Ultimate Baseball
Road Trip Blog

Our Mideast Tour started yesterday in Toronto with behind the scenes stadium tour with Buck Martinez. Buck, a former MLB player and manager, is the play-by-play announcer with the Blue Jays. 

Our group met Buck prior to the game and was treated to early stadium access, views from the press box,
broadcast booth, in-stadium production area, and on-air production trailer. We finished right behind home plate as the grounds crew was
completing final field prep for the game. 

The game was really fun, too. The Brewers took an
early lead over the Blue Jays only to see the Jays tie the game in the fourth inning. Both teams threatened to score but it wasn't until the bottom of the ninth that the game was decided by a three-run walk off home run by Edwin Encarnacion. 

This morning we jump on the motor coach and head to Detroit. We'll see the Rays and Tigers tonight at Comerica Park. More from the road later!

The Mideast Tour officially begins on July 2nd in Toronto. And what better way to kick it off could there be than to have an appearance by former Major League player, Buck Martinez?
Buck's playing career spanned 17 seasons with three different teams, the Royals, Brewers and Blue Jays. Buck also managed the Blue Jays for two seasons and was the manager of the US team in the inaugural World Baseball Classic. 

Buck currently serves as a broadcaster for the Toronto Blue Jays. He'll share stories with us about his path to the Majors, his playing and managing days, and what he sees in baseball today. We'll also get a sneak peek into the broadcast booth at Rogers Centre and what it takes to televise a baseball game. 

Guests are joining the group baseball tour from all across the U.S. for what lays out to be a great holiday weekend tour package:

• July 1 - Guests arrive in Toronto
• July 2 - Brewers vs. Blue Jays @ Rogers Centre
• July 3 - Rays vs. Tigers @ Comerica Park
• July 4 - Brewers vs. Reds @ Great American
• July 5 - Phillies vs. Pirates @ PNC Park
• July 6 - Royals vs. Indians @ Progressive Field

Still planning a summer vacation? There's still time left to sign up for a baseball tour!! But hurry...the summer's going by fast!! Click here for details.

On every Big League Tours luxury baseball vacation, we put together a meet and greet with a former player on one of the tour days.  We were so pleased that Buck Martinez, former MLB player/manager and current Blue Jays broadcaster, was able to meet with us before the Yankees/Jays game at Yankee Stadium.

Yankee Stadium has its own Hard Rock Cafe inside the ballpark.  Our group took the easy subway ride to the ballpark and headed into the Hard Rock. But before the meet and greet, we experienced a little excitement at the Hard Rock.  

While waiting on Buck to arrive, we all noticed that an elderly diner in the restaurant was experiencing some problems.  He was choking. His son was unsuccessfully performing the Heimlich maneuver and his father's facial color was changing rapidly.  Our tour guest Nancy (a nurse from Canada) quickly ran around to the man, lowered him to the floor, and thrust his abdomen up expelling the food that had been lodged in his throat.  Great job, Nancy!! 

After things calmed down a bit, Buck began to speak to our group about his background and current position, as well as, his opinions on today's players and the game.  One of the great things about having someone like Buck Martinez is his insights into the current game.  As a broadcaster, he talks with the players and managers on a daily basis and sees many players/teams in his job.  This is the second time we have used Buck as our MLB Player Experience and we hope to have him back again in 2014.  He was great.

If you would like to join us on one of our tours in 2014, just click the link below and fill out the contact form.  We will add you to our mailing list and make sure you are one of the first to know about our 2014 schedule.

www.bigleaguetours.com

July 22, 2011 - The Midwest Plus tour got off to a great start in Toronto. After meeting up with all our participants here at the Four Diamond hotel, we took the short walk over to the Rogers Centre. Yes, it was a hot one, with temperatures expected up at 37! (That's about 105 fahrenheit if my math is right.) The walk over was early enough that it was actually pretty pleasant as we walked over.

