Press box view
Posted on February 21st, 2008 – 5:31 PMBy Joe Christensen
FORT MYERS — Regular readers of this blog have heard me complain a few times about certain aspects of the job. The occasional travel snafu. The stress of competition. Time spent away from family.
But the sun is setting here at Hammond Stadium, and all I can do is stare at this field. George Toma has been out grooming the infield for hours. I think he’s done for the day, but who could be sure?
The Twins won’t even play a Grapefruit League game here for another week. But George is out there every day, from dawn until dusk, working on that field.
Sometimes, he’ll drop his rake and pick up a tiny rock, throwing it to the side. His three-word motto is, “And then some.” As in, do the job, and then some. I think he takes longer breaks now than he used to, but he still outworks everyone here.
I’m no Marlin Levinson (the Star Tribune photographer down here with us, sending those amazing shots back to the paper). I took this photo with my phone and just discovered that I can e-mail it to myself and then input it into the blog. (Randball has been doing this since he could walk.)
Not sure if the camera phone does it justice, but that is about the greenest green I can imagine. You’ll note the bigger batter’s eye in center field. They have about doubled the size this year. I’m assuming they’ll screw up that outfield wall soon enough with advertisements, but it sure looks sweet without them.
During the day, they are putting fresh coats of paint on walls here. The faded old seats have been replaced with new ones, forest green.
Anyway, for these six weeks of spring training, this is generally the view from my press box “office.” I hate how that sounds. As a Minnesotan, I have a hard time rubbing any of this in to the folks back home, slogging through winter. Consider this a quick postcard from Fort Myers. And yes, Mom & Dad, I’m having fun.
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