Miss D.C. Day @ the Nationals

Yesterday, I had the honor of attending the Washington Nationals game against the Milwaukee Brewers. It was "Miss DC Day at the Nationals," so that meant that my friend 2006 Miss DC, Kate Michael would be there and throwing out the first pitch! Yes, Kate's waving at me in the pic to the left - I had come down by the field to get a close-up look at everything!


Elizabeth Payne, Miss D.C.'s Outstanding Teen, sang the National Anthem beautifully just before Kate threw out the first pitch. She also took a moment to pose with Kate and one of those wacky Nationals mascots... Just what is he trying to do to Elizabeth there? :)


Most of us met up with John (the personal trainer of the Miss DC contestants) at the front gate to pick up our tickets for the game right around 1 pm. Kate threw out the first pitch just before 1:30 (it was right over the plate by the way!) Check out my 30 second video of it below!




Thanks to Kate, I had the priviledge of sitting in the Miss DC section along with Kate's boyfriend Bill Dean, President of the Miss DC organization Tricia Morrin Lloyd (along with her husband Michael), Teri Galvez, the Executive Director of the Miss DC organization, and several of the competitors in the upcoming 2007 Miss DC and Miss Teen DC pageants.




During the game, I had a very enjoyable time talking to Kate, Bill and the entire Miss DC party. We all were enjoying each other's company so much that we often lost track of what was happening in the game! Everyone was very friendly and we all had a good time sharing stories on pretty much every topic under the sun.... even I got to be the center of attention a couple of times! One question that I've been wondering about for quite a while that I'm sure some of you were interested in knowing too is that Kate does indeed know fellow Parkview High School graduate and now Atlanta Braves outfielder Jeff Francoeur. Kate assured us all Jeff's a nice guy and she also informed us that he's going to be getting married to his girlfriend in the not too distant future. Congrats to Jeff!

The game itself began on a high note for the Nats as Felipe Lopez hit an opposite field fly which just cleared the right field fence in the second inning to give the Nats a 1-0 lead. The game remained a pitcher's duel through the first five innings as neither starter (Tim Redding of the Nats and Chris Capuano of the Brewers) would be scored upon. The sixth inning changed things though. Redding gave up a two run double to All-Star Prince Fielder to give the Brewers a 2-1 lead... In the bottom of the frame though, the Nats exploded for six runs, highlighted by a two-run homer by Ryan Zimmerman.


Personally, I think Zimmerman might have been inspired in the game as he did get to meet with Kate just before the game started! As quickly as the scoring barrage began, it ended... the Nats wound up winning 7-2 and everyone went home happy! Just before it was all over, Bill took a few shots of Kate and me...


... we all hung out for a bit after the game and then went our separate ways. It a thoroughly enjoyable experience, and as I said to EVERYONE at the end, they should have a Miss DC Day every day at the Nats games!!!

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There of course was one other significant sporting event happening in the D.C. area this weekend and that was Tiger Woods' AT&T National tournament. I managed to get back to my Georgetown hotel room just in time to catch Tiger as he was playing the 17th and 18th holes... Tiger would birdie 18 to wind up with an even par 70 round and tying for 6th in the tournament. Saturday leader Stuart Appleby unfortunately fell apart on Sunday, shooting a 6-over-par 76... K.J. Choi took full advantage, winning his second tournament of the year with a finishing two-under-par 68 for a three round total of 271, 9-under-par. Steve Stricker was second, three strokes back of Choi. With the victory, Choi has now won both "Jack's Tournament" - the Memorial (Jack Nicklaus' tournament held annually) and "Tiger's Tournament"... given how Choi idolized Jack growing up and now with Tiger being today's equivalent to the Golden Bear, I'm sure this has special meaning to Choi. His wife and three kids were also on hand to witness his win.

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Tracking the Tiger...

Yesterday, I had the great oppoturnity to watch the AT&T National at the Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, MD. I arrived at the venue just in time to catch Tiger Woods as he was playing the first hole. My original intention when I made plans to attend the event was to follow both Tiger and Phil Mickelson. As Mickelson did not make the cut, I decided I would concentrate most of my time on following Tiger.

On the first hole, I stood and watched as Tiger rolled in a long 20 foot birdie putt, much to the crowd's approval! For Tiger, it would be a frustating day though as putt after putt either lipped out or came agonizingly close to going in for a birdie. As I commented to a man on the Metro bus to Friendship Heights on the way back to D.C., I said his round could have easily been a 65 and if he had putted decently at all in round 1, he'd be leading the tournment. Such is not the case though. Woods parred holes 2 thru 5 and then got into some trouble on the 6th hole. He holed a nice ten foot put for par on the sixth - I may have gotten on T.V. there.

