Baseball and Burritos in the Bay Area: Day 1

I fully intended yesterday to write up my review of my most recent baseball trip out to the city of San Francisco, but instead I had to write about the 40,000 or so people I witnessed fist pumping in AT&T Park. Now the duty of reviewing this trip falls to me today. The trip started off fairly well as nothing went wrong on either of my flights and I enjoyed one last Five Guys bacon cheeseburger before departing Dulles International Airport for my connecting flight in Hartfield-Jackson Airport.

When I arrived at SFO my friend was waiting for me and we made our way to pick up our rental car. The first thing we did was then to eat lunch or whatever meal it actually was as we were now three hours behind our normal time. Whatever meal it was, lunch or dinner, we ate it in South San Francisco at a Mexican grocer that came highly recommended for delicious burritos, and indeed this burrito was an amazing taste sensation. The flour tortilla was lightly grilled and carried with it the perfect consistency to greet the senses before getting to the juicy insides. The carne asada I got on the burrito was seasoned to perfection that cannot be described in words, and every aspect of this burrito was better than any other burrito I have ever had. So much so that I may never be able to eat another burrito as long as I live and will always long for a return to that small Mexican grocer in South San Francisco.

After our meal was consumed we got in the car for some brief sight seeing. Once we got on the highway we found out that traffic in San Francisco was worse than anything we had run into before. Even in LA. This caused us to quickly exit the highway and make our way down the shore via a more scenic route. We stopped briefly to go and take a look at the Pacific Ocean and then made our way into the city proper in search of the Full House house. It didn’t take us long and we found it and got our pictures of it before making our escape. We drove down towards the water and when we saw a sign for the Golden Gate Bridge we made that turn and drove to it.

The first overlook we passed was too crowded to stop in so we settled for driving across the bridge before seeing that the next overlook was also too crowded to stop in. Continuing on we drove into a random neighborhood with houses built into the side of hills and soon realized that wherever this was we should leave.

Once back on the highway it was late enough to go ahead and make our way to Modesto where we would be watching the Rockies high A minor league affiliate the Modesto Nuts. Before going to the game we stopped at a local chain restaurant known as BJ’s and with my on coming headache I tried the house brewed cream soda over a beer and ate a salad instead of my more traditional burger. After that was over we found a CVS where I quickly swallowed six Advil even though I meant to take only four. It worked out as the headache quickly vanished and when we made it to John Thurman Field I was ready to enjoy some minor league baseball.

As we made our way in and were handed that days program one thing started to become clear. In Modesto Tyler Matzek is kind of a big deal. After being our Nuts hats we made our way over to the adjacent to left field where the Nuts’ players take their swings or get their bullpen sessions in, and the pitcher warming up was none other than the aforementioned Tyler Matzek. This was good news as one of the fun parts about watching minor league ball is getting to see a top prospect play.

Once the game started we stood near left field for the first couple innings as Matzek had a no hitter starting to brew. It seemed almost like destiny since the first batter of the game had reached on an error, and what else is funnier than the first batter of the game reaching base without a hit and then the next 27 outs being recorded, but the no-hitter wasn’t to last. By that time thought the Nuts had built themselves a decent cushion with an absurd amount of extra base hits. Tyler Matzek continued to pitch well and ended up pitching seven solid innings allowing only one earned run. Jarrod Parker who came into the game with the lowest batting average on the team was an offensive force with a couple of extra base hits including a homerun.

It was good to get out and watch some California League baseball. All of the high A baseball I had seen up until then was of the Carolina League variety and that is more of a pitchers league where the California League is known for its hitting. The way back to our hotel was met with little resistance and finally collapsing into bed 23 hours after I had gotten out of bed thousands of miles away was one of the most relaxing and enjoyable moments of my life.