More Than a Simple Game to Me
Why I Love Baseball
Most will view this picture and see a white
ball. But what they will never see is all that is inside
of that ball. It is filled with lessons, memories,
victories, losses, laughter, friendships, battles, and
tears. It is magic to me. As magical as any crystal ball
or mystical message. I see my life.
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Baseball is more than a simple game to me.
The greatest game on earth has been like a grand
musical score playing throughout my time on stage in
this life. The first notes began very early with my big
brother, my idol, conducting for the first decade of my
existence. He was a big, strong player nicknamed the
Valley Fireball and I his ever present shadow.
The melodies picked up in tempo as I came out of
the shadows and became a bit of a star myself with my
brother now watching me, in my hometown park. A
full baseball scholarship allowed me to go to college
and graduate. Later, the game gave me more mellow
times when I became the Coach, the leader of young
men and a few young women. Baseball made my
mother’s last few years more enjoyable. My two boys
and I bonded while they struck out thousands of
imaginary batters throwing to me with my older knees
bend and glove waiting. They both became better
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players than me which was a splendid thrill. Now, I see
my son leading his own American Legion team as I
cheer from the bleachers.
Genius author and therapist Virginia Satir
once said: “Everybody needs a magnificent
obsession.” Come travel with me and I will try to share
what I found inside that ball over the years. I want to
tell you about my magnificent obsession.
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I am a senior second baseman playing for the
American Legion team in the summer of 1969. I am
warming up and Scrappy Curtis, the local umpire
legend of over forty years who was once signed by
Branch Rickey himself and made it to the majors for a
cup of coffee in his playing days, speaks to me in a
whisper without looking at me: “Bobby, be on your
game today, son. People are watching.”
His words needed no translation. The scouts
are there tonight to watch me. My heart starts
pounding. I have been waiting for this night all my
life. The night is like a dream. I play one of my
greatest games ever. In the first inning, our pitcher
walks the first two and the third batter smashes a 3-1
pitch off the right center field wall. Gene, the right
fielder, gets to the ball and throws a strike to me, the
cutoff man. I time my turn, grab the ball and in one
motion throw a perfect one hopper to our catcher who
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tags the runner trying to score out. The crowd screams
its approval. I turn three double plays that night the
last one a slow roller to the shortstop who says as we
run into the dugout, “Man, what a turn! I was only
going for one. What a turn!”
But what I will never forget is my last at bat
in the eighth inning of a game we trailed by one run. I
got up with one man on. I took the first pitch on the
outside corner and drilled it straight down the right
field line. The crowd screamed but I could hear
nothing after I rounded first. I was wearing a helmet
and the only sound I could hear was the wind
whipping through the ear holes as I rounded first and
then second. I was a few feet from third and was going
to start to slide when Coach Church frantically began
waving at me to score. I rounded third and the helmet
came flying off. I could hear the crowd roaring now
instead of the wind. The ball and I got to the plate at
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the same moment. I slid around the tag, popped up,
saw the safe sign, and sprinted toward my teammates
who started pounding me on the back and ushered me
into the dugout. People cheered for minutes. It was
the highlight of my life and still is. An inside-the- park
homer with the scouts in attendance.
That was the Yin. Here comes the Yang. Same
year in the Regional Tournament in early
August.
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I came up in the regional Legion baseball
tournament with two outs and us trailing 6-3 in the
ninth inning. The crowd was a sell out, over five
thousand people in attendance. We had made it to the
finals with three straight late-inning rallies. The
winner of this game would head to the Nationals. The
bases were loaded. They bring in this tall lefty who can
really hum the ball. I am in the on-deck circle and
trying to catch my breath as this big guy’s pitches are
making the catcher’s mitt smack in the hot night air. I
succeed in slowing my breath down and enter the box.
I know that they will try to jam me inside. I
just know it. A fastball inside to get ahead will be their
plan. I take my usual stance and at the last moment as
he starts his windup, I move a couple of inches away
from the plate. I had guessed right. I took the pitch
and drilled it over the left field fence. It hooked a foot
foul at the last second. I struck out four pitches later
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when he threw me the exact same pitch that I couldn’t
get to this time. It was a perfect pitch. The crowd
boomed its approval at my loss. I headed to the
dugout. Nobody was there to greet me. I was
disappointed and near tears but as we shook hands
with our opponents, I searched out the lefty.