I then strolled up to the 7th tee to watch Tiger attack the short par 3. As I'm getting ready to watch him tee off, I decide to head towards the green to catch him and playing partner Kevin Stadler putt. I took maybe five or six steps towards the green when I see a very familar looking guy. He looks at me and gives me the "I know you" look... I then saw his shirt and it said "M.C. Dean" - yes, it was none other than Mr. DC himself, Bill Dean! For those of you that don't know, Bill is dating my friend, 2006 Miss DC Kate Michael and I've seen many pictures of him via Kate's blog. Bill was very pleasant and cordial and he also introduced me to several of his friends who happened to be in the same area. I sort of had expected to see Bill today as I'm attending the National's game and they are having "Miss DC Day" there today, so this encounter was a pleasant surprise. With that, we talked a little more and then went our separate ways, saying we would see the other tomorrow.

Getting back to the golf, I continued to folllow Tiger onto the 8th hole and then the first two shots on the 9th - he drove the green on the latter, but could only manage a par from the greenside rough. At that point, the 95 degree heat got the better of me and I decided to get a couple of drinks and a hot dog at one of the concession stands. I found Tiger again on the 12th hole as he again made par. I decided to skip the short par 3, 13th and get a good place in the gallery for the 14th hole... something I'd soon regret doing as not more than 10 minutes of my arrival on 14, a HUGE roar came from the crowd over on 13... Obviously, something great had happened, and judging by the duration of it I assumed someone made a hole-in-one. Most of us hoped it was Tiger that had made it, but instead it was his playing partner, Stadler. On the 14th Tiger again had a close call with a birdie... I continued to follow him to the 15th and the par 5 16th where he finally made his second birdie of the day. A par followed at 17... I then made a quick run over to the scorers tent where world #3 Jim Furyk was signing some autographs... I had the good fortune of seeing him up close and getting the next to last autograph he gave out! Tiger had a tough time on 18, and made his lone bogey of the day. He shot a 1-under-par 69 and stands seven shots back of Staurt Appleby as he prepares for the final round of his tournment.

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A quick kudos to Jamie McMurray who won his first NASCAR race in five years last night - a photo finish over Kyle Busch. The winning margin was .005 of a second... tying for the second closest margin in the history of the series. After what happened to him a couple of weeks ago (he led at the Toyota Save Mart 350 a couple of weeks ago, only to finish 37th when he ran out of fuel on the final lap) it was very nice to see Jamie win... he's one of the nicest guys in the sport, and judging from the interviews afterwards, everyone was happy for him... Jeff Gordon and Carl Edwards were amongst those who gave him the thumbs up for winning. With the win, McMurray pulled within 51 points of Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the chase to be in the top 12...

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Today I'll be headed off to RFK to catch the Nats game and the aforementioned Miss DC Day event there... it should be fun. Unlike yesterday (where they did not allow cameras), I should have some pics to show you all.

Hill??? What Hill???

Well, as most of you probably know by now, I reached "that" age today... Yes, the big "39B" as one of my good friends tells me... Judging by what people have said, the best is yet to come and I'm far from over the hill!

I had a lot planned to celebrate the big day and will tell all about in tomorrow's post... a couple of quick things I wanted to drop in real quick... first off, in the AT&T National, Tiger Woods recovered to a 2nd round 66 to get back into contention at 1-under-par. Phil Mickelson looked good to make the cut until a disastrous second shot at the par-5 16th hole resulted in a double-bogey 7... Another double bogey followed at 18... Phil finished at 7-over-par, missing the cut by three strokes... Stuart Appleby and K.J. Choi share the midway point lead at 7 under par... CBS Sports covers the event on the weekend. For those of you that didn't know, I had already made my hotel reservations to attend this event quite a while ago. I've been telling people for a very long time, actually since before I turned 39, that I didn't want to be at home in SoCal for my next one and I got my wish!!! Actually, I celebrated it in the air - not sure where we were at, but the flight attendant gave me a cup of white wine to celebrate... I enjoyed it and actually got a little sleep on the way into Baltimore before taking the shuttle into DC.

Tiger, Phil & PGA return to D.C.!

