2/08/2009
In case you missed it...
You can relive the pre-Olympics, and Olympic games through my pictures and blogs here. Unfortunately each blog doesn't get it's own page, but if you scroll down just past the halfway point on this link's page you'll be around the pre-Olympic blogs' beginning. Hope you enjoy(ed)!
2/04/2009
The New Mitt
I have already fallen in love with this one, and I can't close it more than 1 inch from where it's at right now. This is the second custom made glove I have received from SSK. They have been sponsoring the national team with gloves and some other equipment since the day we won the European championships and qualified for the Beijing Olympics.
In case you are not familiar with baseball there are many different kinds of gloves. Outfielders use long big gloves, infielders usually go with shorter wider gloves, first basemen have a combination of a catcher’s glove and outfielder’s glove, long and designed to pick and hold in scooped ball from the dirt. Catchers have a smaller round, well padded glove. Pitchers normally use gloves a lot like this one I just got, medium size, closed webbing to hide the ball and pitch grip in the glove, and can form the glove however they want (meaning it doesn't need to be long like the outfielder or flat like the infielders). There's your glove lesson for the day, I could go in depth a whole lot more, but this is a solid idea for anyone who doesn't know gloves (so, pretty much for you mom).
I'll only be utilizing this glove while pitching for the national team, so it won't see as much action as my other 2 gloves. Now I need to go to work on it. This puppy needs to be game ready in 3 weeks, time to shaving-cream the crap out of it.
Yea, I added 6 pictures of it. Too many? probably, but I'm like a kid on Christmas morning with this one.
In case you are not familiar with baseball there are many different kinds of gloves. Outfielders use long big gloves, infielders usually go with shorter wider gloves, first basemen have a combination of a catcher’s glove and outfielder’s glove, long and designed to pick and hold in scooped ball from the dirt. Catchers have a smaller round, well padded glove. Pitchers normally use gloves a lot like this one I just got, medium size, closed webbing to hide the ball and pitch grip in the glove, and can form the glove however they want (meaning it doesn't need to be long like the outfielder or flat like the infielders). There's your glove lesson for the day, I could go in depth a whole lot more, but this is a solid idea for anyone who doesn't know gloves (so, pretty much for you mom).
I'll only be utilizing this glove while pitching for the national team, so it won't see as much action as my other 2 gloves. Now I need to go to work on it. This puppy needs to be game ready in 3 weeks, time to shaving-cream the crap out of it.
Yea, I added 6 pictures of it. Too many? probably, but I'm like a kid on Christmas morning with this one.
2/03/2009
WBC
The World Baseball Classic site recently posted all of the preliminary rosters for the 2009 World Baseball Classic.
Here's the numbers. Preliminary rosters consist of 45 players, which will eventually be cut down to a necessary 28 for the tournament by February 26. Our roster has 20 pitchers, 5 catchers, 12 infielders, and 8 outfielders. From that, they need to choose a mondatory 13 pitchers, I'm thinking 3 catchers, 7 infielders and 5 outfielders... give or take one from each of those groups (except for the take part from the pitchers). Our coaching staff has some tough decisions to make in the near future. Saturday they are to cut 7 players and come up with a roster of 38 that will travel to Florida on our 2 week pre-WBC training period in Bradenton, the spring training home of the Pittsburg Pirates. For the pitchers that they take, all will get to throw one inning in the first 2 exhibition games we play vs. the university teams to give the staff a small sample of what they can do.
We have a roster with 4 current major league pitchers, and the Seatle Mariners and Washington Nationals top prospects (outfielders Grag Halman and Rogear Bernadina). Of the 45 players on the roster 23 are from the dutch Headclass league, and 22 are on professional clubs. 31 have played or are currently in professional baseball.
Anyways, we play in a pool with the Domincan Republic, Puerto Rico, and Panama. These are 3 teams full of major leaguers, especially the team we face first, the Dominican Republic. This team includes such major league all-stars as Alex Rodriguez, Albert Pujols, Alfonso Soriano, Pedro Martinez, Vladimir Guerrero and a team full of recognizable names. I think they will all underestimate us, which is excellent. If we can win one of our first 2 games (which we pretty much need to since it's double elimination), I honestly think we have a chance at being one of the top 2 teams in our bracket.
You can check out all the rosters here.
We're heading out in 2 weeks for a couple weeks of WBC spring training, and hopefully after 3 exhibition games versus major league team right before our bracket begins march 7, we'll be ready to go... watch out.
