A Year To Remember

Phillies Opening Day - April 3, 2021
(frontline workers honored)

2021 was both my best and my worst year as a Phillies fan.

Before the season began, I was chomping at the bit to go to a live, professional baseball game. We had been denied that glorious experience the year before when the coronavirus pandemic shut down the world. My last game was in July, 2019. That felt like a lifetime ago.

I began buying tickets with reckless abandon. By season’s end, I had attended nine Phillies games and 12 major league games overall in four different stadiums. I also added three minor league games to the mix. By the summer, ballparks returned to full seating capacity, and those of us who were vaccinated gladly ditched the masks.

All was not rosy outside of baseball land, however, as my dad suddenly passed away in July at the age of 66. I owed my love of the game to him, and my level of gratitude was such that I even wrote a book about it. We finally crossed the last big item off our baseball bucket list in April when we went to Opening Day at Citizens Bank Park. At the time, it felt important after a year of being stuck at home. 

The pandemic filled everyone’s future with a sense of uncertainty. I think we began approaching life with more of a “seize the moment” mentality, and we’re all the better for it. Dad and I got to go to one more Phillies game together before his untimely passing, and that honestly made accepting his death a little easier.

Going to nine Phillies games in one season (my previous record was six), I definitely experienced things I’d never seen before. I was there for Aaron Nola’s complete-game shutout in April, and it was one of two Phillies shutouts I saw. I’d only attended one other Phils shutout before 2021.

I sat through my first rain delay ever, and another game was suspended to the following day due to thunderstorms. Both times, the Phillies provided me the option of purchasing heavily discounted tickets to future games, which I jumped on. The team also offered a flash sale of $8 tickets after an eight-game winning streak in early August. I very quickly realized the perks of being a die-hard Phillies fan.

Then again, by the time August rolled around, I began wondering if the Phillies had any die-hard fans left.

As I mentioned earlier, I saw games in four different stadiums in 2021. It’s always nice to immerse yourself in the fan atmosphere in another city. Unfortunately, my travels and the sense of loss I felt at Citizens Bank Park after my dad died made me realize that the Phillies have one of the most apathetic fanbases around.

I went to Citi Field in June, and every Met fan in that stadium was riveted by every play and every pitch, and I felt the same vibe when thousands of them flocked to Citizens Bank Park to watch the Phils sweep their team out of first place. Hell, I felt more fan participation at Camden Yards, and the Orioles were the worst team in baseball. At Citizens Bank Park, the fans cheered louder when a fellow fan caught a foul ball than the last out of a win. I realize Philly is a football town, but come on, give me something!

Simply knowing that I could get a better fan experience somewhere else, I won’t be going to as many Phillies games in 2022, and that’s a shame. 2021 will wind up being the exception, rather than the rule. It also ended on a high note, as J.T. Realmuto crushed a walk-off double at my ninth and final Phillies game in September. At least the fans lost their minds for that play.

The 2021 season featured a little bit of everything, including every emotion on the spectrum. I will look back on it with fondness and heartache, and now that it’s over, I only have question: is it April yet?!

Stuck

 

This is getting old, isn’t it?

The rebuild has been over for a while, but the Phillies continue to spin their wheels, stuck in mediocrity. After four seasons and hundreds and millions of dollars spent, I’ve arrived at a troubling thought: the Phillies are terrified of success.

It’s no doubt that the team on paper has holes. The organization has focused most of its energy on creating a powerhouse offense while mostly ignoring the back end of the starting rotation, bullpen and defense. The farm system has been devoid of top-shelf talent for the past decade or more.

These issues don’t always paint the road to failure, however. Just this year, we saw clubs that turned out to be more than the sum of their parts, like the Giants and Cardinals, and in 2020, the Padres, Marlins and White Sox took advantage of a shortened season and wider postseason field to end their long playoff droughts.

I look at the Phillies, and I see a squad fully capable of making the postseason. Bryce Harper won the MVP. Zack Wheeler should’ve won the Cy Young. Ranger Suarez sparkled in bullpen and rotation. Rhys Hoskins, though he stopped walking for some inexplicable reason, put up solid numbers, and Brad Miller provided sufficient pop after Hoskins got hurt. Andrew McCutchen hit 27 home runs at the age of 34. Even with a historically awful bullpen, the Phillies still had a chance to make some noise in 2021.

And then came the end of September.

This is an area of futility at which the Phillies excel. It felt like maybe this year could’ve been different, but once the season got inside that final week, the boys in red pinstripes folded like they always have.

