Tagged: Justin Boar
Boise Hawks Baseball Camp: Bringing It Back to the Kids
This week, the Boise Hawks hosted their annual baseball camp directed towards children ages 7-14. The camp is two half-day sessions jam-packed with drills. The kids had the chance to learn from Hawks players and Manager Casey Kopitzke (who is actually the first manager to take part in the yearly camp) while rotating from station to station, covering everything from base running to pitching.
Check out the montage of clips from the first day of camp here.
Besides the manager getting involved, there was also something new to the way the camp was run–on the baseball side. Manager Casey Kopitzke did not assign guys to the camp but instead hung up a sign-up sheet so the guys could volunteer on their own.
“I think it’s best if the guys decide they want to do something like this on their own,” said Kopitzke. “I want to make sure everyone has a good time…I don’t want to give a kid a bad experience because maybe the player didn’t want to be there.”
However, there was no shortage of interested players testing out their coaching skills. On the first day of camp pitcher Corey Martin manned the station on throwing basics, pitcher Yohan Gonzalez and catcher Richard Jones worked with the kids in the batting cages, first baseman Justin Bour taught the kids some ground ball skills, pitcher Danny Keefe worked on fly balls and Kopitzke took over base running. On the second day, outfielders Jose Valdez and Runey Davis worked in the cage, pitcher Ryan Sontag took over fly balls, infielder Logan Watkins and Tarlandus Mitchell taught the kids double plays, Kopitzke taught a little bit of catching, and pitchers Jon Nagel and Yohan Gonzalez taught the kids a little bit of pitching.
After the sessions, the kids were able to eat lunch with the guys and get a few autographs.
By far, it has been one of my favorite events this season–it is so cool to see these guys work with the youngsters, and you know these kids are just in awe because they were able to play with professional baseball players. So awesome!
Third Times the Charm?
In all actuality, this title can apply to a lot of things the Boise Hawks will encounter tonight.
First of all, coming off two winning games against Yakima, the Hawks are looking for their third straight win. So far this season, the Hawks have only been able to string two wins together at the time. Tonight will actually be the third time they try to get that winning streak kicked off.
The second reason is more of a personal beef I have…and yet, beef may be the wrong word.
On Wednesday, we started doing on-field Northwest Dodge player-of-the-game interviews (and I get to be the correspondent). The first night, I interviewed Logan Watkins who has now extended his hitting streak to eight games. Logan was a little camera-shy so I had to beg him to come do the interview, at one point, taking him by the hand and dragging him across the field (not one of my prouder moments). When I finally convinced him to sit in the hot-seat and we were moving through the interview fairly well, here comes Brett Jackson with a shaving-cream pie–right in Logan’s face!
Logan handled it well, even completing the interview with shaving cream on his face, but was convinced that I had planned the whole ordeal. After talking to Logan afterwards and straightening out the fact that I did not have anything to do with the shaving cream, I figured I was back on good terms and wouldn’t have any problems with the post-game interviews in the future.
Then came last night’s player-of-the-game interview with Justin Bour. Justin’s a newbie, joining the Hawks just three days ago. As I pulled him aside after the game I said to him, “Hopefully you won’t get a pie in the face like Logan did.”
Let me just say that I needed to eat my words about ten minutes later…as I saw Brett Jackson bolting towards us out of the corner of my eye. Next thing I know…Justin’s face is plastered with shaving cream.
While I don’t know if Brett Jackson is totally to blame–and it is all in good fun anyway–Brett will be the Northwest Dodge Player of the Game tonight no matter what. We’ll see if what goes around comes around!
Although, maybe I should be the one hoping not to get a pie in the face…
Remember, you can watch all home games on BoiseHawks.tv. At the end of the game, don’t forget you can also catch the Northwest Dodge Player of the Game interviews…and plenty of pies.
A Bird's Eye View 