In an oddity of the calendar, three BlueClaws coaches celebrate a birthday within two days of each other, plus a few players have birthdays around the same period.

Happy Birthday to hitting coach Greg Legg and pitching coach Les Lancaster, who share a birthday (today). Tomorrow is manager Mickey Morandini’s birthday as well as reliever Colton Murray.

Colin Kleven celebrated his birthday last Sunday (4/15), Mike Nesseth’s birthday was on Thursday (4/19), Colton Murray’s birthday is tomorrow, and Carlos Perdomo celebrates on Wednesday.

We’d like to wish a very Happy Birthday to BlueClaws head groundskeeper Ryan Radcliffe, who today turns eight.

A tweet from us this morning awknowleding this returned two responses, both pretty good:

@1tomato2 That’s why there are always crayons on the infield.

And the more classy @OhHeyItsKevin He ages gracefully.

We appreciate both responses of course.

But regarding the first one, sometimes crayons are very good, especially when they do this:

In this case, “crayons” shares a meaning with “stencil” and “spray-paint,” but you get the point.

In looking up some famous people who share a Leap Day birthday, we found John “Pepper” Martin (born 1904), who played for the Gashouse Gang Cardinals of the 1930s and three times led the National League in steals. He also managed an International League franchise named the, of all names, Miami Marlins.

For those of you that subscribe to this blog’s RSS feed using Google Reader, the posts that have appeared here after January 20th have not shown up on there. We’re trying to figure that out. For those that don’t know how to subscribe but would like to, click the orange icon at the bottom of this post.

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Earlier this week, I talked with Phillies assistant director of minor league operations Steve Noworyta about a few players that could be here with Lakewood this year. I’m planning to start the Road to Lakewood series tomorrow. We’ll do four groups – starting pitchers, relief pitchers, infielders, and outfielders (go figure).

The plan is to do more podcasts this year too, so we’ll do that with some staff members, fans, and when the season starts, of course the players and coaches.

Michael Taylor, a BlueClaw in 2008, interned at sports-talk KNBR in San Francisco this offseason. He spends his afternoons walking around a five or six block radius from the station trying to get comments from fans on the streets.

“Thousands and thousands of no’s,” he joked. “I have more of an appreciation for this side of the media because of this.”

He said working in the sports media was always something that he thought about.

“I decided to find out if there was a chance to get in on the ground floor. They had a new segment called ‘What’s Bugging You’ and they gave it to me. It grew from there.”

Watch the full video here on MLB.com.

(Thanks to former BlueClaws broadcaster and current Charleston RiverDogs broadcaster Sean Houston for the find)

Today is Friday the 13th, and we’d like to wish everyone a Happy Friday the 13th. This day has always been good to the BlueClaws, as the team is 7-2 all-time on Friday the 13th.

The BlueClaws will actually play two Friday the 13th games this year, one in April against Hagerstown and anothyer in July against Hickory, both at FirstEnergy Park.

Here’s the BlueClaws history on Friday the 13th:

• 2001: April, W 1-0 vs Hickory (11)…Two future big leaguers, Yoel Hernandez, six, and Eude Brito, three, helped pitch the shutout.
• 2003: June, L 7-5 vs Delmarva…Led 5-1 but gave up six runs in the eighth inning.
• 2004: August, W 7-3 and 11-0 vs Greensboro…Michael Buorn went 4-8 over the double-header and Randy Ruiz hit a home run in game two.
• 2005: May, W 10-4 at Delmarva…Jason Jaramillo went 4-4.
• 2007: April, W 9-5 at Hickory…’Claws pound out 14 hits including two from Quintin Berry, Adrian Cardenas, Tuffy Gosewisch, and three from Jay Miller.
• 2008: June, W 4-0 at DEL…six shutout innings from Chance Chapman.
• 2010: August, W 10-0 vs DEL…Trevor May threw seven shutout innings, Leandro Castro drove in three and Stephen Batts hit a home run.
• 2011: May, L 4-3 vs HAG…8,217 fans were here to see the Bryce Harper and Jesse Biddle struck him out in the first inning. However, Hagerstown scored four in the second before holding on for a 4-3 win.

April 13th, July 13th, both at 7:05. See you then.

Boo.

We heard, ad nauseam, throughout the summer about the NFL lockout. We heard, ad nauseam, over the last few months about the NBA lockout. Both of those deals got signed.