“Good luck back there. That last pitch was a
beauty. You got me good,” I managed to say.
“Shit, man, thanks. How about you? You smashed
my first pitch way out of here like you knew it was
coming. I am damn lucky it went foul, great game,” he
said to me. I felt admiration and love toward the guy.
We had battled and he had won. A few feet between
glory and disappointment. They, the Portland, Oregon
Contractors, won the National Championship.
Those two short snippets showed my high
and low points. Baseball allowed me to learn, in the
process of playing a structured game, a bundle of
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tremendous life lessons. Sometimes things go you way
and other times, for whatever reason, they don’t. I
learned that I could respond to pressure, to a
challenge. I was a little guy, 5’9″ and 135 lbs soaking
wet, and yet I reached a high level. This game was the
core of my self-esteem and personal confidence. It
gave me motivation to make my body bigger and
stronger. It was a place where I made great, lifelong
friends who were teammates or worthy adversaries. I
had something at which I could excel. I got to travel to
Montana, Oregon, Northern California, all over Idaho
and Washington to play. My ears heard large crowdsat least to us at the time- howl with approval at both
my successes and failures. Baseball gave me this thrill.
Nothing has been like it in my life since.
You see, I never got a yelp from the crowd
when I created and pulled off an innovative teaching
lesson. Nobody pats me on the back when I prevent
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someone from going into the hospital in my work
today. But I learned how to excel in those areas
because of baseball.
My playing days are fond memories now so
distant they don’t seem totally real. I actually got more
enjoyment out of coaching and mentoring kids than I
ever did playing mostly because it lasted so much
longer. More than thirty years.
I walk around my little town and people still
call me coach and I quit teaching years ago. My mind
is filled with memories of the kids on my various teams
winning great battles and losing in heartbreaking
ways. I have hundreds of stories in my head centering
on baseball and life. I have hugged kids, yelled at kids,
taught kids what to do, when to do it and then watched
as they put my teaching into action. It was such great
excitement.
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But the best was the passing of the torch to
my own boys. Hours of bonding and talking as we
played catch for thousands- no exaggeration- of hours.
Watching my youngest son at age eleven sleeping in
his ball uniform ready for his first All-Star game. My
oldest boy from an small school dominating the
Spokane larger schools as he made all league as both a
pitcher and shortstop. My boys playing in the summer
sun and on windy, rainy spring days.
My chest swelling with pride at their key hits or a
precisely thrown curve ball for strike three. My loud
voice echoing in all the parks around the Northwest.
Seeing my oldest boy, pitching with a near-crippled
glove arm, after the District final. He had given up a
ninth inning two-run homer with two outs to lose 3-2
after throwing 148 pitches and sat dejected as he cried
in disappointment and pain. He had almost lost his left
arm less than a year before. Almost burned it off when
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tripped into a beach fire. I saw my boys become men
on the baseball diamond. I got to be the proud Papa.
My Mom also loved baseball. In fact, baseball
became her second favorite entertainment (Bingo was
first) and she never missed any of my sons’ home
games. We spent many hours together watching the
Seattle Mariners and I always laughed to myself when
I saw her skinny body adorned with her Edgar
Martinez or Ichiro jerseys.
I am sharing today is all I am doing. I am
telling you about how I was formed, how I have such
self-confidence, the memories that fill my mind. To
some baseball is merely a silly, slow game. To me, as
you now know, it is much, much more. It pains me to
see this great sport being overshadowed by other
games. I will end with this fabulous quote from my
favorite baseball film, Field of Dreams.
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“The one constant through all the years, Ray
has been baseball. America has rolled by like
an army of steamrollers. It’s been erased like a
blackboard rebuilt and erased again. But
baseball has marked the time this field, this
game; it’s a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us
all of all that was once good and could be
again.”
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Don’t Widen The Plate!
In Nashville, Tennessee, during the first week
of January, 1996, more than 4,000 baseball coaches
descended upon the Opryland Hotel for the 52nd
annual ABCA convention.
While I waited in line to register with the hotel
staff, I heard other more veteran coaches rumbling
about the lineup of speakers scheduled to present
during the weekend. One name, in particular, kept
resurfacing, always with the same sentiment — “John
Scolinos is here? Oh man, worth every penny of my
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airfare.
Who the hell is John Scolinos, I wondered. No
matter, I was just happy to be there.
