By this time next week, I’ll have already seen two games during my first road trip of 2012. Can you guess that I’m counting down the days in a big way?

If you’re new to this blog, I thought I’d post the road trip schedule again, and as I think you’ll agree, it’s going to involve a terrific amount of baseball in a short period of time:

Monday, May 21: Delmarva Shorebirds at Lakewood BlueClaws 6:35 p.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Louisville Bats at Lehigh Valley IronPigs 10:35 a.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Akron Aeros at Trenton Thunder 7:05 p.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Potomac Nationals at Wilmington Blue Rocks 11:05 a.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Carolina Mudcats at Frederick Keys 7:05 p.m.

Thursday, May 24: Harrisburg Senators at Altoona Curve 10:30 a.m.

Thursday, May 24: Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees at Buffalo Bisons 7:05 p.m.

The plan is to get up very early on Monday morning and drive nearly nine hours to Lakewood, N.J., where I’ll watch the BlueClaws at FirstEnergy Park. As you know, I love to get to the ballpark a couple hours before the game, so I’ll do my best even though it’ll be a long drive. As an added bonus, I’m going to get to spend some time in the press box during the game and perhaps get a tour of the park.

I’ll be staying in the Trenton area Monday night because first thing Tuesday, I’ll head to Allentown, PA, to watch the IronPigs in a matinee game. Once that one’s wrapped up, it’s back to Trenton to catch the Thunder. The Thunder have graciously agreed to give me a tour of Waterfront Park, so I’m definitely looking forward to that.

Wednesday, May 23 will be a big day. Not only will I get to watch the Wilmington Blue Rocks in matinee action, I might even get mentioned on the ballpark’s video board! I realize things get hectic on game days, but the team has told me this is a possibility, so I’m definitely keeping my fingers crossed — and my camera ready.  As I’m writing this post, I just got word from the Blue Rocks that I’m going to get to be interviewed on the team’s radio broadcast in the top of the fifth inning. Outstanding!

Once the Wilmington game has wrapped up, I’ll hop back in the car and zoom to Frederick, MD, where I’ll attend a Keys game. I’m really pumped for this one because I’m getting to meet Keys outfielder Jeremy Nowak, whose name you’ll know if you follow this blog. If not, check out this link. And here’s a picture of Jeremy that I took last year as he signed autographs as a member of the Delmarva Shorebirds:

What could make this visit better? How about a tour before the gates open and a half inning in the press box being interviewed on the game’s broadcast? Needless to say, it’s going to be an outstanding day. And I see that Frederick’s Harry Grove Stadium has crab on the menu, and if it’s anything like the crab cake sandwich I had last year at Aberdeen’s Ripken Stadium …

… I am going to have a full stomach.

On Thursday morning, I’m going to have to be on the road very early for the drive to Altoona, PA. Not only is there a third matinee game in three days that I get to attend, the team expects it’ll be able to give me a tour that morning before the gates open. After the game, I’ll drive straight to Buffalo, where I should get to Coca-Cola Field shortly before the gates open. At this game, I plan to meet up with some of the bloggers from NY Bisons to say hello, so that should be fun. If you haven’t seen this blog, check it out. These guys are all over Buffalo baseball and provide several entertaining reads every week. I’ve been to Coca-Cola Field in the past, but I’m looking forward to seeing it again — especially now that the park has the biggest scoreboard in the Minor Leagues.

So, yes, it’s going to be a full four days, but I’m obviously really looking forward to it. The opportunities to get tours of the parks and time on-air are absolutely outstanding, so I’ve got even more reasons to be pumped for this trip. The schedule is so packed that I won’t have a ton of spare time for sightseeing, but I’ll try to see some cool places and share photos.

I’ll be blogging as much as I can while I’m away, as well as updating my adventure on Twitter. As always, thanks for reading and please be sure to check out my website, The Ballpark Guide, for guides to MLB and MiLB parks. I’ve got guides to more than 20 parks listed on the site now, with more coming soon. And if you find the guides helpful, or just enjoy following my travel adventures, please visit this page and consider making a donation to help out the cause.

