Ron Kantowski gets taken back to school on a beautiful day at the ballpark

Thursday, April 27, 2006 | 7:14 a.m.

I spent Tuesday morning with 6,000 screaming fifth graders.

And loved every minute of it.

The 51s held their third annual Cox Communications School Day with a game at 10:30 a.m. against the Sacramento River Cats at Cashman Field. That's right, 10:30. In the morning.

It's a good thing Mickey Mantle didn't stop in Las Vegas - for many reasons - on his way to Yankee Stadium. He would have missed batting practice and probably the first three innings.

Being a proponent of daytime baseball, especially when the temperature is in the high 70s with bright sunshine and sitting in the office is the alternative, I didn't mind the rude hour. In fact, 51s general manager Don Logan had me at "Play Ball!"

My strategy was to watch the first three innings or so, then stretch out among the rows of empty bleachers for a middle-inning nap as the 51s and River Cats continued to flail at batting practice fastballs and curveballs out of the strike zone.

Didn't happen. Couldn't happen. For starters, there wasn't any place in the bleachers to stretch out. And even if there was, it was so darn loud inside the stadium that not even The Mick, after an evening of carousing at Toots Shor's, would have been able to catch 40 winks.

In the home fifth, the 51s' Wilson Valdez caught a batting practice fastball or a curveball out of the strike zone (I couldn't tell which) off his front foot and drove it over the 328-foot sign down the left-field line with one hand.

Cashman Field erupted.

Usually for that to happen, somebody has to drop a flare in the wrong place on Fireworks Night. But the screaming fifth graders went crazy. The last time I heard that many young voices shriek in unison was the night the Beatles went on "The Ed Sullivan Show."

I have been going to 51s/Stars games - one or two a year, anyway - for 19 years. I can say without a doubt that the atmosphere at Tuesday morning's game was easily the best I have ever experienced at Cashman Field.

Even better than when Robert Goulet sings the national anthem, and that's saying something.

Next to getting a new ballpark, it was Camelot for Logan and his staff. They had experimented with day games in the past with businessmen's specials and the like, and they've been moderately successful.

"But not like this," Logan said above the racket as the fifth graders chanted for a foul ball to be hit their way.

Counting the season-ticket holders who didn't show up, Tuesday's attendance was 7,933. That's about 7,000 more than would have been there had the game been played at the regular hour of 7:05 p.m. And it broke the previous School Day record crowd of 6,851.

Logan said Cox Communications and game sponsors Nevada Power, Republic Services, Focus Property Group and Country Insurance stepped up to the plate like Reggie Jackson against Bob Welch in Octobers past. They purchased the tickets and arranged for the buses that got the kids to and from the ballpark.

The game was billed as a field trip for the kids, an educational experience that included two presentations - one on Tobacco Awareness and another that didn't go as well, on the value of hitting the cutoff man and moving the runner into scoring position, which the 51s didn't do upon falling behind 4-0.

I guess it was still a too little early in the morning for baseball fundamentals.

Although the fifth graders didn't seem to mind the lack of execution.