Practice day 2

Today was freaking hot, 33 celcius and very very humid.

To see how our water intake was our trainers took our weight before training, and after. I was 95 before, and 94 after, despite drinking over 3+ liters of water. Some guys lost 2 kilo's, some guys gained some. Anyways, even though it was super hot, and I was able to pop a few pictures throughout the practice, and had a couple taken by team staff. Today was a bullpen day, and tomorrow will be light throwing and lots of running, specially since we have 2 practices, including one in the heat of the day. We are looking good, bunt plays went well today, and the new additions to the pitching staff are looking strong and hopefully can help us in the coming games and of course Olympics.

Here's some pictures from practice today.

Cordemans, Van Kampen, and Bergman, catching their breath.

Quite the mountain range in this areaVery nice stadium, but piece of crap feild surface, Dragonflies and Bee's everywherePre-practicePosition players getting their conditioning in.Weigh insNew pitcher Sulbaran, and me, just finished my sit-upsJack Hubbard (former MLB head coach (our 3rd base coach), and our head coach Robert Eenhoorn)Bunt playsBanner on the hotel

Today= super sweaty practice, wilderness walk, Olympic outlook

Hi everyone. Well, today was our first complete day in Korea, first practice, first lunch, first team meeting. I did not realize what kind of extreme humidity we were in for today, but holy crap... this place is a freakin sauna, all day.

Tomorrow, we practice an hour later into the day to get a little more accustommed to the heat, and be punished a bit more, and lose 3 more pounds in water. After that we are planning on heading into the city of Chuncheon, it has some stores and stuff to see I guess.

We also had a long meeting tonight about all the going ons and whatnot of the olympics, what to expect, tell press, doping controls, the village, emergencies, all this stuff, very informative, and I can't wait to arrive.

Just a couple pictures from today...

Nature walk, heading up the stairs (already sweating my ass off) with the whole team in our olympic shwag
Couple guys popping pictures at a lookout point, pretty nice, but dirty looking coastlines with garbage all over
Poor Koreans. I mean, poor Korean ladies.
A little scenery across the water from our hotel
I don't really know why, but I figured my sister would like this one, again Dean, I don't know what I was thinking that when I saw these.

First travel day, Amsterdam -> Korea

We made it. Long journey, but I've been through longer. It was about a 10 and a half hour flight, then we had to wait a good hour for everyone to make it through customs and gather their bags, then on the bus for another 2 hours to Chuncheon. The bus trip included some poker, a crappy driver, and a little napski. Good news is I came second in the poker tourny - doubled up, I didn't puke even though I was car sick for the first time in a looong time, and the nap was a satisfying power nap that's keeping me going right now.

So far what I know about Korea is that this place is friggin muggy, they don't speak chinese, and we have to walk about 10 minutes to get food at a better hotel (every meal while were here except for breakfasts). I am ready to play some baseball. Tomorrow is most likely a bullpen day since we practice our first 4 days here. They are getting us going early too, 10 am practices...whew.

My current dilemma is that my roommate tiny has the only key we get to this crappy room, and you need to plug the key into the wall to get lights and TV in the room. I need a shower, I've taken cold showers before, but never a dark one, I think I might in a minute.

Anywho, it's going to be shower, then off to bed for night one on this wonderful Korean brick bed. Until tomorrow.

Some pics in chronological order=

Everyone saying goodbye and recieving good luck from our families and loved ones

Loek and David pre-flight, giddy as little girlsThis is once we arrived, Percy Isenia (1st base) and 8 of the 9 guys who were on our bus played a little poker tourny the first couple hours on the bus.Our tableMichiel Van Kampen (crazy closer), having a dip, asian style, suprisingly it worked out quite well for himRoel took a shot me passed out, I managed about 6 hours, better then mostView from our hotel window, definetely by far the best part of the hotel, bar none.Waiting to go eat, (L->R Pitching coach Brian Farley, catcher Tjerk Smeets, 7'1" pitcher Loek Van Mil, catcher Sydney de Jong). All wearing different Olympic shirtsSameCouple Neptunus boys, (L->R Eugene Kingsale( centerfield), SS Jeroes Sluijter, Lefty Diego Markwell). Neptunus is my club team in HollandOn the trek to the other hotel to eat, don't mind the dome at the bottom of the pic, I thought I sropped it out, but am too lazy right now to go back and fix itDinner. Our team and staff, and the ladies rowing, and men's cycling were eating also.

