A Raley Field Outing

Today we skived off from our Saturday morning peace vigil duties and went to see the exhibition game between the Seattle Mariners and the Texas Rangers at Raley Field in West Sac. We went with Cindy, a friend of ours from the Davis Peace Coalition, and her husband Tony.

It was great seeing Ichiro and A-Rod in Yolo County’s very own Raley Field. We were on the lawn, the regular seats having sold out within hours of being put on sale last month. Good view of Ichiro not too far off in right field, and he even lead off the first inning with a home run.

Ichiro and the Mariners inspire celebrations of Japanese culture, or at least the River Cats management think so. There were Sacramento-area taiko drummers pre-game, and the first pitch was thrown by a pitcher from the Nisei leagues. The catcher of this pitch, clad in a buff Fresno uniform, was the director of the Nisei Baseball Research Project, a group that is rediscovering the history of Japanese-American baseball.