Monterey Trail @ Florin Football

An away game at the home stadium. Weird, right? The Monterey Trail Mustangs walked out of the same locker room, touched the same rock and walked onto the same field that they do every home game on a Friday night. But this time, they were the away team. Donning the away white uniforms and banished to the visitor's sideline, the Mustangs played the Florin Panthers, with whom they share the Mark Macres Memorial Stadium. Florin hung their banners on the outside fences and wrapped their "Panther" cushions around the base of the field goal uprights but they never quite gained that home field advantage, losing to the Mustangs 55-14.

Grant @ Bella Vista Soccer

My high school soccer practices consisted mostly of jogging and running and I hated it. Now and then we'd get to take a couple of shots. In 2012 when I show up to high school soccer games, I take a seat somewhere on the goal line in this super comfy chair and take a couple hundred shots. Two reasons I'm out shooting soccer: 1) the golden, early evening, directional sunlight 2) Gotta keep my action game sharp...I haven't done it in a while. 

Shout out to Grant (blue and yellow), who like my team, consisted of an overwhelming majority of Spanish speakers. The technical soccer terms of "cruz a la", "medio", and "cabrón" sounded all too familiar.

Martha + Nate: Engaged!

Well, they were actually engaged in October when Nate got down on one knee in the middle of running a marathon. No big deal. He approached and proposed to a cheering Martha, adding precious seconds to his overall time and I was right there to witness it all. Nate is my brother-in-law and the two currently live in the great city I grew up in. We had a great shoot early, early in the morning in Hermann Park and their laughter and interaction with each other made everything so easy. As a side note, I had no idea how many people take photos in Hermann Park. As we were heading back to the car there was a crying baby on train tracks and at least three other couples all being photographed. I felt a little bad hogging all of the good light. Anyway, shout out to Martha and Nate. Congrats and see you in March!

Otis Griffin - Sacramento Boxer

As you can see from previous posts, I've been spending a little bit of time around boxers and hot, box gyms. A few months ago, I got a sudden urge to photograph some boxing activity but I have no idea where the inspiration came from. A Floyd Mayweather tweet? A Manny Pacquiao Hennessy ad? I don't know. I photographed boxing before...the negatives are around here somewhere.

Anyway, I got online and on the phone emailing and calling boxing promoters, matchmakers and gyms in the Sacramento area. I got a call back from Eddie Rodriquez who gave me Otis Griffin's number and that's how it all came together. Eddie told me that Otis was fighting on August 24th and being around mid-June, I thought it was an ideal time frame for a small project. O had already been on and won a boxing reality show called The Next Great Champ produced by Oscar de la Hoya. The show premiered a little bit before The Contender debuted, but definitely wasn't as popular.

I called Otis and told him who I was and what I wanted to do and to my surprise, he was down. Between the training sessions and fight night, I spent about seven days with the Griffin camp and they put in work! He was in the boxing ring, the weight room, on playground equipment and hitting the stairs at his high school amphitheater. I took plenty of days off...but whenever I came back around, they were in the same routine. One of his goals is to get back in contention for the light heavyweight crown with a series of 5 fights in his hometown of Sacramento. The first fight occurred on August 24th against Adam Collins from Ironton, Ohio and 4 minutes and 30 seconds later, it was over. O now sits at 23-10-2 with 4 fights left in this series that will hopefully prepare him for a title shot. Here is the journey, in pictures, to the first bout. Shout out to Otis "Triple OG" Griffin.

CHECK OUT MORE PICTURES HERE!

Nieces, a Nephew and Dad cutting grass.

I got a chance to spend a few days in Houston last month visiting old family, new family and being nostalgic about the southwest side of the city. Whenever I go back, it's a must that I take some photos of the growing kids whose diaper days don't seem that long ago. Just so you can keep count, we've now got two high school seniors, an 8th grader and a TWENTY year old (unbelievable) who's not pictured. Oh and that last shot is my dad tending to a neglected back yard. Felt good to be home.

Spent Time in H-A-W-A-I-I

Thanks MA$E. I'll always know how to spell this country's youngest state. About two months ago, my wife and I went to Hawaii for our honeymoon (thank you, thank you). We split time in Kona and Maui doing mostly adventurous things in the former and chillaxing a lot in the latter. There is a lot to tell, but I'll just give you the short recap and a few pictures. Luau, cheesy. Beach, wavy. Turtles, lazy. Volcano, smoking. Black sand beaches, Hawaiian shaved ice with the ice cream in the bottom, and a couple of flights on very, very small 9 passenger planes.

PURCHASE PRINTS HERE!