St. Louis is a nice city

Having traveled to St. Louis a couple years ago, I'm pretty certain that Hannu Toivonen will enjoy his move. In some ways, baseball in particular, it will remind him of Boston. It's more quiet, though. Not so much hustle and bustle. And there's always the Mississippi and the Gateway Arch. Besides, Brad Boyes, another ex-Bruin, plays for the Blues.

Summer projects

Astute observers of Hound Central 2.0 will have noticed that I'll have a couple of summer projects to keep me busy until the Lightning open training camp in September.

The sharpest of these observers, too, will notice that I'm stepping outside the boundaries, so to speak, to keep my autograph hounding skills sharp during the offseason. As it stands, I'm calling it Baseball Mondays.

In it, I'll begin to build, one cherry-picking session at a time, a collection of autographed baseballs. Rather than hound every team that travels to St. Petersburg to play the Devil Rays, I'm going to restrict the hounding efforts to one of my days off -- Mondays. If necessary, though, and I reserve the right to do so, these adventures may also take place on Sundays or Tuesdays.

At first glance, this project will include not only the Tampa Bay Devils Rays, but such teams as the Seattle Mariners, San Diego Padres, Los Angeles Dodgers and Toronto Blue Jays as well. And, yes, I'll make strong efforts to hound the Boston Red Sox and, ahem, the New York Yankees.

It'll begin either tonight or tomorrow, as the Minnesota Twins come to visit. And though I fully intend to hound the likes of Torii Hunter, Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau and Johan Santana, my primary focus will be on broadcasters Bert Blyleven, Jack Morris and Dan Gladden.

The other summer project, and this will take some time to cull together, will entail an insider's guide to collecting hockey autographs in the Tampa Bay area. From the Lightning's training facility in Brandon to the handful of hotels used by visiting NHL teams, I'll provide information -- in text and in pictures -- that should help with your efforts.

And if that's not enough, I'm sure we can agree upon my consultation fee for guided autograph tours.

Sunday morning homily XXII

There are times in life, such as this morning, where one is forced into making a decision. Do we drive over to Tampa and continue adding to the hockey collection. Or do we stay closer to home and get Trot Nixon, Colin's favorite baseball player, to sign his Red Sox jersey.

As you can see, there was no dilemma. Either decision would have left us happy. Somehow, though, watching Colin's eyes light up when he saw Trot, someone he had seen only on TV, showed we made the right call. For the record, Nixon also signed in the sweet spot of a MLB baseball.

The day of decisions will also take us to Tropicana Field this afternoon, rather than the St. Pete Times Forum, where the Lightning hopes to stave off elimination by beating New Jersey. Again, we're happy with our decision.

Rather than spend $60 a ticket for the same seats that were $25 during the Lightning's regular season, we'll be 12 rows behind Nixon at the Trop. Our tickets, which include a hot dog, pop and a snack, are just $15 a seat. And, if Colin's one of the first 7,500 kids through the door, he gets a free Devil Rays hat.

It's not that I've abandoned hockey. Nor am I suffering from burnout, thanks to a long season that started in early September. Nope, my motivation was to have Colin meet one of his Boston baseball heroes, even if that hero now plays for the Cleveland Indians. This temporary diversion, I'd dare say, was well worth the time.

A true keeper

Should the Lightning lose today, it'll also bring an end to my hockey hounding season. Do you know who signed the final puck of the season? None other than New Jersey's Martin Brodeur, providing puck no. 1,275 of the collection.

Even if I'm not exactly thrilled with the quality of the autograph, I certainly won't quibble about the fact that it came from the game's top goalie. Would you?

Swing . . . and a miss

With former Red Sox player Trot Nixon in town with the Cleveland Indians, I stopped by the team's hotel after work today hoping to have him sign an item or two, or, if I'm really lucky, three. Unfortunately, I missed the team.

Colin and I will head out tomorrow morning. Maybe we'll have better luck. If not, we'll see him at the game. We're sitting in right field.

Take me out to the ballgame

If you ever want to see your favorite baseball team on the road, visit the Tampa Bay area and take in a Devil Rays game. Other than Red Sox and Yankees games, you can walk up and get an $8-12 seat by the first pitch. Free parking, too.

Given the way the Lightning played last night, I'm sure baseball will become the only game in town.