2004’s Home Opener starting pitcher R.A. Dickey finally made his first appearance of the 2005 season, in game 145. Only this time he showed up with a different pitch, a knuckleball. Something the Rangers haven’t really (seriously) had since Charlie Hough last was in a Ranger uniform in 1990. My wife and daughter were with me in this game. We had some comp tickets in Sec 229 Row 2. We almost got a foul ball, the closest one came was that it hit the red railing right in front of us, and the bounced back downstairs. The section two to our right got about half a dozen fouls over the night.
Aside from the first inning, Dickey was pretty good. His total line was 7IP, 5H, 3ER. Two of those runs and three of the hits were all in the first inning (along with a walk). So yeah, I’d say Dickey did pretty good. I’ll write off the first inning to jitters, as it was the first time he’d pitched in the majors with a knuckleball. The problem this game had was that the Orioles kid was better. John Maine went 6.1IP, giving up just two hits – both solo home runs (Mench, Blalock). In fact, outside of those home runs, we had only two other hits total the whole night (double – Soriano, single – M Young). We were pretty inept at the plate.
Still, I had a great time at the game with my family. Took some pictures of that, they’re online here if you want to see ’em.
The attendance was listed at 21,167. It looked like a lot less than that to me.