The Newberg Report Wipe Out Kids Cancer Charity Event

Do you know what was the best part of our charity event on Tuesday night?

It wasn't just the great Chuck Morgan - who always knows what say, how to get the crowd into the moment and adds that special touch class (that the Rangers haven't always had) to every event he hosts.

It wasn't just seeing Sean Duncan and his kids there.  Sean  was one the first players who sat and signed autographs at our inaguaral Newberg Report booth at Rangers Fan Fest in the Arlington Convention Center  (was it it really 10 years ago?).

It wasn't just Grant Schiller starting the evening's Q & A with some good questions for Rangers Assistant Director of Player Development Jake Krug.

It wasn't just watching Chuck Greenberg's responses to all the questions and suggestions from the loyal and mighty fans of the Newberg Nation (as one questioner called us); and the fact that he volunteered to auction the Rangers jacket he was wearing that night.  (By the way: in all the time that Mr. Hicks owned the team, I never once thought about refering to him as just Tom.  Mr. Greenberg made a point of telling everyone to call him Chuck, and I felt pretty comfortable doing that right away).

It wasn't just the fan who gave Chuck Greenberg his Ranger cuff links to wear to the first owners meeting he attends representing the Texas Rangers.

It wasn't just Annette Leslie's moving speech about her son Carson's and Michael Young's friendship.

It wasn't just watching professional acutioneer Luther Davis (a fan of the Newberg Report) get the crowd to bid up those charity items that Annette, Cristina Barbosa-Young and others donated.

It wasn't just the first beer that I ever received via text message.

It wasn't just Michael Young giving honest answers and conveying his enthusiasm about his teammates and "something really special" that is on the horizon for Ranger fans in 2010.

You know what the best part of the evening really was?  It was announcing that the combined auction results with a matchng donation from Michael and Cristina raised over $12,000.00  for Wipe Out Kids Cancer.  I know somewhere Carson Leslie is raising a high-five and saying "allright!"

Here's the link to the pictures from Tuesday night's event.

Proud to be a charter member of the Newberg/Rangers Nation -- Marla Hooch
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What You Didn't See On Sunday....

If you got an automated e-mail from this site showing a link to the story on Sunday, I apologize, I had blog entry up for a short time on Sunday night about the Ranger events from last weekend – I had to delete it – long story not worth the time and bandwith to explain.

There are several good wrap-up’s of the weekend events online – I’d recommend you read Grant Schiller’s and Jamey Newberg’s.

Here are just a couple of things I want to add:

Friday night’s banquet was very nice, the food was good (Grant really liked the dinner rolls) and the Omni Hotel is beautiful. I was very disappointed that the Rangers decided to go back to having all the players at a head table set away from the fans. The past couple of years they’ve had players, team officials and other Ranger related personnel seated at each table with the fans. My perception is that many season ticket holders attend the banquet every year, and if the Rangers are really committed to being fan-friendly I think this is the group they need to start with. I think most fans understand that the big corporate sponsors will get Michael Young, Ian Kinsler and Josh Hamilton at their table – however, I do think the fans who attend the event really enjoy having anyone connected with the Rangers (minor league players, Ranger alumni, media types, coaches) at their table.

Saturday’s Newberg Booth at Fan Fest, although a bit cold was as always terrific. I’ll admit I was a bit miffed when the Sports Service guy came in and turned off the space heaters in our area in the middle of one of our autograph sessions – saying that was uncool is probably a bit of an understatement. The players who signed with us were gracious, humorous and all of them were great with the fans. You can see my pictures of all them using the link in the entry below this one.

Just a couple of other random baseball thoughts:

Jim Reeves is only semi-retired (thank goodness) he’s writing occasionally for Dallas ESPN.com – his column on Tom Hicks is absolutely on target.

I was trying to program my new DVR yesterday and ran across the NFL Pro-Bowl, and I have to ask – why are fans so worked up the record holders in baseball using steroids, but you don’t hear anyone ranting about the same for football? You can’t tell me that those players aren’t using some kind of PED’s – so aren’t their records just as tainted, or don’t football fans care about that?

Finally – a few words about February from Whitey Herzog:

“You sweat out the free agent thing in November then you make the trades in December. Then you struggle to sign the guys left in January. In February I finally get down to sewing all the new numbers on the uniforms. “


Grant – would you like another dinner roll? – Marla Hooch

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Pictures From The Newberg Report Boot At Rangers Fan Fest

Saturday at the Freeze Fest... er I mean Fan Fest - The  Newberg Booth participants were great - the weather was not.

The Newberg Report Booth was re-located this year to the Cuervo Club - unforunately the Cuervo Club doesn't have any heat, so things were just a bit nippy inside - but that didn't keep the fans from coming out for autographs from: Kasey Kiker, Brandon Boggs, Justin Smoak, Ben Snyder, Tanner Scheppers, Zach Phillips, Mitch Moreland, Blake Beavan and Eric Hurley.

Here are my pictures from the Newberg Report Booth at Fan Fest.

One more Newberg event this week: a book release party at Sherlock's in Dallas featuring Michael Young, Assistant Director of Player Development Jake Krug and impending owner Chuck Greenberg.

Still thawing out my hands and feet from Saturday - Marla Hooch

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