In 1996, Coach Scolinos was 78 years old and five
years retired from a college coaching career that began
in 1948. He shuffled to the stage to an impressive
standing ovation, wearing dark polyester pants, a light
blue shirt, and a string around his neck from which
home plate hung — a full-sized, stark-white home
plate.
Seriously, I wondered, who in the hell is this guy?
After speaking for twenty-five minutes, not once
mentioning the prop hanging around his neck, Coach
Scolinos appeared to notice the snickering among
some of the coaches. Even those who knew Coach
Scolinos had to wonder exactly where he was going
with this, or if he had simply forgotten about home
plate since he’d gotten on stage.
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Then, finally …
“You’re probably all wondering why I’m wearing
home plate around my neck. Or maybe you think I
escaped from Camarillo State Hospital,” he said, his
voice growing irascible.
I laughed along with the others, acknowledging the
possibility. “No,” he continued, “I may be old, but I’m
not crazy. The reason I stand before you today is to
share with you baseball people what I’ve learned in my
life, what I’ve learned about home plate in my 78
years.”
Several hands went up when Scolinos asked how
many Little League coaches were in the room. “Do you
know how wide home plate is in Little League?”
After a pause, someone offered, “Seventeen
inches?” more of a question than answer.
“That’s right,” he said. “How about in Babe Ruth’s
day? Any Babe Ruth coaches in the house?”
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Another long pause.
“Seventeen inches?” came a guess from another
reluctant coach.
“That’s right,” said Scolinos. “Now, how many high
school coaches do we have in the room?” Hundreds of
hands shot up, as the pattern began to appear.
“How wide is home plate in high school baseball?
“Seventeen inches,” they said, sounding more
confident.
“You’re right!” Scolinos barked. “And you college
coaches, how wide is home plate in college?
“Seventeen inches!” we said, in unison.
“Any Minor League coaches here? How wide is
home plate in pro ball?
Seventeen inches!”
“RIGHT! And in the Major Leagues, how wide is
home plate in the Major Leagues?”
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“Seventeen inches!”
“SEV-EN-TEEN INCHES!” he confirmed, his voice
bellowing off the walls. “And what do they do with a
Big League pitcher who can’t throw the ball over
seventeen inches?”
Pause.
“They send him to Pocatello !” he hollered,
drawing raucous laughter.
“What they don’t do is this: they don’t say, ‘Ah, that’s
okay, Jimmy. You can’t hit a seventeen-inch target?
We’ll make it eighteen inches, or nineteen inches. We’ll
make it twenty inches so you have a better chance of
hitting it. If you can’t hit that, let us know so we can
make it wider still, say twenty-five inches.”
Pause...
“Coaches …”
Pause...
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”What do we do when our best player shows up late
to practice? When our team rules forbid facial hair and
a guy shows up unshaven? What if he gets caught
drinking? Do we hold him accountable? Or do we
change the rules to fit him? Do we widen home plate?”
The chuckles gradually faded as four thousand
coaches grew quiet, the fog lifting as the old coach’s
message began to unfold. He turned the plate toward
himself and, using a Sharpie, began to draw
something. When he turned it toward the crowd, point
up, a house was revealed, complete with a freshly
drawn door and two windows.
“This is the problem in our homes today. With our
marriages, with the way we parent our kids. With our
discipline. We don’t teach accountability to our kids,
and there is no consequence for failing to meet
standards. We simply, widen the plate.
Pause...
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Then, to the point at the top of the house he added a
small American flag.
“This is the problem in our schools today. The
quality of our education is going downhill fast and
teachers have been stripped of the tools they need to
be successful, and to educate and discipline our young
people. We are allowing others to widen home plate!
Where is that getting us?”
Silence.
He replaced the flag with a Cross.
“And this is the problem in the Church, where
powerful people in positions of authority have taken
advantage of young children, only to have such an
atrocity swept under the rug for years. Our church
leaders are widening home plate for themselves! And
we allow it.”
“And the same is true with our government. Our so
called representatives make rules for us that don’t
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apply to themselves. They take bribes from lobbyists
and foreign countries. They no longer serve us. And we
allow them to widen home plate and we see our
country falling into a dark abyss while we watch.”
I was amazed. At a baseball convention where I
expected to learn something about curve balls and
bunting and how to run better practices, I had learned
something far more valuable. From an old man with
home plate strung around his neck, I had learned
something about life, about myself, about my own
weaknesses and about my responsibilities as a leader. I
had to hold myself and others accountable to that,
which I knew to be right, lest our families, our faith,
and our society continue down an undesirable path.
