May 10 - The Thursday Lineup Card: Mom Knows Plenty About Baseball

This is the week that was: Let's start with the obvious: Eric   Hurley - you already know about the 13 IP, 9 Hits,  2 ER, 4 BB and 7 K's from his last 2 starts. What you might not know is that the Texas League is hitting .211 against him - righties hit .222 - lefties an anemic .200.  Eric doesn't like giving up runs - with runners in scoring position his opponents BAA (batting average against) is a sickly .167

2006 draftee Chad Tracy blistered Midwest League pitching at a .384 pace this past week: 10 hits in 26 AB's with 3 Doubles, 2 Home Runs and 15 RBI's.

Duly noted: May is Jason Botts month.  Since May 2nd he is 9 for 28 (.321) including 2 Home runs.  Also worth noting:  23 year old Doug Mathis has adjusted well to Frisco with 12 K's in 18 IP and a 1.93 ERA.

This is the week that will be: The Oklahoma Redhawks finish their trip to Las Vegas (Dodgers) on Friday and then meet the Sidewinders (Arizona) at Tucson's Electric Park which is 50 miles south of Picacho Peak - the site of the western-most Civil War battle in 1862.  If there are no more games cancelled due to "unplayable conditions" in Frisco they will finish out their homestand against the Corpus Christi Hooks (Houston) on Saturday.  Eric Hurley would've started Saturday's home game  but with the game cancellation on Tuesday - I'm not sure what the Frisco rotation will look like for the remaining games.  Way out west they are "Celebrating Baseball in Bakersfield" this weekend with Team Photo Night on Saturday as the Blaze play the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes - an Angels affiliate whose name sounds like a game show on Univision.   Back east in Iowa it's "Steak Sandwich Saturday" in Clinton where the Lumberkings play yet another Angels affiliate: The Cedar Rapids Kernels - I detect a trend as the major league team limps home to play the Angels in Arlington.

Giving my Toll Tag a workout:  It's all about Frisco for me on Friday and Saturday with game reports on Tuesday.

Baseball Moms:  One of the things I enjoy most about working on the Newberg Report is the opportunity I've been afforded to meet the families of the Rangers minor league players.   Every baseball family has a story - and I love hearing Baseball Moms tell those stories.  All of the them are heartfelt: surgeries and recoveries, single Moms holding together families and trying to fill in for absent Dads,  struggles, setbacks and financial sacrifices all in the name of chasing the dream. 

Baseball Moms are always on the road: they started by driving to T-Ball and Little League games, High School and College tournaments. Followed by traveling to likes of  Surprise, Spokane, Savannah, Clinton, Port Charlotte, Stockton, Bakersfield, Tulsa, Frisco and Oklahoma City.  They are the sports enhancement coaches, personal shoppers, accountants, trainers and the little touch of home for their sons. 

Then there's the phone call with the estastic voice on the other end "he's going to the show!"  I've sat with Baseball Moms, seen their nervous and proud smiles as their son walks to the plate or the mound in the Ballpark knowing it's another story, a happy one, that a Baseball Mom will be glad to tell.

One More Baseball Mom:  I'm not sure, but she may regret that Sunday in May when she and her sister Cathi took me to Tiger Stadium to see the Kansas City A's play Detroit.   What I remember is that we sat along the third base line near the bullpen mound,  I wasn't bored, I didn't want anything to eat, I just wanted to watch the game.  She spent the entire drive home to Toledo explaining a sacrifice fly to me - looking back I know that's when I became a baseball fan.   We sat together through a couple of cold, rainy and miserable Ranger openers in the 1980's wearing trash bags and rain hats.  We've had mini-season seats together,  we decided at the last minute to go to a game in July 1994 and wound up watching a little bit of history (she didn't even say anything when I tried to jinx Kenny's perfecto) she insisted on going to games while she in the midst of chemotherapy, and she never minds that I've planned some of our vacation trips to Seattle, Austin and San Antonio to coincide with baseball games.  She can name every member of the 1948 Cleveland Indians World Series team.   She raised 3 daughters who are very proud of her and grateful for all that she did for them.  She recently lost her mother, 93 year old Genevive, another baseball fan (who really liked Hank Blalock). 

She taught me to love the game of baseball - and I can't ever say I love you or thank you enough to Toni Gibson - my Baseball Mom.

Happy Mother's Day! -- Marla Hooch