Over the past four seasons, the Phillies tweaked the roster, brought in big names, changed managers. By season’s end, they still ran out of gas. Here are the win-loss records over the final seven games of each Phillies team over the past four seasons:

2018: 2-5 (part of a 9-game losing streak)
2019: 2-5
2020: 1-6
2021: 1-6

 

Those 2018 and 2019 squads only got those two wins at the very end after the wheels had already fallen off. Take those away, and the Phillies are only 2-22 over the last four years in games that mattered the most. Such a poor showing was the most frustrating in 2020 and 2021, when the Phils were fighting for a playoff spot.

At first, people blamed Gabe Kapler, and he was replaced by Joe Girardi, a veteran manager with a proven success. And yet, in two seasons Girardi’s managerial record is two games below .500, the same as Kapler.

When I look at the big picture, I feel like the Phillies culture must change. When the organization declared that the rebuild was over, it adopted a lazy approach to winning – add a bunch of pieces and hope it works out.

Outside of Harper and Wheeler, I don’t sense a whole lot of pride on the team either. Hitters on winning teams consistently work the count and extend at-bats, and pitchers on winning teams consistently retire batters once they get to two strikes.

I look at a team like the Dodgers who have an airtight system (complete with a mental health division) that is the same from the lowest level of the minor leagues to the major league club, or the Rays, whose player development is so fine-tuned that it can turn any pitcher into an out machine, and I ask, “Why can’t the Phillies be like that?!”

Of course, the short answer is that they aren’t willing to spend that kind of money, and honestly, a lot of teams aren’t, but the Phillies do have the money to put together a winning team. They simply need to make the players and fans believe it.

There’s a reason Carlos Santana had a career year with the Indians after his one down year with the Phillies. There’s a reason Kapler went to the Giants and led them to a 107-win season. There’s also a reason why a seemingly talented team collapses at the end of every season. At their core, the Phillies don’t believe they can play in October. Until that changes, they never will.

Take the Bad with the Good

Part 4 of a four-part series on the 1993 Phillies

 

Now it is time to address the elephant in the room.

The 1993 Phillies never claimed to be a group of upstanding citizens. On the contrary, they played up their rough-around-the-edges appearance to the fans and the media. At the time, their antics were sheer entertainment, but a few players were hiding skeletons in their closets, which they eventually released for all to see.

I talked about the ’93 Phils a fair amount in my book, and I must admit that I made one claim that was factually inaccurate, and evidence to the contrary was already available. I wrote that despite the steroids scandal that rocked the sport, the ’93 Phillies played the game in its purest form. Lenny Dykstra alone disproves that claim.

I won’t get into all of the financial and legal troubles Dykstra has faced over the last several years, but I will say that he did not play the game cleanly; far from it. First, both he and backup catcher Todd Pratt were named in the infamous Mitchell Report that was released in 2007. Dkystra then stated in interviews that he used steroids, beginning in 1990, because he realized his skills were diminishing, and he had a family to support.

More recently, Dykstra claimed that in 1993 he paid private investigators $500,000 to dig up dirt on umpires so that they would give him a more favorable strike zone. Dykstra said that’s why he led the league in walks that year, and the numbers seem to support that. His total of 129 was far and away the best he ever posted in a single season. His walk numbers in other years didn’t even come close, even when you take into account seasons in which he missed time due to injury.

Since I’ve been re-watching games from 1993, I’ve scrutinized nearly every Dykstra at-bat to see if I could tell a difference between the strike zone umpires gave him in comparison to other players. It was very difficult, though, because John Kruk and Darren Daulton walked so much themselves.

Speaking of “Dutch” Daulton, he was asked in a 2009 interview if he used steroids during his career. He somewhat dodged the question but said, “I can assure you, there’s probably no one in any sport that has taken more drugs than I have.” Based on that, we can’t say for sure if Daulton took steroids, but chances are, he was on some kind of illegal substance during the 1993 season.

Let’s consider that in ’93, Dykstra was 30 and Daulton was 31. Most major league players begin to decline after the age of 27 (the age Dykstra was when he allegedly began taking steroids), and yet the two of them were still performing at a high level. I’d say Daulton was even more suspect than Dykstra because he was a catcher, and by the early 90s had been through several knee surgeries. In ’93, he set career highs in games and at-bats, and he was sprinting around the bases better than most catchers in the game. Considering his later admission, it doesn’t look good.

Dutch was my favorite player on that team simply because he was a better hitter than most catchers, and I was definitely sad when he passed away at the age of 55 from brain cancer. Unlike Dykstra, Daulton owned up to all the mistakes he made when he was younger, and he moved on from them. It’s still a shame that some of those transgressions cast a dark shadow on one of the most exciting seasons in team history.

