This month, Brian was selected to participate in Pittsburgh’s ‘08 NABA All-Star game. The game took place yesterday in a hidden field on Pittsburgh’s North Side. It was kind of like field of dreams except once they built it you need GPS and a Landrover to find the field. 

I would have been at the whole game but an earlier Yinz Team game held me up. I arrived late in the 4th inning and was surprised to learn that Keystone is not allowed in the park. I cried foul and then took my place along the left field line to heckle Brian, who was playing left field. Brian didn’t see any action except for a homer his team gave up it the 5th (or 6th I don’t remember as I smuggled in one or twelve Keystones). I thought for sure he was going to rob that guy of a home-run until I realized the fence is 30 or so feet high. Shame on Brian for not scaling that wall. 

Brian’s first at bat seemed like an excellent hit when he found the gap in right center. That is until he got greedy and tried for a triple. Well I’ll just quote the official report for actually what happened: 

“Strom lead off the sixth after doubling past the now twice dawg-bitten Ducks outfielder Ben Gwin.  However, Strom incorrectly decided he had wheels like the “Big Rig”, and was thrown out on a seven-hop strike to third as he tried to leg out a triple.

Strom later claimed the tag had missed him completely, but replays showed the umpire had the correct call.  While Strom’s slide did avoid the initial tag, his trailing mullett was tagged by the third baseman, resulting in him being correctly called out.”

Anyway, congrats to all the NABA ‘08 All-Stars. For more info on Pittsburgh NABA click here.