Kieran Actually Played a Baseball Game

Tuesday night, Kieran had another game scheduled, this time in Delano.  Which meant that I had to leave school, pick up the kids, feed them and get Kieran back to Delano (within 500 yards of my classroom) within a couple of hours.  Plus, Luke had ComboBall practice the same night (although it was apparently cancelled because of impending storms that never really materialized) --- Sarah has class Tuesday nights this summer and both Kieran/Luke have ball most of those nights...it's going to be interesting how it all works out...

Driving to Delano that night it just got darker and darker the farther north we got.  Here's a picture of the sky shortly before the start of the game...

Luckily, the storms just missed Delano to the south...meaning the game would go on...

Kieran learned some good lessons that night...some I thought he already knew...the first at-bat he came up swinging....a little early on this pitch...

Eventually he got the count to one ball and two strikes.  At which point I think he was scared of striking out, so he attempted a bunt on the next pitch...

Well, the bunt went foul and if that happens with two strikes, you're out.  I hoping he doesn't try to bunt without being told to again...

He played a few outfield positions too....

His second time up to the plate he tapped the ball right in front of the plate and was thrown out at first.  The third time up, he came out swinging again, but struck out...it's going to happen.

His team though was winning 7-0 at one point.  Too bad the rains didn't come...they ended up losing 14-8....

Kieran's Baseball

Kieran's been practicing for over a month now - it's about two practices a week, two hours at a time.  He's had 2-3 games postponed because of rain and multiple practices also rained out.  Tonight was the first night that the game was postponed before we had to leave...

He's excited, it's the first season of 'kid pitch' and he has a whole uniform.  With the weather tonight, it looked like it would be close whether we would get the game in or not...

 While the kids were warming up, 10 minutes before the game, the first lightning bolt struck.  All the kids were removed from the field for a time to wait things out....eventually they started the game though.  They made it through 1 1/2 innings before the next bolts of lightning, though they finished the next 1/2 inning before this happened...

Maybe it's hard to see...but that's a deluge all over the field.  Ponding water everywhere...eventually the postponed the game until June 28th.  We'll see what the weather will be like then...

Best part --- Kieran didn't start the game and wasn't going to enter the game until the 3rd inning...we drove to Winsted just to watch some weather....Lexy was able to make her entire practice though back in Cologne (not of drop of rain)....

Twins Baseball Clinic

A couple of days ago, Kieran had the opportunity to participate in a baseball clinic at Target Field (home of the Twins) that was being put on by the Minnesota Twins and Suburban Chevrolet.  It was almost three hours of drills at somewhere between 10-15 stations.  He went in both dugouts and even went up towards the visitors clubhouse where they saw the indoor batting cage and they even got a free lunch.  But, most of the time was spent on the field --- I've never been on that field, that would be cool....

It was hard to get pictures of Kieran doing the drills, here's one where he's working on fly balls...

Kieran is somewhere in that group across the infield (btw...the seats down low are cushioned...they were nice)...

And another one where they were doing some stretching...though if you knew Kieran as a baby, he was better at this superman position then (he would lift both his arms and his legs off the ground all the time)....

What it really did was give us time to explore the outside of Target Field...like the Gold Glove...

Or the Kirby Puckett statue representing Game 6 of the '91 Series...

Or Harmon Killebrew...

After watching Luke at the Rod Carew statue, I'm wondering if he should bat left-handed?

TC Bear anyone?

What Luke really wanted though was to get on the big screen.  He and I moved to the right field corner when Kieran was coming around and there just happened to be a camera guy on the field then...

The camera guy noticed Luke at the rails, motioned to me to get my camera ready, and....

Luke was happy...later - Luke, Lex and Sarah all made the jumbotron....

It was a great day, especially since it was free...everyone had fun!