City Of Palms Park

This release from the Red Sox: The Boston Red Sox today released the 2012 spring training schedule, which includes 18 games at the team's new Spring Training facility, JetBlue Park at Fenway South. The 33-game exhibition season includes one game against the Washington Nationals in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, April 3. Tickets for all 2012 Spring Training games at JetBlue Park are scheduled to go on sale on Saturday, December 17. View the 2012 spring training schedule Ticket prices at JetBlue Park will range from $5 to $46 for the 2012 season with more than 75 percent of...

This release from the Red Sox: The Boston Red Sox today released the 2012 spring training schedule, which includes 18 games at the team's new Spring Training facility, JetBlue Park at Fenway South. The 33-game exhibition season includes one game against the Washington Nationals in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, April 3. Tickets for all 2012 Spring Training games at JetBlue Park are scheduled to go on sale on Saturday, December 17. View the 2012 spring training schedule Ticket prices at JetBlue Park will range from $5 to $46 for the 2012 season with more than 75 percent of...

FORT MYERS, Fla. - The Red Sox are engaged in negotiations with local authorities about the relocation of their spring training site. They've got the number of potential sites whittled from 15 to nine. The problem: This is a want, not a need. Their desire to "upgrade" is the wrong quest at the wrong time. Who doesn't know these are the most perilous economic times since the Great Depression? And anyone who's paying attention understands that few areas are having more difficult economic times than southwest Florida.

FORT MYERS, Fla. — Before his arrival in the clubhouse at City of Palms Park, Alan Embree asked that his name not be put up on his locker. He wanted to surprise his former teammates, to pull “the old sneak attack,’’ as he put it. But his appearance, seemingly out of nowhere, had implications far beyond his fellow members of the Red Sox from 2002 to 2005. There was the little matter of the pitchers a few lockers over. The trio of Joe Nelson, Scott Atchison, and Brian Shouse has been pitching for what is, in all likelihood, a single spot in the bullpen.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - Dane Clemens grew up 15 minutes from Yankee Stadium and came of age as a baseball player when David Ortiz was torturing the Yankees with towering blasts in The House That Ruth Built. Yesterday afternoon, Clemens, 21, found himself standing on the mound at City of Palms Park, staring at Ortiz, thinking about what all of his friends back home in New York would say if they could see him facing Big Papi. Clemens is a sophomore righthander at Boston College. He's endured three knee operations and Tommy John surgery since 2006 and has pitched in exactly one college game since coming to BC....

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Hoping for a miracle, the Red Sox instead yesterday ran into a major misfortune as they lost Nomar Garciaparra most likely until May with a vexing case of Achilles' tendinitis. The All-Star shortstop received the disconcerting news less than 48 hours after he declined to rule out returning for the season opener Sunday in Baltimore. "It's going to be horrible," Garciaparra said as he prepared to return to Boston for three weeks of rest and rehabilitation before the Sox consider clearing him for baseball activity.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Stopper. " That's the tune citizens of Red Sox Nation could have been humming after Curt Schilling's two innings in the inaugural game of the 2007 spring training season last night. Miffed that his contract extension request was rejected by management, clearly overweight after an offseason attending to business ventures, Schilling was the strike machine Sox fans have come to love in his first Grapefruit League outing. Fifteen of his 19 pitches went for strikes as he allowed two hits and no runs.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - It was only one inning. It was against a college team. But maybe someday we’ll tell our grandchildren about it. Maybe someday City of Palms Park will be renamed “Casey Kelly Field.’’ Boston baseball’s new golden boy pitched his first inning in front of Red Sox fans yesterday, retiring the Northeastern Huskies, 1-2-3, in the first inning of the first game of the 2010 spring season. Kelly struck out two (both swinging) and threw 10 pitches in his showcase start at City of Palms Park.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - Red Sox ace Josh Beckett walked to the mound at City of Palms Park yesterday, threw one warm-up pitch, and put his hand to his lower back. He tried five more tosses before alerting catcher Jason Varitek, who brought out manager Terry Francona and the trainers. That was it for Beckett, who was removed as a precaution before the start of the game against the Florida Marlins. He was diagnosed with lower back spasms. "In his first warm-up toss after warming up in the bullpen, in which he was fine, his landing foot seemed to give way just a little bit," pitching...

FORT MYERS, Fla. — Before his arrival in the clubhouse at City of Palms Park, Alan Embree asked that his name not be put up on his locker. He wanted to surprise his former teammates, to pull “the old sneak attack,’’ as he put it. But his appearance, seemingly out of nowhere, had implications far beyond his fellow members of the Red Sox from 2002 to 2005. There was the little matter of the pitchers a few lockers over. The trio of Joe Nelson, Scott Atchison, and Brian Shouse has been pitching for what is, in all likelihood, a single spot in the bullpen.

