Montana summers are perfect for baseball.

It’s something I couldn’t do for about 10 years before moving to Missoula without embarking on a road trip — to a nearby city, sometimes even as far as a neighboring state. It’s affordable. There’s food and drink. It’s fun and entertaining. Pick the right day or night, and the weather will be a major perk, too.

Whether it’s Saturday night or Sunday afternoon, or maybe both days this weekend, I’ll be in the stands at Ogren Park at Allegiance Field watching the Missoula PaddleHeads against the Ogden Raptors as the Pioneer League continues its 96-game march to the September playoffs.

In my summertime leisure, in fact, I can think of few places I’d rather be than at the ballpark. When Cassandra and I went to our first PaddleHeads game last month, I bought a T-shirt to support the home team. I might just have to add a hat to the collection this time.

Baseball was my first sporting love as a child, with my fandom solidified in the 1984 MLB playoffs when the San Diego Padres beat the Chicago Cubs to make the World Series before losing to the Detroit Tigers, and I played into my high school years before my abilities with a reporter’s notebook in hand overtook my skills with a bat.

I’ve told this story many times to explain my nearly 40-year allegiance to the Padres, who have made the World Series only once since then, losing in 1998 to the New York Yankees.

I was 10 years old and walked downstairs to find my mom watching a baseball game on TV. I asked who was playing and she told me.

The rest of the brief conversation went something like this:

“Who are you rooting for?”

“Well, then, I’m rooting for the Padres!”

Soon after, when I started playing Little League, I idolized Tony Gwynn, the Padres’ star player and one of the best hitters to ever step onto a baseball diamond. I played right field, his position, and I tried to model my swing after his, albeit from the other side of the batter’s box.

I wrote “TGR” on my glove: Tony Gwynn Rules.

The Padres are my one team in all of sports. I root for all the Canadian NHL teams, with the Winnipeg Jets and Edmonton Oilers at the top of the list, but my bond isn’t nearly as tight. The NFL and NBA lost me years ago.

I can only hope that, one day, my loyalty will be rewarded with the World Series victory. The Padres, once a total afterthought in the sport, have tried in recent years by spending lots of money and making lots of trades. Maybe someday.

There are few opportunities to buy a ticket and watch the Padres, though. It’s also far more expensive, and ridiculously so if you want to see the game like you can see it at a minor-league park, where every seat is a good one. I also appreciate that I can enjoy the game without being on edge with every pitch, which is how I feel when I watch the Padres.

Sure, I’ll be rooting for the PaddleHeads. But my day won’t be ruined if they lose.

That also doesn’t happen much this season. Powered by the big sticks of Adam Fogel and Roberto Pena, Missoula (32-10) has already won the first half of the Pioneer League season to clinch a place in the four-team playoff bracket.

Bill Speltz, our venerable Missoulian sports editor (and a good guy despite being a fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers), keeps close tabs on the PaddleHeads and has already knocked out a few good features this season, including one on Fogel and another on Andrew Garcia, the pitcher who is usually called on to protect a close lead in the last inning.

The Pioneer League’s footprint in Montana is bigger than Missoula. There are also teams in Billings, Great Falls, and Kalispell — and as the summer goes on, I’ll be looking for a chance to venture to their home stadiums, too.

Our sports editor in Billings, and a baseball diehard himself, John Letasky, does just as Speltz does in Missoula, following the hometown Mustangs and looking for good feature opportunities — like the neat piece he crafted on Taylor Lomack in the season’s opening weeks.

Summer is but weeks old. There are dozens of games yet to play. Tickets are just a few bucks.

What are you doing this weekend? Maybe I’ll see you at the ballpark.