Aberdeen IronBirds
We drive to Baltimore to see Fort McHenry before continuing to Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen, Maryland, for a High-A tilt between the Aberdeen IronBirds and the Hickory Crawdads.
The primary focus of our baseball road trips is Minor League Baseball — and that’s with capital letters, meaning the 120 teams affiliated with Major League clubs, from Single-A to Triple-A. This does not include other types of “minor league” baseball such as independent professional leagues or collegiate summer leagues. We love those, too, but these are our priorities.
Our goal is to see as many Minor League teams as possible in a given region over the course of about three weeks. When the inevitable gaps in the schedule occur, we fill them with those other minor leagues plus some Major League teams. Mondays, for example, are an excellent night for Major League games, when all other leagues are typically off.
It is by this reasoning that Dad and I drove past Oriole Park at Camden Yards — which I have never visited — on a Baltimore Orioles game day to get to an Aberdeen IronBirds matchup further on. Skipping the landmark baseball palace that ushered in an age of neoclassical ballpark construction would have been unthinkable before my first Minor League ballpark experience. We were essentially trading the franchise’s top-tier players in one of the most nostalgic stadiums in sports for their fourth-tier (High-A) youngsters, playing in a smallish suburban ballpark. But Camden Yards will have to wait for another day.
Fort McHenry
We did make a stop in Baltimore, at Fort McHenry National Monument. The bastion is best known as the inspiration for Francis Scott Key’s poem that was later set to music to become “The Star-Spangled Banner.”Late in the War of 1812, British land and sea forces attempted an invasion of the busy port city. The Americans had suffered terrible losses the previous month, with the British capturing and burning Washington, D.C., before taking the city of Alexandria, Virginia. But British ships could not penetrate American defenses — including a chain of 22 sunken ships — to reach Baltimore’s harbor and instead bombarded Fort McHenry from a distance for 25 straight hours.
Key was aboard the HMS Tonnant, an 80-gun Royal Navy ship of the line, where he had dined with British officers while pleading for the release of a prisoner of war. The American lawyer and amateur poet watched the battle play out from the British ship. When the bombardment ended on the morning of September 14, a large American flag was raised to replace the tattered storm flag that had flown through the battle. The attack had failed, Fort McHenry had stood strong, and the British ships retreated from the scene. The symbolic raising of the flag inspired Key to write his poem, “Defence of Fort M'Henry,” on the spot.
The Ballgame
After a short drive from Baltimore, Dad and I pulled up to Leidos Field at Ripken Stadium — a place that is as Ripken as Ripken can be. Located at 873 Long Drive (8 for Cal Ripken Jr.’s number, 7 for Cal Ripken Sr., and 3 for brother Billy Ripken) in Cal Ripken Jr.’s hometown of Aberdeen, the ballpark is of course named for the Ripkens. It sits next to Ripken Experience Aberdeen, a complex of nine baseball fields designed to replicate the feel of different Major League parks. In the signature Camden Yards replica, called “Cal Sr.’s Yard,” a brick Courtyard by Marriott looms beyond right field, recalling Baltimore’s B&O Warehouse building. The bigger brick ballpark next door is the home of the IronBirds, owned by Ripken, Jr. and named after the "Ironman" who played an incredible 2,632 consecutive games for the Orioles. By any accounting, that’s a lot of Ripkens.
The IronBirds are the High-A affiliate of the Orioles, naturally. The franchise originated as the Utica (New York) Blue Jays in 1977. They became the Blue Sox in 1981 after losing their affiliation with the Toronto Blue Jays and retained the name for the next two decades through periods affiliated with the Phillies, White Sox, Red Sox, and Marlins.
Ripken bought the club in 2002 and moved it to Ripken Stadium, giving Aberdeen its first-ever Minor League Baseball team. The IronBirds played in the Class-A New York-Penn League from their inception until 2021, when they joined the High-A South Atlantic League. Famous alumni from the Utica years include Jesse Barfield, Larry Walker, Andy Ashby, and Mike Cameron. Previous IronBirds include Nick Markakis, Manny Machado, Trey Mancini, and Adley Rutschman.
Ripken Stadium seats 6,300 fans but drew just 2,203 per game in 2023, 26th out of the 30 teams in High-A baseball. A hot and humid Sunday did not bode well for a big draw.
Just inside the front gates, Dad and I made an immediate right turn into The Hanger, the IronBirds team store. Dad grabbed his logo baseball while I perused the wide variety of alternate caps and jerseys on display celebrating kids, heroes, decoys, steamed crabs, chocolate chip cookies, and the USA.
