SARASOTA -- After sweating through a sunny month of spring training — just one rainout — baseball fans might savor a cool breeze tonight.
The final Baltimore Orioles home game at Ed Smith Stadium will begin at 6:05 p.m. The twilight start should feature a vivid sunset along with refreshing temperatures.
On Wednesday night, some fans pulled on jackets for the 70-degree weather.
“It’s perfect, absolutely perfect,” said Norm Schimmel from his seat behind the first-base dugout. “The most perfect weather you’ve ever seen in your life, with the moon sitting on top of everything.”
For him, March means Major League Baseball, up close and personal. April means taking down the spring training banner he hangs on his condo door.
“You definitely suffer from withdrawal when they go," Schimmel says. “This is a special time of year."
Generations of fans
Spring training has been a Florida tradition for a century now.
Each year, the national pastime gets started in the Sunshine State. It’s all about the weather. Also players and fans sharing irrational expectations for the coming season.
Anticipation. Hope. Enthusiasm.
People grow up with baseball and spring training. It’s a tradition for fathers and sons, especially. The circle of life rounding the bases.
Look at the Cook family in Section 215.
Kenny Cook is the 9-year-old Orioles fan with the autographed cap and Matt Wieters bobblehead doll. Casey Cook is the 45-year-old Orioles fan in the J.J. Hardy jersey. And George Cook is the 77-year-old Orioles fan with the custom jersey that says “Poppa George” on the back.
The Cooks are from Long Island, N.Y., but they took family vacations for spring training.
“We raised our kids out here,” says George. “We brought them to spring training parks all over Florida.”
Now his son and grandson live in Annapolis, Md., where they share Baltimore season tickets. This time of year, they join Poppa for games at Ed Smith Stadium.
George is not supposed to eat hot dogs — heart condition — but he makes an exception for spring training. His only problem with baseball in Sarasota is that there should be more of it.
“What you miss is a minor league team to follow up,” he says. “There’s no minor league team here to follow up. That’s terrible.”
Night vibe
Most spring training games start at 1 p.m. under a sun that can be merciless. Most of the fans are snowbirds and tourists who slather on sunscreen to bake in the heat that they don’t have up north.
Night games have a different vibe.
The ballpark looks different with the evening sun slanting across the field. The ballpark feels different with people going out for the evening.
More local residents. More business people. More young couples and teenagers.
On Wednesday night, in a stadium full of people in shorts and T-shirts, Michelle Messick wore a chic skirt in Orioles black and orange.
She works in her husband’s law office. She can’t go to many day games. She prefers nights at the ballpark, anyway.
“This is a real treat,” Messick says. “No. 1, the temperature, and you don’t have the sun beating down on you. And you can relax more. You don’t feel like you have to rush back to the office.”
Talking baseball
Bob Biddle wears a Cubs cap and walks with a cane. He’s a 74-year-old retiree from Plainfield, Indiana. He sits in the first row of seats in the Left Field Pavilion.
He loves to talk baseball.
Biddle remembers going to spring training games at the old Payne Park in Sarasota. He always showed up early. To pass the time, he’d chat with fans, friends and, occasionally, Hall of Fame pitchers.
“One day I went and there was this guy there and he kept talking to me,” he says. “I kept thinking that I knew this guy and then all of a sudden it hit me — Don Drysdale. He was an announcer for the White Sox back then.”
When Biddle talks about Ernie Banks — “Mr. Cub” — he pulls his cane off the railing to demonstrate a batting stance.
Time stands still and he’s a little boy talking about his favorite player.
Biddle laughs. He puts his cane back on the railing. He turns back to the Wednesday night Orioles game.
He enjoys the warm afternoons of spring training, but has to admit that it’s a beautiful evening at the ballpark.
“Great place to watch a game,” he says. “What could be nicer than this?”