The Home Opener

I made it to the Asheville Tourists home opener last night and it was the first home opener I have ever had the chance to attend. I got to McCormick Field a couple of hours early, went to the box office, got my ticket, and headed across the street to the Wild Wing Cafe for my pregame meal.

The weather was beautiful but supposed to turn chilly so I stopped back by my car on my way into the stadium to pick up my Appalachian State hoodie. I just didn't realize I was going to need it before the game ever started. I looked at the American flag flying beyond the centerfield fence and it was blowing out to left center and centerfield. I thought it may turn into a homerun festival.

I had a great seat right behind the Asheville Tourists dugout- Section F, Row C, Seat 5- and I was ready for some baseball. The Tourists are a progressive minor league team and are always at the forefront of trying new things. They have implemented a Zipline to deliver the gameball to homeplate and I have to admit it was pretty cool. I had a great view of the guy hitting his landing spot down the third base line.

The game itself was really close up to the 5th inning. The nights opponent, the Delmarva Shorebirds, rolled out highly touted pitching prospect and Baseball America's #1 Baltimore Orioles prospect Dylan Bundy to oppose Asheville righty Vianney Mayo. It was Bundy's professional debut.

Dylan Bundy lived up to the hype. His fastball topped out at 97 MPH, his changeup was in the mid 80's, and a knee buckling curve that ranged from 74-77 MPH. He was on a pitch count so he only pitched 3 innings. He struck out 6 of the 9 batters he faced. According to the boxscore, he threw 21 pitches and everyone of them for strikes. A very impressive debut and worthy of the hype. I am glad I got to see it.

The Tourists offense struggled tonight. Sam Mende doubled in the first run with a frozen rope into the left field corner and David Kandilas doubled off the right center field fence to plate the second run in the bottom of the fourth inning, and first baseman Harold Riggins barely missed a homerun off the top of the left centerfield fence in the sixth inning. The Tourists did hit into four doubleplays and those are always rally killers.

On the Asheville Tourists side, they had several impressive defensive plays led by Sam Mende at third base, Trevor Story at shortstop, and Australian import David Kandilas in left field.

Sam Mende grabbed a high chopper down the third base line and fired to second to nab the lead runner and just missed a turning a double play. Trevor Story made a diving stop in the hole and barely missed nailing the runner at first with a real strong throw. David Kandilas made a perfect one hop throw to catcher Will Swanner to nail Shorebirds shortstop Mychal Givens at home. Swanner also did an excellent job of blocking the plate.

The downside to the game was the fact that Asheville Tourists pitchers walked 9 batters and the Tourists gave up 7 stolen bases. I thought the homeplate umpire was squeezing the plate on Tourists starting pitcher Mayo. At one point in the top of the fifth inning, Tourists manager Joe Mikulik thought so as well because one of the umpires calls made Mikulik yell from the dugout "That pitch was good! C'mon!" When the umpire gave his definition of a strike, Mikulik waved him off.

The final result was a 7-2 Tourists loss to the Shorebirds with a doubleheader scheduled for tonight.