AURORA, Ore. — The opening night of the Wild Wild West League was an evening of introductions.
Fans were introduced to live baseball with social distancing.
The players were introduced to each other, as evident by the calls of encouragement from the dugout to teammates in in the field of “Way to go there, Number 29!”
Even the guy in charge of pre-game player introductions, public address announcer Robert Jones, needed to be introduced to the players he was introducing to the crowd during on-field ceremonies before the game.
“Batting second … playing second base … he’s from the University of Washington … No. 32 … Noah,” Jones then paused for a moment. “Noah, how do you pronounce your last name? … Hsue!”
It’s pronounced “Sue,” by the way.
“What can I say, folks, it’s the first game,” Jones explained to the crowd.
The first night of the new summer college wood-bat baseball league didn’t go off without a hitch, or two. But by the end of the night, no one cared.
“I think everyone is just so thankful to be playing baseball again,” said Portland Pickles pitcher Nick Nygard, a Columbia River High School graduate and University of Portland player.
The Wild Wild West League is an offshoot of sorts of the West Coast League, which decided to cancel its 2020 season. But everything about the Wild Wild West League is condensed.
There are just four teams, including founding team, the Pickles, playing in just one location, Bob Brack Stadium on the campus of North Marion High School. And the season is just 30 days long.
But fans starving for live baseball will take what they can get and are willing to adhere to some strict health guidelines.
Upon entry, each of the roughly 100 fans in attendance Saturday night were required to have a temperature check and sign a release waiver. But the line to get into the park was not long.
Everyone in the crowd adhered to the strict face-covering rule. On the field, the grounds crew wore masks, as did the coaches, umpires and players in each dugout and bullpen.
The only people not wearing masks were the players in the field playing the game. Well, except for the catchers, of course.
There were a few first-night bumps along the way.
Printed rosters were not provided for fans. Even the lineups posted in stadium didn’t include uniform numbers.
Pre-game predictions were also off. Expecting the hitters to have the advantage over the pitchers, Jones predicted a long, high-scoring affair with several errors, as the players tried to knock the rust off their gloves after four months of inactivity.
Instead, there were just three runs scored — the Portland Pickles beat the Portland Gherkins 2-1 — on eight hits on only error. And the game finished smartly in 2 hours, 20 minutes.
“I guess I got that wrong,” Jones said afterward.
Not that anyone cared.
The fans were happy. There was plenty of room to spread out and keep their distance, and there was plenty of food, ranging from traditional concession faire to a food cart providing tacos and other Mexican entrees.
The Pickles were thrilled. In addition to the 100 fans on site — capacity is being limited in the first week of play — more than 500 others followed along on team’s live webstream online.
And no one was happier than the players.
Nygard is one of four Clark County players on the Pickles’ roster, joined by Alan Becklehimer (Heritage High graduate), Chad Stoner (Camas High) and Lucas Gregory (Mountain View High).
And even though none of the four saw the field on Saturday night, they were all happy to get to lace up the spikes again in their first baseball game since spring college sports were shut down in March.
Gregory got seven games in with Clark College this spring before the season was shut down.
“It’s different with everything that going on, but I’m glad to get some normalcy as much as we can,” he said. “But obviously, we’re all adapting to what we need to do play the game.”
Nygard said the University of Portland got in 16 games in the abbreviated 2020 season. Saturday night felt like a relief to him.
“It’s a long time coming, it feels like,” he said. “This is probably the longest stretch I’ve been in without playing baseball in a long time. To get that opportunity again, it just feels good. It feels good to support your teammates, watch the game and be a part of it in a unique situation.”
Nygard said Saturday night was the first time the Pickles were able to do anything together as a team.
“It’s all been guys on their own,” Nygard said. “It’s just in-home setups, if you’ve got weights there. Some guys have just been trying to stay as active as possible. But as for team stuff, we’ve had no contact with coaches.”
The first run of the Wild Wild West League was scored, appropriately enough, on a wild pitch when the Gherkins’ Miles Norman scampered home from third in the top of the sixth.
The Pickles would counter with two runs in the bottom of the sixth, including one on a home run by Nygard’s University of Portland teammate Christian Cooney.
The game ended with some excitement, as Nick Parr struck out the Gherkins’ Cade Edmonson with the bases loaded.
On Sunday, three Clark County Pickles got into the game against the Gresham GreyWolves and contributed to a 6-1 victory.
Nygard pitched two hitless innings. Stone also pitched two hitless innings, recording all six outs by strikeout to earn the save. Gregory went 2 for 5 with two runs scored and a stolen base.
After a scheduled day off Monday, play resumes Tuesday with the Gherkins playing the GreyWolves at 2:30 p.m. followed by the Lions against the Pickles at 7:30 p.m. Tickets for those games are available on the Portland Pickles website.
And players couldn’t be happier about that.
“I’m definitely excited to get some work in before the fall, and then we can get back out there next spring,” Gregory said.
Nygard added: “It is nice to know that something is finally set in place for us to be given an opportunity to play. It’s been pretty sweet, and I’m extremely grateful for the opportunity.”