Baseball seems to have it down cold. They got their big labor deal done with so little fanfare that unless you were paying attention, you probably missed it.

And now…wait for it…the minor league baseball umpires have reached labor peace with MiLB. They agreed to a five-year extension that will take them through the 2016 season. You may remember the strike at the outset of the 2006 season.

“It will allow us to manage the costs associated with our umpire program in an effective manner and will help maintain our industry as an attractive form of affordable family entertainment,” said Tim Purpura executive vice president of the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues.

The great folks with the Fordcast Tour and the Ford Focus were here on July 7th and gave the tour to a number of BlueClaws fans plus had a great night at the ballpark. Take a look!

Phillies broadcaster and Brick native Tom McCarthy was inducted into the Trenton Thunder Hall of Fame last night and, as you can see in the picture, they named the broadcast booth after him.

Tony Graham was in Trenton to cover the story.

Perhaps no one locally, other than family members,  have followed McCarthy’s career more closely than Geoff Brown, general manager of the Lakewood BlueClaws.
Brown was in group sales for Trenton in the mid 90′s when McCarthy was the Thunder Director of  Public and Media Relations while also working as a broadcaster.
After the 1999 season McCarthy left the Thunder to pursue a full-time career in broadcasting.
“”He was the first radio guy I ever knew,” Brown said Thursday. “”He was the best.”
McCarthy’s father, Tom, is a long time usher behind home plate for Lakewood.
Said Brown, “”When Tom was doing radio for the Phillies before he was doing TV, I swear I’d be out running and listening to the game and have to remind myself, “”Wait a minute, this is a Phillies game, this isn’t a Thunder game back in the day.’

You can read the full story here.

The BlueClaws are excited to welcome the Fordcast Tour to FirstEnergy Park for next Thursday’s game, which is one of the Fordcast Tour stops!

If you are unfamiliar with the Fordcast Tour, it is an awesome summer-long tour created to celebrate the launch of the new 2012 Ford Focus.  The Fordcast team will make stops all across the Northeast at music, sports, and food festivals events.

At the BlueClaws game there will be two Ford Focus Lounges with video games, trivia, a Focus Fotobooth for you to strike a pose in and free giveaways! One of the giveaways will include Ford Focus binolculars, five of which will feature a gold star to denote a winner of tickets to a future BlueClaws game.

We should also mention that there will be 2012 Ford Focus vehicles on-site for BlueClaws fans to check out in person! This vehicle has everything a BlueClaws fan would want – MyFord Touch capabilities that include voice commands and a rear-view camera (just to name a few!), heated seats for those cold winter nights and best of all, it gets 40 miles per gallon!

Cant make it to the game? No worries, we will post a video recap shortly highlighting our experience in the Fordcast Lounge!

For more information on how you can win tickets to next week’s BlueClaws game, follow the Fordcast Tour on Twitter at @FordcastTour and check out their website here.

The BlueClaws were excited to host the Bruce Brunch at FirstEnergy Park, 105.7 The Hawk’s weekly tribute to Bruce Springsteen hosted by our buddy Tom Cunningham. If you missed the show, you can download it online by clicking here.

Included on the show are BlueClaws 1B Jim Murphy, LHP Jesse Biddle, manager Chris Truby, groundskeeper Ryan Radcliffe, and general manager Geoff Brown.

Enjoy.

Steve Rogers, who won 158 games in a 13 year big league career, will be signing autographs at FirstEnergy Park on Saturday during the 4:05 game to promote the upcoming Hope4Heroes Charity Baseball Classic which comes to Lakewood on June 17th.

Rogers defeated Steve Carlton and the Phillies twice in the 1981 division series, helping the Expos advance to the NLCS.

His autograph signing will help promote this event, for which you can buy tickets on Saturday. Read info below:

The BlueClaws will host a Hope4Heroes charity baseball game at FirstEnergy Park on Friday, June 17th which will include Hall of Famer Gaylord Perry.

Players, which will include members of the military and former Major Leaguers like Jay Johnstone and Bob Boone will put on an entertaining show and raise money for military families. Lakewood is one stop on a tour that also includes Tuscon, San Antonio, and Las Vegas.

Fans can get autographs from the players before and during the game.

Brian Kilmead of Fox News will also be at the game to throw out a ceremonial first pitch with retired two-star General Alfred Valenzuela.

