Notes: Extra Fielding Practice Needed

Moral High Ground needed
By Beth Sass / hereforthesass.blogspot.com

ANAHEIM -- The Here for the Sass Team demands the Moral High Ground, even when victories are sparse, and difficulties arise in the form of injuries or troubles. This high-caliber playing is demanded not only of the Sassians themselves, but it is also demanded of everyone in the ballpark. Earlier in the year, fans were required to show up early for some fielding practice. The Fans Fielding Percentage (FFP) has gone up, and is highest in the BFL, Beth and Dawn noticed something while watching the games on Tuesday.

“The fans were doing okay. We’re still missing a lot of plays we just need to make, but they’re steadily improving. They’re new to this--this is the first year the Sass have been around. However, there is positively no excuse for how poor the ushers and umpires are fielding,” Dawn said.

Oftentimes during games, the umpires will be throwing balls to the Ball Boys, and will need to catch balls the Ball Boys have thrown to them. Ushers, on the other hand, do no regularly need to field balls, which is probably the cause of their laxness in fielding. However, when fans are not near enough to field cleanly, the ushers will need to catch the fouls. While the balls not being fielded cleanly does not affect the play of the game, it does affect the aesthetic pleasure of all watching.

“This is of serious concern to the Sass Management,” Dawn said, “And I’ve scheduled extra fielding practice for the umpires and ushers before the game on Wednesday. I hope that when I’m watching tonight’s game from my suite in Nice, I will see quality fielding.”

Fantasy broadcasting opportunity: When the Sass are on the road, or when a Sass player cannot make a Sass game, the fans love to critique the announcers. No matter how high the caliber of announcers a team has, the fans still feel they could do better. When the Sass return home in a week and a half, the fans can put their money where their mouths are. A fantasy broadcasting booth will be available for fans to show their skills, at a cost of $25 per inning.

“You can broadcast just one inning, or you can broadcast an entire game--if space permits,” Clubhouse Manager Rach said.

The fans will be given the same access to stats as the professional announcers, and, in a twist unseen before, their broadcasting will actually be broadcast live at the Sass Radio Network’s alternate station.

“This way, fans can listen to other fans broadcast, but, more importantly, we will always have our professional broadcasters if any fantasy broadcaster is not performing up to the high standards Sass fans are used to,” Beth said.

Fans can sign up for their fantasy time up to 10 days in advance, by calling the Sass ticket offices, or visiting the Sass web site.

Banned! Sass Stadium now bans the use of speaker phones in the stadium.

“There is positively no reason that any fan should have to listen to someone else’s phone calls. We already ask that any fans making non-baseball related telephone calls during the game please remove themselves from the stands. However, there’s been some reported irritation over the use of speaker phones before the games,” Beth said.

Sass front office was quick to point out that speaker phones themselves were not banned, simply the use of them in the stadium.

Teddy-Bear Give-away Thursday: The next Sass Promotion will be on Thursday, when Teddy Bears dressed as players will be given away. Teddy bears will be the approximate skin color of the player they are representing, and will wear a the players’ uniform. There will be 1,000 of each player, coach, and manager; this will also include the DL Boys and any player who has played for the Sass this year (except pitcher R. Johnson. Marketing analysis showed 97% would be burned before the game ended). The total number of Teddy Bears given away will be 40,000, which means almost all fans entering the ballpark should get one teddy bear.

“It was a bit difficult. Sass Stadium has a capacity of 47,651,” Dawn said, “We usually sell out, even on Thursdays, so we needed to make sure we could get the promotion to as many fans as possible.”

The Sass promotions are only available to Sass fans. Any fan entering the park wearing logos of any other team are given a pocket-sized packet of Kleenex.

“If you’re not a Sass fan, why would you want a Sass branded item?” Beth said. “It makes more sense to give the gifts to those who will appreciate them.”

Tonight: Beth is still recovering from Brad Halsey’s pitching performance on Tuesday, so she is unable to bear the thought of another Sass starter on the mound. For this reason, there will be no starting pitching tonight. It’s entirely possible that a Sass reliever or two could take the mound, as they’ve not disappointed her too much in the last couple of days, but she has not yet decided on that.

“It will depend on how the game is going, I guess,” Beth said, “If we need a pitcher, then I’ll throw one in.”

Mark Grudzielanek confided to the press that he’s pretty sure that Beth will not be able to face having a starting pitcher until Friday, when she’ll be recovered from the recent performances.

"Even the starting pitchers agree: if one of them were to pitch in the next couple of days, it could land Beth on the DL for fatigue. It's better for the pitchers to rest and let Beth recover," Mark said, and then added slyly, "At least until Dawn comes back."