A week ago, I blogged about five goals I have for my first road trip of the 2012 season. If you missed that post, check it out here.

My first day of travel, May 21, is rapidly approaching, so here are five more goals I hope to accomplish.

6. Be interviewed during a game broadcast

Not only would this be an awesome opportunity to spread the word about my website and this blog, it would be a lot of fun, too. Without being too much of a tease, I’ll have some great news to share about this goal very soon.

7. Get 50 autographs

This one might be a little challenging. Three of the games I’m attending are school days, which means the parks will be crawling with kids. I’ve got to average a little more than seven autographs per game to hit this goal, so it’ll be interesting to see how I manage. I don’t know exactly how many autographs I got last summer, but it was definitely at least 50.

8. Buy a hat

It sounds simple, right? But I’m a bit picky when it comes to hats. Last year, I bought a handful, which you can see here. I’m not sure which hat I’ll get on this trip, but I plan to add at least one to my collection.

9. Have my photo taken with a player

For all the autographs I get, I never stop to get a photo taken with a player. I think this would be a neat thing to have for my blog. I’ll obviously get a photo with Jeremy Nowak when I’m in Frederick, but I’ll try to get a photo with another player or two during my travels.

10. Have some unforeseen fun adventure

This is pretty vague, but one of the beauties of my road trips is that sometimes, I stumble into something unexpected and awesome. In Fort Wayne, the TinCaps GM gave me a personal tour of Parkview Field that included a visit to the clubhouse. At Salisbury’s Arthur W. Perdue Stadium, I retrieved Nowak’s first South Atlantic League ball that eventually got returned to him (as you probably know about by now!) and in Baltimore, I got to meet 1970 American League MVP Boog Powell:

Hopefully, something extra exciting will transpire, and I’ll be able to blog all about it!

I absolutely love traveling to new cities to watch ballgames, and then blogging about my experiences on this blog. It’s awesome to share photos and stories and connect with so many of you. I’m counting down the days until my next road trip, but in the meantime, I wanted to share a bit of information about how you can help me with my travels.

If you enjoy reading this blog or have found TheBallparkGuide.com helpful in the past when you’re planning your own trip, please consider making a small donation to help me out. Being on the road so much adds up, and with your donations, I’ll be able to travel even more and share more great adventures.

On my website, I’ve not got a “Contribute” button, which you’ll see on the right side of the page, just under the Facebook and Twitter links. Clicking on it will take you to a new page where you can make a donation. Or, if it’s easier, you can just click this link to see the page in question.

Once there, you can make a donation with PayPal, and it doesn’t have to be big. Every donation adds up and helps me hit the road for more exciting adventures to share. Thank you.

And speaking of adventures, my next road trip is fast approaching. You can read the schedule here, if you haven’t already seen it. In the days leading up to the trip, I’ll have some cool news to share, too. And I’ve still got some more road trip goals that I’ll blog about soon.

Given the amount of time I spend studying schedules, maps and hotels, you’d think that when I blog about plans for a road trip, it’s set in stone.

Apparently not.

Last week, I blogged about my first road trip of 2012, which begins two weeks today. The schedule was fine, but I wanted to revisit it and see if I could add two more nearby teams to the already-full week without adding more days. Mission accomplished!

I’ve removed the independent level York Revolution, although maybe I’ll catch one of their games later this summer. And I’ve also decided not to see the Hagerstown Suns. I visited Municipal Stadium last summer, and while it’s always cool to make repeat visits, my number one goal for TheBallparkGuide.com is to hit new ballparks.

Here’s the new (and final, I hope!) schedule:

Monday, May 21: Delmarva Shorebirds at Lakewood BlueClaws 6:35 p.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Louisville Bats at Lehigh Valley IronPigs 10:35 a.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Akron Aeros at Trenton Thunder 7:05 p.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Potomac Nationals at Wilmington Blue Rocks 11:05 a.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Carolina Mudcats at Frederick Keys 7:05 p.m.

