Sometimes as a photographer you’re looking at the clock trying to figure out if you’ll make it out of the ballpark in time to beat the traffic home. Yesterday was one of those days for me. Tim Lincecum was pitching for the Giants and they were cruising all the way into the ninth inning with a 4-1 lead over the Philadelphia Phillies. I was in a good state of mind because I was looking at the clock and thought… “Wow… I’m going to beat the rush hour traffic and get outta here by 3:30.” Oh how I wish that would’ve actually happened.
Lincecum got one out in the ninth before giving up a base hit. Then the Giants manager took his star pitcher out of the game, and well… I don’t want to even write about what happened next. To make a long story short, the Giants ended up losing to the Phillies 7-6 in eleven innings… and I didn’t make it onto the freeway until after 5:00… right in the middle of rush hour. I was not a happy camper to say the least.
On the “photo-side” of things… I had a few decent shots, not a great game overall… but enough shots to not walk away disappointed from the day’s game.
So I’m a little behind on the blog posts. I just got back from a Giants game today (… I’ll try to get that blog up tomorrow). But I wanted to post a few pictures from the Yankees game against the A’s in Oakland last week before I put today’s game up. Last week there were a couple of funny moments that occurred during Wednesday night’s game… well… one wasn’t so funny… but the other one kept me entertained for a few innings I have to admit.
Early in the game I noticed a fan taking photos with a pretty nice camera in some great seats right behind home plate (… to be honest… he may have had an even better angle of the pitcher than I did!). I glanced over in his direction an inning later and noticed he was now standing just to the side of his seat close to the aisle. At this moment… you could tell he wanted to get closer… and that’s exactly what he did. Soon after he moved ever so slightly towards the ‘media photographers’ area. But greed took over and he couldn’t stop there… and he proceeded to make his way directly behind the backstop towards the professional photographers. This didn’t fool security for a moment. Just as the man made his third step towards our area, a security guard was onto his ‘idea’ and immediately demanded to see his press pass. I didn’t want to laugh but at the same time I couldn’t help but smile because each time the fan tried to make a sneaky move forward… all he was really doing was drawing more attention to himself which resulted in his failure. The fan was escorted back to his seat and I was smiling because the whole episode kept me entertained during a pretty slow-moving game.
On the disappointing end however… well… I missed a shot. (I guess every photographer there missed it too though because I haven’t seen one shot of it yet). But in the sixth inning I looked up at the scoreboard and realized the Yankees pitcher was throwing a no-hitter. I turned to the guy next to me in shock at this fact… but I guess he knew nothing of it later. About two minutes after I realized this my cell phone starts ringing and they want more shots of the pitcher transmitted. I sighed and said I’d get on it after I got a few different angles of him in the seventh inning. Right after I get my shots, I load, edit, and caption 5 shots of the pitcher… but now the internet connection is moving at a snails pace and the Yankees have already taken the field again for the eighth inning. I’m kneeling on the ground next to my laptop… finishing up the photos at the start of the inning realizing that if the no-hitter is broken up I’ll make sure to stand up and get a shot of the pitcher’s reaction. But just as I plan this, I hear the crack of the ball on the bat and I look up from my position and see the pitcher staring into the heavens looking for a the ball while it in fact sits peacefully about 5 feet behind him. Awwwww… the no-hitter was broken up AND I missed the shot. I wasn’t happy. But all I can do is tell myself what all photographers say when this happens. You can’t get every shot. The only frustrating thing for me is I would’ve got the shot if it weren’t for the demands of pictures on the internet. Hopefully this won’t be a reoccurring theme throughout the season though.
Sadly enough… my first full NBA season has come to an end after I shot the Sacramento Kings last two home games of the year this past Saturday and Monday. The Kings closed out the home games with losses to the Dallas Mavericks and Houston Rockets. While the games had their fair share of entertaining moments, the most ‘colorful’ part of Saturday’s game against the Mavericks took place in the front row where two fans dressed up in tuxedos based from the comedy movie “Dumb and Dumber” (… see picture below). Another noticeable fan showed up to Arco Arena on Monday when Arnold Schwarzenegger stopped in to watch the last game of the year. I almost got really lucky at one point when a loose ball was headed right for him.. and one of the players on the Rockets came “this close” to jumping into the stands to save the ball from going out of bounds. I remember watching the play unfold through my camera and I was thinking… “RUN!!! go get that ball!!!”… but unfortunately… Arnold was the only one who touched the ball as the player decided against the idea of jumping into the lap of the governor to save the ball. I had a great picture in my mind of what it would’ve looked like though… too bad it didn’t actually happen.
As a huge basketball fan I had a great time covering the NBA this year though… and I’m already a little sad that I won’t be shooting any more basketball games for awhile. However… the one thing I know I won’t miss is getting kicked in the back by some of the drunk fans who… for some reason or another… thought it was hilarious to kick photographers in the back during some of the games… but that’s about the only part I’ll miss. Looking forward to shooting some baseball now.
The Giants sure do know how to please an opening day crowd. I was expecting to start packing up to go home until shortstop Edgar Renteria hit a two-run home-run to tie the game against the Atlanta Braves in the bottom of the ninth inning. All of the photographers I was shooting next to started to become impatient after that point because almost no action occurred for the next three innings… (and on top of that it was started to get cool outside and I left my jacket in the car… huge mistake when shooting in San Francisco… I feel embarrassed just to admit that I did that on here). But thank goodness the game ended in the 13th inning after an RBI single by Aaron Rowand.
I have to admit I was pretty rusty for my first baseball game of the year… but I didn’t feel too bad because most of the photographers kept looking at each other in disgust because it was one of the games where nothing too exciting had taken place. I was shooting a horrible game until things picked up near the end… including a moment where a Braves player got caught in a pickle and unsuccessfully attempted to dive back into first base. I got a few pics from that one sequence but the best looking one I captured came before the dive.
But as for the Giants… I hope they can keep up these winning ways for the rest of the year because I would love to shoot some playoff baseball later this year. We’ll see how it goes!