My hat choice du jour was the team’s excellent powder-blue-and-white home hat featuring “Ace” the grinning jet — a reference to the nearby Aberdeen Proving Ground U.S. Army installation.
I met IronBirds mascot Ferrous on the concourse. It was Military Appreciation Day, as it is every home Sunday in Aberdeen, and Ferrous wore a USA jersey in keeping with the theme. His avian partner in mime for more than 20 years, Ripcord, sadly did not make an appearance during our game.
There wasn’t a lot of variety on offer at the concessions stands — a few of the specialty food carts were closed with the lighter attendance. But I did manage to find a very good brisket sandwich piled with cole slaw and paired it with a Hammerhead IPA from Big Oyster Brewery in Lewes, Delaware.
I walked down to the field level as Aberdeen players strolled onto the artificial turf in their Military Appreciation Day jerseys to sign autographs and stretch.
The IronBirds were finishing a six-game series against the Hickory Crawdads, who had completed the first half in fifth place in the South Atlantic League’s South Division but were on their way to winning the division in the second half. The Crawdads would lose in the playoffs to the league’s eventual champions, the Greenville Drive.
We’d attended two Italian Heritage Nights and were scheduled for another the next night in Philadelphia. Just before the National Anthem in Aberdeen, however, we were treated to a bonus salute to Italian culture as the Sons of Italy came onto the field, unfurled the Italian flag, and a recording of “Fratelli d’Italia” played over the public address system.
RIght-hander Juan Nuñez took the mound for the IronBirds. He had pitched well in 13 games at Single-A Delmarva and was still getting his legs after being promoted to the High-A level. He looked good in the first, allowing just one walk to a player IronBirds pitchers clearly wanted to avoid: designated hitter Wyatt Langford.
The University of Florida slugger had been the #1 draft pick, and #4 overall, in the June draft. After a few games in the Rookie leagues, he had been sent to High-A Hickory just four days earlier, skipping the Single-A Down East Wood Ducks. Langford would hit .333 in 24 games as a Crawdad and moved quickly through the Rangers Minor League system in 2023, hitting .405 in 12 games with the Double-A Frisco RoughRiders and .368 in five games with the Triple-A Round Rock Express.
Juan Nuñez
Wyatt Langford
Nick Lockhart
Hickory started 6-foot-6-inch right-hander Nick Lockhart. He had given up just one earned run in 14 innings before his promotion to the Crawdads.
After IronBirds second baseman Collin Burns walked to lead off the bottom half, Aberdeen tested Lockhart, with Burns stealing second and third with just one out. But Lockhart worked out of trouble, and we began with a scoreless inning.
The Crawdads scored in the third inning on a double steal and in the fourth on a home run by second baseman Max Acosta. Meanwhile, Lockhart finished his three-inning start with a scoreless scoresheet.
I took a walk down the left-field line as Aberdeen pushed a run across in the fifth to make it 2-1 Hickory.
Jared Beck
The tight game loosened up a bit in the seventh when 7-foot-tall, left-handed reliever Jared Beck entered the contest for the IronBirds. The 23-year-old from St. Leo University in Florida had pitched well for Delmarva earlier in the season. That earned him a promotion to Aberdeen, where he would struggle more, especially on this day.
Beck walked his first batter, gave up a single, then hit a batter and gave up another single before getting his first out. A sacrifice fly made it 5-1 Hickory. Beck stayed on for another inning and allowed a leadoff double to Acosta, who eventually scored to extend the lead to 6-1.
Hickory added yet another run in the ninth, and Crawdads closer Larson Kindreich put an exclamation point on the proceedings, getting three strikeouts in the bottom of the ninth to finish off Aberdeen. Final score: 7-1.
It was our fourth straight loss for the home team, coupled with a rainout two nights before. I’m not saying the IronBirds anemic performance was entirely our fault, but our luck was not running anywhere near as hot as the Mid-Atlantic summer.
Ripken.
Stinger’s Waterfront
Sunday games are a nice break in our routine, allowing us to enjoy an evening of relaxation and dinner outside the ballpark. Dad and I took full advantage at Stinger’s Waterfront, a seafood restaurant in Ridley Park, just southwest of Philadelphia. We sat outside on the edge of Darby Creek, which feeds into the Delaware River. The weather was warm but breezy and comfortable. We ordered some decidedly non-ballpark meals of salmon and crab cakes and let our minds exhale. One full week of baseball remained.