Starting off about a week and a half in the Southern part of California, I worked a game at Recreation Park yesterday in Visalia. This is a place I'd been to before in 2005, but just from the point of view of a traveling fan wrapping up visits to all of the California League parks.

This time around, it was a little different. As small as it is, there is no field access so everything needs to be shot from the seats. On the plus side, they're making renovations to the ballpark and some newer, lower seats are now down the third base line. The drawback to the current renovations is the entire first base side past the dugout is completely off limits as all the work is taking place there. That severely limits places to go but once it's all done I'd like to get back there to check it out.

Regardless, it's both interesting and challenging to shoot there. The position of the sun was tough at times and better on the first base side, but like I said that was the more restricted side. So, not my best set of work but not every game can be. This is also the first gallery I put together using the new laptop and drawing tablet I picked up last week. Doing that sure beats having to get multiple memory cards without the ability to do anything further until I get home again.

The game didn't have a whole lot of action. Lancaster scored a run in the 5th and Visalia came back with a pair of their own in the bottom half for a 2-1 win. Good pitching by Cesar Valdez was enough for the win and three Oaks collected a pair of hits. Josh Papelbon ended up pitching for Lancaster so it was fun shooting his submarine style at different points.

A sample:

5/13/08: Lancaster Jethawks at Visalia Oaks