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A flower to the more than 15,000 fans who attended the Tucson Sidewinders' last home stand this past weekend.

The team is scheduled to move to Reno next season, but it was heartening to see diehard baseball fans express their loyalty one last time to the city's Triple-A baseball franchise.

The actual number of fans who attended the home stand was probably closer to 20,000, but Sunday's game was suspended by rain, so no official attendance figure was announced.

A thorn to the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Sidewinders' parent team, for forfeiting Sunday's suspended game for what was supposed to be a double-header on Labor Day.

The Diamondbacks' minor-league director A.J. Hinch told the Star's Sarah Trotto that the organization felt it was taking too much risk and putting a strain on its pitching by playing that many innings on the last day.

The late change in plans — an announcement was made less than three hours before the scheduled first pitch of the doubleheader — was a major inconvenience to some fans. Many likely decided to skip the final game instead of driving out to the ballpark twice.

We heard one family complaining at the ticket booth that since there was school the next day, they didn't want their children staying up late at a night game.

The D-backs' decision to forfeit the game was ill-considered and dampened enthusiasm at the season finale.

A thorn to Pima County for the condition of the Tucson Electric Park field. Once again, the playing surface was a splotchy mess of large dirt spots and turf patches.

Pima County is in charge of maintaining the field at TEP. We wrote last season about how terrible the turf looked, and it was the same story this season. The condition of the field is an embarrassment.

Oddly enough, the grassy knolls in the outfield were lush and green with no dirt spots.

TEP's turf problems also don't make sense considering that the University of Arizona keeps its football field in outstanding form.

And lastly a flower to former Sidewinders owner Jay Zucker, who announced this week that Tucson will have professional baseball next summer.

Zucker's new independent team will be called the Tucson Toros — that deserves another flower — and is set to play its games at Hi Corbett Field.

It certainly won't be the same as Triple-A baseball, but we're hopeful that Zucker can put out a good product that will keep Tucson fans happy and entertained in the summer.