Olympic roommate

Martijn Meeuwis. How can I explain this guy... He's unique. What you see is what you get, black and white, laid back, genuine. Those are the first words I can come up with.

Martijn or "Tiny" as we like to call him is the catcher for my club team, but has been reinstated with the national team as a outfielder/bullpen catcher. He weights about 165 soaking wet, is made out of wire, and has the best arm of any catcher I've ever played with. He's hitting .340 or so right now, and has thrown out over 50% of baserunners, while leading the league in triples.

Tiny has been my roommate for 2 tournaments, one with Neptunus, and one with the national team. Funny coincedence is that in both of those tournaments I didn't give up a run. We'll see if there's still some magic there! knock on wood...

He just found out wednesday that he will be a Olympian, he was only guy on the maybe list because the team was waiting to find out if Roger Bernadina a Triple A outfeilder with the Washington Nationals (MLB) would be released, he wasn't. He was slated to come to Korea for the exhibition games after which the coach would make a decision as to him coming to the olympics or not. We decided a couple weeks ago to be roommates again since both our current roommates at that time we're cut.

Looking forward to experiencing the olympics with this guy.

Picture was taken about 2 minutes after he got the really good news wednesday. He threw in a celebratory chew and hit the feild.

This is tiny and I at the beginning of the season awards ceremony, he was last years' MVP, and I received the best pitcher crown.

Stepping up the blog for the Olympics

Alright, so I've told a few people here and there, but spread the word that I plan on keeping a daily blog while I'm in Korea for pre-Olympics, then Beijing for the Olympic games. I've got 2 camera's, lot's of digital memory, a laptop, tons of wires (even though we get wireless in the Olympic Villiage), and lots of downtime, so I think I have what it takes to stay up with the blog daily.

I'll do my best to keep pictures flowing, give you the ups and downs of each day, new experiences, and whatever else happens. Can't wait.

Hope you enjoy.

Some Honkbalweek pics

July 4-13 in Haarlem, Netherlands. Us, The Netherlands national team hosted and international baseball tournament. We played like shit, but most of the guys on the team had the imminent and much more important Olympics in Beijing on our minds. Here's a few pics from that week

Lange tijd

I know I know... it's been over a month since my last post. Which means I feel bad about that, and I will be putting up a lot in the near future. I have been granted a spot on the Dutch Olympic baseball team roster, so I will be there in about a week, and I will be blogging, I will try to make is daily or bi-daily, but pictures will be included... so stay tuned!!

Couple no-hitter pictures

A couple of seconds after the final out (grounder to third) I get swamped by my team... an amacing moment for me.

We had a couple random, quick, hard rain showers throughout the game.

Kinda cool pic taken a couple days before thursday June 12.

The last batter, At about 123 pitches here, check the scoreboard.

My first No-hitter

Last night was bliss.

1 to 4

It was my 9th start of the year, chasing the 7-0 mark on this night, and after the first inning I did not have good stuff. Okay the first inning was fine, 3 up 3 down, 2 k's, but the second inning took 29 pitches, and was straight up ugly; this is the point when I figured, ok, let's just get through 5 innings, keep the team in the game, and see what happens from there. After that I started setteling down, found my groove a little bit, and despite a couple of walks and hit by pithes, made it through 4 innings giving up 2 runs, partially because of errors, and my own rare foolish mishap (man on 3rd 1 out, comebacker I went to first, he scored, should never happened, but I'd like to say, I played off my stupidity like a champ).

