Minor League Trip - Charleston Riverdogs

• Date: July 13, 2013
• Venue: Joseph P. Riley, Jr. Park
• Location: 360 Fishburne Street Charleston, SC 29403 
• League: South Atlantic
• Result: Augusta 4 – Charleston 1

 

What a crappy winter we just had.

I realize that  this proclamation, originating from someone who lives in the Southeast, probably elicits equal parts scorn and ridicule from loyal blog readers who have suffered though a real winter the last four months or so in the Northeast or Midwest. But it is all relative, isn’t it?

Multiple ice storms with loss of power. Snow and the dreaded freezing rain and wintry mix. Unseasonable cold. Weird and wild fluctuations of temperature  – 71 degrees on March 2 to 16 degrees only 36 hours later in Hilltown.

No better time then to lay down some memories from a warmer time – past summer’s minor league baseball trips. We’ll start with a trip to Charleston last July.

I was driving to Charleston from Asheville, NC where I had taken in a couple of Tourists games and hit the Blue Ridge Parkway and Mt. Mitchell. Asheville to Charleston is about 270 miles, a straight shot on I-26. I don’t recall much interesting about that stretch of I-26 – an efficient way to eat some miles, but not a whole lot to see.  This was a Saturday in July, so things got backed up around the I-26/I-95 interchange with all the beach traffic coming and going.

 

I really screwed up the itinerary on this one. I should’ve booked two days in Charleston instead of one night and I should have stayed in Charleston instead of out in the burbs of North Charleston. As soon as I got to town around noon, it started raining just buckets and I spent most of the time dodging the rain that weekend. As a result, I didn’t get to see much of Charleston at all. Before I checked into my hotel, I did manage to squeeze in a couple of beers and a sandwich at Charleston Beer Works downtown (they had a local IPA that was quite nice – can’t recall the name of it). As usual, I went el-cheapo on the lodging, but I was pleasantly surprised by the Hampton Inn in North Charleston (adjacent to Charleston Southern University). Very clean and nice.

 

Joseph P. Riley, Jr Park (aka “The Joe”) sits right on the Ashley River and abuts the campus of The Citadel.

 

There was plenty of parking in the two large lots on Fishburne St – parking was $5.00.  Though I arrived about 15 minutes before the gates opened for the 6:05 PM start, there was already a line formed on Fishburne. Apparently there was a promotion giveaway for a Bill Murray T-Shirt. (Don’t ask me about the relationship between Bill Murray and the Riverdogs. I have no idea.) While I was waiting in line, it started to rain (again), so I scrambled back to my car and hung out until the weather cleared up.

I was sweating the weather on this one anyways. Charleston is mid-July is quite soupy (hot and humid) and with the early start, I was assuming this was going to be one of those “drink three beers and sweat four” evenings. It turned out to be about 85 during the game, but a really nice 10 or 15 MPH breeze made things actually quite comfortable. (It occurs to me that I just managed to complain about both the heat and cold in a single blog post.) Here is a Flickr slideshow featuring images taken of Joseph P. Riley Jr. Park in Charleston.

One of the unique features of The Joe is the marsh that lies down the first base line. Foul balls easily reach the marsh and you could see little white orbs poking their domes out from the mud. That is a site you don’t see everywhere.  Pretty cool.

When I was doing research for the trip, the other unique aspect of The Joe was the eclectic concession menu. Some really interesting choices there for a minor league park. The famous (or should I say infamous) Home Wrecker gets all the pub, but other weirdness comes in the form of The Pickle Dog, PBJ Jalapeno Bacon Burger, Beer Shakes, and Hummus. The list goes on and on.  I wasn’t feeling particularly adventurous that evening, but did find room in my stomach for an Old Smokey Dog, washing it down with some domestic light beers – too muggy to sample the large number of heavy craft brews at The Joe.

The rest of the baseball experience at The Joe is pretty standard for your minor league baseball park. It is a pleasant enough place to watch a game. Charleston is the low A farm club of the NY Yankees and everything was really clean with friendly customer service. Charleston is actually really a friendly town.

A couple of other observations:

• Ticket prices were really high, considering this is the South Atlantic League. I paid $12.00 for a lower reserved seat. Hell, I sat in the grandstand at PNC Park a couple of years ago for $16.00!
• In a number of parks, when you have field box seats, park employees will take your food and drink order for you. At Charleston, they actually extend it to other reserved seating areas as well. I never take advantage of this service – beer runs usually work in synchronous relation with bio breaks and it just seems incredibly lazy to not get off my butt to get my own food and drink.
• The Riverdogs replace the tired, old  Sumo Wrestling between-innings shtick with two patrons bashing the hell out of each other with pugil sticks – a nice link to the nearby Marine Corps Recruit Depot at Parris Island, SC.
• The Riverdogs are one of six minor league team whose nickname is based on a non-existent dog.