Take me out to the ball game...

Spring training is happening all over the Valley of the Sun - the Cactus League is in full swing as the Major League teams determine who stays and who goes.  It is a great opportunity to see professional baseball at a reasonable price.  Our game today: the Cleveland Indians vs the Milwaukee Brewers.

$5 to park; buy one, get one free for the tickets to the game.  Joan and Dan picked up tickets last Saturday (the deal applies for local residents).  We got there an hour early and got a close parking spot.

One of the souvenir stands tried to lure Joan in...

I was more interested in the eating options: one place advertised a Cincinnati Chili Cheese Dog... I know what I'm having.  Professional Sports Stadium prices have come to the food vendors at the spring training games.  We bought some food and headed to our seats.

Along the way, there were people playing beanbag in one of the open grassy areas...

They understand who their winter visitors are.

We have great seats: 10 rows up, right behind home plate...

A sunny day, and our seats were in the sun, to start.  It was cool out, though, so the sun felt good.  A very young girl from Cleveland sang the National Anthem - she was great.  Play ball!

The stands were not full...

Back to the game...

Four innings in, almost two hours had passed.  The game seemed to be moving slow.  The pitching was less than stellar on both sides, but the Indians were walking a lot of batters.

Oh, look - the moon...

Like other professional games, there was the occasional tossing out stuff...

And, no game is complete without the tossing of the giant fries...

OK, back to the game...

A grand slam in the 6th inning put the Brewers way ahead...

It was pretty clear where this game was going.  By this time, our seats were in the shade; with the breeze, it felt down-right chilly (not the Cincinnati kind).  The seats began to thin out as people left, or moved to seats in the sun (what you generally try to avoid here).

We hung in there with our seats.

No, that's not me.  Steeee-rike!

By the ninth inning, it wrapped up fairly quick...

Final score: Brewers 14, Indians 4.

Not much of a crowd to fight to get out of the parking lot - most had left earlier.  We enjoyed the outing.

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So the day doesn't go by without some Izzy content: a couple shots I took of her this morning, before heading to the game...