2/02/2009
The first Tattoo
Yessir, I got me a tatty. I was blessed enough to be able to participate in the summer Olympics this past year, so I figured this was as good a time as any to come up with a sybolic tattoo. Who better to ask to draw the idea than my dad, he's been my lifelong pitching coach, took me to all of my practices and games year round growing up, and on top of that he's a very gifted artist. He came up with about 100 sketches until we finally decided on a mix of a bunch to come out with the final product. I asked him to put in several symbols which he did well. I wanted to have the Canadian flag represented for where I was born and raised and where the baseball career began, I also wanted the Dutch flag, for who I participated in the Olympics with. On top of that something to do with baseball, and the Olympic rings too. He came up with an abstract stick figure of me in my pitching motion and added it to the middle of the tattoo beautifully. Check it out...
First of all, we were the nerds that showed up at the tattoo place 5 minutes before they opened, so we were the first customers of the day. We got in after driving to get a orange juice and some cash for the tattoo down the street and came back to 'Eyewitness tattoos + piercings'. I went in hoping I could find a fella names Jake who did Shorty's back last year with the vine and flowers, but he had moved to Missouri to work at some other place. So, the first artist I talked to was a guy named Psycho. Yep, Psycho. He looked his name, and sounded like it too with his very low, drawn out, mono-tone, southern pronunciation of everything he was saying... until he found something funny and burst into a nervous-sounding, out of character laugh. I came in and showed Psycho the artwork my dad had put together after hours and hours of his sketches and pre-drawings, and he sketches out his own version, which was pretty much a photo-copy of my dads work, and I was happy about that.
After 25 minutes of setting up and my own nervousness sitting next to him watching all the preps and what not he got under way. It took just under an hour and wasn't nearly as painful as I had expected. He has been doing tattoo's for over 20 years, and you could tell by the slow and controlled hand movements while applying the artwork that he was a pro.
It turned out exactly as I had hoped, it's a spitting image of his sketch, and bring together all the symbols I wanted to portray beautifully.
So this was a big day for me, and I am proud to now wear a symbol like this on my right forearm.
Tattoo day, we were there a bit before they opened, so Shorty and I just chilled in the parking lot, apparently I'm getting a little nervous here.
Last picture of bare right forearm *sobs*.
Getting the black outline done, my first taste of a tattoo gun. I pretty much prepared myself for the worst, and it wasn't nearly as bad as I figured it would be painwise.
This is Psycho...
First photo of the finished product
Full body shot to get an idea of where it's at on my arm.
First of all, we were the nerds that showed up at the tattoo place 5 minutes before they opened, so we were the first customers of the day. We got in after driving to get a orange juice and some cash for the tattoo down the street and came back to 'Eyewitness tattoos + piercings'. I went in hoping I could find a fella names Jake who did Shorty's back last year with the vine and flowers, but he had moved to Missouri to work at some other place. So, the first artist I talked to was a guy named Psycho. Yep, Psycho. He looked his name, and sounded like it too with his very low, drawn out, mono-tone, southern pronunciation of everything he was saying... until he found something funny and burst into a nervous-sounding, out of character laugh. I came in and showed Psycho the artwork my dad had put together after hours and hours of his sketches and pre-drawings, and he sketches out his own version, which was pretty much a photo-copy of my dads work, and I was happy about that.
After 25 minutes of setting up and my own nervousness sitting next to him watching all the preps and what not he got under way. It took just under an hour and wasn't nearly as painful as I had expected. He has been doing tattoo's for over 20 years, and you could tell by the slow and controlled hand movements while applying the artwork that he was a pro.
It turned out exactly as I had hoped, it's a spitting image of his sketch, and bring together all the symbols I wanted to portray beautifully.
So this was a big day for me, and I am proud to now wear a symbol like this on my right forearm.
Tattoo day, we were there a bit before they opened, so Shorty and I just chilled in the parking lot, apparently I'm getting a little nervous here.
Last picture of bare right forearm *sobs*.
Getting the black outline done, my first taste of a tattoo gun. I pretty much prepared myself for the worst, and it wasn't nearly as bad as I figured it would be painwise.
This is Psycho...
First photo of the finished product
Full body shot to get an idea of where it's at on my arm.
Back at it...
I'm back.
I flew into Amsterdam yesterday morning on a very uneventful, sleep-filled flight. I've arrived a month and a half earlier this year than the past 2 seasons to begin team practices with the Oranje (semi-formal team name). I'm here so early because of several reasons. First off, I wanted to practice with the national team for a bit, and be able to travel with the team because I find that important. Secondly, my personal long toss program was set back about a month due to a rediculous amount of snow in Vancouver. It finally melted by the start of the new year, and I was able to get out and throw on sloppy wet fields to begin my arm workouts. I figured the earlier I could get here the more training I would be able to get in.
