HANK CONGER’S SPRING JOURNAL #4

WEEK FOUR — 
March 14th, 2010

Week 4 and all the days feel like they’re running together, as we’re playing games everyday. We made a couple of trips to Surprise, Ariz., this week to play the Rangers and Royals, and then a trip out to Tucson to play the Diamondbacks. We also had a split-squad game and I stayed at home to play the White Sox. I got to play a couple of innings behind the plate and got a couple of at-bats in that game, so that was pretty cool.

This week we were very fortunate to have a couple of special guests come and help out the pitchers: Mark Langston and Chuck Finley. Every time I looked around, both of them were always talking to different pitchers about stuff. At the end of the week, Bobby Grich also came into town to hang out with the team.

On Sunday, we played the Cubs and it was a well-fought ballgame. I entered the game as DH and the part that I thought was funny is that my two at-bats came off two guys I caught and played with in the Fall League — Andrew Cashner and Blake Parker. Both are good pitchers.

So far in camp, a couple of new guys that have really been hitting well are Michael Ryan and Cory Aldridge. Ryan had a couple of stints in the big leagues with the Twins and recently came over from the Marlins organization. I got to play against Aldridge two years ago, when he was in Northwest Arkansas and I got called up by Little Rock for the playoffs.

Also this week, position players and pitchers arrived to report to minor league camp. I was pretty excited to see the guys, considering I haven’t seen most of them since the end of August. I got to see my boys, Yung-Ill and Pil Joon, and caught up with them to see how their off seasons had gone in Korea. We also went to a local Asian market to pick up some groceries.

The toughest part of the regular season is missing home cooking from the family, and you can only imagine what some of the guys have to go through when dealing with a culture change. So whenever we have time, Yung-Ill and I try to go and pick up some Korean type foods to bring back to cook. One of our favorite foods is this barbecued spare rib called Kalbi.

This week is also usually the week where some guys get sent down to minor league camp to get some more work in. So, whatever happens, I’m going to continue to keep working and making sure I feel ready for the upcoming season.

Hank Conger

Read Hank’s WEEK ONE Journal here
Read Hank’s WEEK TWO Journal here
Read Hank’s WEEK THREE Journal here 
Stay tuned next weekend for Conger’s fifth and final journal in this series.