Spring Training
On November 13, the Phillies announced their spring training schedule. In addition to their Grapefruit League games, the Phillies played two games against two of the World Baseball Classic teams. The Phillies defeated Team Canada (with Phillie Matt Stairs) on March 4, 9–2, and lost to Team USA (with Jimmy Rollins and Shane Victorino) on March 5, 9–6. The team broke camp April 2 and headed north to play two "On Deck Series" games on April 3 and 4 against the Tampa Bay Rays at Citizens Bank Park; they split the series, winning 3–2 and losing 9–7.
The Phillies finished the 2009 preseason with a record of 13–19, 10 games behind the Grapefruit League-leading New York Yankees. Ryan Howard led all players in Spring Training with 10 home runs. The team set spring training attendance-records for Bright House Field in 2009. They set a single-game record with 10,335 people in attendance on March 15 for a game against the St. Louis Cardinals. The Phillies set the franchise's total spring training attendance record for Bright House Field, with 133,620 attending in 2009.
Read more about this topic: 2009 Philadelphia Phillies Season
Famous quotes containing the words spring and/or training:
“When we reached the lake, about half past eight in the evening, it was still steadily raining, and harder than before; and, in that fresh, cool atmosphere, the hylodes were peeping and the toads ringing about the lake universally, as in the spring with us. It was as if the season had revolved backward two or three months, or I had arrived at the abode of perpetual spring.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“... the time will come when no servant will be hired without a diploma from some training school, and a girl will as much expect to fit herself for house-maid or cook, as for dressmaker or any trade.”
—Lydia Hoyt Farmer (1842–1903)