(more…)

The BlueClaws and 105.7 The Hawk are giving fans the chance to come out and watch Tom Cunningham and the Bruce Brunch on Sunday, May 15th.

We’ll have a live broadcast of the show from inside the ballpark (9 am – 11 am) and fans can come out, enjoy the show, meet Tom Cunningham, the host, and then enjoy a BlueClaws picnic with all the other guests.

Here’s more on the Bruce Brunch:

Tom Cunningham hosts a weekly two-hour celebration of the career of Bruce Springsteen! From 1973 to the present, all eras of Springsteen’s recordings are included. In addition to studio recordings, various live versions of songs are also represented–with a special emphasis on rare import discs. And whenever there is Bruce News or Bruce is in the news, you’ll hear all about it.

To sign up, call Dennis at 732-901-7000 ext 163 or email dchachko@blueclaws.com. Tickets are $24.95 for adults and $16.95 for children and come with a viewing of the broadcast and a picnic during the game.

A few things as we get ready for a 1:05 game between the BlueClaws and Savannah Sand Gnats at FirstEnergy Park. Click here for the full game notes.

Anthony Hewitt has an 11-game hitting streak after going 2-4 yesterday. He’s 16-47 over that stretch with six doubles and two triples. He turned 22 on Wednesday.

Also, and I find this relatively interesting, David Buchanan starts today for Lakewood. The Phillies took him in the 7th round of the draft last year but the Mets did in 2009 (6th round from Chipola JC). He elected to go to Georgia State where he pitched for one season, but today gets to face the organization that drafted him for the first time (he did not pitch against Brooklyn last year).

You can listen here beginning at 12:50.

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Here is the story from yesterday’s game in the APP.

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Here is a story on the Jackson/Jackson Memorial game with Jackson winning 3-1 under the lights.

36 years ago, a team from Lakewood, NJ won the Little League World Series. This Tuesday is Lakewood Township Night at FirstEnergy Park and we’ll honor that team with one of their coaches, Dick Work.

You can order tickets to that game by clicking here. Work will be there to throw out a ceremonial first pitch with a few players and we’ll have some of that team’s memorabilia. It will be a great thing to see on Monday.

Work was the Co-Manager of the 1975 Lakewood Little League team that won the Little League World Series that year. He coached Little League, Youth Basketball, and Pop Warner Football for over 25 years, he was the Mayor of Lakewood for 4 years, worked 47 years for Jersey Central Power & Light, and was a Volunteer Firefighter for 26 years with Engine Company #1 in Lakewood.

Mr. Work is excited to be at the game on the 26th, and we had a chance to talk with him about that 1975 Lakewood Little League squad that won it all:

The most amazing moment of that entire season:

“Just the fact that we won 17 straight games to win it all was remarkable. Nowadays the tournament is double elimination, but back then we had to win every day, and it was really an amazing run we had.”

Single most memorable game:

“After we won Districts in Point Pleasant, we went to the State Finals in Hamilton. We were trailing by 2 runs going into the 6th inning, and our first 2 batters got out. I remember thinking to myself ‘Well, it has been a good run’. I don’t remember who the hitter was, but he swung and missed at 2 straight curveballs, and then for some reason the pitcher threw a fastball and he hit him with it. Then the next 3 guys up all got hits and we won. It was an unbelievable comeback.”

Funniest moment:

“After we won States in Hamilton, we went and played in Hagerstown, MD. We gave up 2 runs in the top of the first, and it just wasn’t looking good. We were facing a really good pitcher. But, we went out there and loaded the bases for Dion Lowe who was probably our best hitter. And I remember this just like it was yesterday. Some guy, he wasn’t a coach or anything, just a fan, ran out behind the fence in Centerfield and was screaming “WALK HIM! WALK HIM!” But, they didn’t. They pitched to him, and he hit a Grand Slam and we took the lead and never gave it up. We won that game and then headed to Williamsport, PA”

On what made that team so good:

“We had 5 good pitchers and a whole team full of kids that could hit, and that is really exactly what it takes. We also had 5 kids who turned 13 after the date where they are still allowed to play with the 12 year olds. You wouldn’t think that makes a difference, but it really does when you are talking about 12 and 13-year olds.”

Talks about the 14 kids that made up the team:

“The kids really were great the whole way. They never stopped playing hard the whole time. It was a crazy schedule, and it was quite the experience. I really do think they appreciated it. But when they had to play, they were always ready to go.”