For all your PawSox needs, visit Baseball Heavy. In the meantime, click to aggrandize these shots I took at McCoy Stadium last night.
Pretty funny logo on this dude's shirt. The Buffalo Bisons are the Indians' AAA team.

John Halama has a job. It's with the Bisons.

I got to the stadium pretty early, so I walked around and took some shots of the place while I waited for Kim to arrive. Here's Marty Barrett in the parking lot. For more ex-player shots, go to the gallery from the PawSox game I went to last year.

The back of the grandstand.

Looking down at the winding walkway--be careful on that top level!

View from the first base side.

The big tent down the right field line.

Another stadium shot. It was, like, 100 degrees, but we were in the shade.

The crowd wasn't too much bigger than this when the game started.

I love this standings board! Get the ladder!

Looking through the tunnel.

Clay Buchholz was starting for Pawtucket. Got a bunch of pre-game shots of him, some of which will go un-captioned. I love the shadows at this park!




Despite limited advertisement, it was indeed "Red Sox Legends Night." Legend number one was Tommy Harper. Great to see that the Red and Paw Sox have welcomed him with open arms lately, as opposed to the old days when he was treated like dirt for not being white. Legend number two was fan- and me-favorite Lou Merloni.

Again, these shadows rule.

Clay on the mound.

Sometimes-major leaguer Jason Tyner is retied to start the game. Chad "C-Spann" Spann makes the play. I hope he leaves the organization and comes back for the CSPANN-2 nickname.

More Double-H action.

Clay's shadow, taller than his so-oo-oul.

My man Joe Thurston! It was effing hot.

Joe can pop up at any level, unfortunately.

Clam, crab, cockle, Lowrie.

I assume this coach is former major leaguer and Sparky Anderson-favorite Torey Lovullo, or as I used to call him back when I was just a real-life person and blogs didn't exist, "Torey Love You High, Love You Low."

I love the number 80. It's not seen too often in the sport of baseball. Nice job by this Bison. You know I actually have a friend who is a Buffalo Bisons fan? At least he was in middle school. I think he had family up there, because he was also a Bills fan.

My last Fenway game was Chris Carter's MLB debut. He's back in AAA now. I love watching his quirks when he's up. He does a little fly-swat move with his hands. And of course, he does it every time, the exact same way. He would hit a dong in this game, the only real offense for the PawSox.

Dusty Brown. At one point the sky was kind of a dusty brown while his name was up on the scoreboard in front of it.

Shadows at about the longest they can go before the sun goes down.

Crazy cloud.

Jon Van Every up.

Night falls on the smallest state. Joe Thurston's at the plate.

Another sky shot.

The PawSox' submariner, Jose Vaquedano.

Kim headed for home in the eighth, and I headed for better seats, though we could've done this at any time. This dude is Aaron Herr. After going through the standard Aaron Burr jokes, it hit me. When I was a kid, the Cardinals had Tommy Herr. I said to Kim, I wonder if this is Tom Herr's kid. He proceeded to smash a double to right-center off Clay, at which point I said, Oh yeah, this is Tom Herr's kid. He'd add another hit and, shortly after I took this pic, a mega-dong to left. I can't figure out his tattoo, but it looks like it could be "DISCIPLE." Oh, and I looked it up to make sure, and yes, it's Tommy Herr's boy.

Chris Smith, whose pic I took at Fenway when he was called up (he never got in a game) recently, closed out the game for Pawtucket. He entered to Pennywise's wordy but heartfelt "anthem," Bro Hymn. (I put anthem in quotes because I only count a song as an anthem when it happens organically. That song was clearly written for the purposes of becoming an anthem. But I'm not knockin' 'em, it is about people who died and stuff--and later the guy who wrote it died, giving new meaning to the tune.) Chris is from SoCal, home of Pennywise, so maybe he was a surf/skate-nu-punk growing up in the 90s. Or maybe the song was picked at random, I have no clue.

Moon over McCoy. By the end all you could hear was the group of guys who'd obnoxiously shout out stupid things on each batter, like, "Hey 22, you know what to do!" In classic-me style, those guys were three rows behind me. If there's one asshole among thousands, they'll find me, and stand right behind me. They were actually part of the reason I moved to different seats. But it was dead silent by the last batter, so their unoriginal taunts were heard by the whole city.

They interviewed Aaron Herr after the game, and these two dudes, not much younger than me, ran down to the front row and started yelling at him while he was trying to hear the questions! It was like the Pawtucket Gang or something. And they had a couple more friends waiting for them when they finished their heckling! They seemed genuinely mad that some guy would come in to their park and beat their team and then answer questions when asked. It was weird. Final score: Buffalo 10, Pawtucket 3.