Knights Scoreboard on April 11

That should tell you a fair amount about the game.  The Knights (AAA of the White Sox) only faced the minimum number of Gwinnett batters in the first, eighth and ninth innings. Gwinnett is the AAA affiliate for the Atlanta Braves.  The problem was mostly pitching.  Jonathan Marquez, pitcher for the Knights, had poor pitch selection, throwing 88 mph fastballs to fastball hitters.   He left the game in the second, after pitching to the each batter in the line-up.  The story stayed about the same, no matter who the pitcher was.

The stadium was nice.  Quite large, though typical for AAA.  The concourses are wide, and big enough that many food carts offering non-typical baseball fare were set-up.  The concourse is open to the field, too, so you never leave feel like you have left the game.  At the end of the concourse, down the right field line is a play area for kids, which includes an antique carousal.  Just in front of that area, is a big grassy hill/picnic area where kids ran around for nearly the entire 4 hour game.

The stadium also had a number of suites, and a large restaurant area on the top floor- though I don’t believe the restaurant was open to the public.  The staff was very helpful, especially Ryan from the box office who came to track me down when I left my car keys sitting outside the window.

The team doesn’t do a lot between innings.  There was a poorly executed dizzy bat race– the worst one I have ever seen because they didn’t make the contestants keep their heads on the bat.  They also had a couple of other events, but really all seemed a little half hearted.  On this level of baseball, the game should be able to sustain itself.  Forget the sponsor of the rubber suit joust- get someone to sponsor the scoreboard repair, so fans can actually read the players names.  Or change the light bulbs in the pitch speed sign, so that one might actually be able to read the number.  At one point, I couldn’t tell if it said 58, or 88.

The fans were into the game.  Even with the score.  They were cheering wildly for the 3rd out, after it became clear that those were quite tough for the Knights to get.  One fan, near the end, yelled over to the scouts- “Scouts- send all these guys back to AA”.  Which I have to say was more amusing then telling the players they suck.  The scout actually from the White Sox was not amused.

Here is a shot of the stadium without players– perhaps the way it should have stayed last night.

Knights Stadium

Tonight I’ll see the Durham Bulls.