Thursday, May 24: Harrisburg Senators at Altoona Curve 10:30 a.m.

Thursday, May 24: Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees at Buffalo Bisons 7:05 p.m.

I think this new schedule is even more ambitious than the last one, but the huge benefit is that I’ll be visiting six new ballparks (and one I’ve already seen) in four days. And, as you can see, I’ll have two games a day for three of the four days I’m away. In other words, it’s baseball heaven.

If you missed them, check out the first batch of my road trip goals. I’ll be listing another group of goals sometime this week. And always, thanks for checking out my blog and my website. If you haven’t seen TheBallparkGuide.com lately, please take a look. I added Cleveland and Bowie last week and should having the Lansing Lugnuts finished and up in the next 48 hours.

The planning of my first road trip of 2012, which you can read about here, is going well. But instead of telling you about going to the passport office, contacting the teams I’ll be visiting and planning other minor details, I thought it’d be fun to go over a list of goals I’ve got for this road trip. I’ll break this list into at least two installments, so watch for a blog entry on the second group of goals in the near future.

1. Get tours of five of the seven ballparks

Last year, I was lucky to get a tour of Fort Wayne’s Parkview Field from TinCaps GM Mike Nutter. It was great because it gave me extra insight into the park that I  wouldn’t have gotten otherwise, which was useful in writing Parkview Field’s guide for my website. This year, I’m going to contact each of the seven teams and see if I can arrange a ballpark tour during my visit.

2. Get 10 baseballs

I’ve been able to get more than 50 balls since I first started traveling for TheBallparkGuide.com, and I hope I can add at least 10 more on this trip. I hope at least one of those balls is a foul ball.

3. Get a game-used item

Over the course of my travels, I’ve accumulated some cool game-used items, including a New Hampshire Fisher Cats warmup jacket:

A Randy Ruiz bat:

And a Ryan Skube bat:

On this trip, I’d like to add a jersey or another bat to my collection.

4. Get autographs from Wally Backman and Ryne Sandberg

Both former MLBers are currently International League managers. Backman manages the Buffalo Bisons and Sandberg skips the Lehigh Valley IronPigs. If possible, I’d like to get each of them to sign a ball. I just missed Backman last summer when I saw him in at Prince George’s Stadium, home of the Bowie Baysox:

5. Find a food item that gets into my top 10

A while back, I blogged about the 10 best items I’ve eaten on my travels, and the blog post got a huge response. As things stand now, Classic Park‘s pulled pork nachos sit 10th on the list. Will I find something that knocks them off?

Random points:

I mentioned it on Twitter yesterday, but if you don’t follow me there, you might not know. MLBlogs released its April leaders and this blog ranked 15th among fan blogs! In February and March, I was 18th, so I’m climbing slowly. It’s all thanks to everyone who reads, so please know how grateful I am. Please bookmark me and keep checking back and let’s crack the top 10!

I can’t resist giving another Jeremy Nowak update. If you don’t already know, he’s the player I’m hoping to meet when I’m in Frederick, MD on May 23. Anyway, he’s now hitting .307 and leads the Keys with 23 hits. No home runs yet, though. Hmmm, I wonder if the stars will align and he’ll hit his first when I’m visiting!

If you plan on attending any of the games that I’ll be at, feel free to get in contact with me and perhaps we can meet up and say hello.

This week, I’ve added Cleveland’s Progressive Field and Bowie’s Prince George’s Stadium to TheBallparkGuide.com. As always, I appreciate you checking out my website.

Question: What has four days, seven games and seven different ballparks?

Answer: My first baseball road trip of 2012!

Nope, I didn’t make a typo. I’ll be on the road for only four days, but I’ve put a lot of time into planning this trip to include seven games in seven locations. As always, I’ll be blogging along the way and afterward, writing guides to each ballpark for my website, TheBallparkGuide.com.

There should be plenty of highlights on this trip, so let’s get to it and look at my schedule:

Monday, May 21: Akron Aeros at Trenton Thunder 7 p.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Louisville Bats at Lehigh Valley IronPigs 10:35 a.m.

