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Take Me Out To The Ballgame

EDITOR’S NOTE: The following column first saw the light of day in August 2014. With Major League Baseball finally beginning its 2020 season tonight, it was deemed appropriate to run the column again.

Every Sunday morning in the summer, worshipers at my church — First Covenant in Jamestown — are urged to wear a name tag, are asked a question and then are required to put the answer underneath their name.

The question might be: What is your favorite ice cream? What is your favorite color? Or, maybe, what is your favorite season?

Last Sunday, the question was: “What is your favorite sport?”

I didn’t have to ponder that one very long.

As columnist George Will once opined:

“Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona.”

With that “home run” of a quote as a backdrop, following are some of the reasons I’ve come to love America’s pastime:

¯ Breathing in the delicious smells of a Major League ballpark for the first time when my dad took me to Municipal Stadium in Cleveland to see the New York Yankees, my favorite team, play a doubleheader against the Indians. The year was 1969 and it began what has turned into a 45-year love affair with the game.

¯ Meeting Diana Munson, wife of Yankees’ catcher Thurman Munson, at the will-call window at Municipal Stadium a year later.

¯ Attending Game 4 of the 1986 World Series in Boston. That was the night that New York Mets’ catcher Gary Carter hit two home runs over the Green Monster, which helped even the series 2-2. It was also the night that a hobbled Bill Buckner, the Red Sox first baseman, was a defensive replacement in the late innings. Seated in right field near the Boston bullpen, I had struck up a friendship with a die-hard Red Sox fan, who, upon seeing Buckner enter the game, declared: “Bill Buckner is going to cost us the World Series.” Two games later, Buckner, in combination with some horrendous relief pitching, did just that.

¯ My brother and I taking our dad to a World Series game in Cleveland in 1997. Our seats were in the next-to-last row, high above left field. Upon reaching them, dad looked around and said — his tongue planted firmly in cheek — “I feel sorry for those poor suckers in the last row.”

¯ Touring Fenway Park and then being escorted to our suite above third base to watch the Red Sox take on the Atlanta Braves in 2012.

The trip was a reunion of the Ames-Bedient families of Falconer, who traveled to Beantown to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Boston’s 1912 championship. The family patriarch, the late Hugh Bedient, was a Red Sox pitcher and World Series hero that year. Seeing the reaction of Tom Ames, the guy who invited me and my wife Vicki to tag along on that memorable weekend, walk on the field during the pregame knowing that his grandpa once did the same was a memory I’ll never forget.

¯ Attending the 1982 Major League Baseball All-Star Game at Olympic Stadium in Montreal with Jamestown native Dan Lunetta. We were fortunate to get tickets because we both worked that summer for the Jamestown Expos of the New York-Penn League. Dan was the club’s general manager and I served as the assistant GM. Anyway, in that Mid-Summer Classic, we had the privilege of seeing such future Hall-of-Famers as Rickey Henderson, George Brett, Reggie Jackson, Robin Yount, Carlton Fisk, Dennis Eckersley, Rod Carew, Eddie Murray, Carl Yastrzemski, Dave Winfield, Rollie Fingers, Goose Gossage, Andre Dawson, Mike Schmidt, Gary Carter, Ozzie Smith, Steve Carlton and Phil Niekro. All-time hits leader Pete Rose, batted second in the NL lineup. The managers were Billy Martin and Tommy Lasorda.

¯ Seeing my first — and only game — at the old Yankee Stadium in 1999. Included on the agenda was an out-of-this-world pregame buffet in the Stadium Club restaurant and box seat tickets. Upon arriving at the E. 161st Street subway stop in the Bronx, I ascended the stairs to find “The House That Ruth Built” right across the street. I turned to my friend, Rich Pinciaro, a Jamestown resident and another die-hard Yankees’ fan, and said, ‘We’re here.” Pinciaro’s response? “We have reached Mecca.”

¯ Sitting in box seats at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia in 1970. During that game between the Phillies and the San Francisco Giants, I was nearly hit in the head by a foul ball off the bat of Bobby Bonds (Barry’s dad); Hall-of-Fame pitcher Juan Marichal sat a row behind me and autographed my program; and I got to see Willie Mays play. Not a bad day for a 9-year-old.

¯ Having the opportunity to hear Jamestown resident Gordy Black recall his experiences while attending Lou Gehrig Day at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939. Now 83, Black’s vivid recall of that afternoon is amazing, and he still has the ticket to prove his attendance. “I can still visualize myself there,” Black told me.

¯ Watching Derek Jeter play dozens of times — from New York to Cleveland and from Pittsburgh to Detroit — and having thousands of photographs of No. 2 to show for it. It will be a melancholy time for yours truly when Jeter calls it quits at the end of this season.

¯ And, finally, watching in awe as a 13-year-old from Oakland, California blasted a home run OVER the scoreboard in left-center field at College Stadium (now named Diethrick Park) in Jamestown during a Babe Ruth World Series in 1990. I can still see that ball climbing into the night sky.

The Grand Canyon might not have held that one.

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