Tonight is my first practice with the Oranje, running practice. I will be getting in daily weightlifting workouts on my own, as well as 6 days a week of team training. Tonight is running practice, tomorrow night is team weightlifting, and then wednesday is an indoor team practice. We have 2 days off from the national team per week, and those days are filled with Neptunus practices (club team in Holland).
I just saw our pre-WBC (world Baseball Classic) schedule from arrival in Florida in 2 weeks until game time. 2 a days should be a excellent, specially in the heat of Bradenton (southern Florida).
Check out our schedule on the Dutch Honkbalsite (Baseball site), the article is in Dutch, but it's not hard to figure out, just click here to see what we're in for in 16 days.
I flew into Amsterdam yesterday morning on a very uneventful, sleep-filled flight. I've arrived a month and a half earlier this year than the past 2 seasons to begin team practices with the Oranje (semi-formal team name). I'm here so early because of several reasons. First off, I wanted to practice with the national team for a bit, and be able to travel with the team because I find that important. Secondly, my personal long toss program was set back about a month due to a rediculous amount of snow in Vancouver. It finally melted by the start of the new year, and I was able to get out and throw on sloppy wet fields to begin my arm workouts. I figured the earlier I could get here the more training I would be able to get in.
Tonight is my first practice with the Oranje, running practice. I will be getting in daily weightlifting workouts on my own, as well as 6 days a week of team training. Tonight is running practice, tomorrow night is team weightlifting, and then wednesday is an indoor team practice. We have 2 days off from the national team per week, and those days are filled with Neptunus practices (club team in Holland).
I just saw our pre-WBC (world Baseball Classic) schedule from arrival in Florida in 2 weeks until game time. 2 a days should be a excellent, specially in the heat of Bradenton (southern Florida).
Check out our schedule on the Dutch Honkbalsite (Baseball site), the article is in Dutch, but it's not hard to figure out, just click here to see what we're in for in 16 days.
2/01/2009
Road trip album
Click on them to enlarge pictures of our road trip home... trust me, it's worth it...
Road Trip Repeat
Well, we are crazy. We drove over 5500 miles (over 9000 km) on the way to and from Vancouver from Tulsa... and to Tulsa also, I, guess. 2 times the same trip in 3 months... yes, crazy... but awesome. Unfortunately but understandably my sister couldn't join us for this trip like she did in on the first trip, but we managed to somehow pull ourselves together and make it without her.
Shorty and I headed out January 22, and arrived on the 28th in Tulsa. We followed pretty much the same route as we had on the initial trip north, except for the trip through Las Vegas and Death Valley. Shorty and I had a solid pace going, we drove approximately 550 miles a day, except for splurging on a 700 mile day in the middle of the trip. I'll break our days down...
Day 1: White Rock, BC - Oakland, Oregon
Day 2: Oakland, Oregon - Modesto, California
Day 3: Modesto, California - Kingman, Arizona
Day 4: Kingman, Arizona - Tucumcari, New Mexico
Day 5: Tucumcari, New Mexico - El Reno, Oklahoma
Day 6: El Reno, Oklahoma - Dewey, Oklahoma
Day 1 included a swift and smooth boder crossing, followed by fog for a couple hours, a 10 degree temperature drop in a 3 mile span, Portland traffic hour and a diner that stayed open for us at 8:30 pm for dinner next to the hotel we were staying in... with about the best food you can ask for from a diner.
Day 2 was full of mountain driving, mt. Shasta (a ginormous peak 5 miles off the highway in northern cali), throwing with Shorty at a rest stop, and staying at the nicest hotel of the trip (mariott courtyard), and some de-freakin-licious Olive garden for dinner.
Day 3's drive immediately brought us into some of the most beautiful hills in California (where we took about 500 pictures). It was one of the more boring drives through desert and whatnot, but just driving with Shorty made it an enjoyable experience. We ate at the same seafood/mexican restauraunt (yea interesting mix), just this little hole in the wall we ate at 3 months earlier and looooooved the food. The biggest 5 dollar Burrito's in USA for sure.
Day 4 was a long day, many miles, and a few stops, lots of desert, and cacti, and roadkill, and naps, and energy drinks....