Tuesday, May 22: Sugar Land Skeeters at York Revolution 6:30 p.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Greensboro Grasshoppers at Hagerstown Suns 10:35 a.m.

Wednesday, May 23: Carolina Mudcats at Frederick Keys 7 p.m.

Thursday, May 24: Harrisburg Senators at Altoona Curve 10:30 a.m.

Thursday, May 25: Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees at Buffalo Bisons 7 p.m.

As you can see, it’s a pretty ambitious schedule, but I’m taking advantage of three matinee games (which are common during the school year) to pack a lot of games into a short timeframe.

Some notes about this road trip:

- I plan to meet Baltimore Orioles prospect Jeremy Nowak when I’m in Frederick. If you’re a reader of this blog, you’ll know that I retrieved Nowak’s first South Atlantic League home run last season when he played for the Delmarva Shorebirds. His girlfriend tracked me down, I sent her the ball and she gave it to him for Christmas. Anyway, I’m super-pumped to meet Jeremy.

- The York Revolution are the first independent team I’ll see since I began traveling for TheBallparkGuide.com. York plays in the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball, which has a ton of former MLBers in its ranks. Because I haven’t fit independent games into my schedule thus far, I haven’t added an indy ball section to my website. But I plan to do so to help out any baseball fans who are interested in seeing what independent baseball has to offer.

- Five of the seven ballparks I’ll visit are new to me. I’ve been to Hagerstown’s Municipal Stadium and Buffalo’s Coca-Cola Field in the past. This year, I’m returning to Hagerstown (the site of last year’s Bryce Harper autograph adventure) because it works out with my schedule and to Buffalo because Coca-Cola Field has installed a humongous LED video board since I was last there.

- After this trip, I’ll have been to eight of the 12 Eastern League ballparks. I hope to visit at least three of the remaining four later this summer.

I’m counting down the days until I hit the road, but I’ll have a lot more blog content coming between now and then, including a list of fun goals for this trip and more. If you plan to be at one of these games and want to say hi, send me an email, catch me on Twitter or leave a message below.

Finally, thanks to everyone for reading and visiting my website. Please check the site and remember that your visits and ad clicks help me pay for future road trip adventures!

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll probably remember an entry I wrote last month about Baltimore Orioles prospect Jeremy Nowak. For the full story, click here.

Here’s a picture I took of Nowak when I saw him with the Delmarva Shorebirds last summer:

Anyway, as you’ll see in the story, Jeremy said that when I’m able to get to one of his games, he’ll hook me up with some tickets. I haven’t met him yet, but doing so is high on my list of things to do this season. And it gets even better — Jeremy is playing for the High-A Frederick Keys, which is a team I didn’t get to see play last season. As you can see here, my road trip last June/July took me all around Maryland (Aberdeen, Baltimore, Bowie and Salisbury) but just because of the way the schedules lined up, I wasn’t able to see a Keys game.

Right now, I’m looking at a number of road trip options that will get me to Frederick. This trip probably won’t be a two-week one like I took a couple times last season, but I hope to see at least one Keys game and a couple others around it. I’ve already been to all the ballparks closest to Frederick, and my goal is to include a few others that I haven’t visited so I can write guides to them for my website, TheBallparkGuide.com.

I don’t have any dates finalized, but my guess is this trip will include these teams and parks, in no particular order:

- Frederick Keys – Harry Grove Stadium

- Lehigh Valley IronPigs – Coca-Cola Park

- Reading Phillies – FirstEnergy Stadium

- Hagerstown Suns – Municipal Stadium

- Harrisburg Senators – Metro Bank Park

I went to Municipal Stadium and Metro Bank Park last summer, but the other three will all be new territory. Both ballparks had lots of cool features. Metro Bank Park is new:

And Municipal Stadium is old:

But I loved them both. Best of all, I’m looking forward to meeting Jeremy and hopefully writing another cool blog entry about it. I will have my schedule for that trip posted soon. If you plan to be at one of the games, leave me a note in the comments or send me an email and hopefully we’ll get to say hello.

