Mat Latos makes the bigs...

---


---

“Baseball gives every American boy a chance to excel, not just to be as good as someone else but to be better than someone else. This is the nature of man and the name of the game.”

- Ted Williams
---

I do the photography for the Eugene Emeralds, Eugene's minor league pro baseball club. The Ems are the San Diego Padres' single A short season team. This is the team that the young guys come to, usually straight out of college (or sooner if they're top talents) or coming in from out of country.

One of the best pure talents for the Emeralds was a young man named Mat Latos. Mat is a tall kid and heaves a fastball that clocks up to 98 mph. And he controls it. He made the Padres' starting pitching rotation and will take the mound this Saturday (April 10) against the Colorado Rockies.

Denis Savage from the Padres scouting crew posted an article over at MadFriars.com the other day and here is his view on Latos:

Latos has ace stuff. His maturity, a question mark in the minors, has taken a significant leap forward. He has the plus fastball, a nasty slider and has made strides with his changeup.

Denis also notes that Mat's ERA in spring training games was an outstanding 1.59 and he won 3 games and lost 0. Mat is now 22. He actually did play 10 games for Padres last season (2009) going 4-5 with a 4.62 ERA in 10 starts. In a game last month against the San Francisco Giants, Latos only let one run cross the plate, only allowed three hits in four innings and struck out three and walked two.

I know that Mat was a hit with the fans here. When he pitched, fans' expectations rose and so did the volume of their cheers when Mat would blow strikes by the batters.

At about 6'6" and 225 pounds Mat Latos is no small pitcher. He has determination, and a talent. It's nice for me to see Mat's making the Big Leagues and I wish him the best in his just beginning career.

I didn't realize when I started shooting for the Ems that someday I would have the rookie photos of big time baseball pros. I think this guy will be one.

I hope your career is long and fruitful Mat - and profitable.











(More on the Emeralds can be found at my Eugene Emeralds Photo blog)
---

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan "press on" has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race”

- Calvin Coolidge

---

It's baseball time again!

---

“Baseball is a game where a curve is an optical illusion, a screwball can be a pitch or a person, stealing is legal and you can spit anywhere you like except in the umpire's eye or on the ball.”

- Jim Murray
---




For 3 months of the year I get to be part of professional baseball. I am the photographer for the Eugene Emeralds here in Eugene. The Ems are the minor league single A short season affiliate for the San Diego Padres.

Photographically it's a pure joy. Socially... I get to hang out with jocks. And I'm grinning as I say that. I play sports (or at least used to) - softball, football and basketball. I ran track and cross-country in High School. Not well, but I liked running and what better way than competing at it and working out on a regular schedule to get to do it. I know my competitive lack of success came not from lack of ability but from lack of application. I didn't take it serious and I didn't care that I didn't take it serious. My gawd! I was a teenager in southern California, there were girls, beer and rock and roll. And tackle football on the weekends...

But these guys... this is serious stuff for them. With enough hustle, skill and a few strokes of luck any one of 'em could make millions of dollars a year and have a place in the limelight.





And really, seriously... as political as I am, as much as I dislike pro sports and the overpriced entertainment industry sports has become, at the pro level these guys are still just playing ball. I'd sure play a game with a stick and a ball and lots (sometimes) of running, for money. Besides, the game may be played by them, but they are watched by us. Because we want to. We like going out to an evening baseball game, sitting in the stands and watching not just the game, but each other. And the kids?

It's magic for them... it's peanuts and hot dogs and crowd roars and the beer guy "COLD beeeer herE! Getcher cold beer!" It's action, it's other kids, pennants and ice cream and color. It's autographs and uniforms and the cracking of bats... and lots of people. It's bugs lit up up as they fly under the stadium lights and foul balls and bigger kids with mitts running to get a ball hit into the parking lot...















For me, as the Ems' photographer, it is a pallette of color and motion and emotion. It's focused intensity...



and occasionally there is a visual twist



And there is always the ongoing teaching. The young guys listening to their manager and coaches. And if they listen well, they will learn what they need to know. This is no different than any aspect of society... the handing off of information, the sharing of knowledge because certainly, this is a game of skill. And those who demonstrate the best skills, will be rewarded.



I'm a fan of the Ems. I'm a part of the Ems and images like these are what they have me there to do. How cool is that? If you like baseball please visit my Emeralds' blog:

Eugene Emeralds - baseball photography

---

“Baseball is almost the only orderly thing in a very unorderly world. If you get three strikes, even the best lawyer in the world can't get you off.”

- Bill Veeck

---