Cap History 101, part 7 of an occasional series

This is my oldest Navigators cap. A promo cap (free) from the good folks at Mallon Chevy from the 1996 season. I still see this one at the ballpark along with the first Mallon cap from the inaugural 1995 season (nice one-white with purple pinstripes). It is the cap I worn most often until I replaced it in my rotation with the 10 year anniversary cap in 2004.

Defenders continue to add to the promo schedule with...

The Hard Rock Cafe at Foxwoods presenting a "Rockin Block Party" every home Saturday night game starting June 3nd thru the end of the season. This is a new type of promo being offered and the type of new ground I look forward to seeing (actually expect) the new front office team break. They've had a band or two playing before up by the first base berm in prior seasons usually for Grateful Dead Day at Dodd but never a season long series. I take it as a sign that Dead Day in August will continue! One of my favorite promos because the players wear tie dye uniforms and by that time in the season I'm sick of taking player pictures and the tie dye uniforms give me something new to shoot.

The past on the auction block....

as the Defenders are selling off some stuff from the Navigators past on their website; most notably the neon gift shop sign (opening bid $250). The rest of the offerings are signed baseballs, pictures and gloves collected down thru the years with very reasonable opening bids. The team tried selling before on eBay. I hoping game-used uniforms and hats make their way to the block but at an affordable opening bid. I always wonder what happened to those turn back the clock uniforms, both Giants and Yankees, the Gators worn occasionly.

Defender Fan Fest will be Saturday Feb 11, 2006...

at the Mystic Aquarium from 1-4PM. Great choice of a site! Promo schedule continues to fill in with a bunch of community days similar to last year. So far the promo schedule hasn't broke any fresh ground over last year but all has not been revealed yet.

O's send Burres to their Triple A team in Ottawa

Promo schedule slowly filling in...

with Friday night fireworks and fireworks Opening Day well. Anxious to see the rest of the promo schedule and how well they've sold the team in the off-season.

Saw a great promo in the Courant today being..

offered by the University of Hartford Hawks womens basketball team. It's called "Local heroes Night," free admission to local police, firefighters, teachers, etc. Maybe the Defenders will come up with something like this.

Brian Burres picked up by the Orioles on waivers...

as the former 2005 Navigators lefty starter was dropped off the Giants 40 man roster to make room for recent pickup INF Jose Visciano. He was the best starter the Navs had down the stretch last season and would have been in Triple A Frenso this year. Not overpowering stuff but got guys out.
Another reason Burres sticks out is I really needed a picture of him as the 2005 season progressed. Since 2004 I made it a goal to get a picture of each player in uniform something I wished I had started earlier. That's a hard goal because some guys get called up for spot roster fill-ins from other levels and then get sent back down or up. Last year catcher Steve Holm filled in one game for the Navs and only saw a half inning worth of work in the season home opener and then got sent down. I was lucky enough to get his picture in that game. He came back up later in the season but for awhile I thought I had a real collectors item; the player with the shortest Navigator career.
With starting pitchers you really have a one out of five chance of getting game action pictures. I remember missing Brian's first couple of appearances and then he went on the DL. I was worried he might not come back to the team and I wouldn't reach my goal but things turned out otherwise. The first weeks of the season I'm taking pictures like mad because you never know how long a guy is there for. And later on as the roster settles in, the addition of a new guy gets pretty exciting because I have to get that shot.

The old Gators fan van that I saw painted over white...

as been transformed into the Defenders fan van. As reported on the Defenders website, it will be used by their "street team"--a group of volunteers to spread the word. Each team member gets a free half season pass. It's a new concept the team is trying out. The Gators kinda of, sorta tried using the fan van last year but it frizzled out. I did however get a free fan bracelet off my only encounter with the Gator van. The whole fan bracelet thing frizzled out too. There is a picture of the new van on the Defenders web site.

Congrats to HuskyBlog.com on winning the 2005..

Sports Blog Award in the category of NCAA basketball. The blog, along with mine, can be found on CTWeblogs; the link is to the right. Great game coverage of both teams and super links. Go Huskies!