SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. ? There was the retired insurance salesman from New Jersey who now spends his springs guarding a stairwell in Clearwater for his Philadelphia Phillies. And a road-tripping spring breaker from Washington State who unsuccessfully asked Matt Tuiasosopo ? a proud member of a notable UW family ? to pose with his Wazzu flag at Seattle Mariners camp in Peoria.
There was also a front desk clerk in Tampa who was a Boston Red Sox transplant, a Cincinnati Reds dad watching his son collect autographs and a minister from Orlando who counts several players, including Luke Scott, among his friends.
What they all had in common is that I found myself talking baseball with them over these past few weeks of the Stew's spring swing. It's the best part of spring training for me, really. While catching up with players and their prep work is our primary goal, it's meeting fans from across the country that ends up being the best byproduct.
It also allows us to pick up some pretty good stories, too. On Friday, I ran into Ed and Marilyn Hansen, the couple in the photo above, as they watched some minor league batting practice at the Colorado Rockies' great new Salt River Fields complex at Talking Stick.
"We just got done with the tough part of calving season," Marilyn told me. "That's pretty much the reason we were able to come down here now."
It's tough to get out to the barn in the morning when a night game doesn't get you home until after midnight, after all.
The Hansens said this was the first time they have driven the 1,000 miles south to see their Rox in the spring. One of their sons had been to Colorado's spring training in Tucson a few years ago and when he came back, he asked his parents if they had ever thought about going down. They had, but there were duties to be done at the ranch.
Nonsense, their sons said. They said they'd look after the couple's 350 head of cattle and sent their parents south to spring training and a reunion with some high school classmates they hadn't seen in almost 45 years. A friend of the Hansens' works for the Rockies and hooked them up with some nice seats ? no small feat with the new park regularly selling out.
"After 60 days of staying up all night with the calves, it's nice to get a break," Ed said, while looking at players move in and out of the cage. "The warm weather doesn't hurt, either."
(And here I thought I had earned my spring training trip after being snowed inside my home for the past four months.)
For the next 15 or 20 minutes, we watched batting practice, marveled at the $100 million complex and talked baseball. How Troy Tulowitzki's unbelievable late-season surge still wasn't enough to drag his team into the playofs. Whether the Rockies can ever truly have a league-leading pitching staff. The beauty of a day at Coors Field and the time Ed came to my Chicago on business and wasn't able to sneak away for even just a look at Wrigley Field, something he still regrets.
"It would've been nice to just see what the field was like," Ed said. "But I didn't think it was right to sneak away if someone else was paying for me to be at the conference."
After awhile, the Arizona sun started to get hot and game time creeped closer. There was shade to be sought and a turnstile to click. We did the usual spring training goodbye. We said it was real nice talking to each other ? because it really was ? and I wished the Rockies luck for the upcoming year.
And then we went our separate ways toward the season ahead.
The part I love best about making friends at spring training is that it's the only time of year that the sport concentrates itself in two states and brings all of its fans in close contact with each other. While we all share in the sunshine of the Grapefruit and Cactus League, it's even nicer to learn about the different backgrounds and lifestyles that brought others to the same spot where you're standing.
Inside the gates, I later saw Ed standing on the concourse behind home plate. He had traded in his cowboy hat for a white Rockies baseball cap, the type with a stars-and-stripes logo.
"You got rid of your cowboy hat?" I asked.
"Figured I better," he said. "There's probably going to be people sitting behind me."
'Duk is in Arizona's Cactus League this week, finishing up Big League Stew's Spring Swing. Follow his trip on Twitter and Facebook
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