5 to 9

After the 4th, I started to pitch instead of throw. Nobody reached base from the 5th on, I believe I/my defence retired the last 16-17 batters faced.

Pre no-no realization

I looked up at the scoreboard in about the 4th, and that's when I first realized "what the hell, they don't have a hit yet?" This, one of the top hitting teams in our league, an explosive offense, and they managed their 2 runs without a hit. Then I reflected some more, and realized... huh, I guess not, weird. That's about all I wanted to think about at that point because we were down 2-1. Then I started pitching, hitting spots, my pitches seemed to start moving more then before, and I got grounder after grounder. After I threw the 7th, I found myself back checking out the scoreboard briefly as I had in the previous couple innings. Huh, still no hits. At that point, just after the 7th is when it dawned on me, I could potentially throw a no-no against these guys. At that very point, I almost got choked up a little, thinking about it. So many times I have been so close. I have thrown a bunch of one hitters in the past 5-7 years, always dreaming about the elusive no-hitter.

Then came the ninth. I wasn't as nervous as you would think, I figured, it they get a hit, they will deserve it because I am going to make all my pitches, which I did except for one. The first out was a lazy grounder to our secondbaseman Benji, I managed to jam their cleanup hitter, and national team catcher to get the first out. Next up was the ageless wonder Fausto Alvarez. A former cuban national team star, and last years league MVP was on my get-me-over-first-strike curveball and hit it hard to the outfield where our right fielder Lenny slid and made a great play to save my ass. The last out was their right fielder, I know how to get him out, and knew if I made my pitches I was golden. I'm not really sure which pitch in the at bat it was, but he rolled over on a slider, and Raily threw him out from third.

At that point, elated crazyness took over. Glove went flying, the first person I wanted to hug was my cather Martijn, he derserved half of the credit for sure. But I ran into my first baseman Jeffrey at full speed and then the whole team came out. It was something I have always dreamed of, such a perfect moment.

Post no-no realization

It took me a little bit to finally gain my bearings, and sort of come to terms with what had just happened. After a bunch of hugs, and handshakes from teammates, loyal fans and my wife, I went into the locker room to drink a couple beers and have a shower, and shoot the shit with my teammates and coaches about the game. I ended up getting a beer shower first from my short stop Jeroen and our aussie closer Roo, but it felt so good (and cold).



Today I am going to run, like prefontaine. 125 pitches is about 20 more than any game I've thrown all year, so I need to work it out of the arm by running my freaking ass off. Time to run off the ugliest, but most satisfying no-hitter ever.

slacking blogger and a - C

You may not have understood the title, but the - C stands for the lack of actually having a C on our keyboard at the time being. Despite having 2 c's in the opening sentence, we lack the actual key "c" on the keyboard, it kind of got broken a few weeks back, we don't really know how, we woke up, and the keyboard was just lacking a C, shitty, we know.

Anywho, I know, I've been slacking on the bloggage, and that's my bad. What you've missed this week= I got win #6 personally, and am now 6-0 with a 1.17 era which is pretty okay, and is 2nd in the league. I'm sitting behind a guy whose 7-0 with a 2.20 era... also 2 pitchers have lower era's but possess lower then 4 wins a piece. My team is now sitting in first place also, tied for point with the 2 time defending champ Kinheim, but we are 3-1 vs. those buggers this year, so no matter what, we are ahead of them this season if our records are similar.

Also, my wife and I have been looking at our future, and trying to decide whats the best option for us in the upcoming months, and years. What it's currently looking like is that she will head to Canada in August while I'm supposedly at the Olympics (don't wan't to jinx) and she'll coach softball nightly at an indoor clinic, and I will meet up with her in October in Oklahoma with her possesion's back at her home in dewey, Ok... should be a sweet semi-cross-country trip.

I think that's about it for this blog... Any questions and or comments are always welcome.