FORT MYERS, Fla. — Even before a successful debut at first base, Mike Lowell politely declined interview requests, preferring to string together a few performances before he’s ready to comment about playing again. Being the most accessible Red Sox player of the last four years, he’s built up much goodwill. And the fans gave him a roaring ovation when he was introduced and another when he first stepped to the plate in the Sox’ 8-4 loss to the Baltimore Orioles yesterday.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - It was only one inning. It was against a college team. But maybe someday we’ll tell our grandchildren about it. Maybe someday City of Palms Park will be renamed “Casey Kelly Field.’’ Boston baseball’s new golden boy pitched his first inning in front of Red Sox fans yesterday, retiring the Northeastern Huskies, 1-2-3, in the first inning of the first game of the 2010 spring season. Kelly struck out two (both swinging) and threw 10 pitches in his showcase start at City of Palms Park.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - Dane Clemens grew up 15 minutes from Yankee Stadium and came of age as a baseball player when David Ortiz was torturing the Yankees with towering blasts in The House That Ruth Built. Yesterday afternoon, Clemens, 21, found himself standing on the mound at City of Palms Park, staring at Ortiz, thinking about what all of his friends back home in New York would say if they could see him facing Big Papi. Clemens is a sophomore righthander at Boston College. He's endured three knee operations and Tommy John surgery since 2006 and has pitched in exactly one...

FORT MYERS, Fla. - The Red Sox are engaged in negotiations with local authorities about the relocation of their spring training site. They've got the number of potential sites whittled from 15 to nine. The problem: This is a want, not a need. Their desire to "upgrade" is the wrong quest at the wrong time. Who doesn't know these are the most perilous economic times since the Great Depression? And anyone who's paying attention understands that few areas are having more difficult economic times than southwest Florida.

FORT MYERS, Fla. - Red Sox ace Josh Beckett walked to the mound at City of Palms Park yesterday, threw one warm-up pitch, and put his hand to his lower back. He tried five more tosses before alerting catcher Jason Varitek, who brought out manager Terry Francona and the trainers. That was it for Beckett, who was removed as a precaution before the start of the game against the Florida Marlins. He was diagnosed with lower back spasms. "In his first warm-up toss after warming up in the bullpen, in which he was fine, his landing foot seemed to give way just a little bit," pitching coach John...

FORT MYERS, Fla. - It was the great Bob Ryan who wrote, "Beat me, whip me, take my picture," back when ballplayers from foreign lands enjoyed getting their butts kicked by the 1992 US Olympic basketball team. We had a little bit of that at City of Palms Park yesterday. It was "college day" for the world champion Boston Red Sox. Still jet-lagged from their whirlwind trip to the White House (seen the photo of David Ortiz riding a sidecar yet?), the Sox returned to Florida and opened their spring season with a day-night doubleheader against Boston College and Northeastern.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Twenty years ago, Globe sportswriter Michael Madden reported on Tommy Harper's revelation that the Red Sox had patronized an Elks Lodge in Winter Haven, Fla., that excluded blacks. The presence of Harper, who was then a coach with the team and is now a consultant, is a reminder of how socially backward the Red Sox were in those days. Yesterday, those of us who had been to spring training in the early '80s couldn't help but see the irony as five baseball players were having the time of their lives with the Fab Five of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," a Bravo program in which gay men make...

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- His story never wavered. From the beginning, Nomar Garciaparra attributed the tendinitis in his right Achilles' tendon to a ball striking him in batting practice before an exhibition game between the Red Sox and Northeastern University March 5 at City of Palms Park in Fort Myers, Fla. But Garciaparra said he never knew who hit the ball. And no one else in the organization acknowledged hitting the ball or witnessing the incident. As it turns out, the episode may not have happened.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Stopper. " That's the tune citizens of Red Sox Nation could have been humming after Curt Schilling's two innings in the inaugural game of the 2007 spring training season last night. Miffed that his contract extension request was rejected by management, clearly overweight after an offseason attending to business ventures, Schilling was the strike machine Sox fans have come to love in his first Grapefruit League outing. Fifteen of his 19 pitches went for strikes as he allowed two hits and no runs.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- One shot cleared the sizable scoreboard behind the wall in left center. Another crashed into the "H/E" sign halfway up the scoreboard, and had it been an actual game, the blast most definitely would have been scored an "H," not an "E. " A couple more landed on the back field beyond City of Palms Park. "Sometimes," Wily Mo Pena said yesterday, before that inaugural batting practice session in a Red Sox uniform, "when I hit a ball hard, I can hit it far away. " Then came the game, and Pena -- the anti-Sox player, because he doesn't hit for average (.252 career)