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We got up early this morning, at a quick continental breakfast at the hotel, and headed down to watch the Yankees practice.  They ended up not practicing on the practice field this morning, which meant that the morning involved a lot of standing around and very little action.  We saw Phil Hughes working in the bullpen from a distance, but that was about all we saw.   So for the Yankees/Indians this afternoon, we didn’t have the greatest luck on the autograph front.  That’s the way it goes though.

After we left Tampa, we headed over to Clearwater where the Major League Baseball Players Alumni Association does a charity game that is hosted by Wade Boggs.

Two things here are important to note:

• Wade Boggs is a punk.
• Wade Boggs’ wife is just as bad (if not worse).

We had a great time, despite the evening’s host.  We got to see a lot of old players that played when we were kids.  I got lots of pictures from that, but I’m too whooped to do the uploading and stuff tonight.  I’ll get them online tomorrow night from Lakeland.

Kevin Maris (Roger’s son) drove in the winning run in the bottom of the last inning.  There’s nothing like a little excitement in a “nobody cares what happens here” charity game.

We ate at Capogna’s Dugout (again) after the charity game.  Yum.  Best stromboli ever.  Yes, ever.

After that we drove the 3+ hours to Fort Pierce.  We’d stay in Vero Beach, but hotels there are crazy expensive.  So we have about a half hour drive in the morning…no big deal.  We’re going to see the Dodgers play their final home game at Dodgertown.  They’ve done their spring training in Vero Beach for more than 60 years, and they’ll be moving to Arizona after this year.

Vero Beach is one of the first stadiums we went to when we started coming to spring training.  It’s also where I met Brett Butler (who eventually my son was named for).  So there are a lot of fond memories here.  We’ve heard that the Orioles are moving to Vero Beach, but I’ve got no official word on that.  Everything would look weird painted orange though.

Ok.  Off to bed now.  I’ll post tomorrow from Lakeland with all of today’s (and tomorrow’s) pictures.