Day 115—Scranton Wilkes-Barre Yankees
August 7th, 2007 by Tim Riley
The SWB Yankees used to be affiliated with the Phillies up until last year, but this year the Yankees took over the team when the Phillies temporarily moved up to Ottawa. I had some more family join me today—but unfortunately the rain struck again and there really wasn’t much we could do in Scranton—except eat some crazy local pizza that is made with American Cheese! Seriously, this pizza is like none other that I’ve had before—it’s kinda like home-made Ellios pizza squares that taste a lot better. Not sure if I could eat it everyday, but it was a nice treat.
Last September, when the team announced that it would be moving its Triple-A team to Scranton, 47,000 tickets were sold that same day for the 2007 season. Unreal! In somewhat related television news, the show The Office is said to have some ties to the former Phillies team that played here. The temp character “Ryan” is rumored to be named after Phillies MVP slugger Ryan Howard, who played in Scranton at the start of the show in 2004. Also, the character Dwight Shrute has a bobblehead of Mike Lieberthal on his desk. In honor of this Office connection, here is a clip from The Office with both Dwight testing Ryan with brainteasers.
Sitting next to Dwight is a lot like driving in a car with Tim Riley.
Another Phillies reference on the show: Jim’s girlfriend Karen said that he prefers to stay in every night and watch the Phillies. Made me like the character Jim even more. Bears, beets, baseball.
And quizzing Chris Richards was very similar to questioning Ryan, except he never knew any of the answers.
“some more family”
did i miss a proposal? have I become family?
Tim,
Awesome article in the Inquirer. Keep up the good work!
Kevin
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/20070808_A_grand-slam_tour_for_cancer_research__He_aims_to_cover_all_the_bases.html
Tom — I forgot about that Jim quote. Nice reference.
Edyta — Welcome to the family.