Elson gets to show off handiwork When Arkansas Travelers broadcaster Phil Elson finally needed his glove at Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rock, he didn’t have a chance to break it out.
No matter. Elson turned out to have pretty good hands anyway.
In the span of 10 pitches during the first game of Monday’s doubleheader with San Antonio, Elson caught two foul balls barehanded — one with his right, one with his left — to end a drought that had existed since the ballpark opened April 12, 2007.
Foul balls have flown in clusters through open press box windows on either side of Elson’s booth and have sent people ducking almost from Dickey-Stephens’ inaugural pitch. While the damage has been repaired, there were once dents in the wall in the back of the visiting broadcaster’s booth and a dented rail behind the upper deck of the print media and scorekeeper’s side.
Elson, who keeps a battered baseball glove in his booth and works with the windows open no matter what the temperature, could only look to his left and right in envy.
Not anymore.
“Who would think that the same seat would get a foul ball twice in the same inning or even in the same game at a minor league ballpark, or any kind of ballpark for that matter ?” Elson said. “So to have two in the same 10 pitches come right at me is the kicker. It’s cool enough to catch the thing, especially in front of a couple thousand people.... But then when the second one comes back and it’s the same thing, it’s kind of surreal.” Elson was standing when the first ball came in and, trying to protect his computer, he snagged it despite holding a pencil in his right hand. The second, which Elson said was even more surprising, he caught with his left, bobbled and pinned against his body.
They were the first catches made in the press box and the plays drew a standing ovation from the crews on either side of Elson’s booth. The second catch even prompted an abbreviated wave from the group of scorekeepers, writers, photographers, Internet statisticians and assorted hangers-on to Elson’s right.
“I was still basking in the glow of the first one when the second one surprised me even more than the first one did,” Elson said.
Elson was an all-city catcher during his high school days in Pittsburgh and won the league batting crown as a senior. Since coming to Arkansas in 2001, Elson has shown his athletic ability mainly by throwing leftover press box food at unsuspecting victims — usually with alarming accuracy —after games.
It was good to prove he could still handle baseballs as well as he does hot dog buns, Elson said.
“I never question that I’ve lost any of my hand-to-eye coordination, but to have realworld experience on that now is great,” Elson said.
Adhering to Travelers tradition, Elson gently dropped both of his caught baseballs to kids in the stands.
“I can have a ball any day I want,” said Elson, who clearly does. Recalling the count Newest Arkansas Travelers outfielder Brian Stavisky is no stranger to the odd twists and turns of a Texas League title chase.
A few years ago, Stavisky witnessed one of the oddest turns personally.
Stavisky, signed as a free agent by the Los Angeles Angels after six years in the Oakland Athletics organization, joined the Travs on May 29. He arrived in time to help Arkansas in its pursuit of the Northwest Arkansas Naturals in the Texas League North Division first-half race.
Entering Friday, Arkansas was two games behind firstplace Northwest Arkansas.
As a member of the 2005 Midland RockHounds, Stavisky played in the Texas League Championship Series against Arkansas and, Sept. 16 at Ray Winder Field, he had a ringside seat for the final pitch and umpire Steve Fritzoni’s infamous “4-2 count.” Midland led 6-5 entering the bottom of the ninth and, with two out, Arkansas had Jason Aspito at the plate and Texas League hits leader Erick Aybar on deck. Fritzoni lost track of the count and would not allow Aspito to take his base after Aspito drew ball four, Aspito struck out on the next pitch and the on-field party began for Midland.
“It’s kind of a weird situation,” said Stavisky, who had an RBI single and scored twice in the final game. “I kind of feel bad for the umpire to have that hanging on his head the whole off-season, that being the deciding championship game. It was a weird ending, but I’m glad it worked out for us.” Things ended up all right for Fritzoni, who was promoted to Class AAA the next year. There was no guarantee it would have worked out for the Travelers even if Aspito had been awarded his base, Stavisky said. “It should have been ball four with a guy on base,” Stavisky said. “I think the situation was two outs, nobody on and that would have put a guy on. I would like to have thought, whether there was a walk or whatever happened there, that we would have won anyway. That’s kind of how I feel, that we would have won anyway.” Noting the votes Texas League midseason All-Star balloting is restricted to managers, broadcasters and newspaper beat writers, who are allowed to vote only on players within the division they cover, but cannot include players from the home team. While that keeps the voting objective, it can sometimes lead to a few surprises.