Day one of Tiger Woods' new tournament, the AT&T National is in the books and surprisingly the host is nowhere to be found on the leaderboard. Woods drove the ball well enough and hit 14 of 18 greens, but a balky putter was his undoing as he uncharacteristically had seven bogeys to go with four birdies en route to an opening round 3-over-par 73. The star studded field also features world #2 player, Phil Mickelson had similar putting woes, stumbling to a 4-over-par 74 in a birdieless round. Some of the other stars did well though... Vijah Singh, Jim Furyk and Stuart Appleby all share the first round lead at 4-under-par 66 along with K.J. Choi and Joe Oglivie. A couple of the tours elder statesmen - 51-year-old Fred Funk, and 47-year-old Corey Pavin - head the group one back at 3-under-par. Coverage of the tournament can be found on the Golf Channel starting at 3PM ET/12 noon PT. For the live leaderboard, go here: AT&T National Leaderboard

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There was lots of baseball played yesterday... my AL teams did well, my NL teams not so well... For starters, the Boston Red Sox just demolished the Tampa Bay Devil Rays 15-4! The Red Sox pounded out 21 hits, and Devil Rays starter didn't even make it out of the first inning, giving up six earned runs while only recording two outs... Mike Lowell had a massive day, pounding out five hits, including a three run homer, while driving in five and scoring three more while Big Papi had three hits and scored four times. Josh Beckett pitched an effective six innings, including nine strikeouts, for his 12th win of the year as the Sox improved to 53-31 on the year and maintained their AL Eastern division lead to 12 games over both the Toronto Blue Jays and New York Yankees. In Texas, the Los Angeles Angels took on the Rangers and scored a 5-2 victory. Fresh from the disabled list, Maizer Izturis had the key blow for the Halos, hitting a two run triple in the top of the sixth inning... All-star snub Kelvim Escobar pitched a brilliant seven innings, giving up only one run and three hits, while walking one and striking out eight in recording his 10th win of the year. With Escobar's win, the Angels increased their lead to 4 1/2 games over the Seattle Mariners in the AL Western division race...

The Nationals played second fiddle to the aforementioned Tiger Woods in our nations' capital today as they looked to split their four game series against the Chicago Cubs. Cubs starter Sean Marshall and Nats starter Jason Bergmann both pitched an effective 5 1/3 innings, each allowing two runs... In the top of the 7th, Mike Fontenot and Darryl Ward hit run scoring singles off of Nats reliever Luis Ayala as the Cubs took their third game of the series by a 4-2 score. The two teams continue to be headed in opposite directions - the Cubs have now won 11 of their past 13 games, while the Nats have lost 13 of their past 18... At Chavez Ravine, the Los Angeles Dodgers took on the Atlanta Braves, and apparently both starters - Brad Penny of the Dodgers, and Tim Hudson of the Braves - had other plans... Both got torched by the opposition allowing six earned runs each in their short time. Hudson managed to go only three innings, while his counterpart only made it through four. Chipper Jones decided to be a one man wrecking crew for the Braves after the starting pitchers departed, smashing solo homers in both the 6th and 8th innings as the Braves went on to an 8-6 victory. With the loss, the Dodgers remain a game back of the San Diego Padres in the National League West race. In the meantime, the Braves continue to reel in the New York Mets, closing the gap to only three games in the National League East race.

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The Return of "Da Meat Hook"

A year ago at this time, Dmitri Young was in the midst of just trying to get back to playing the game he loves... A divorce, alcohol abuse and depression were amongst the things that the former Rio Mesa High School (Oxnard, CA) star dealt with prior to his return. Young played well after his mid-July return, nonetheless, he would be released by the Detroit Tigers less than a month before Season's end... following the season, he would end up in a hospital where he would be diagnosed with diabetes...

With seemingly everything going against him, it would have been easy for the 33-year-old Young to pack it in and call it a career... Young was a non-roster invitee to the Washington Nationals this spring. Starting Nats first baseman Nick Johnson was slow to recover from a broken leg and Young would wind up winning the starting job at first base. Young got off to a slow start, and by early May was losing at bats... On May 16th, his batting average stood at .227 with only three home runs and 14 RBI's... it appeared that this latest comeback was also going to end badly... but Young persevered and began to come out of his slump the next day with a pinch hit RBI single... a 2-for-3 performance with a homer and an RBI followed that... over those next ten games, he would go 16 for 29 and raised his batting average 75 points to .302... Incredibly, the best was yet to come though... back-to-back 4-for-4 performances followed on May 31 and June 1st... suddenly Young became the Nats leading candidate for the All-Star Game. He would wind up hitting .377 in June with three homers and 13 RBI's... This past Sunday, the All Star Game reserves were announced and Young had made it as the Nats lone representative! For someone that has gone through so much this past year, it was certainly nice to see this happen. Yesterday, he was the star of the Nats 6-0 victory over the Chicago Cubs as he hit a grand slam home run off of Cubs starter Rich Hill, and went 3-for-4 to raise his batting average to .337. One can only hope that "Da Meat Hook" can continue on this path and lead the Nats to some better times in the second half of the season.

