It’s been three years since I’ve been to a postseason baseball game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No, I didn’t attend any of the Nationals 2019 World Series run. I spent the first week of that in the hospital, and, honestly, Diamond didn’t then (and doesn’t now) pay well enough for me to have bought World Series tickets. That postseason, the Harrisburg Senators made the Eastern League playoffs, losing in the first round to the Bowie Baysox, and I attended both the Senators’ final game<\/a> and the Baysox’s final game<\/a> (in which they lost to the now-defunct Trenton Thunder).<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the Senators this year were woeful, the Lancaster Barnstormers showed real fire in the second half of their season and made the Atlantic League playoffs. When postseason tickets went on sale two weeks ago, I bought tickets to both games in Lancaster (games 1 and 2 of a best-of-five series) against the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Last night was game 1. I wore a Barnstormers shirt I bought last week at the team store — after two seasons, I finally<\/i> found a piece of apparel I wanted — as well as a red hat (a Harrisburg Senators 30th-anniversary hat, specifically), and I took a red Nationals hoodie for when the sun went down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There was a good sized crowd, and there was also a contingent from the “Crustacean Nation” (ie., the Blue Crabs faithful), including their flag-carrying mascot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Barnstormers lost 2-1. It was a tight pitcher’s duel, with Blue Crabs pitcher Daryl Thompson putting on a Greg Maddux-like pitching clinic — 8 scoreless innings, and not giving up a run until two outs in the ninth. The game ended with Trayvon Robinson striking out with the tying run on third.<\/p>\n\n\n\n