I’m not going to pretend that Dykstra, Daulton and Pratt were the only ones cheating to gain a competitive edge on the Phillies in 1993. Not everyone who cheated got caught. But I also can’t say that this really changes all the good feelings I have about that team. I know the era in which they played, and I know they were far from the only ones breaking the rules behind closed doors. I refuse to feel sorry for the 10-year-old me who watched that team ascend to heights no one expected, and they taught me to love the game of baseball. I will forever be grateful for that.

Philly Fluke

Part 3 of a four-part series on the 1993 Phillies

 

How the hell were they so good?!

I tried to search online for any other “one-hit wonder” MLB teams, but the only results were articles/posts about players who had one good season. A deeper search revealed that the Kansas City Royals had just one winning season between 1994 and 2013, which came in 2003, but they finished just four games over .500 that year. That’s quite different from a pennant-winning campaign. The 1993 Phillies were an anomaly of historic proportions, and I will try to explain how that happened.

For context, we need to look at 1992. The Phillies limped their way through a 70-92 season, but they were actually significantly better than that record. On the offensive side, they placed second in the National League in runs and third in home runs. The nucleus of Lenny Dykstra, John Kruk and Darren Daulton was already established, and Dave Hollins emerged as well. The ’92 team also had two solid starting pitchers in Terry Mulholland and Curt Schilling. The front office definitely had foundation from which to build heading into 1993.

A fair amount of luck was involved as well. The Pittsburgh Pirates dismantled their powerhouse team, and the Atlanta Braves were still a year away from joining a realigned NL East. As far as the pundits were concerned, the division was up for grabs, but no one was predicting a first-place finish from the ragtag Phillies.

The best way to describe the 1993 season is that the Phillies entered what I’m labeling a “Trisection of Success.” That year, the team was comprised of three different groups: new players, players who had their career year and players in their last full season. This flash-in-the-pan bunch brought all the right ingredients together at once.

The organization was busy in the offseason, adding an incredible six players who all had key roles during the ’93 season: starting pitcher Danny Jackson, outfielders Jim Eisenreich, Milt Thompson and Pete Incaviglia and relief pitchers David West and Larry Andersen, the latter two providing desperately-needed stability to the bullpen. The Phillies don’t win the division without those six guys, and they not only produced, but they bought into the crazy clubhouse culture. The 40-year-old Andersen and his unique sense of humor fit in particularly well with a group that was notorious for its practical jokes and hijinks.

West joined a group of career-year players that included Dykstra, Mulholland, Tommy Greene and Ben Rivera. With the latter three excelling at once, you suddenly had the most stable starting pitching rotation in baseball. Not only did all five starters reach double-digit wins (no Phillies team had done that since 1932, and no other team did that in ‘93), but they all had winning records and each recorded at least one shutout. They also led the league in complete games with 24, and the pitching staff as a whole placed first in strikeouts with 1,117. That alone is mind boggling, and I haven’t even talked about the offense yet.

The ’93 Phillies, likely more by accident than design, produced numbers championed by Bill James nearly 10 years before Billy Beane’s “Moneyball” A’s changed the baseball landscape. They led the NL in runs, walks, doubles, on-base percentage, on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS) and OPS+. They also led the league in home runs for most of the season before a power drought in September. Walks were the hallmark of the offense. This team walked A LOT. The Phillies’ 665 walks were well above the runner-up Cardinals’ 588. Not even a pitcher like Greg Maddux, known for his surgeon-like precision, made it through a game against this lineup without surrendering a free pass or two.

A big reason for the Phillies’ base-on-balls prowess was that their lineup of mostly left-handed batters did not fall victim to a trap typically laid for lefty hitters - the breaking ball low and away (a trap Ryan Howard fell for more and more as his career progressed). You could almost see Kruk and Daulton give smirking, ‘nice try’ expressions as they’d watch those breaking balls fall harmlessly into the catcher’s glove out of the strike zone. The ’93 Phillies set a National League record, becoming the first team to feature three players - Dykstra, Kruk and Daulton - with at least 100 walks.

No one knew it at the time, but 1993 also wound up being the last hurrah for several players. Dykstra, Kruk, Daulton, Greene, Rivera and Mitch Williams never played a full season again after 1993, and Hollins didn't until after he was traded in 1995. Another major reason for the team’s success was that no one spent significant time on the Disabled List (now known as the Injured List). You could even see during that year how the season might have unfolded without that stability. The Phils hit a bad stretch in the early summer at the same time that Hollins and Mariano Duncan were injured, and their other dip in mid-September happened when Mulholland was shelved. No one denies the amazing team chemistry that group had, but they needed all 25 guys healthy to succeed, and for the most part, that’s what they got.