Day 5 we woke up to the coldest temperature of the whole trip, 17 farenheit (-9 C). We drove to the world famous "Big Big Texan Steakhouse Ranch" and had some amazingly tantilizing food there, that's when the roads started to get really bad, one we reached the Oklahoma state line the roads got really really really bad, I'm talking a plain looking road covered in a sheet of 1/2 inch thick clear ice. Over this day and the next we counted the amount of accidents we saw.
Cars off the road= 32
Cars flipped over= 4
Semi's flipped over= 3
Cars we actually witnessed go off the road= 4
Day 6 we had to stay in El Reno, only a normal 2 hour drive from Shorty's family home in Dewey Oklahoma, but we decided our lives were much more important than putting them in danger with horrible driving conditions. Vancouver with snow on the roads is nothing compared to what we drove through this day. A 2 hour drive became 5 1/2 because of us going 30 MPH in 75 MPH zones. We made it though.
We kept ourselves busy with XM radio and it's 250 channels, maps, GPS, talking, napping, planning, and other stuff.
Road trip final stats=
2700 Miles
126$ on gas (I love you hybrid)
1 great time with my wife on the road
I definetely suggest a roadtrip...
Shorty and I headed out January 22, and arrived on the 28th in Tulsa. We followed pretty much the same route as we had on the initial trip north, except for the trip through Las Vegas and Death Valley. Shorty and I had a solid pace going, we drove approximately 550 miles a day, except for splurging on a 700 mile day in the middle of the trip. I'll break our days down...
Day 1: White Rock, BC - Oakland, Oregon
Day 2: Oakland, Oregon - Modesto, California
Day 3: Modesto, California - Kingman, Arizona
Day 4: Kingman, Arizona - Tucumcari, New Mexico
Day 5: Tucumcari, New Mexico - El Reno, Oklahoma
Day 6: El Reno, Oklahoma - Dewey, Oklahoma
Day 1 included a swift and smooth boder crossing, followed by fog for a couple hours, a 10 degree temperature drop in a 3 mile span, Portland traffic hour and a diner that stayed open for us at 8:30 pm for dinner next to the hotel we were staying in... with about the best food you can ask for from a diner.
Day 2 was full of mountain driving, mt. Shasta (a ginormous peak 5 miles off the highway in northern cali), throwing with Shorty at a rest stop, and staying at the nicest hotel of the trip (mariott courtyard), and some de-freakin-licious Olive garden for dinner.
Day 3's drive immediately brought us into some of the most beautiful hills in California (where we took about 500 pictures). It was one of the more boring drives through desert and whatnot, but just driving with Shorty made it an enjoyable experience. We ate at the same seafood/mexican restauraunt (yea interesting mix), just this little hole in the wall we ate at 3 months earlier and looooooved the food. The biggest 5 dollar Burrito's in USA for sure.
Day 4 was a long day, many miles, and a few stops, lots of desert, and cacti, and roadkill, and naps, and energy drinks....
Day 5 we woke up to the coldest temperature of the whole trip, 17 farenheit (-9 C). We drove to the world famous "Big Big Texan Steakhouse Ranch" and had some amazingly tantilizing food there, that's when the roads started to get really bad, one we reached the Oklahoma state line the roads got really really really bad, I'm talking a plain looking road covered in a sheet of 1/2 inch thick clear ice. Over this day and the next we counted the amount of accidents we saw.
Cars off the road= 32
Cars flipped over= 4
Semi's flipped over= 3
Cars we actually witnessed go off the road= 4
Day 6 we had to stay in El Reno, only a normal 2 hour drive from Shorty's family home in Dewey Oklahoma, but we decided our lives were much more important than putting them in danger with horrible driving conditions. Vancouver with snow on the roads is nothing compared to what we drove through this day. A 2 hour drive became 5 1/2 because of us going 30 MPH in 75 MPH zones. We made it though.
We kept ourselves busy with XM radio and it's 250 channels, maps, GPS, talking, napping, planning, and other stuff.
Road trip final stats=
2700 Miles
126$ on gas (I love you hybrid)
1 great time with my wife on the road
I definetely suggest a roadtrip...
1/30/2009
'Bout that time...
I'm heading back to Holland tomorrow... the blogging will kick off then. Be ready, be very ready.
1/21/2009
Road-trippin' again...
Were heading back.
On the road again. Frappe la rue. Shorty and I are heading back to Oklahoma tomorrow morning, making pretty much the same trip just in the opposite direction as we made in early November. We got the oil changed, tires rotated, car washed and cleaned and are ready to get back on the road Oklahoma bound.