“If I am lucky,” Coach Scolinos concluded, “you will
remember one thing from this old coach today. It is
this: if we fail to hold ourselves to a higher standard,
a standard of what we know to be right; if we fail to
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hold our spouses and our children to the same
standards, if we are unwilling or unable to provide a
consequence when they do not meet the standard;
and if our schools and churches and our government
fail to hold themselves accountable to those they
serve, there is but one thing to look forward to …”
With that, he held home plate in front of his chest,
turned it around, and revealed its dark black backside.
“… dark days ahead.”
Coach Scolinos died in 2009 at the age of 91, but
not before touching the lives of hundreds of players
and coaches, including mine. Meeting him at my first
ABCA convention kept me returning year after year,
looking for similar wisdom and inspiration from other
coaches.
He is the best clinic speaker the ABCA has ever
known because he was so much more than a baseball
coach.
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His message was clear: “Coaches, keep your players
—no matter how good they are—your own children,
your churches, your government, and most of all,
keep yourself, ALL, at seventeen inches.
Story by Chris Sperrywww.sperrybaseballlife.com
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The Secret Soul of Baseball
I got to wave a young man/child around third
I knew it was going to be a close play at the plate
He is huffing, puffing cuts the bag just right and
heads for home with the ball in the air, a slide–
SAFE!
I got to grip the bat in my hands as I eyed the pitcher
With all my concentration I see the ball leave his hand
I see the spin of the laces, a curve ball breaking toward me
I swing and catch it on the meat of the bat up the middleHIT!
I got to watch my little boy take the ball out of his glove
and with total focus he fires his best little fastball at my
waiting glove that I don’t have to move even an inch
the imaginary hitter doesn’t have a chanceSTRIKE THREE!
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I got to see my boy, now a big buff senior man, dive
from his shortstop position into the hole in a cloud of dust
he has it in his glove, jumps to his feet, steps and throws
the runner is quick, flying, the ball beats him by a stepOUT!
I got to view the once skinny, shy one stroll up to the plate
at a key time swinging his bat; he digs in his metal cleats
he is ready, he is confident, he takes a pitch and then another
he swings at one down the middle; off it goes over the fenceHOMER!
I got to hit a thousand grounders that skipped through the dirt
taking hops and bounces that have a rhythm, a life of its own
my player does it right; charges the ball like he has been told
he fires it to the waiting catcher’s mitt at home plate- a perfect
SMACK!
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I got to see the hundreds of high flies that hung in the blue air
on a hot summer mid-day as kids in new uniforms followed their
flight that either found mitts or vibrant green grass growing long
the echoes of voices yelling “I got it!” bounce off the canyon wallsLIFE!
Baseball has a secret soul known only to those who have played
and fallen in love with this game like so many others over the
last century and a half; maybe the best part of America’s past glory
fathers showing love to their sons as they play a game of catchSOUL!
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Baseball Memories
MY EARLIEST BASEBALL MEMORY
HAPPENED when I was four years old. My
older brother, John, had organized a neighborhood
game and allowed me to try to play with all the older
kids. I got up with a bat way too big for me and tried
to hit. I swung at the first pitch with all my might and
missed by a mile. The second pitch hit me in the
shoulder and I tried not to cry as my brother ordered
me to run to first base. I stood on the base rubbing the
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spot as my brother came up to bat. He took the first
pitch and drove it way over the left fielder's head. I
took off running and got to third base and stopped.
My brother was right behind me sprinting at full
speed. He started yelling at me, “Bobby, go home!
Keep running! Go home, go home,” he repeated as he
rounded second. I got confused and started crying as I
ran off the field, across the park, crossed the street,
and vaulted onto our little front porch. My mother
heard me bang open the screen door and came out of
the kitchen.
“Bobby, what's wrong?”
“John yelled at me to go home,” I answered. She
hugged me and I went to the top bunk and sobbed. A
few minutes later, John showed up all out of breath
and came in the room.
“Bobby, what happened to you?”
“You told me to go home,” I answered with my little
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boy anger.
“No, I meant for you to go to home plate. Now come
on back over there. We have a good game going on.”
I went back and ignored the teasing from some of
the boys. I was out in right field and a high pop fly
came my way. I yelled out, “ I got it! I got it! I got it!”