One last thing I will say about the ’93 team is that man, did those players hustle! Up and down that lineup, guys constantly took the extra base, especially in the first half of the season. It got to a point when if there was a runner on second, he was going home on a single, no matter what, and he made it nearly every time. That’s why they wore pitchers out all year. They’d work deep counts, draw walks and fly around the bases. It was so much fun to watch.

It’s a shame that the Phillies’ moment in the spotlight was so brief. Even if the 1994 season hadn’t ended in August with the strike, the Expos and Braves would have battled for the division title, leaving everyone else in the dust. The 1995 Phillies gave fans a thrill with a 37-18 start, but a pitching rotation full of rookies and a collection of position players well past their prime could not sustain that success. It was clear that the team had to break down and start again.

At least we had 1993. Had everything not come together just right, it could have easily been 15 straight years of losing seasons. The long-suffering fans got a brief respite, and I believe we’re all the better for it. I certainly know that I am.

Now and Then

Part 2 of a 4-part series on the 1993 Phillies

 

Fans my age and older well remember that whacky bunch of players that defied all expectations by winning the National League pennant and coming within two games of winning the World Series. That special group only lived to play baseball and have a good time, capturing the hearts and minds of a city well known for its blue-collar mentality.

As both the ’93- and ’08-era teams drift further and further into the past, I find myself feeling much more nostalgic about the ’93 team. The memories aren’t nearly as vivid because I was only 10 and didn’t understand the game as well as I would later, but that team taught me to love baseball. Plus, great events in life are more revered when they’re unexpected. That team literally came from out of nowhere and faded just as quickly. I will now share some observations I formed as a green kid, alongside changing opinions and different things I’ve noticed while watching this team again over the past few weeks.

When I was 10, I always deferred to the players who hit the most home runs, so it annoyed me when Milt Thompson and Jim Eisenreich were put in the lineup more than Pete Incaviglia and Wes Chamberlain. Of course, I understand now that the left-handed Thompson and Eisenreich were typically used against right-handed starting pitchers. They were also better outfielders. I love Incaviglia and his monster home runs as much now as I did then, but I can’t get enough of Eisenreich. The guy sprayed the ball all over the place, making it a nightmare for opposing teams to defend against him. He unassumingly went about his business, quietly becoming one of the Phillies’ best hitters of the 1990s, and who doesn’t love a good comeback story like his? When he was diagnosed with Tourette’s Syndrome, he initially felt his baseball career was over, but after receiving the proper treatment, he fought his way back. I don’t think I knew what Tourette’s was before I learned about Eisenreich.

I’m also realizing that Eisenreich was one of the few hitters who didn’t prolong the game by trouncing well outside the batter’s box after every pitch. Instead, he would simply retreat a few steps to the back corner of the box while staring intently down the third-base line until the pitcher returned to the rubber. He was an all-around model of efficiency.

Moving onto other players, another habit I’ve noticed is that during every game, starting pitcher Curt Schilling was perched on the top step of the dugout and always the first to congratulate anyone who scored a run. That makes him appear like the ultimate teammate, but given everything else I’ve learned about Schilling in the years since, he was probably doing it just to look good in front of the camera. Schilling evolved into one of the best pitchers of his generation after leaving the Phillies in 2000, but his outspoken, ultra-right views that at best border on homophobia and xenophobia have turned him into a villain. The seeds of this persona were actually planted in 1993 when cameras caught Schilling with his head buried in a towel when closer Mitch “Wild Thing” Williams was on the mound. Schilling claimed it was a joke, and the fans and media accepted it as such, but Williams was not amused, and it drove a wedge between the two that has never been removed.

As the ’93 season came to a close, I was surprised that John Kruk only hit 14 home runs. I simply assumed that because he was a bigger guy, he was a home run hitter. Of course, I know now that bigger does not necessarily mean stronger, and Kruk was most known for his patience at the plate and hitting for a high average. If anything, he was the Phillies version of Tony Gwynn, Kruk’s former teammate when he was with Padres. The beer-drinking, mullet-wearing country boy from West Virginia often liked to play the fool for the media, but there were actually few in the game who studied it and understood it more than he did. Kruk did reach the 20-homer mark twice in his career, but by ’93, all that constant running on Astroturf began giving him chronic knee problems that would sadly result in his retirement two years later. And actually, if we’re to believe his claim that he rarely worked out, then it’s a miracle he played until he was 34.

