Come Home to Baseball
June 28, 2007 - 12:20pm — ecooley
Location(s)
Altoona Curve
Altoona, PA, 16602I am standing in right field. I am not a great baseball player but I am yelling “no batter, no batter, no batter, Swwwiinnnnggg batter!” Then with the crack of the bat a small, white, leather orb sails high into the blue sky and is coming towards me! Most of my teammates are praying I catch the ball. Now I played catch a 100 times with my brother and dad, so it should not have been a surprise when the ball slapped into the leather pocket of my glove but the adrenaline rush and the grin on my young face showed otherwise.
Baseball, a part of Americana since 1840, back when the sport was called Base Ball and closely represented the British sport of Rounders, still makes me feel like a kid everytime I watch the game. It started when I went to see the Phillies play the Pirates in 
Philadelphia. What a great day that was. I got to see Pete Rose play and learned that people BOOOO the opposing team. I got to eat hot dogs, drink soda and was entertained by the Philly Phanatic. Now I watch the Altoona Curve, a Pirate’s affiliate, beat up on the Reading Phillies.
Philadelphia. What a great day that was. I got to see Pete Rose play and learned that people BOOOO the opposing team. I got to eat hot dogs, drink soda and was entertained by the Philly Phanatic. Now I watch the Altoona Curve, a Pirate’s affiliate, beat up on the Reading Phillies.Baseball has been great medicine. Last year after an extremely frustrating day, Dad asked me to go to the Altoona Curve home Opener. It was a cool night, Dad bought me a hat, a hot dog, we sang the National Anthem and we watched a young girl smile as she saw the Altoona Curve’s Mascot … STEAMER. What a terrific night of baseball. I wanted to run out grab a glove, a ball and play catch with Dad. So when I heard Ray Stevens new song “Come On Home to Baseball” I had to make it into a video that shows what I think of the game. I hope you enjoy and please share with me your favorite Baseball story. If I like the story I would be happy to give you two tickets to see the Altoona Curve.
Comments
Not a fan
I'm not much of a baseball fan. I've been to a couple of major league games in my life- mostly the Colorado Rockies. But I have to admit, I have more fun watching all the people at the games. There's something different about people at a baseball game- moreso than other sporting events. Maybe it's how long the games are- or how many breaks there are in the game- or maybe it's just that I'm not enthralled with the game so I watch more of the people! It's fun to watch the combination of competition, popcorn, hot dogs, and cold beer (even cold soda for some folks!!!!) and what it does to people.
But, I still have a favorite baseball memory. Every spring my brothers and I would play mud baseball with some of the kids that lived around us. It'd start out as a regular game (that they actually let me be involved in) but pretty soon the soft grass gave way to the mud underneath. Sliding into base became the norm- just so we'd get extra dirty. Nothing like making memories!
A meeting with Roberto
I have been a Pirates fan since I was a kid in the 1960s. My favorite player of all time is Roberto Clemente. An avid ballplayer myself for most of my youth, I even taught myself how to make Clemente's signature "basket catch." Not bad for a girl!
In the summer of 1972, I was lucky enough to attend a game at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. It was a Sunday afternoon, and it was "Autograph Sunday." The Pirates would post a couple of players on these Sundays near the gates. You could walk right up to them and they would sign a photo for you. For free. It was great.
This was early in the season. Later that summer, as the season wrapped, Clemente joined the 3,000 hit club. But on this May afternoon, I had a singular purpose -- to get Roberto's autograph; I didn't care if he ever got another hit, he was my hero.
My friends and I made our way around the stadium, trying to get to the gate where Clemente was posted. We had entered exactly opposite where we needed to be. We scrambled through the crowd, getting glimpses of the bright green field as we passed the entrances to the field boxes.
Finally we got to the right gate. As you can imagine, it was a mob scene. We grafted ourselves onto the back of the line, peering through the crowd for a glimpse of the great man.
The line inched slowly toward the table, dissolving as fans got their photos and were urged away. Just as I got close to the table, Roberto stood up. His time was up, and he needed to get down to the clubhouse to prepare for the game. So close!
When he stood, some of the fans behind us knew he'd be leaving, so they abandoned the line. I held my ground, and I'm glad I did. He stood there and signed a few more autographs, including one for me! And this was even better than just coming up to him seated behind a table; he had now walked around to the side of the table, so I stood RIGHT NEXT to him as he signed the photo. I thought I would just die!
He said "Hello, how are you?" in his heavily accented English. I hope I said hello back to him.
This was a landmark encounter for me. This was the most famous person I'd ever met. Even though I knew the stats backwards and forwards, I was surprised to see that Roberto wasn't much taller than me. And he smelled good. Not with cologne and aftershave, but just a nice clean soap smell. But most of all, I was fascinated by his hands. This was the first "person of color" that I'd ever gotten physically close to; I was surprised that the palms of his hands were pink, like mine.
