Happy New Year!....Defenders sign 4 year lease...

extending thru the 2009 season with the city of Norwich as reported by local news organizations. That long term commitment should help the team sell adverising/promotions. Real curious has to what the promo schedule will look like. And only 90 plus days left to Opening Day. Fan Fest is sometime in Feb. Should send them an e-mail to find out when exactly. See you in 2006.

2006 tickets in the house....

as I stopped up to Dodd to pick up my 2006 Holiday 6 pack vouchers. Great deal--6 undated tickets for $36 and as previously mentioned I picked up 4 of them. The box office was open and from what I overheard the ticket paper stock will change from the familar purple and white currently used to a black colored stock; perhaps the type pictured on the team home page. The gift shop wasn't open but I looked in and there is a bunch of new Defender stuff in there. Not a single piece of Navigator merchandise I could see. I wonder what happened to all that stuff? Also the old Navigator trailer had been painted over white. If I don't post Friday--Merry Christmas!

Stopped by the Defenders website yesterday and today...and

got to give them props on keeping the site updated and adding new stuff. It's a good sign of things to come when the season gets underway. The "old" Gators site would remain unupdated for weeks sometimes.

Defenders player transactions...

S.F. Giants agreed to terms with RHP Oscar Montero, C Guillermo Rodriquez, and INF Julio Cordido. Also OF Doug Clark from the 2004 team signed on with Oakland. The first three guys all played on the 2005 Navigators team. Oscar was with the team most of the year. A setup pitcher he had some great outings and some not so great ones. Guillermo appeared in a handful of games when Elizer Alfonzo was suspended for a couple of weeks for substance violation. He spent most of the year in single A San Jose. Julio turned out to be a jack of all postions playing every postion except catcher and center field. I was hoping he'd get a chance to play every position in a single game as a promotion but the team battled to the end in hopes of a playoff position. Doug Clark was perhaps the best player on the 2004 Navigator squad. He played this past season in Triple A Frenso with solid stats. He made his MLBB debut in Sept. Good luck with the A's.
Also R.I.P. actor John Spencer. Best actor on "West Wing" hands down.

The new electronic scoreboard will be ready a week..

before Opening Day. The Norwich Bulletin reported this today. The cost will be about $193K.

Got an e-mail from the team today....

promoting last minute Christmas gifts. There is more clothing for sale now and one of the caps is actually sold out. Haven't seen anyone wearing a Defender cap yet out in the world. Also got Defender snail mail from their website request for a pocket schedule. The front office is cooking.

Cap History 101, part 6 of an occasional series

I actually bought this player's "batting practice" cap for some reason on eBay for about ten bucks. It's fitted (size 7 and an eighth) and has light player usage. I did see them sold in the gift shop for more at one point. I've never seen this cap worn by anyone. Anyone wishing to buy this for $10 LMK--free shipping!

Just back XMAS shopping at the Crystal Mall in..

Waterford. Made me recall the Navigators salad days when they had a XMAS store at the mall as an extension to their gift shop at Dodd. Didn't see any Defender stuff today shoppping but didn't look that hard either. Reminds me to put up another update to the Navigators cap series soon.

In Rule V action the Defenders picked up 3B Aaron Sisk

from the Cubs. The team really didn't have a regular third baseman this past season so he might be it for 2006. Really snowing out there today!

Defenders return the Holiday 6-pack special!!!

Special Holiday gift offer: 6 vouchers for $36. A dollar off the regular price grandstand price of $7; the offer is good thru 12/30/05. I bought four 6 packs of them last year at the same pricing and it lasted me to the end of the season. The Sunday "Big Y" special is $4 per ticket and "Monday Markdown" is $5 per ticket so these 6 pack vouchers fill in the the rest of the days of the week. Of course I don't know if they will reprise the Sunday/Monday specials yet for the upcoming season, so I'll have to ask when picking up the 2006 vouchers. Hopefully someone will be in the know. Great deal; happy to see it return!

Found a handy reference source today for...

minor league baseball stat: the Baseball Cube at http://www.thebaseballcube.com for the 2002 Navigator review I'm doing on the other blog. Check them out.

Defender outreach...

Ran into a friend of mine whose business belongs to the Chamber of Commerce. He said they got a questionaire from the team a few weeks ago seeking advertising and fan feedback. Good job by someone in the front office.

Tater pic from the 2002 Navigator season.

Check out the ongoing 2002 season pic release in my companion blog by clicking on "My 2005 Nor. Navigators blog" at the right.