As for Jeremy, he’s playing very well in Frederick. It’s his first stint in High-A, and he’s hitting .308 with 16 hits and five RBIs in 13 games, which is good for second on the team in hits and batting average. He’s hit in the two slot a bunch of times this season, so it’s cool to see the faith the team has in his ability.

As far as other trips, I’m still figuring things out. But don’t worry, I’ll be taking some this spring/summer and will blog about it when I’ve got things narrowed down.

Finally, a huge thank you to everyone for reading and visiting my website, TheBallparkGuide.com. My hits and ad revenue are continuing to climb because of your visits and ad clicks. The more, the better — it’s all helping me pay for these trips! Thank you.

And remember, if you don’t already, please follow me on Twitter.

I just finished a really cool page on my website that will help everyone see not only where I’ve been on my travels, but also provide an opportunity to easily read my blog entry about that adventure.

If you’re familiar with my website, you might have visited the Game Archive page, which lists every game I’ve been to since I started the site. That page is here.

But now, I’ve turned each of the dates next to each entry into a link. If you click on any of the dates, you’ll be redirected to my blog entry about that day. Neat, right? I think so.

So if you ever want to know if I’ve been to a certain ballpark, just check the Game Archive page. And to read about my visit, just click on any of the links. It’s that easy!

As always, thanks for reading.

If you’ve been following this blog for a period of time, you’ll know that it’s just one of my projects. My main project is my website, TheBallparkGuide.com. I use this blog to share my travel adventures and other information, and my website to share guides to every ballpark that I visit.

The process of compiling information for my website’s fan guides is fun, but it’s also time consuming. Right now, I’ve got comprehensive guides to 17 MLB and MiLB parks on my website, and I’m currently working on a handful of other guides that will be up soon. (The Portland Sea Dogs are next!) My goal is to have a new ballpark on my site each week.

Admittedly, it’ll take a while to visit every affiliated park, but in the meantime, my website is still a great resource if you’re planning a baseball road trip this season. Check it out and if I’ve written a guide to somewhere you plan to go, I guarantee you’ll find it helpful.

Each ballpark’s guide is broken down into several categories:

- The ballpark itself

- Getting to the ballpark

- Parking

- Finding your way around

- Where to sit

- What to eat

- How to get a ball

- Autograph tips

And for the Minor League parks, I’ve also written a brief history of each team.

On each park’s page, you’ll also see a list of the closest ballparks, which is useful if  you want to take in other games while you’re visiting the area.

As you check for the team of your choice on the home page’s menu, the team name will appear in light gray if I’ve written a guide to that ballpark. If it’s in dark gray, as most are at this point, there’s no guide just yet.

Lastly, please know that visiting my website really helps out. The more hits I get, the higher my site rises in Google’s rankings and the more money I earn that I can use toward future trips. I’ve got a lot of worthwhile ads on my site, including Holiday Inn — so if you’re planning to visit a new city, click the Holiday Inn ad and book your hotel right then and there.

If you enjoy reading about my travels, please bookmark my website, TheBallparkGuide.com, and check it periodically. And if there’s a link that appeals to you, please check it out, too.

Thanks for your support!

If you’ve been reading this blog over the last couple months, you’ll have seen a number of posts talking about different highlights from the 2011 season. The 2012 is now underway, and soon, I’ll have road trip plans to share.

Today, though, I want to share a few multi-signed balls that I got signed during my travels in 2010. It turns out that while I mentioned them on the blog way back when, I didn’t show any images.

My road trips for my website, TheBallparkGuide.com, began in July 2010. That summer, I went to a number of ballparks, including Auburn’s Falcon Park, Rochester’s Frontier Field and Mahoning Valley’s Eastwood Field.

At each of those games, I was lucky (and persistent) enough to get a ball signed by several guys on each team. Part of the appeal of looking back at Minor League autographs is you never know whose signatures you’ll get. I keep a list of the guys I get to sign for me so that I can follow their careers.