It took us about 9 days on the way here, but we are making an abbreviated version of our drive on the way back, trying to squeeze 3000 miles (5000km) into 5-6 days. It's very possible, but we will need to drive more and party in vegas, sight see, stop for tarantulas, stop for ocean views, stop for amazing photo's less.
Looking forward to the drive. Plans are that I'm flying out of Tulsa on the 1st of February, and will train and practice with both Neptunus and the national team from the 1st until team Netherlands leaves for Florida.
I'll have more from when we get there... then expect an influx of posts starting upon arrival in Holland.
Looking forward to that...
On the road again. Frappe la rue. Shorty and I are heading back to Oklahoma tomorrow morning, making pretty much the same trip just in the opposite direction as we made in early November. We got the oil changed, tires rotated, car washed and cleaned and are ready to get back on the road Oklahoma bound.
It took us about 9 days on the way here, but we are making an abbreviated version of our drive on the way back, trying to squeeze 3000 miles (5000km) into 5-6 days. It's very possible, but we will need to drive more and party in vegas, sight see, stop for tarantulas, stop for ocean views, stop for amazing photo's less.
Looking forward to the drive. Plans are that I'm flying out of Tulsa on the 1st of February, and will train and practice with both Neptunus and the national team from the 1st until team Netherlands leaves for Florida.
I'll have more from when we get there... then expect an influx of posts starting upon arrival in Holland.
Looking forward to that...
1/10/2009
Some Holiday pictures with the family... and zoo
Our wonderful christmas tree, covered in gifts. This year we created, albeit late, a competition to see who had the worst wrapped gift. My dad's used bag with a post-it note barely edged out my sister's used/ripped xmas bag with 2x crossed out to+from tags.
This is our forest downstairs, I like it, family hates it. It was put up in the 70's by whoever owned our house before us, and I think they may have been stoners.
The wife and I messing around on New Years eve. She's oddly growing a new hand out of the top of her head.
One of my dad's only christmas jobs, lighting the fire. Other fatherly dutie's include growing an awesome beard, setting up his new office and being one of the best humdinger's in the world.
Just a good old father - daughter snow brawl... winner = daughter.
Shorty and I with my folks on a snowy boxing day (26th)...
A family shot right before the father - daughter snow brawl. We have a family tradition to be together around christmas if possible, and when we're together, no matter what the weather throws at us we go out for nature walks. This was an extremely snowy christmas so the walks were quite enjoyable for yours truly, a snow lover at heart.
Roo (sister's pup) loves chasing snow balls and eating them more than anything, it's just about the greatest and funniest thing ever. You can take the smile off your face watching her chase snow...
My wife took this beauty, the trees looked quite amazing, and somehow looked taller with all the snow.
A quality ma-son picture in the forest.
Had to pop a picture with the white in the background on my first (first one I can remember) white Christmas. It's something I sadly hope for every year, but never neem to get. My prayers were answered in the way of a record setting december for snow in Vancouver.
The zoo. We always enjoy their company around the holidays. For some ready they really really love boxes.
Rooster Mclooster, everyones gift.
My sister, I think she may have enjoyed her new apron. We got it custom made, and she wanted it to appear like the 50's. I think we did well.
This is our forest downstairs, I like it, family hates it. It was put up in the 70's by whoever owned our house before us, and I think they may have been stoners.
The wife and I messing around on New Years eve. She's oddly growing a new hand out of the top of her head.
One of my dad's only christmas jobs, lighting the fire. Other fatherly dutie's include growing an awesome beard, setting up his new office and being one of the best humdinger's in the world.
Just a good old father - daughter snow brawl... winner = daughter.
Shorty and I with my folks on a snowy boxing day (26th)...
A family shot right before the father - daughter snow brawl. We have a family tradition to be together around christmas if possible, and when we're together, no matter what the weather throws at us we go out for nature walks. This was an extremely snowy christmas so the walks were quite enjoyable for yours truly, a snow lover at heart.
Roo (sister's pup) loves chasing snow balls and eating them more than anything, it's just about the greatest and funniest thing ever. You can take the smile off your face watching her chase snow...
My wife took this beauty, the trees looked quite amazing, and somehow looked taller with all the snow.
A quality ma-son picture in the forest.
Had to pop a picture with the white in the background on my first (first one I can remember) white Christmas. It's something I sadly hope for every year, but never neem to get. My prayers were answered in the way of a record setting december for snow in Vancouver.
The zoo. We always enjoy their company around the holidays. For some ready they really really love boxes.
Rooster Mclooster, everyones gift.
My sister, I think she may have enjoyed her new apron. We got it custom made, and she wanted it to appear like the 50's. I think we did well.
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