oh my ohtani!

i wound up only going to four major league games this year, and one of those was in a new-to-me stadium which is always nice.  the first two games were in april as the dodgers visited the twins, and then i saw the white sox and rays in tampa, taking in the amenities of tropicana field for the first time. the fourth game took place near the end of the season and featured the angels of anaheim against the home town twinkies. 

i saw the angels at the twins last year, but neither shohei ohtani nor mike trout appeared in that game. when i saw that ohtani was going to get the start on the mound for one of the games this year, i made sure to buy a ticket to attend:

we got to the stadium early enough to grab the giveaway swag - it wasn't just kid beanie night, it was all person beanie night

and we needed those things as it was chilly and somewhat drizzly.  we sat through the first inning as local kid louie varland pitched to luis rengifo who was followed by mike trout:

who wound up flying out to deep center

ohtani was batting third, and he rolled one over to second (although it was fielded by the shortstop (good riddance to the shift) for the last out

in the bottom of the first, i took a picture of ohtani's first pitch to eventual american league batting champ luis arraez

and then sat back to watch. ohtani hit a batter and walked two in the first but gave up just one run. i figured with the weather he would be lucky to make it to the fifth inning, but his control made it seem that he might not even last that long. fortunately, he found his groove and the angels' offense scored some runs. taylor ward homered to lead off the second inning, and mike trout hit an rbi single in the third to give the angels the lead.

meanwhile, ohtani didn't give up a hit until the bottom of the fifth inning, and had at one time struck out five twins in a row. he was removed from the game in the bottom of the sixth, but left with 7 strikeouts which put him over 200 k's for the season.

i was pretty pleased the next day when topps issued a card to mark that feat:

as you may know, i have a collection featuring cards that represent games i attended in person, and this one certainly made the cut. here's the back:

overall, i had good luck with 3 of the 4 games i attended getting the topps now treatment. and, the only game to not be so feted wound up with some representation in 2022 topps update when some images from the game were used on a couple of twins' cards.

i already have plans to get to dodger stadium in 2023 and am looking for other opportunities to see some notable baseball events and add to this collection.