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Phillies Girl Problems: Hatfield Dollar Dog Night
On Tuesday, the Phillies will play the New York Mets at 7:05 PM EST.
While this doesn’t sound like a particularly earth shattering match up, especially in the middle of the week, there is a baseball gem hidden within Tuesday’s game that only those lucky enough to attend Citizen’s Bank Park that night will get to experience.
Enter Phillies Girl problems.
While I love where I live out in Scottsdale, and I must admit, I’m a true West Coast girl, there are certain things about not living near my team that stink worse than how stinky I imagine Brian Wilson’s beard must be after meal time.
And one of those things is missing out Hatfield Dollar Dog Night. The Phillies promotional schedule says it all.
“For the first time this season, enjoy delicious dollar dogs while the Phils take on the Mets as Hatfield Phillies Franks Dollar Dog Night returns!”
Why, yes, I WOULD like to enjoy some delicious dollar hot dogs while watching my most favoritest team in the entire world play my most favoritest sport in the entire world.
But I can’t. Because I live in Arizona.
What’s better than going to a ballgame? Going to a ballgame and enjoying some ballpark food. What’s better than going to a ballgame and enjoying some ballpark food? Going to a ballgame and enjoying some CHEAP ballpark food. Especially these days, when enjoying a sporting event with the family involves dipping into the kids’ college funds (not quite, but almost), you simply cannot beat hot dogs for a dollar.
Mets fans attending Tuesday’s game will probably have a field day. Not only will they finally learn that a ballpark can actually completely fill up with fans, but they’re used to shelling out $6.25 for a single hot dog at Citi Field, the most expensive in all of baseball.
That’s 6 Hatfield Dollar Dogs for less than the price of ONE Citi Field dog. And I bet they taste like Mets fandom…. flavorless.
I’m not saying that’s just another reason the Phillies are better than the Mets…. but that’s just another reason the Phillies are better than the Mets.
So, phellow phans, if you’re attending the Hatfield Dollar Dog game on Tuesday, or at any point this season, keep The Phillies Girl in mind, and eat a hot dog (or four) for me.
What I wish I was eating on Hatfield Dollar Dog Nights.
What it feels like I’ll be eating on Hatfield Dollar Dog Nights.
What I’ll actually be eating on Hatfield Dollar Dog Nights.
Like I said. Phillies. Girl. Problems.
And They’re Off!
The 2013 MLB season is officially underway, and the Phils have had a less than desirable start. After dropping the first two games of the season to our NL East rivals, Cliff Lee takes on Kris Medlen tonight as the Phillies look to avoid getting swept in the very first series.
Despite a tough first couple games, I’m not giving up on anyone or anything yet. Baseball is a looooong season, and you can’t write anyone off until we’re a few weeks in. Bad games or good, I’m happy to finally get excited again as the clock hits 7:10 each day…. and actually, in my case, it’s 4:10. As usual, I’ll be hunched over my phone at work, keeping up with the score 
With Halladay facing his own set of issues on the mound, hopefully Cliff Lee’s first start will be a positive one. I want to see lots of K’s from Cliff and lots of runs from the rest of the Phils.
Come on, boys. Make ‘em cry. Let’s do this.
Why We Need Baseball Back
Need I say anything at all?
Probably not, but you know I will anyway.
Almost everyone has seen Tim Lincecum’s new haircut (MA!), and yes, it’s shocking. However, I’m not here to point out that Timmy now looks like 500 Days of Summer Joseph Gordon-Levitt instead of 3rd Rock From the Sun Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I want to point out exactly how high (no pun intended) this development is on MLB.com’s list. Let’s see:
It’s on the FRONT PAGE. Never mind that once King Felix signs his new 7 year, $175 million contract offer, he’ll be highest-paid pitcher in baseball history. No, no, no. Tim Lincecum cut his hair.
What’s next, Ryan Howard’s favorite toppings at Subway? I wonder…
Well, anyway. If this “breaking news” isn’t an indication that we need baseball back in our lives, and ASAP, I don’t know what is.
I’m Back… But For Real This Time
Well, if anyone is a professional at giving you guys false hope… it’s me.
I’m almost ashamed that I so excitedly announced the return of The Phillies Girl Tells All a couple of months ago, when baseball season ended. However, due to “life” and an oddly timed deep depression that just HAPPENED to start after the World Series parade and that I have a strong feeling will end once pitchers and catchers report, I have failed to post a single blog.