For the rest of the season, I looked at Roberto differently. He was still a great ball player, one of the best ever. He could still catch anything hit to right field, and could throw ropes to the infield that caught more than one base runner off guard. He still stood there at the plate, bat in hand, stretching and craning his neck like he was in great pain. But then he'd stretch his bat out there and hit any ball for a single and stretch it into a double, or a turn a double into a triple, with his perspicacity and speed. But now I knew that he was human, too. He was a guy who smelled good, about my height and with pink hands like me, who just also happened to be one heck of a ball player.
On the last day of the year, Clemente was killed on a humanitarian mission to earthquake victims in Nicaraugua. I was at an all night New Year's Eve party with friends. We'd stayed up watching Dick Clark's Rockin' Eve (it was quite a novel idea then), eating pizza and drinking soda. The next morning, we heard the news as we were packing up our sleeping bags and pillows. They never found his body, and for a long time I hoped that he had somehow managed to survive the crash and swam ashore, dazed and confused. After all, he was Roberto Clemente. He could do anything.
Great Story
I wish I had the opportunity to meet Clemente. He was a great ballplayer. Do you still have the autograph picture?
Clay hardens by immobility – men's minds by standing pat. Both lose the power to take new impressions. (Pinchot 1910: 138)
You betcha!
Yep -- that autograph is one of the things I'll grab if the house is ever on fire!
Here's the entire speech from Field of Dreams
Terrence Mann: Ray, people will come, Ray. They'll come to Iowa for reasons they can't even fathom. They'll turn up your driveway, not knowing for sure why they're doing it. They'll arrive at your door as innocent as children, longing for the past. "Of course, we won't mind if you have a look around," you'll say. "It's only twenty dollars per person." They'll pass over the money without even thinking about it; for it is money they have and peace they lack.
And they'll walk out to the bleachers, and sit in shirt-sleeves on a perfect afternoon. They'll find they have reserved seats somewhere along one of the baselines, where they sat when they were children and cheered their heroes. And they'll watch the game, and it'll be as if they'd dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick, they'll have to brush them away from their faces.
People will come, Ray.
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, is a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again. Ohhhhhhhh, people will come, Ray. People will most definitely come.
Oh, man, was that awesome!
About 4 years ago I started collecting baseball movies. I have about two dozen to date. I only buy them when I'm in the mood. It's not an obsessive hobby at all. I just purchase them when I see a good steal. Ha! But, which one is my favorite? Do you have a favorite?
The Major League series were hysterical, the classic Bad News Bears with Walther Matthau got me interested in classical music with their hilarious theme song, and A League of Their Own was both heart filling and light hearted. But which one baseball movie is my favorite? This is hard. As far as classics are concerned Gary Cooper as Lou Gehrig in THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES, is at the top of the rankings. Any baseball movie with Kevin Costner usually scores pretty darn high. Angels in the Outfield gave me goosebumps as well as The Rookie with Dennis Quaid. Ones right to video like Soul of the Game and Bleacher Bums are very good too.
I narrowed my selection down to just 2. The Natural with Robert Redford or Field of Dreams with James Earl Jones. The best parts are when Roy Hobbs strikes out Babe Ruth in the beginning, then when the ball boy gets Roy his Wonderboy bat and the final fade shot of Roy playing catch with his son makes me wish I would have played. Oh, man that movie is awesome. Roy rounding the bases, bleeding and the light towers exploding like 4th of July fireworks... the best.
But I have chosen FIELD OF DREAMS as my all time favorite baseball movie. 2 reasons; Burt Lancaster playing Doc Archie and this heart pounding, goose bumping, butterfly tingling speech from James Earl Jones...if you are a fan, you probably know which clip I'm gonna show, if you are a die hard, you can probably recite along with it....and of course the closing scene with Ray having a catch with his dad and all the cars lining up, perfect.
Playing Catch With Dad
Thanks for the compliment. Yeah Field of Dreams and The Natural are great baseball movies. The endings are the best but Field of Dreams is the best. How many of us remember playing catch with our fathers or brothers or in some cases our sisters (Paula). There is something special about standing there tossing a ball back and forth and having a catch. It gives the time to enjoy the outdoors, talk about what is happening, laugh, and share memories. Thanks for sharing the clip from that movie.
More favs
I've got to put in a vote for A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN (Tom Hanks as manager -- awesome; it does, however, lose points for the sappy Madonna song) and EIGHT MEN OUT, John Sayles' movie about the "Black Socks" scandal.
Definitely good ones!
John Lovitz was my favorite cameo in A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN. You hafta get the DVD, there's a lot that Penny Marshall decided not to put in the final cut, especially a scene where Tom Hanks and Gina Davis are practicing in the batting cages, and boy were they swinging. EIGHT MEN OUT, good flick, a very low point in baseball history. I'm a John Cusack fan, but I believe that role should have gone to someone else. Cool, Paula.