Ultimate Baseball
Road Trip Blog

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.

What better way could there be to start our 2013 baseball trips and tours than one of our Hall of Fame tours? This tour starts in New York City where we'll stay in the heart of Midtown Manhattan giving you great access to all kinds of sites, restaurants, and shopping. The first day of the tour we'll see the Blue Jays face the Yankees at Yankee Stadium. The next day we'll see the Reds play the Mets at Citi Field and have our Big League Player Experience with former MLB pitcher and Reds Broadcaster, Chris Welsh. 

We'll then travel to Cooperstown to spend the day at the National Baseball Hall of Fame. You'll have time to explore the exhibits in the Hall as well as the many memorabilia and collectibles shops in the Village. 

After a relaxing evening in upstate New York, we'll head over to Boston for a free day and evening. You'll be in the heart of the city once again. The following day we'll head over to historic Fenway Park to see the Indians and Red Sox.

This tour will also include one or more stadium tours which we'll finalize once the Yankees and Red Sox release their game times. Here's a short video that will give you the quick rundown of the tour. We hope you'll join us!! 

Since joining the Big League Tours crew in early summer, I've had the amazing opportunity to lead two tours. The first time I was the co-pilot with Martha Ellen in Chicago/Milwaukee and the second I was flying solo with the group in New York, Boston and Cooperstown. 

As the 2012 MLB season wraps up, I thought this would be a great time to share some of my favorite pictures from the trips this summer (I also threw in a few from the corporate outing we hosted). My iPhone is my best friend and I love snapping shots of absolutely anything and everything! FYI- My iPhone is far from professional so ignore some of the blurry stuff and just imagine the great times everyone was having!

Join me while I recount the amazing people I've met and wonderful places I've been thanks to Big League Tours.

There will be plenty of photos to come next year so stay tuned, hopefully your face will even be featured in a few! Sign up for our 2013 Tours and be the first to recieve the schedule once it's released!

Follow us on Facebook (Big League Tours), Instagram (BigLeagueTours) and Twitter (@BigLeagueTours) to view our other photos!

Music: Sweet Caroline- Glee Cast

Looking for a way to ditch your cubicle and get outside for a day?  One of the best parts of our job is working with companies who enjoying spoiling their employees with some staff bonding and baseball!  Lucky for Indy companies, their location is perfect for a weekday getaway to Chicago or Cincinnati.

This month we hit the road with Service Concepts who awarded more than 30 employees from around the state a day outing to see the Cincinnati Reds.  I don’t know many people who can classify jumping on a bus, having an unlimited lunch buffet and watching a MLB game as a bad day at work!  

Here’s what Mandy K. had to say about the event:

“Attending a Cincinnati Reds game with my coworkers was so much fun! Big League Tours made the day so enjoyable. All we had to do was get on the bus, sit back and relax! Everything was wonderful — from the coach bus ride there, to the unlimited buffet lunch and the special meet-and-greet with former Reds player Chris Welsh, who now announces games for the team. The day was well planned, and it was a great way to spend time with coworkers outside of the office. The stadium was awesome, with a beautiful location overlooking the Ohio River. I can only hope our company will consider taking another Big League Tours trip in the near future!”

Sharing the day with Mandy was also special for me; we went to a high school with less than 250 students TOTAL and hadn’t seen each other for more than four years!  Words can’t describe my surprise when I stepped on the bus and heard “GO JUGROX” from the back of the bus.  Wondering what the Jugrox are?  You’ll have to find that one out on your own.

High school reunions aren’t guaranteed on future trips but everyone here at Big League Tours can guarantee your company outing will be just as successful as this one!

Interested in planning an outing for your sales team or management staff?  Now’s the time to start planning for next year.  To set up a company outing for your crew, email me at kayla@bigleaguetours.com for more details.

Do you by chance remember hearing the news that MVP Joey Votto was on the DL? Perhaps youare a fan of another NL Central team and you cheered on your chances, but I for one sat devastated and hoped he wouldn’t be gone long. My confession: I thought I could kiss post-season play goodbye all because my favorite first baseman was out of the lineup. 

Joey’s teammates, however, thought otherwise. Over the past several weeks I’ve gleefully watched my team step up to the plate by making amazing double plays, hitting back-to-back single and two-run homers and have even watched a few heart attack comeback victories. What an amazing and flat out fun team to watch right now! Make no mistake, Votto is a great asset to the Cincinnati Reds baseball organization, and thankfully he will be back. My advice Joey, don’t rush it! Get yourself healthy. Your team has things under control! Have you seen Todd Frazier and Zach Cozart?! Have you glanced at the MLB Standings? The Reds are seven games up on the second place Pirates. SEVEN!  

How exciting to be attending the Reds Road Trip to Pittsburgh and see this great matchup at PNC Park on September 29th and 30th! If you haven’t already booked your tour, do it today!

Our West Coast Baseball Tour flew from San Francisco to Los Angeles. After the travel day and free morning to explore LA on their own, our guests headed out to Dodger Stadium on July 4th to see the Dodgers host the Cincinnati Reds. Here's a view from our seats. 

We started the night with a visit with Reds broadcaster andformer MLB pitcher, Chris Welsh. Chris hung out with us at field level and then took us up to the broadcast booth to see things from that vantage point. The booth is pretty small so we only went in three people at a time. Here's a shot of our three with Chris. 

I would have to say the highlight for me, though (and no slight intended for Chris), was to meet the voice of baseball, Mr. Vin Scully. As we were exiting the visiting team's booth, Chris introduced us to Mr. Scully who graciously spent a few minutes talking with us. It was surreal to be talking with the man who I've listened to all of my life calling the Dodgers games. 