Now that baseball season is about to start, I’ve finally realized what a slacker I’ve been. I wish I could change the past and have written way more in the offseason, but then again, if I could change the past, I wouldn’t waste the opportunity writing blog posts.
I’d prevent Chad Qualls from ever wearing a Phillies uniform.
BUT WE DON’T NEED TO GO THERE RIGHT NOW. This post is just a really complicated way to let you all know that with the return of baseball, there will DEFINITELY be the return of The Phillies Girl Tells All. I know my Facebook friends are SUPER pumped right now
I’m back, and I’m ready to tell all… but for real this time.
The Phillies Girl Returns
No, this is not a dream. It’s not a mirage, and you aren’t brainwashed (by me at least).
You’re reading this correctly.
I’M BACK.
While unable to cover the Fightins in 2012, I just lived a baseball season to remember. I spent the summer in the company with some of my favorite athletes, writers and broadcasters. While the end of the season ended… well, less than favorably, I have to say, I wouldn’t change a thing.
Under normal circumstances, I’d say that taking the season off from Phillies writing would severely depress me. However, I think that actually blogging this season would have done irreversible damage to my precious psyche.
Alas, it’s time to put the past where it belongs: behind us.
With no MLB games this time of year, I pretty much want to fling myself from every building in the vicinity. This winter is blowing a particularly cold wind into Philadelphia, and change is upon the Phillies. No longer the top contender in the division, the NL East has become much stronger and far more competitive.
I won’t beat around the bush. There is no quick fix for the Phillies’ woes of 2012. Add a list of ailing players and the team’s average age of 28.1 years old (one of the collectively oldest groups in MLB today) to the fact that there are more than a couple positions that need to be filled if they want to contend next year. The ever exciting Winter Meetings set to begin the first week of December, Ruben Amaro Jr. and Co. are going to have their work cut out for them before pitchers and catchers report.
There are a lot questions that need to be answered. Who will we see in the outfield? Third base? When is Raul Ibanez coming back? What exactly does Ryan Howard order when he goes to subway? How many alligators will Doc be wrestling in his spare time?
You know… the important stuff.
The World Series trophy has been hoisted, but in my world, baseball never ends. I’m back, counting down the days until Spring Training, and making each non-baseball day a little less painful. Or, attempting to, at least.
That’s right, people. The Phillies Girl has returned, and she’s ready to tell all… again.
The Phillies Girl Says Goodbye… For Now
Hello friends and baseball lovers. This is a bittersweet moment for me, in which I announce that The Phillies Girl Tells All is being placed on hold, possibly for good. Many if not most of you know that I’m starting a new journey, one that until now, I could have only ever DREAMED of.
And for my last Phillies Girl post, I’m going to talk about how excited I am for baseball, and tell you why you should be too.
In two days, Spring Training is going to be in full swing (Ha, already with the puns). Normally, this is exciting.
Period.
Something about this year, however, is going to be extra special. When the 2011 season ended, I had no solid plan for my post college life. Yet who knew that mere weeks later, I’d be staring out at an empty field, waiting for an interview to work with a Major League Baseball team.
Who knew that I’d actually land it.
Fast forward two months. I’ve moved to a new city, where hundreds of players just HAPPEN to flock each Spring (total coincidence, right?) to go back to work, back to baseball. It’s almost like you can feel the buzz here, something in the air just changes.
Like the weather, Spring Training is a transition, preparing baseball players and lovers alike for a new season. The weather is getting warmer, the days are getting longer, and we trade our sweatshirts and long T’s for cutoffs and shirseys. This month long baseball frenzy brings so much hope and excitement, so many possibilities. What happened last year, it happened last year. Each team starts their journey to either climb their way to the top or fight to stay above the rest.
And before we know it, 2012 Opening Day will be here.
Nothing makes my heart race like seeing a baseball diamond, smelling the freshly cut grass (then sneezing because I’m allergic), and breaking out the new team paraphanalia. How baseball as a whole is losing fans, I’ll never understand. So, it’s not football, or hockey. Less contact… less fighting, but that doesn’t make it any less exciting.
If you only take one thing away from reading my blog, let it be this.
Loving baseball is more than just about loving the sport. It’s about loving summer, being happy, being free.
Everyone gets a little tanner, stays out a little later, laughs a little harder. Now you TELL me that baseball isn’t a huge part of what makes summer so great. Just try.
No. You can’t.