Without further delay, here’s the Rochester Red Wings ball:

The sweet spot belongs to manager Tom Nieto:

Nieto was let go by the Red Wings at the end of a rough 2011 season.

On the panel below, you’ll see the autographs of Brian Dinkelman, Trevor Plouffe and Anthony Swarzak:

All three guys have spent time with Minnesota, Rochester’s parent club, in 2011. Dinkelman even hit .301 in 23 games with the Twins.

On the next panel, it’s Jose Lugo, Glen Perkins and Pat Neshek:

Lugo currently plays in the Minors in Atlanta’s system, Perkins appeared in 65 games for the Twins last season and Neshek had 25 appearances with San Diego last year.

When I was in Auburn to watch the Doubledays, I managed to get 16 players on a single team ball.

Below the Doubledays logo are Dayton Marze and Matt Johnson:

Marze rose through Toronto’s ranks to Class-A Lansing last season, while Johnson is still in Short-Season A ball.

On this panel, you can see the sigs of Lance Durham, Yudelmis Hernandez, Sam Strickland and Jack Murphy:

Durham spent 50 games with Lansing last season before being released, Hernandez has struggled at the plate and spent all of 2011 in rookie ball, Strickland went 3-1 largely as a relief pitcher in Lansing and Murphy rose through Toronto’s farm system all the way to a short stint with AA New Hampshire in 2011.

I can’t recall the second signature on this panel, but the other names are Tyler Powell, Steve McQuail, Matt Nuzzo, coach C.J. Ebarb and Marcus Knecht:

In 2011, Powell moved up to Class-A, McQuail stayed in Short-Season A, Nuzzo was in Class-A and Knecht was a star in Lansing. He’ll start the 2012 season in High-A Dunedin.

On the last panel, the players who signed are Daniel Webb, Shawn Griffith, John Roberts and Gustavo Pierre:

Three of these four guys have moved up in the Toronto system. In 2011, Webb was with Lansing, Griffith was in Lansing and Dunedin and Pierre spent part of the season in Lansing. Roberts did not play in 2011.

Finally, I got 14 autographs on a Mahoning Valley Scrappers ball before I watched the team play. Since then, it’s been neat to occasionally follow these players’ progress, too.

Takafumi Nakamura signed under the team’s logo:

He reached as high as Class-A Lake County in 2010 but did not pitch in 2011.

On the sweet spot, you’ll see the signature of Indians pitcher Mitch Talbot, who I saw during a rehab start:

He split 2011 between AAA Columbus and the Indians.

The next panel belongs to Dan DeGeorge, Brian Heere, Jordan Cooper and Casey Gaynor:

DeGeorge made it up to AA in 2010 and last year, began the season in High-A before being released and ending up in the independent Atlantic League. Heere and Cooper spent 2011 with the Class-A Lake County Captains, while Gaynor played with indy-league Newark.

On the next panel, you can see the sigs of Aaron Fields, Tyler Cannon and J.D. Reichenbach:

Fields spent 2011 in Class-A, but Cannon and Reichenbach both had pretty sharp climbs up the organizational ladder in 2011. Cannon went from Class-A to High-A to AA, while Reichenbach rose from Class-A to High-A to AAA.

I’m not certain about the second-lowest autograph on this final panel, but the other names are Chase Burnette, Kyle Smith, Kevin Fontanez and Jordan Casas:

In 2011, Burnette split time between Class-A and High-A, Smith went from Class-A to High-A to AAA, Fontanez began 2011 in Short-Season A but soon went to Class-A and AA and like many of his teammates from the 2010 Scrappers, Casas made it to Class-A in 2011 and even spent some time in High-A.

As you might have noticed, by Rochester ball had a lot of guys who’ve at least spent some time in the bigs. Since the other two balls were from Short-Season A teams, those guys are still a ways off. But it’ll be interesting to follow their progress and see who gets there first. I’d say that overall, the guys whose autographs I got climbed the ladder well in 2011.