Kruk was just one of dozens of miracles to happen for the Phillies in ’93. I’m loving the experience of this crazy team’s Cinderella season, where for six months, everything that could go right did go right. Consider the unbelievable fact that 1993 was the only year between 1986 and 2001 in which the Phillies posted a winning season, and they went all the way to the friggin’ World Series! I doubt we’ll see anything like it again. In my next post, I will delve into how that happened.

Friendly Voices

I would now like to focus on the 1993 Phillies. This will be the first of a four-part series.

I have spent the last several weeks watching Phillies games from 1993 on YouTube. The odd thing is that I will end up watching more games from that season than I did when they were played because in 1993, my family didn’t have Prism, the TV station that carried 40-45 of the Phillies' games. I’d obviously forgotten nearly all of the games before I began re-watching them, and I’ve taken great pains to avoid looking at the final scores. I wanted as authentic an experience as possible. As expected, the picture quality isn’t great because the games were transferred from VHS, but they still oddly feel recent because the players wore very similar home uniforms that the Phillies wear today during non-weekend games (a classic pinstripe look that debuted in 1992). The road uniforms were the same as well.

Of course, the best part of this return to the past is hearing Harry Kalas and Richie “Whitey” Ashburn call the games. I personally only heard Whitey’s voice for five years before he died in 1997, but it sounds as familiar as it did back then. I will spend the rest of this post sharing some interesting realizations about the broadcast team, both from 1993 and now. In my next post, I will do the same with the players.

I heard color commentator, Chris “Wheels” Wheeler, several times before I saw him on camera, and it blew my mind how old he looked (he was 48 at the time) because I thought he sounded so young on the air. I also finally understand why so many people didn’t like Wheels. I still appreciate his commentary for the most part, but listening to him now, I can tell he was clearly a know-it-all who talked too much. It was especially noticeable when he was in the booth with Whitey, because as we all remember, Whitey was a man of few words. I didn’t much care for Andy Musser, the lesser-seen fourth member of the broadcast team, but I don’t mind him nearly as much now. He sounded too much like a news anchor (like Tom McCarthy), but I see now that he was a solid play-by-play announcer.

And then there’s Harry. My high opinion of him has never wavered over the past 27 years. He had so many catchphrases that it’s difficult to keep track, and I always hope a Phillie will do something amazing so I can hear that magical voice raise with excitement. In those moments, he knew the right words to use to get me even more excited. During this long re-watch, every time I’ve clicked on a new game, I’ve hoped it’s a WPHL 17 game so that I can hear Harry call it. He was quite simply the best at what he did.

Harry and the other guys had plenty of opportunities to yell with excitement during that amazing season. I didn’t think I would enjoy watching these games as much as I have. After all, everyone knows how well the Phillies did. But watching familiar players performing at the top of their game, even if it was nearly three decades ago, somehow never gets old. Who knows; I might do this again in another 30 years on whatever advanced medium is around then.

Little League Legends

I never had a future as a baseball player. I had convinced myself of that as a child, and when I did play any kind of organized ball, I didn’t put in the necessary work to be the very best I could be as a short kid with poor eyesight. If I had, I believe now I could have been a bench player at the varsity level in high school at the very least. Still, not every attempt at playing was a disappointment.

My best experience by far was the Little League team I played for when I was in seventh grade. I was the third baseman (in homage to Phillies legend Mike Schmidt) and the oldest player on my team, which actually made it easier for me to get along with everyone. I wasn’t the best player, but I was certainly in the middle of the pack. That group was full of quirky characters, not the least of whom was our coach, Larry, a short, hot-headed man. Despite his tendency to yell, he was mainly very nice and encouraging. Plus, I never suffered his wrath, which he reserved for his son, Kyle, our team’s catcher, whenever he began crying after striking out.

The only other kid Coach Larry yelled at was Lucky, our enigmatic right fielder. The rest of us on the team avoided him because he didn’t seem to have a whole lot going on upstairs (I later found that was not the case at all). He didn’t pay attention during practice or even during games, as he was more interested in the state of the grass he was standing on. I can still hear Coach Larry yelling at him from the dugout, “Lucky! Stop pickin’ the flowers!” The rest of us tried our best to stifle our laughter during those moments. I think Lucky’s reputation even spread around the league. There was a strict rule against sliding headfirst, but in Lucky’s most triumphant moment of the season, he basically belly-flopped into home, kicking up a cloud of dust that completely enveloped him. Once the fog lifted, the umpire called him safe. Any other player in that situation would’ve been called out for breaking the rules, but it was Lucky.