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As for the other games, the great Johan Santana went up against the New York Yankees... early on, it looked like it would be another tough luck outing for Johan as the Yanks held a 2-1 lead though five innings. Michael Cuddyer would drive in a run for the Twins to tie the game in the sixth and Jason Kubel would hit a two run homer off of Mike Mussina in the seventh to knock him out of the game and hand him the loss as the Twins would go on to a 6-2 victory. For Johan, it was just another day at the office as he picked up his 10th victory... Seven innings pitched, two earned runs allowed, four hits, two walks allowed and five strikeouts. Johan will make his next appearance at the All-Star Game in San Francisco next week...

The early games were all enjoyable ones for me yesterday - the Boston Red Sox got a strong six innings from starter Tim Wakefield before he faded in the seventh, giving up four runs before he was pulled against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays... The Red Sox went into the inning with a 7-1 lead, but it ended with them only up 7-5... Manny Delcarmen pitched a strong 1 1/3 innings and Jonathan Papelbon closed things out for his 20th save of the year. "Paps" lowered his ERA to 1.69 with the effort and has only one blown save this year... Like Young and Santana, he will also be making the trip to the city by the Bay next week...

The locals didn't do so well yesterday... both the Angels and Dodgers could only manage two runs a piece as they respectively lost to the Texas Rangers and Atlanta Braves. Marlon Byrd and Frank Catalanotto each led the Rangers with three hits and ex-Dodger Eric Gagne pitched a perfect ninth to record his 11th save of the year in a 4-2 Texas win. Yunel Escobar had three hits, and Jeff Francoeur had two hits to lead the Braves to a 5-2 win over the Dodgers... Andruw Jones truly had a "feast or famine" night, striking out four times, while hitting a solo homer in his other plate appearance... Bob Wickman closed things out in the 9th for his 15th save of the year.

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Happy 4th of July!!!

I just wanted to wish everyone a very safe and happy 4th of July... Our nation's 231st birthday... I hope and pray that each and every one of you remembers what a great gift we have in our freedom and everyone that has given over the years and even today to protect this precious gift we have.

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Soriano returns to D.C.

Although he only played one year in the nation's capital, there's no doubt that Alfonso Soriano made a lasting impression... 46 home runs, 41 stolen bases, 41 doubles, 119 runs, 95 RBI's??? Those are AMAZING numbers... only a select few have hit 40 homers and stolen 40 bases in a single season. Soriano got off to a slow start for his new club, the Chicago Cubs, but lately he has gotten hot. His 11 home runs in the month of June helped him to be selected again the the All Star team and be named NL player of the month for June. Soriano helped stake Cubs starter Ted Lilly to a 7-0 lead at RFK Stadium, going 2-for-5 with an RBI, run and a stolen base as the Cubs cruised to a 7-2 victory over the Washington Nationals. Lilly pitched a very strong seven innings, allowing only a run and three hits, while walking three and striking out five to pick up his 7th win of the year. The suddenly hot Cubs have now won nine of their last ten games, while the Nats have suddenly gone ice cold, losing 12 of their past 16 games. Carlos Zambrano goes for the Cubs tonight while Tim Redding makes his first start for the Nats.

Locally, the Dodgers got the "Lowe-down" again as they took on the Atlanta Braves at Chavez Ravine... For five innings, the game was a great pitching duel between Dodgers' Derek Lowe and Braves ace John Smoltz... Lowe gave up only a run in five effective innings, scattering eight hits while striking out five. Two of those hits came to lead off the top of the sixth inning and with that Lowe was replaced by Joe Beimal, who made some great pitches to get the Dodgers out of the jam. Smoltz was similarly effective, only allowing a run on six hits through the first five frames... Smoltz was cruising along in the sixth inning, getting James Loney to strike out for what should have been the final out of the inning. The pitch however was well out of the strike zone, and got past catcher Brian McCann for a wild pitch. Loney reached base, and then up stepped Matt Kemp. Kemp powered a 1-2 pitch deep into the Dodger bullpen in left field to give the Blue Crew a 3-1 lead. From there, the Dodgers cruised as they put up five more runs off the Braves bullpen in the 7th inning... Catcher Russell Martin celebrated his first All-Star Game selection, leading the Dodgers with four hits. He also stole his 16th base of the season as the Dodgers won 7-2. With the victory, the Dodgers remain a game back of the San Diego Padres in the National League West race...

Lastly, I want to give congratulations to the Rocket, Roger Clemens... he pitched a brilliant eight innings, giving up only two hits and a run, while walking one and striking out four in a 5-1 Yankees win over the Minnesota Twins. The victory was the 350th of Clemens' brilliant career... Even with the victory, the Yankees remain mired in third place, 11 games back of the American League East division leading Boston Red Sox. Kason Gabbard pitched an effective 5 2/3 innings, giving up three runs for the Sox in a 7-3 victory over the Texas Rangers. With the win, the Red Sox remained 10 1/2 games in front of the Toronto Blue Jays in the AL East.

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