Julio Urias/Josh Beckett Rehab Quakes vs SJ Giants Game 4-4-14

Last Friday was the perfect opportunity to attend my first Rancho Cucamonga Quakes game of the year. Loan Mart Field is one of my favorite places to graph minor league baseball and is a great spot to graph current members of the LA Dodgers who are on rehab assignments. Tonight Josh Beckett was scheduled to pitch. I decided to check out the game after work with the goal of getting Julio Urias and Josh Beckett's autograph.

I arrived around 6pm as batting practice already started. As soon as I entered Loan Mart Field the Quakes gave out free magnet schedules.

I headed straight towards the Quakes dugout to try to get Julio Urias' autograph. I figured Josh wouldn't sign during BP since he was already scheduled to pitch.

The first player to sign was Corey Seager who was kind enough to sign my ROMLB on the SS with the "Go Dodgers" inscription.

Julio Urias denied all autograph requests but did promise to sign after the game. Here is Julio chilling in the dugout.

I was a bit worried that he was already big leaguing us even though he is only 17 years old. When you have that amount of talent at a young age you just never know what his agents and handlers are telling him to do. I just hope Urias doesn't turn out like Puig and says the dreaded word "contracto" when we ask for autographs on the SS in the future.

Since there wasn't much graphing going on I decided to take a few photos of Josh Beckett warming up in the bullpen.

Here are the Quakes also observing Beckett pitch.

I met up with my friend Ryan to watch the game. Check out his blog and you can see how much he racked on Beckett that day.

For some reason it was freezing cold on the field today so the game was tough to watch.

As soon as Beckett finished pitching we waited by the Quakes locker room to wait for him to leave. Unfortunately Beckett was skipping baseballs as he was only signing cards and photos. He was in a bad mood since he injured himself during the game and looked like he wasn't in the mood to even sign. Beckett ended up signing about 15 autographs and left promptly. I ended up striking out which wasn't a big deal since I got Josh Beckett's autograph before several times.

After the game we waited for Julio Urias. Surprisingly everyone else had the same idea.

There were at least 50 people waiting for him postgame which is unheard of at minor league games. You see less people postgaming at Angels and Dodger Stadium most of the time.

There is so much hype surrounding Urias as he is projected to be the next Fernando Valenzuela. With him being only 17 with a ton up upside and talent he has a bright future ahead of him. Basically everyone is trying to get his autograph now before the "contracto."

As soon as Julio walked out he was mobbed. Luckily he was cool with the fans. He had a ton of family and friends from Mexico who visited since he made his Quakes Debut tonight. Julio signed autographs for everyone who asked and also took photos as well.

Julio signed three baseballs for me each one with a different variation of inscriptions and was nice enough to take a photo with me as well.

Even though I missed out on Beckett it was otherwise a great day of graphing. I want to give a shout out to the graphing family Ryan, Jeremy, Matt, Jesse, and Clint who were out there with me today standing in the cold getting autographs.