Diamondbacks go from worst to first

At the end of the last Major League Baseball season, the Arizona Diamondbacks had won only 65 games and finished in last place in its division. But in 2011, the Diamondbacks made a remarkable turnaround to finish in first place in the National League West division.

The Diamondbacks’ final record this season was 94 wins and 68 losses — a 29-win turnaround from 2010! The team also found itself in the playoffs, where they have been facing the Milawuakee Brewers, the team that won the National League Central division.

Game 3 of the Diamondbacks’ first-round series against the Brewers is tonight, and Arizona down 0 game to 2. If the Diamondbacks lose tonight, its season is over. But the team is playing at home, which it hopes gives the players an advantage. If Arizona wins, Game 4 will also be played in Phoenix. And if the D’backs win Game 4, the final game of the series will be played in Milwuakee. The winner will then take on the winner of the Philadelphia Phillies - St. Louis Cardinals series in the National League Championship Series.

But however things turn out, this has been a great season for the Arizona Diamondbacks!

 

A baseball fanatic’s first Hall of Fame induction weekend

"Practice, practice, practice, practice, and more practice! Don’t ever quit!” former Pittsburgh Pirates catcher Bill Mazeroski chuckled as he told me what it took for him to be a Hall of Fame baseball player. Already a diehard baseball fan, my experience as a member of the media during the Hall of Fame weekend helped me appreciate our national pastime even more.

The day before the Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, many Hall of Famers played golf at the Leatherstocking Golf Course in Cooperstown, New York.

At the golf course, I met and talked with several of these baseball legends, including Holland-born Bert Blyleven, who, after 14 years of being eligible, was finally being inducted into the Hall of Fame.

“Being born in Holland and just learning the game at nine, you never imagine this. I feel very fortunate,” he told me.

Soon after, Sandy Alomar, the father of new inductee Roberto Alomar, gave the reason for his son’s successes: “Whatever achievement that Roberto got is because of his hard work and the respect and discipline that he had for the game.”

Next, I met Jeff Idelson, the president of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. To a baseball fanatic like me, that’s the greatest job in the world!

I grew more impressed as Jeff described his “dream job” to me.

“I do a lot of fundraising for the museum, I build partnerships with companies and individuals, I spend a lot of time visiting our Hall of Famers, and I stage a lot of special events both here and around the United States,” he shared.

Jeff also suggested a way for Major League Baseball (MLB) to attract more young fans.

“What MLB can do is to have a much stronger presence in social media,” he said. “I’d like to see players more accessible on Facebook and Twitter, and I think that MLB can encourage contacts through social networking.”

The next day, my dad and I were two of the 17,500 people in attendance for the National Baseball Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony. But before we took our seats, I stumbled upon the greatest baseball fan alive: the affable Homer Osterhoudt.

Now in his 90s, Homer has attended EVERY induction ceremony since the inaugural celebration in 1939, only missing the four years in which he proudly served in the Army Air Corps during World War II.

Homer, a longtime resident of Cooperstown, is happy with his town’s evolution over the years.

“Being from a small town and meeting all those dignitaries, I mean wow! In ’39, it was quite a thing for a small town like this one to get so many people,” Homer told me.

During the ceremony, I was awed by the overwhelming number of Alomar’s Puerto Rican and Canadian followers and by the joyous, baseball-crazy atmosphere.

While this was my first Hall of Fame experience, I hope to follow in the footsteps of the legendary Homer Osterhoudt and not make it my last!

—Kid Reporter Kevin Agostinelli

Photo: Kid Reporter Kevin Agostinelli interviews baseball superfan Homer Osterhoudt at the 2011 National Baseball Hall of Fame induction ceremony. (Credit: Courtesy Kevin Agostinelli)

Disney World's ESPN Wide World of Sports

When you think of Disney World, you may automatically think of Mickey Mouse, Cinderella, or the huge castle in Magic Kingdom. But did you know that Disney World has an entire sports park just for athletes and their really devoted fans? Recently, my family and I got invited to Disney World to tour Disney’s ESPN Wide World of Sports. 

The Wide World of Sports complex spans about 230 acres, all of it holding bunches and bunches of fields for any sport imaginable and any team that plays it. It also hosts more than 300 sporting events annually, including spring training camp for the Atlanta Braves, exhibition games for many other major league teams, and many amateur athlete tournaments from all over the country.

The Wide World of Sports also has some fascinating technology, and all of it is developed right there at the facilities. Through their work and with the help of the many games held at the parks, ESPN has come up with many ways to help coaches, athletes, and fans get into the game, including creating 3D televisions to make you feel like you are actually at the sporting event and high-def broadcasting so that you can see everything going on at the field. The Wide World of Sports is actually the headquarters for where the inventors of all of that technology do all of the testing and inventing for ESPN, and we got to see where they worked. 

We also got to do some pretty cool stuff while we were there. We got a tour of the fields and got to go inside some of the buildings that had just been upgraded. We also saw the unveiling of the new fieldhouse for all of the athletes and coaches. At the unveiling, we saw Mia Hamm, world famous soccer player, and Jason Witten, NFL star. Mia Hamm was even signing autographs after the unveiling, and my sister and I got to take a picture with her! My dad also got very excited when we went to go see the Atlanta Braves play against the Detroit Tigers in an exhibition match. 

What I liked a lot was when we got to pose for a picture and they made it look like we were on the cover of ESPN. They had us dress in a Braves jersey and hat and pose with a bat in our hands. It was a really cool picture when it came out. 

So the ESPN complex was definitely a world of fun, from the 3-D television to being on the cover of ESPN! I had a great time at Disney World’s Wide World of Sports.

—Kid Reporter Mari Chiles

Photo courtesy Mari Chiles