It bounced off my glove and hit me dead center in
the left eye. I was down. I had got it.
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Memory two
I was coaching the junior high team at the
small country school where I taught when I witnessed
a baseball memory that has stuck with me. It involved,
Carl, one of the toughest, strongest country kids
around. He had matured early and was an advanced
athlete in all sports. We were playing against one of
the other small schools who had some tall, skinny kid
on the mound who threw with a crazy sidearm motion.
He threw pretty hard for this level but had little idea
where it was going.
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Carl came up to bat and took two straight balls that
were way outside. The third one blasted him square in
the back and the thump sounded like a gunshot. Carl
crumpled on the ground but shook himself up and
sprinted to first base. He stood on the bag and nearly
collapsed while trying to get back his breath. I called
time and started over toward him. He waved me off.
“I'm okay, coach.” I shrugged and returned to the
coaching box. The wild pitcher threw two more balls,
both of them in the dirt. I gave Carl the steal sign and
he took off. The pitch was a called strike and the
catcher came up throwing. Carl went into a slide and
the ball hit him dead center in the head, knocking off
his helmet and the ball bounced into center field. I
yelled for Carl to get up and come to third. He rolled
over the bag and was up sprinting toward me. The
center fielder got to the ball and fired it toward third.
It didn't make it, instead it caught poor Carl directly
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between the shoulder blades and knocked him to the
ground. The ball bounced off him and into left field. I
yelled, “Score, score Carl.” The poor kid somehow
willed himself to get up and started racing toward
home. The left fielder picked up the ball and flung it
with all his might toward home where it found Carl's
lower back and knocked him into the dirt as he crossed
the plate.
He flopped into the dirt screaming with pain. The
entire bench involuntarily burst into convulsive
laughter as the toughest kid in the entire county rolled
around and around on the ground. I tried to be kind
but lost it myself. I admit it, I laughed too not because
I think or thought that seeing someone in pain is
amusing. It was the very definition of dark humor. It
was so unreal to see Carl take massive blow after blow
and still try to play the game despite what had to have
been some intense pain. I did get it together as did my
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other players and we gathered around the poor kid,
congratulating him and comforting him, too. He
stayed on the ground for several minutes howling,
crying and laughing all at the same time. We finally
picked him up and carried him to the bench.
“Jesus, Carl are you really okay?” I finally asked him
after a few minutes.
“I think I better go to church with Grandma more
often,” was his perfect answer. I bought him and the
entire team pizza-Carl's choice- after the game.
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Memory three
I HAVE HAD TAUGHT AND COACHED over
1,500 kids in my career. Daryl is one of my favorite
kids and in my personal Hall-of-Fame. He created a
great baseball memory for me and several others one
day.
Daryl was a kind, caring boy with some mental
challenges who was my team manager in both
basketball and baseball. He took much pride in doing
his managing duties and I always cheered his efforts.
When he was a senior he was also my teaching aide
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for the last period of the day. I taught him to help me
groom and tend to the baseball field. I modeled for
him how to chalk the batter's box around home plate
and make straight, perfect foul lines. He got quite
good at putting down the chalk and had my
confidence. We had a game right after school so I sent
him down to the field during last period and told him
to go ahead and chalk the batter's box and foul lines.
He was thrilled.
I showed up minutes after the last bell and there
stood a proud Daryl on home plate beaming at his
accomplishment. The batter's box was perfectly done.
So was the left field and right field line. They were
absolutely perfect. The only problem was that Daryl
added a little something to the job. He also had made
perfect chalk lines from first to second and from
second to third. I knew enough not to rain on the poor
kid's parade. I calmly told him to wait as I raced to my
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car to get my camera. I took a couple of pictures
before informing him that perhaps we didn't need the
two extra lines.
To my team's credit when they showed up they
didn't go crazy and start teasing him. There were some
snickers and dazzlingly looks but no nasty comments.
I was very proud of them. The opposing team and
coach were pretty cool about the entire thing, too.
We started the game a bit late as it took some time
to rake out Daryl's perfect lines between second and
third. I wish I could find that picture. But I can't, dear
reader. Hence, you are left with imagining what it
looked like.
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Memory four
IT WAS OVER A HUNDRED AND TEN
DEGREES my junior year in American Legion
summer ball and we had a doubleheader scheduled for
the day. Community member, Chuck Norton, was
employed as a postal worker but was best known in the
town as a referee and umpire. He nickname was a
nasty one. He was called “Snortin' Norton,” by almost
everyone behind his back.