The Arkansas Travelers had four players named to the North Division team for the All-Star game against the South on June 25 at Hammons Field in Springfield, Mo.
Manager Bobby Magallanes was pleased with the selection of catcher Ben Johnson (11 home runs, 46 RBI ), and pitchers Kevin Jepsen (2-1, 1. 57 ERA, 10 saves ), Dan Denham (4-5, 3. 02 ERA ) and Robert Mosebach (4-3, 3. 53 ERA ).
But Magallanes was disappointed right fielder Jordan Czarniekci and shortstop Hainley Statia didn’t make the cut. Czarniecki is a free-agent pickup whose. 316 average is among the Texas League’s top 10 and Statia, batting just. 237, stands out in a weak shortstop field thanks to his. 979 fielding percentage.
“I think a couple guys were worthy of making it,” Magallanes said Friday. “Czarniecki definitely. He’s in the top 10 in hitting. To me, that was a tough one to accept because what does a guy have to do get to the All-Star game when he’s in the top 10 in hitting ?
“ Another guy I thought was pretty deserving was Statia. I know his offensive numbers weren’t that good, but you look at his slugging percentage [. 330 ] and RBI [18 ] compared to the other shortstops in the league and they were pretty good. And he was probably the best defensive shortstop in the league by far.” Nodding in approval Northwest Arkansas Naturals Manager Brian Poldberg has been in baseball a long time, but he’s never had his likeness on a bobblehead doll until Saturday.
The Naturals gave out 2, 500 Poldberg bobbleheads to fans before their game against the visiting Arkansas Travelers. Poldberg received a few of the dolls before the game — one sits on his desk — and said he was amused with the way it looks. The bobblehead Poldberg wears a home white jersey, and features his signature mustache. “You can only do so much with what you’ve got to work with, so they did a pretty good job,” said Poldberg, laughing. “I sent some home and [my children ] just laughed. They thought it was pretty cool.” Northwest Arkansas is giving away another 2, 500 bobblehead dolls Saturday, June 21, when it hosts the Travelers. That night, the bobblehead will be of the Naturals’ mascot, Strike the Sasquatch.
No explanation Neither Northwest Arkansas Naturals Manager Brian Poldberg nor Arkansas Travelers Manager Bobby Magallanes has any idea why their teams’ series has been so one-sided in favor of the home team.
The home team won the first 10 times the Naturals and Travelers met this season, and after Northwest Arkansas won Wednesday, the home team improved to 12-1.
What makes that statistic even more remarkable is that the games have been extremely close. Five of the first 13 were decided by a run and all but three were decided by three runs or fewer.
“Right now, it’s just luck,” Poldberg said. “The last time they were here, they could have won two or three of those games, and when we’ve been down there we could have won three or four of the eight we’ve played down there. It’s just happened that way.” Magallanes agreed that there was no obvious explanation for the home team’s dominance, other than the fact that the teams are built similarly. Entering Friday, both teams had scored 251 runs, and the number of runs they had allowed was just four apart.
“It’s just baseball,” Magallanes said. “You’ve got two teams that are similar with good pitching, good defense and there’s some power in the middle of their lineup, which we’ve got as well.” BY THE NUMBERS 2 Foul balls caught by Arkansas Travelers broadcaster Phil Elson in the same inning Monday 4 Arkansas Travelers selected to the Texas League All-Star roster 7 Northwest Arkansas Naturals named All-Stars 24 Players on each Texas League All-Star team 36 Times the Travelers and Naturals have been caught stealing, the most in the league, although Northwest Arkansas has 31 more stolen bases 39. 1 Percent of would-be base stealers who have been successful against Naturals catcher Adam Donachie, who has thrown out 14 of 23 runners
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