We were met at the Rogers Centre entrance by Buck Martinez, longtime player with the Blue Jays, Brewers, and Royals and now the TV play-by-play man for the Jays. Buck took us into the baseball stadium and gave us the story of what was originally called SkyDome. We were there for the first time the dome had been closed for heat, so that's some history. Buck took questions for about half an hour, then walked us up to his TV booth. Then we went down to the TV Truck, a place most people don't get to see. (We went back during the game to see it working - very cool!)

As Buck went off to call the game, we took our seats for a close game between the Jays and Mariners. We were sitting a couple rows back near third base, a great place to see Jose Bautista normally, though he was DHing due to his ankle injury last week. It was a pitchers duel for the first seven innings, a tight 1-1. Then Doug Fister fell apart and the Jays pounced on the opportunity to ring him up. Quickly 5-1, the M's struck back even more quickly. Reliever Casey Janssen walked a couple, gave up one blooper, then Miguel Olivo tied it up with a line drive to dead center. It was the M's first grand slam of the season!

The M's, in the midst of a 12 game losing streak, couldn't hang on. Rajai Davis hit a long line over the CF's head to score a couple, but got the laughter from his teammates as he raised his hands after the hit. Yes, Rajai thought it was the ninth inning instead of the eighth and that he had hit a walk off. No, Rajai - run! (He made it to second on the throw, but he'll get a fine in kangaroo court for that one!) The Jays closed it out with big Jon Rauch, getting the win, 7-5.

Most of the tour group headed to the hotel attached to the stadium to meet up with Buck Martinez again. (I missed this part, staying behind to take part in the Blue Jays post-game show with Mike Wilner. The show goes out not just to Toronto, but is a nationwide broadcast in Canada.) Buck brought along his TV partner, Pat Tabler, for a drink before they jetted off to Texas. The group walked back to the hotel and had a night in beautiful (but hot) Toronto.

We'll be packing up and heading for Niagara Falls this morning, so I'll wrap this up for now. It was a great start to our small group tour. At one point, one of the participants turned to me and said "It's going to be tough to top this!" I had to just smile - while we had a great time in Toronto, Rogers Centre is the "worst" stadium we'll see on the tour and we've got a lot planned for the next four days.

January 2, 2009 - A favorite one of our MLB Tours each year is our Big Apple Tour. This premier sports travel package includes two games at Yankee Stadium and one game at Citi Field. We'll stay in the heart of midtown Manhattan where you'll be close to Times Square, Fifth Avenue, and Central Park and so many restaurants, shops and sites.

This tour will provide you with two great chances to enjoy games at Yankee Stadium as the Yankees host the Blue Jays in an AL East division rivalry. The times for the games haven't been posted yet but we're sure that we'll either be entertained with fireworks for the 4th of July at Yankee Stadium or we'll be able to enjoy the festivities in the world's greatest city.

The next day we'll take a stadium tour and explore the city before we head out to Citi Field to see the Reds take on the Mets in their new home. If you haven't been to Citi Field yet, you should make the trip. It's a fantastic improvement over the old Shea Stadium. The design did a great job to incorporate old stadium features with up-to-date comforts.

To see more about this and other tour vacations being offered by Big League Tours, visit our website now to get all the details.

Baseball Road Trips Through The Crossroads of America



August 21, 2008 - After ending the Midwest 1 trip in Chicago we took a bus over to Detroit to meet the rest of our group for our Midwest 2 MLB road trip.  We stayed in an amazing hotel, just a few blocks away from the stadium, where each guest got to stay in style with their own personal suite. 

This was a great way to start the trip and show our guests that we work very hard to give them first class accommodations in every aspect of Big League Tours sports packages.  The Toronto Blue Jays came down to the Tigers Den to take on the Detroit Tigers.  Unfortunately, for the Tigers the the Blue Jays came to play and ended up defeating the Tigers 6-4. 

We had the privilege of seeing A.J. Burnett pitch his 15th win for the Toronto Blue Jays.  He had a rocky first six innings, but his teammates were there to back him up.  They came back with a rally against the Tigers to win the the game.  To check out the official MLB stats please click here.