I Fell in Love With Baseball All Over Again

Me on TV after a Lourdes Gurriel, Jr. home run at the D-backs vs Padres game on 8/13/23. Image credit MLB and the Arizona Diamondbacks.

I’ve been pretty busy lately. I mean, being a 14-year-old going into high school, taking classes over the summer to get the credits out of the way, and having a lot of marching band rehearsals.

All of my busyness, however, made me worry: “What if I don’t love baseball anymore?” With the D-backs recent slump and school starting back up, I worried that might be the case.

But, regardless of thoughts like those, my aunt and I went to the D-backs vs Padres game on Sunday, August 13th at Chase Field, and that’s when it started – the game at which I fell in love with baseball all over again. But before I can describe why I fell in love with the sport again, I’ve got to give you a quick overview of the game… boy was it an exciting one.

To start off, the Padres quickly took the lead in the game, scoring three runs in the first inning off of rookie pitcher Brandon Pfaadt. Pfaadt, however, ended up striking out the side to end the inning, despite the early Padre damage.

But, the D-backs started off the bottom of the first with a bang, as rookie outfielder Corbin Carroll hustled all the way around the diamond for a lead-off triple. Ketel Marte cut the deficit in score to 3-1 after batting in Carroll on a softly hit single. But that’s as far as the D-back scoring went for the next few innings.

The D-backs pitcher, Pfaadt, settled in and had one of the most incredible pitching performances I’ve ever seen (dazzling for only four hits in the game, striking out 8, and only walking two).

The D-backs and Padres went back and forth, ultimately leading to a 4-2 Padres lead going into the home half of the seventh inning.

But the D-backs weren’t going to throw in the towel just yet. D-backs manager Torey Lovullo decided to pinch-hit for catcher Jose Herrera. Enter Lourdes Gurriel, Jr., D-back outfielder. After the at-bat went into a 3-2 count, Gurriel hit a two-run home run. The D-backs ended up winning 5-4.

Now the Love Story…

To you, this may seem like an ordinary baseball game. But it was much more than that. In fact, I went into the game being excited, despite the D-backs’ July slump.

One reason that I was excited was that it was the weekend that the Diamondbacks were celebrating their 25th anniversary, so they were wearing their throwback teal and purple jerseys, and even their lineup announcements on Instagram and Facebook were styled after older announcements.

Next reason: I was pretty excited to see Brandon Pfaadt in person for the first time. He’d shown a lot of promise in his previous two starts, and I was excited to see the rookie starter pitch for the team.

I also went to the game with my aunt (which made it a fun road trip up to Phoenix), and we sat in the first row of the left field bleachers, which are amazing seats. (If you haven’t sat in those seats or seats near those, the perspective is really cool, and it shows just how far you have to hit a ball to end up with a home run.)

All of those factors made it fun to be there; a good atmosphere. But there were a lot of people at the stadium, too. In fact, that was the most crowded I’ve seen Chase Field in the past three years. And, unlike the last time I saw a D-backs vs Padres game, it seemed like there were more fans of the Diamondbacks than fans of their NL West counterpart.

It was also a good and close baseball game, one of the first close games I’ve seen in person. This was one of the first games since June that the D-backs had fought hard for the win, and the gradual buildup of their comeback was spectacular.

Especially the Gurriel, Jr. home run. As soon as that ball was hit, everybody was up on their feet. And as soon as it went over the head of the Padres outfielder, the stadium just erupted to maybe the loudest I’ve ever heard it.

And it may have helped that the camera caught my reaction to the homer, played it on the jumbotron, and on TV as well.

But possibly the coolest thing was that the inning after Gurriel hit his game tying pinch hit home run, he finished playing warm up catch with the bullpen catcher, turned to the stands, looked right at me, and threw the ball to me. I caught it. After that, my aunt yelled “thank you” to Gurriel and he winked and smiled.

The game not only gave me a special fan experience, but reminded me that baseball players are human, and that they don’t deserve to be booed or scrutinized when they’re in a slump.

And more than anything, for an exciting team like the D-backs, after a loss, there’s always tomorrow.