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The overweight guy had worked the first game
behind the plate, a tight game that we won with a
sacrifice fly in the seventh inning-2-1. His black outfit
was drenched in sweat and to add to his discomfort on
this miserable, scorching day, he had just had two
wisdom teeth extracted that very morning. Our best
pitcher Joe Kampa had hurled a near masterpiece
against one of our region's chief rivals, the Yakima
Beetles. Our pitching coach, ex-major leaguer,
Thornton “Kip” Kipper had been especially brutal in
incessantly criticizing and questioning Snortin'
Norton's strike zone. It got to the point that Umpire
Norton had taken off his mask, walked over to the
dugout, pointed at Kip directly, and warned him that
he was going to run him if he said another word. Kip to
his credit toned it down and the game was completed
without any problems. But then the second game
started.
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Yakima had the bases loaded in the first inning with
only one out when I made one of my greatest plays
ever in my baseball history. It went like this.
A chink pop fly was lofted into no-man's land in
short right center field. I got a decent jump on the ball
and somehow-luck-managed to dive and the ball
touched the webbing of my glove. I instantly knew I
couldn't catch it but instead flipped it up into the air
toward center fielder Mark Switzer who was racing
toward the ball himself. He dove and caught it! But
that wasn't all as he vaulted up and fired a strike to
second trying to double off the runner. Umpire
Norton was out in the field for this game and called the
guy safe. A run scored and an argument started over
the call. Kip was on the front step of the dugout and
his voice echoed all over the park voicing his
disapproval of the call. Umpire Norton immediately
swung around and hauled his massive body toward our
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dugout while yelling, “You're out of here.”
He had given Kip the thumb, kicking him out of the
game. But Kip, of course, wasn't going to let Snortin'
Norton get the last word. He took his own sweet time
ambling down toward the clubhouse, all the while
yacking insults toward the umpire who ran over
toward him returning the insults with ones of his own.
The two overweight hotheads wound up running
toward each other and smacked bellies exactly like two
male big-horned sheep butting heads.
They both bounced backwards from the impact and
flopped to the ground like two bumper cars in the
amusement park. They started rolling around together
until Umpire Norton grabbed the advantage and
finally silence d Kip by grabbing him in a headlock
choke. Some adults ran onto the field and separated
the two. The entire ball park was filled with laughter
and disbelief. The Yakima batter popped up weakly to
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the third baseman and we sprinted into the dugout
screaming with hysterical belly laughs which was
totally appropriate. Quite possibly the single best thing
I have ever seen in my entire life.
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Memory five
BOBBY WILLIAMS WAS THE ELDEST SON
of legendary Coach Gabby Williams and became a
catcher who played like no catcher you have ever seen.
He lived across the alley from us and was famous in
the neighborhood for winning a bet by eating a full can
of dog food as we all looked on gagging in unison.
Bobby was a couple of years younger than my older
brother and the two used to play catch for hours. John
throwing his fastballs to Bobby's waiting catcher's mitt
with me acting as the decoy batter. I got hit numerous
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times as my brother's control was not his best asset. I
had to take the blows without complaint but Bobby
was always way more sensitive to my pain than my
brother. It broke all our hearts when the Williams
family moved from the Valley to Klamath Falls,
Oregon where Bobby became a star. He returned to
the Valley as a senior and lead his team to an American
Legion National Championship after they defeated us
in the Regional Tournament final hosted on our home
field.
Bobby was a sensational player. On every grounder
to any infielder he would race down the first base line
in his full catcher's gear to back up the throw to first.
He had all the tools. A major league arm—forget
trying to steal on this guy- a powerful bat, great speed
especially for a catcher and he could block any pitches
in the dirt like a pro. He got signed to a professional
contract after getting a full-ride scholarship to WSU
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and was tearing up the AAA league, only one step away
from the majors. He got beaned by a errant fastball
and never fully recovered from the massive blow. His
potential major league career faded. I have never seen
anyone on any level play catcher better than my old pal
Bobby. He is an example of how much luck and
destiny appears to be at play in beating the odds to
make it to the major leagues. This leads me to another
memory dealing with a similar experience I heard
about as a kid.
