The sights of a hot April weekend in Cincinnati

By TheNaturalMevs on April 27, 2009

We were lucky enough to land a pair of Scout Seats behind home plate for last Friday night’s home game against the Atlanta Braves and we had four seats in Club 4192 on Saturday afternoon.

The Reds did not play well, so we had to try and see what we could see to make it an enjoyable trip.

Got to the ballpark early and took in a little batting practice for the first time this season. This is a pretty relaxing experience. It goes way too fast. Nothing more beautiful then watching a few pearls be sunk in some red seats and in areas that they should be hit. We also figured that we should get a shot of Chipper Jones on the site since he’s a future Hall of Famer. Definitely the kind of player you’ll want to be able to prove to your grandkids you saw him play, right? Well, there’s proof.

Here’s scouts alley. Remember that old San Francisco Giants scout that was in the scout seats during our last visit there? He was there again in the exact same seat. The four men in view in this picture are also scouts. There was six total. Nothing better then picking the brain of a scout.

A montage of Jay Bruce appeared on the big screen. The old Giants scout was watching it and we said in between innings as he focused:

Do you think he (Bruce) is going to be a pretty good ballplayer?

Scout: “Uh, yeah. I think he already is. He’s definitely going places in this game.”

After that we left the scouts alone and just listened to them talk about how Javier Vasquez has dirty breaking stuff (slider) and how he should be much tougher to hit then he is.

Another first on the list crossed off. First time we’ve ever been at a ballgame and the benches have cleared. Reds and Braves benches cleared after Yunel Escobar got a doink job from Edison Volquez on friday night. It was definitely intentional. While it was not a “brawl” by definition, it was a moment of excitement.

Here’s Edison Volquez warming up before the game. Guy is fun to watch throw but after a great start in which he allowed no hits through 3 2/3 innings and struck out a hand full of Braves hitters, he walked guys until the point we wanted to choke him.

Here’s a shot of the bar in Club 4192 from saturday. Decorated with Jack Daniels bottles. If you’ve never been to the club, it’s really a lot of fun on a sun-intense hot day. You can stay in the shade if you need to. You can go inside. But the food in the club? They’re taking the easy way out and trying to make a buck. For $85 you are getting a choice of jumbalaya, nachos, burgers, LaRosa’s Pizza, or some subpar ice cream and fountain drinks. It’s went downhill since we sat there a few years ago. It’s definitely not equal to the experience at Jacob’s Progressive Field.

The view from the club seats in Cincinnati is actually pretty sweet. You can see the whole field with ease and the trajectory of home run balls are a lot more fun from a view like this. Or if you’re a Reds fan on a day like saturday when the Braves hit the ball all over the yard it’s less fun because you can really tell when something is leaving the park.

Here’s a view of Jay Bruce at the plate against Derek Lowe. We predicted that he’d homer for the first time ever while we were present at the park on saturday and we were almost right. He went 1 for 3 with a double off the wall. Missed it by a few feet.

And Dusty Baker and Jerry Hairston Jr. got tossed. Gotta say, I like that Dusty Baker doesn’t mind getting tossed when he doesn’t agree with something. There are managers that will never get tossed, and Dusty got his money’s worth on this day. He continued his tantrum in the dugout even afterwards.