For Portland’s newest baseball team, the crack of a bat sounds about as good as the pop of a freshly opened pickle jar.
The Portland Pickles slid into town for the first home game of their inaugural season at Lents Park’s Walker Stadium Friday night. The rainy weather took a pause and gave way to a perfect night for baseball as throngs of enthusiastic fans came out to see the wonderfully silly spectacle.
The game, scheduled to begin at 7:05, was delayed as lines of people waited to enter the ball park. In a ceremony before the game began, co-owner Ken Wilson told the crowd that they were the true owners of the team.
“Just look at the person next to you, on your left and on your right,” said Wilson, “and think of yourself, because you folks own this ball team. It’s your team.”
There were three ceremonial first pitches, tossed out by Mayor Charlie Hales, the first lady of Portland Nancy Hales, and Commissioner Amanda Fritz, with some help from her neighbor.
In a short speech, Mayor Hales also gave the spectators a little history lesson.
“You know where the first baseball club in the Pacific Northwest was?” asked Mayor Hales. “The Pacific Northwest’s first baseball club was the Pioneer Baseball Club of East Portland, started in May of 1866.”
He added, “We’re back! We’re back with baseball in East Portland!”
And while the team performed well, the real eye-catcher was its seven-foot mascot, Dillon the Pickle. (The team’s story of how Dillon got to be the Pickles’ mascot is a must read.
His antics were as you’d expect from a giant pickle: pure fun. And the crowd ate it up like he was serving it to them on a hamburger.
Not since the 2010 departure of the reincarnate Portland Beavers has the crack of a bat echoed from a baseball team that Portland could truly call its own. Sure, there are the Hops in Hillsboro. But the Pickles, named by popular vote in an online poll, are perfectly matched for Portland’s irreverent, good-time style.
As part of the Great West League, the Pickles compete against other collegiate teams from Oregon and California, including the Chico Heat, the Lodi Crushers, the Marysville GoldSox, the Medford Rogues and the Sacramento Stealth. Using wooden bats like those used in Major League Baseball, the Great West League aims to prepare college-level players for the big leagues while they’re away from school in the summer.
Friday’s game went into extra innings, but the victory went to Marysville, 8-6.
The Pickles continue to face off at home with the GoldSox with games at 7:05 p.m. Saturday, June 11 and 5:05 p.m. Sunday, June 12. Tickets are $6-$12.
Win or lose, one thing’s for sure. Portland has opened up a whole new jar of sports fun.
–Dillon Pilorget and Kristyna Wentz-Graff