At first, I thought The Phillies Girl Tells All was a destination for my writing, when really, it was just the jumping off point to hopefully follow my dreams (getting mushy here). Baseball will forever remain number 1 in my heart, and while my blog may be going on hiatus, I won’t soon forget it, or you all for reading it.
Saying goodbye isn’t always bad. I’m proud of the fact that I’m moving on to bigger and better things, and I know that The Phillies Girl will live on as long as baseball continues to return to me, year after year.
Thanks, everyone.
Go summer.
Go fun.
Go baseball.
This post is dedicated to my grandmother, who loved the Phillies <3
I Love Spring Training
Feburary 12th. Does this date have a significant meaning, other than it was one of your last chances to buy your sweetie a gift for Valentine’s Day? No? WELL IT SHOULD.
Sunday was Phillies Truck Day, when the team packs up and escapes the frigid North East winter to sunny Florida for the duration of Spring Training. Not often do images of cranes and taped up cardboard boxes excite me to any extent, but Truck Day is special.
To make it easier to understand for any non-baseball fans (which would confuse me as to why you are reading this), Truck Day is like the Thanksgiving of baseball. Besides Turkey Day, when we eat more food than anyone ever should, Thanksgiving and Truck Day are similar in that they both kick off a season that for the most part involves much joy, however someone always ends up crying because things didn’t go go their way.
I digress.
For the record, baseball season > holiday season. Yup. I said it.
Let’s take a look at SOME of what the team brought to training in their 53 foot truck to Bright House Field in Clearwater, shall we?
15,000 baseballs
2,000 T-shirts
1,500 bats
600 pairs of pants
600 hats
350 pairs of shorts
300 helmets
150 pairs of batting gloves
15 cases of gum
12 cases of sunflower seeds
1 kick ass team (I had to)
Keep in mind this is sans any personal items from the players. And I thought I packed a lot…
By the way, is it any coincidence that Valentine’s Day is the same week that pitchers and catchers report for Spring Training?
Answer: NO.
I’ll tell you why I love Spring Training so much, and why you should too. Loving baseball is about more than just loving the sport. It’s a symbol of summer, of longer days and warmer nights. No school, no jackets, no worries, no problems. It’s about being happy, being free. And Spring Training is where it all starts.
Kinda poetic, isn’t it?
So on this Valentine’s Day, if the most exciting thing you have planned is buying discounted candy on the 15th, remember that you’re not alone.
Baseball is back.
Let the Countdown to Spring Training Begin
A couple of days ago, I something on TV so incredible, so amazing and so beautiful, I wanted to cry. Well, OK, maybe not CRY, but I got pretty excited.
The very first Spring Training commercial on MLB Network.
That peppy music and the shot of the players hopping around (you know what I’m talking about) is pretty much MLB’s way of telling us ‘Get ready, it’s coming’. And thank God, because off season is long enough, and if it were up to me, there would be NO off season. Just a little vacation break. 2 weeks, tops.
But I digress.
This post is nothing official, I won’t be picking apart who is going to play left field or who’s going to be at first base on Opening Day…. yet. I just wanted to add a quick update and let you know I’m still alive.
For everyone that checks The Phillies Girl Tells All every day, I truly appreciate it, and your views are the kick in butt I needed to get going again. Much like everyone has surely fallen off the Tim Tebow bandwagon, I fell off the blogging bandwagon. Never again.
The Superbowl is in one week, and then its just a hop, skip and a jump until pitchers and catchers report to Arizona and Florida. What are you looking forward to most this Spring Training, for any team?? Leave your comment below!
Which reminds me…. 21 days.
Let the countdown begin.
Winter Meetings Hysteria
It’s an ailment that baseball fans suffer from during the cold winter months. We become agitated, fidgety, and many often find that they cannot get a peaceful night’s sleep. There is no known cure, as the cause of this short-lived, yet debilitating disease occurs yearly when December arrives and every MLB team meets for off-season talks.
Winter Meetings Hysteria.
It’s rare that my TV is tuned to MLB Network 24/7 in the off-season, simply because there isn’t enough news to keep my ADD brain amused. But when winter meetings come around, it almost feels like baseball season again, just without any actual baseball games.
Eh… details. We’re barely a day and a half into the meetings, but it certainly feels like no less than a week.
First of all, I’m pretty sure only a few teams ACTUALLY showed up to winter meetings: Philadelphia Phillies, St. Louis Cardinals, Miami Marlins, and I think the Milwaukee Brewers are hanging out somewhere near the hotel bar. Everyone else is completely MIA.