I actually reconnected with Lucky 15 years later, and he told me that he acted aloof on purpose because his mother had signed him up for baseball against his extreme objections. Adding that context just makes those memories funnier.

Our first baseman, Jeff, was the largest 11-year-old kid I’d ever seen. I also remember him because of his grandmother, who attended every game and yelled in shaky, mousy voice, “Little hit, Jeff, little hit,” every time he came up to bat. Not only was the cheer annoying, but it was ironic because slugger Jeff was the only player on our team to hit the ball over the fence during the season.

We weren’t the best team in our league, but we won more games than we lost, and our absolute best game was toward the end of the season. We fell behind early, 13-3, but we made a furious comeback. I contributed to the surge with a two-run double, but Kyle punctuated it with a pair of inside-the-park grand slams in back-to-back at-bats. I think we were further spurred on after Coach Larry got thrown out by the home plate umpire after arguing vehemently that I checked my swing on a strike-three call. We went into the bottom of the last inning trailing by just one run, 19-18. We were still down a run with the bases loaded and two outs when I stepped to the plate. A sudden pain in my wrist made me skittish about swinging, but luckily, the opposing pitcher was wild, and I drew a walk to tie the game. We then won the game in the craziest way, as the batter behind me, Troy, was struck in the foot for a walk-off hit-by-pitch! I’ll never forget watching that ball curve downward and hit Troy’s left cleat with an anti-climactic thud. He shrugged his shoulders and trotted to first, and then we went crazy after the winning run crossed the plate.

That game and that season remain highlights of my childhood, and my parents and I still mention several classic memories from that team, which, of course, always end in laughter.

note: Simply because I revealed the outcome of every one of my at-bats in that crazy game in my journal back in 1995, I’ll share here that I went 2-for-3 at the plate with a single, a double, two walks, three RBI and a run scored. I didn’t write about any defensive plays in that game, but I can tell you that three days before, I caught a pop up, and then I caught a line drive before doubling off the runner at second all in the same inning. It was the only double play I participated in all season. J

A Phanatic, A Shallow Thought, A Non-Insult

My love of baseball has allowed me to meet some colorful characters over the years and put me in some interesting situations. I’d like to share a few of those with you.

 

A lot of people don’t know this about me, but I absolutely love the Phillie Phanatic. I was naturally a huge fan of the loveable and hilarious green creature when I was a kid, but I never got to see him up close. That dream finally came true in 2009.

In the winter following the Phillies’ World Series title, the championship trophy was sent on a tour around the region so that fans could see it. At the time, I was a sports writer for the Gettysburg Times, and my editor was nice enough to assign me the story when the trophy made a stop in town that February. I obviously would have gone anyway, but this allowed me to get in for free and skip the line. It was also my first chance to cover an official event by the team I loved and had been supporting for nearly 20 years.

The cherry on top was getting my picture taken in front of the trophy, standing next to the Phanatic. He happily gave me a high five as I approached him for the photo. The sound of my hand hitting his…um…wing made a funny thud.

The Phanatic provided non-stop entertainment in that ballroom, of course. He stuck out his party-favor tongue for anyone who crossed his path, and the catering staff was so enamored by his antics that they all posed for a photo with him.

That was a magical afternoon, and I would get to have many more interactions with the Phanatic in the following years. Obviously, none of those held a candle to the first time.

 

Another Phillies personality I’ve gotten to meet multiple times is former relief pitcher and radio broadcaster, Larry Andersen. I received his autograph at a game in 1994, his last season as a player, and then 18 years later, he chose me to ask manager Charlie Manuel a question at a media luncheon. In 2013, I went to Fan Photo Day at Citizens Bank Park, where I basically met every member of the team, including the coaching and media staffs. I personally got a photo taken with Cole Hamels, and when ‘LA’ came by, I coyly asked him if he had a “Shallow Thought for the day,” like the late, great Harry Kalas used to do when they were broadcast partners in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Without missing a beat, he responded in his classic deadpan delivery, “We all know the speed of light, but what’s the speed of dark?”

I also had some fun with a Phillies player that day. When Delmon Young (remember when he was a Phillie??) made his way to me, I decided that I was going to flip the cliché home run request on its head. I told him I was sitting in the 400 section behind home plate and asked if he could hit a foul ball to me. He chuckled somewhat nervously and said, “Ok.” Sadly, Young was not able to fulfill my request. Oh well.

