Braving the heat

Anyone who knows how hot it's been in SA lately might be amazed to hear that we were out two evenings in a row at local sporting events this week.

First up was a US Open Cup soccer match between our SAFC and FC Dallas. Yes, our lowly USL team was matched against a team from what passes for the soccer major leagues in our [soccer-ly backward] country.

That's the way this FA-Cup-styled tournament is supposed to work. And we almost pulled off one of the fun upsets that fans of such events live for.

We really outplayed the big boys, and created several more scoring chances than they did, but their defense was always spot on. So it was doubly unfortunate that just after the second half began, we carelessly gave the ball away at midfield and suffered the game's only goal as a result. I think our keeper would have beat theirs in a shootout.

But it was a lovely evening, as you can see, with even a stiff, constant breeze that made the heat much more bearable. So it was fun.

The next night we sweated a lot more (less breeze and more crowded stands) at our token Missions* game of the season.

only in SA: C5 (?) touch-and-goes provide extra entertainment
throughout the game

We always plan to go to more of these fun AA games, but usually end up only making it once. It is somewhat frustrating that a city of our size only has a team at this level, but they have a loyal following and over the years have seen some pretty impressive guys playing for them.

Like this gentleman on the left, who looks unbelievably young on the banner. Especially compared to how he looked about 15 years later when I saw him enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

It's fun that they put the club's history on view like this. (According to Wikipedia, we were a founding member of the Texas League in 1888!)

It's also nice that they were offering dollar beers and hot dogs last night. I'm ready to head up to our seats for dinner in this pic.

Unfortunately we brought bad luck to another local team here. Uneven pitching and sloppy fielding were paired with rather anemic hitting, and the home team lost 8-2. Still a fun outing though!

---

*Although the team is officially the Missions, they often take up an alter-ego and we got to see what has become a wildly popular cultural event that started as a marketing ploy. Yes, we are the Flying Chanclas!

On his way back from a beer run Henry was actually held up by a visit from the main Chanclas mascot (an abuela; read the link above for an explanation, of sorts) in the aisle near our seats...

Unfortunately the "matriarch" had turned away before I could snap the photo, but fortunately he wasn't hit by any flying flip-flops. I couldn't find a picture of her to link for you, but she participates in several of the between-innings activities, including chasing kids around the bases, chanclas in hand. Minor league baseball! Gotta love it!