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Memory six
JACKIE ROBINSON SLIDING INTO HOME
ABOVE broke the baseball color barrier when the
Brooklyn Dodgers started him at first base on April 15,
1947. The man responsible for this happening was
the general manager Branch Rickey. He had worked
with the St. Louis Cardinal organization before taking
the position with the Dodgers. In his last year with the
Cardinals he signed a little guy Elmore Curtis who
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became known as “Scrappy' Curtis. Scrappy was
having a good year at AAA playing second base and
hitting well. He was only a step away from getting a
call up to the majors when he took a fast ball that
broke his left wrist. He was out for six weeks.
He entered the batter's box with excitement hoping
to pick back up on his dream of being a major league
player. The first pitch hit him on nearly the exact spot
on his left wrist and broke it again! That was the end
of Scrappy Curtis's dream. He became the successful
manager of the Lewiston semi-pro team and later
became a legendary umpire who called balls and
strikes for nearly four decades. He took his fair share
of verbal abuse over the years but his dedication and
love of the game allowed hundred of kids to play the
game at a high level. A great player who became a
local treasure as a community member who loved his
great game.
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Memory seven
I TOOK MY ENTIRE FOURTH GRADE
CLASS to hat night at the Seattle King Dome in the
early eighties. All thirty-two of them along with two
parent chaperons, my wife and her friend. We rode
the bus, and ferry from our small town to downtown
Seattle. More than half of the kids had never been to
Seattle and fewer had been to the King Dome. We got
our tickets after visiting Pikes Place Market, the
Aquarium and eating at nearby Waterfall Park. We
ushered the excited and bedazzled group into our
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outfield seats where I lectured them on the rules of this
particular outing which included going nowhere
without a partner and such as they happily adjusted
their new hats that had been handed to them on the
way in. The King Dome was completely sold out50,000 people-as the Seattle Mariners were playing
the New York Yankees.
It was a magical night. The kids behaved
themselves, did the wave, cheered and filled up with
soft drinks, hot dogs, popcorn, and licorice ropes. The
place was simply electric in a close game that saw the
Yankees knock ace Randy Johnson out of the game in
the seventh inning. The Mariners came up in the ninth
behind 9-5. They somehow loaded the bases and with
two outs Ken Phelps, a left-handed slugger, smacked a
grand slam homer to tie the game. The King Dome
was literally shaking with the cheers and my kids got
caught up in the exhilaration but I was distracted as
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we needed to catch the ten o'clock ferry for it was the
last one until until one am. I had to make the call. I
looked around, consulted my wife and parents and told
them my decision. We were staying. The Mariners
won in the fifteenth inning and I found myself leading
a long line of now exhausted fourth graders in the dark
through Pioneer Square on our trek to the ferry dock.
We got home at 3 am and I didn't drop of the last kid
until after 4 am. Those kids never forgot that magical
journey and talked about it until they were seniors.
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Memory eight
GORDY WAS PACING AROUND LIKE AN
expectant new father in the maternity ward. His son,
Creighton, was on the mound for the first time ever in
a game. I was the worst possible candidate for calming
down Gordy as I was an infamous nutcase myself
when my boy was pitching. I understood and paced
around a bit with Gordy as Creighton took his warmup tosses. Guys like Gordy and me die with each pitch
not because we are looking for some lost glory of our
own but because we so want our boys to succeed at
something they love. Our two boys became the best of
friends over the years and Gordy treated my boy like
one of his own.
The gangling, skinny kid did a fine job. He threw
strikes and kept composed when things got tight. I
don't remember the exact outcome other than our
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team won but recall well how involved Gordy was. You
see for otherwise undemonstrative men like the two of
us this was a way to show our love and support for our
two treasured boys.
The years ticked by and Creighton grew into a
confident, dominating pitcher. My son, Perry and
Creighton became an impressive one-two pitching
combo and took their high school team to two state
championships. Gordy's voice filled up parks all over
the area as he cheered at his son skilled pitches, Perry's
hits and great plays and encouraged all of the rest of
his teammates with gusto. The man especially rooted
for my boy and treated him like one of his own. I will
never forget that and I am happy that I expressed my
appreciate before it was too late.
Gordy was diagnosed with cancer and died suddenly
but what will never die is the how the game helped him
bond with his only son. I could go on and on with
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more memories and stories but I am going to end with
my simple salute to Gordy the loving father who left
his son and his own father way too soon.
“Hey, Dad, what to play catch?”
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“Baseball is like church. Many
attend, few understand.” Leo Durocher
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