This last story is pretty short, but I know I’ll be telling it for years. Last year, I went to a Phillies game with some friends, and the one friend who secured the tickets managed to get us seats behind home plate only several rows up from the field. I took great delight in cheering and heckling louder than I ever had before. Another bonus about sitting that close is you might see a famous baseball face. A few innings into the game, I did a double-take when I realized that former, disgraced Phillies General Manager, Ruben Amaro, Jr., had taken a seat directly across the aisle. I believe at this point, he was a scout for the Mets. Over the next few innings, I worked up the nerve to say something to him, and when I got up to head for concessions, I extended my hand and thanked him emphatically for bringing Cliff Lee back to Philly in 2011. He accepted the handshake but gave me a bewildered look. I’m assuming he either thought I was being sarcastic or that I was drunk. My compliment may have been a tad in jest, but I was sincerely happy that he re-signed Cliff Lee a year after letting him walk. It was probably the only thing Amaro did right while he was GM.

The Roads Less Traveled, Part 2

Yankees and Red Sox Road Trip, July/August 2012: My then-wife and I were getting pretty adventurous with our vacations. We decided to spend a few days in New York, a few more days in Connecticut and end the trip with a few days in Boston. She wasn’t a big baseball fan, so you can imagine how surprised I was when she agreed to go to games at the new Yankee Stadium AND Fenway Park. Then again, marriage is all about compromise.

 

July 29: I proudly walked into Yankee Stadium wearing a Phillies shirt, expecting to get needled relentlessly by New York’s notorious fans. I was both disappointed and relieved that aside from one snide comment, I was completely left alone. The Yankees were hosting the Red Sox in a Sunday night ESPN game, so the tension and anticipation in the ballpark were palpable. I had always hated the Yankees, and I still do to this day, but something unexpected happened during the game. I got the sense that these fans, while abrasive and loud, loved their team and knew their team. It was a level of passion I hadn’t even felt at Phillies games. As the game began, I couldn’t help but notice the father and son who sat just to my left. The father was teaching his son about the players and what was happening on the field, just like my dad did two decades before. Though he and I were clearly on opposing sides, the father and I gained a mutual respect for one another as the game progressed. It went to extra innings with the Yanks and Sox deadlocked, 2-2, but my wife, her friend and I left after the ninth to avoid the subway rush after the game (the Sox would go on to win 3-2). As we got up from our seats and the father got up to let us pass, he and I actually engaged in a brief man hug and wished each other a good night. Here I was, embracing a Yankees fan at a Yankees game! It was actually the most positive fan interaction I’ve ever experienced with a stranger at a baseball game. That sure was a life lesson I’ll never forget.

August 2: The polar opposite occurred four days later in Boston, which is a shame because for years I’d dreamed of going to Fenway Park. The stadium itself was beautiful, but the hard seats were very uncomfortable, and the passionate vibe I’d felt at the Yankees game was replaced with bitterness. The Red Sox were in the midst of a disastrous season under manager Bobby Valentine, who lasted just that one year. The fans were not happy, and that contempt hung heavy around the ballpark. The Sox didn’t help, getting blanked 5-0 by the Twins, a team with a record even worse than Boston. My wife and I were so happy to get out of there. I used to like the Red Sox, especially when they stuck it to the Yankees in the 2004 ALCS, but this game began a turnaround in my thinking. I came the rest of the way after their sign stealing scandal and the fans hurling racial slurs at Orioles outfielder, Adam Jones. Now, I’m actually looking forward to my next trip to Yankees Stadium, but I don’t know if I’ll ever return to Fenway.

 

One final thing I will say about Yankee Stadium and Fenway is that traversing the interior of both is like walking through a museum. The venues pay wonderful homage to the long and celebrated histories of their franchises. They belong high on the bucket list of any serious fan.

Whack Stats

Fair warning: this one is for the stat nerds!

After counting all the major league games I went to over the years, I decided to go deeper. When you attend multiple games over a relatively short span, you see the same players several times. I wondered how well those players did in those games. Most of them did as well as one might expect over a much larger sample size, but the randomness of only a few dozen at-bats bore some quirky, funny results as well. Case in point: Wes Chamberlain.

Chamberlain was a minor, but important piece of those Philly teams of the early 90s. He was a backup right fielder who was mainly put in the starting lineup against left-handed pitchers, though he always tended to put on a show when I turned up at the ballpark. Of 18 at-bats I saw, Chamberlain batted a prodigious .500 with three home runs and 10 RBI. Of course, this data is skewed because my dad and I happened to be there for the best game of Chamberlain’s career. On July 31, 1991, he went 4-for-4 with two three-run homers, which I talked about in my book. He’s just one of two players I’ve seen homer twice in a game (Chris Davis being the other). Younger fans won’t even know who Chamberlain is, but he made sure I’d never forget him.