Here we are with Mr. Scully, in the Dodgers broadcast booth. What a fantastic time. Thanks to Chris and Mr. Scully for making our visit so memorable!

Check out the Game Summary on MLB.com. 

Great American Ball Park provides Reds fans and visitors one of the great baseball experiences in the game. Despite the Reds rich history (baseball’s first ever team) this is not a nostalgic feel type venue. Those are reserved for stops at Fenway Park and Wrigley Field. And kudos goes out to those who planned this park for not trying to make it have that feel. What they did is give the city of Cincinnati an intimate setting to watch their beloved Redlegs.

As a person who grew up in the area going to Riverfront Stadium and GABP, there are a few great ways to watch baseball here, even for a Cubs fan like me. I’ll give you my favorite way to watch the game:

There are a number of seating options, including the ultra-premium “Diamond Club” seat section behind the batter’s box. My favorite spot is the club area. They call it the “4192” club after Pete Rose’s record-breaking hit mark. It's a great vantage point and I’m a fan of the elevated view and the club area goes up the first base line on the second level, right on top of the Reds dugout it seems. Inside it is comfortable with ice-cold Freon blowing and great food being served up. Some of which are Cincinnati favorites, LaRosa’s Pizza and Montgomery Inn barbeque as well as a pasta bar and several other stations. One thing to be sure to get: a Big Red Smokey. A hot-dog on steroids. It’s a smoked sausage that eats like a dog without quite the spice you get from a mett. There’s also an option to get one infused with cheddar cheese; a superior hot-dog.

Be sure to keep an eye on the scoreboard located above the bleachers in left (the lower level bleachers in left field leave you with a blocked view of the scoreboard and an area I would avoid FYI) to see two things: the scoreboard stumper and the Mr. Red Race. The stumper is never too difficult and the Mr. Red Race is the tradition at a Reds game.

Lastly, you must go to the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum located just outside the front gate at GABP. This is widely considered the best Hall of Fame and Museum for a team in all of baseball. It features the largest collection of Reds collectibles, artifacts and memorabilia in the world. Two floors and 16,000 square feet of Reds heaven. It’s a must for any baseball fan.

After you’ve taken it all in, finish it off with a sundae from United Dairy Farmers. Your Cincinnati visit is done.

Will Chambers is a local sportscaster and journalist covering Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. His duties include feature sports columnist for Cincinnati Profile magazine and lead play-by-play announcer for Georgetown College, among others. He is a Cincinnati native who currently resides in Kentucky. You can check out his work at IHigh.com.

Cincinnati native and long-time standout for the Reds, Barry Larkin received the fateful call from the National Baseball Hall of Fame yesterday as he will be inducted into the Hall in 2012. MLB.com writer, Mark Sheldon, listed Barry's accomplishments in his article, "Hall of Fame Rolls Out Red Carpet for Larkin."

Larkin played 19 seasons -- all with the Reds -- from 1986-2004. He had a lifetime average of .295 with 198 home runs, 960 RBIs, 2,340 hits, a .371 on-base percentage and 379 stolen bases. He was also a 12-time All-Star, a three-time Gold Glove winner, a nine-time Silver Slugger winner, a member of the 1990 World Series championship team and the 1995 National League Most Valuable Player.

In 1996, Larkin became the first shortstop in Major League history to be a 30-30 player when he had 33 homers and 36 steals during that season. Outside of the numbers, Larkin was also considered a man with intangibles and leadership. He was honored with the role of team captain in 1997.

Congratulations to Larkin for the recognition that he's receiving for his amazing career!

Want to visit the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York? Join us on one of our Hall of Fame Tours or our full East Coast Tour. Each of them include stops in the little village credited as the birthplace of baseball.

While I don’t mind sitting around and taking it easy at the beginning of each new year in front of the television watching more than a dozen football games, I must say, I prefer to be watching 9 innings of baseball. Many argue with me that football provides a more exciting and thrilling product. Perhaps that is true in their minds, and perhaps there is some truth to the fact that I have a far too simplistic mind that just flat doesn’t enjoy time clocks. Yet maybe it has something to do with the fact that I’m okay with baseball being a less physical sport, but a dramatically neat game (as in tidy). I’m not sure. All I know is that I love the game of baseball and cannot wait for the new season to begin.

So while the NHL plays its Winter Classic in a baseball stadium today, college football continues to crown bowl victors, NFL teams prepare for the playoffs or talk strategy for future draft picks, and while my own hometown counts down the days until she will host her very first Super Bowl, I will continue to count down the days until Opening Day for Major League Baseball.

After today, my countdown will end in ninety-four days when my Cincinnati Reds take on the Florida Marlins on April 5, 2012 following a bunch of Opening Day ceremonies. How about you? How long do you have to wait until your team takes the field?

Anyway You Look At It, This Baseball Tour Is Gonna Be Big!!

Baseball and travel are obviously two things that I love. But when you combine my favorite city and my favorite team, it's an unbeatable combination. This May, the Reds are headed to New York City to play the Mets and the Yankees in back-to-back series at Citi Field and Yankee Stadium. This road trip will be a great way to hang out in Manhattan for several days while taking in several games and exploring the sites.

It's been awhile since our tours have included the Reds on a series in New York. In fact, here's a photo of Brandon Phillips at bat at Shea Stadium taken from our seats on a tour in 2007, which I'm pretty sure is the last time we crossed paths in the Big Apple.

If this sounds like a great way to see the city and some great baseball games, check out our Big Apple Tour. You'll have plenty of time to explore NYC and our tour director will guide you through a great itinerary where you'll have a meet and greet with a former big league player, sit in great seats at the game, and stay in a great hotel in Midtown.