Second of all, the question that is slowly eating away at EVERYBODY’S mind… what gold mine did the Marlins hit to be able to afford players like Jose Reyes, Heath Bell, and possibly Albert Pujols? Are you missing any money right now? Seriously, look around. If you can’t find that crisp 20 dollar bill you stashed in your wallet, you aren’t crazy. Their front office has to be collecting spare change from the couch, because otherwise I’m going to have to assume they’re printing their own money in some hidden underground factory.
Sidebar: Don’t believe anyone who says Albert is at home sleeping. Do not fall for this trap. The moment you go to sleep, Ken Rosenthal is going to tweet that the Angels or Rangers or whoever just signed him for 25 years and 800 million dollars.
Seriously, if the Fish filled a seat for every time someone said ‘making a splash this off-season’, they’d definitely break their franchise record of how many fans attended a game. I mean, they’d only need like 100 people.
What would King Albert signing with the Marlins mean for the NL East? Besides 18 games a year of terror and nerve-wracking at-bats for the Phillies pitching staff, essentially it could set off a chain reaction. The Cardinals will look for another marquee-type player, but since they already have Lance Berkman who can play 1st base and he’s already locked up, Jimmy Rollins could pop up on their radar. Then the Phillies will need to pull Plan B out of their pocket…
You see where I’m going here.
All of the free agent madness is coming to a head this week, there’s no doubt about it. Not everyone is going to get signed during winter meetings, and with a surprise offer from mystery team Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim to fuel the Pujols fire, I’ll be surprised if MLB Network even announces any other moves.
Sorry this post was so long, but it’s not like you’re going to sleep anyway. You’ve been infected with Winter Meetings Hysteria. What else do you think will go down this week? Comment below! Keep the TV on, the Twitter open, and the coffee pot stocked.
Let’s sign some ballplayers.
The Phillies Girl Is Thankful For You
So this post isn’t really about baseball. It may not even be about sports at all, but since it’s Thanksgiving, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for a post I’ve been wanting to write for quite a while now. Today I want to thank everyone for helping bring The Phillies Girl to life. Adorable, right?
When I started this blog, I wasn’t really sure what, if anything, would come of it. The only thing I was sure about was the fact that I needed an outlet to talk about baseball and the Phillies as much as I wanted to without my friends hating me and avoiding me at all costs. And deleting me on Facebook. Clearly the most important reason.
I’ll start with Facebook, where The Phillies Girl was born. I can probably count on less than one hand how many of my actual friends are Phillies fans, which is why I’m so happy knowing many of you read my blog. Even some Giants fans… yup, I’m talking about you, but it’s ok, I won’t tell anyone. Yeah, the site stats that MLB provides me are a LITTLE creepy, telling me how many people view my posts from Facebook, but whatever. That’s what it’s all about anyway, isn’t it… stalking? No? Just me?
Awkward.
This will not be me on Thanksgiving.
Well anyway, moving on to Twitter, where The Phillies Girl is being raised and will one day own a condo (penthouse, of course). I can’t say enough thanks to my tweeps (yeah I said tweeps, don’t judge me), mostly East Coasters and Philly fans. You’ve added me to your blog rolls, sent my posts to your friends, subscribed to The Phillies Girl Tells All… you truly appreciate what The Phillies Girl has to say.
This will be.
About baseball at least. The rest of the time you’re mostly making fun of me, but it’s ok. You know who you are…
And this. But, you know, as a girl. And I don't look quite as sexy as Doc when lounging on couches. I can try, but it won't happen.
Writing is the best way to talk without getting interrupted, and if you know me at all, you know I have a lot to say. About everything. All the time. Even in my sleep. And I don’t even think I need to mention that I love the Phillies. It would be like saying how Albert Pujols is like, sort of good at baseball. Understatement of the history of Time itself.
Combing my passion for both and knowing people want to read what I have to say (because obviously you’re reading this right now) is what keeps me going. There’s no greater feeling than when people ask me for a series preview or tell me how hard they laughed at some random post about the Mets being the worst team on Earth.
Speaking of which, just like the President saves a turkey every year, I’m following through with that crisis hotline for baseball’s lesser NY fans who have realized that their team is going to be screwed without Jose Reyes.
So, yes, this Thanksgiving, The Phillies Girl is thankful for you. If you’re my best friend, part of my family, someone I haven’t spoken to since middle school or have never even met, I just want you to know I appreciate the time you take when you read my writing.
Thanks 
The Phillies Girl
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