am in this photo, I'm the one with the red shirt, Nick is in the middle and fellow blogger, Short Arm Guy is on the right. The smaller photos below has everyone else in the league except for myself and our auctioneer, he's just out of frame unfortunately.

More than 13 million people play fantasy football via the internet, yeah, 13 million people. That just boggles my mind. I heard the best online video game only has about 8 million people, that game is World Of Warcraft.

 

2 Minutes For Tripping

Oh wait, that's hockey where you get a two minute penalty. Third grade soccer at Kingston Park in Cottage Grove can get a bit rough at times. When I took this photo, seconds after I snapped the shot, the boy in the red shirt fell to the ground. The red team was allowed to kick the ball from the spot of the foul.

A Guy Walks Into A Bowling Pin

Every time I pass this entrance to the Burnsville Bowl it makes me laugh. The odd thing about it, this is a recent paint job on the building and not something left over from the 70's. I'm speechless....

My 3 Daily Photo Favorites:
Rouen, France
St Louis, Missouri
Guelph, Canada

Nothing But Net

From a Minnesota Gopher basketball game earlier in 2007. Kinda of different looking at all the people with their heads turned towards the action, but you can only see the crowd.

My 3 Daily Photos Favorites
Ampang, Malaysia
Torquay, UK
Novara, Italy

COUNTDOWN: Only 1 Day Until The End....

I took the family to the Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis last weekend to see the Minnesota Twins play some baseball versus Toronto Blue Jays and took this photo on my way into the stadium. The Twins lost in the 13 inning, but the game was rather exciting at the end of it. They were losing 7-2 in the 7th inning and came back to tie the game in the bottom of the 9th. They were down by 1 run in the 11th, came back to tie yet again in the bottom of the 9th. Ultimately they lost in the 13th inning by not coming back a third time to tie or take the lead.

My Top 3 Daily Photo Favorites
Montreal, Canada
Manila, Philippines
Ithaca, New York