I’ve seen the 2008-era Phillies more than any other incarnation of the team, which isn’t surprising. The leaders of the pack here are Chase Utley (57 AB) and Shane Victorino (43 AB), who each hit above .300 and swatted a pair of home runs. Victorino was also the only other player besides Chamberlain to reach double-digit RBI with 10. I’ve got to give the “feast or famine” prize to Raul Ibanez. He had just five hits in 25 at-bats, but three of them were for extra bases, and he drove in nine runs. The biggest of those hits was a grand slam in the division-clinching game in 2011 that I was lucky enough to see with my friend, Bill P., the biggest Phillies fan I know.

At the other end of the spectrum, the “worst player” award goes to Phillies former third baseman Maikel Franco. He hit just .111 (5-for-45), with his one saving grace being a grand slam that Dad and I saw in 2015.

As for pitching, there’s a lot less data, as starters only pitch every fifth day. The top prize here undoubtedly goes to the late Roy Halladay. I saw Doc pitch three masterful games, all in 2011. He won all three, posting an ERA of 1.88. He struck out 22 in 24 innings and walked just three batters. Halladay sadly passed away three years ago, but man, did he ever leave his mark in both Toronto and Philadelphia.

Cole Hamels is the only pitcher I’ve seen more than three times, and he is an easy runner-up to Doc, going 2-1 with a 3.12 ERA. He struck out 28 in 26 innings and walked nine. He is now the only player from that 2008 championship team still playing in the big leagues, and I hope he pitches his way right into the Hall of Fame.

After looking at all of the numbers, I decided to make a Top Performers team. I swear I picked them at random, but when I was finished, I realized I had exactly 10 players. With some minor adjustments, I was actually able to make a full starting lineup! You’ll note the inclusion of three Orioles players of whom I saw a fair amount from 2012-2015:

Now just a few random thoughts about games I’ve attended over the years:

- I never saw home runs by Darren Daulton, Dave Hollins, John Kruk, Lenny Dykstra, Scott Rolen, Bobby Abreu, Pat Burrell or Jimmy Rollins.

- I never saw Randy Wolf, Jamie Moyer or Brett Myers pitch.

- I’ve never seen the Phillies score 10 or more runs at a game. They’ve scored 9 four times.

- The only time I’ve seen ANY teams score in double digits at a game was a Phillies 13-2 loss to the Blue Jays in 2016 and an 11-3 win by the Orioles over the Yankees in 2013. Considering how much I hate the Yankees, that was one of the sweetest games I’ve ever attended. On two other occasions, I left the game before the 10th run was scored.

- The only walk-off home run I’ve seen at a game was by Freddy Galvis against Aroldis Chapman in 2013.

- Most combined runs at a game: 16 (a 9-7 Phillies home-opening win over the Mets in 2000).

For those non-baseball fans reading this blog, the next few posts will be more to your liking. They're filled with funny and interesting memories of mine. They will obviously still be baseball-focused, but less numbers. :-)

Looking Back

In these trying times of a global pandemic, when the social calendar is much emptier than usual, I felt it was time to dust off an old friend.

As you all know, I’m a baseball nut, and my love of the game has only increased with age. Several years ago, I poured that love into a blog series about my dad and the Phillies, which I then turned into a book. Many thanks to all of you who bought it!

With the extra time on my hands this year and a shortened major league season that was understandably played with no fans allowed at the ballparks, I began to take a deeper look at the role baseball played in my life. How fitting that 2020 marked 30 years since the very first major league game I attended.

I went back through the years to try and track down every major league game I watched from the stands, using the always-reliable source of baseball-reference.com. This was obviously the most difficult in the early years, and I would not be surprised if there is a game or two that have completely escaped my memory. Two others, one from 1992 and another from 1993, were educated guesses that I was 80-percent sure about. 

I’m also not certain if I got every game that I went to in 2013 and 2014, the two years I didn’t write regularly in my journal that I’ve kept since I was 10. I had to rely on my own vanity for those years, as I tended to post a photo of the ballpark on social media the same day I attended a game. Facebook can still be awesome once in a while.

Ok, it’s numbers time! I’m sure only 2-3 other people will find these interesting, but as I said way back in my first post 10 years ago, this is my blog. I can do what I want! ;-)

Phillies record in games I attended: 25-25

Record at Veterans Stadium (1990-2003): 6-7

Record at Citizens Bank Park (2004-2019): 16-17

Record in other stadiums: 3-1

Orioles record in games I attended* (1997-2018): 7-7

*all at Camden Yards

It’s pretty funny that both the Phillies and Orioles records came out to exactly .500. Unless you’re a fan of perennial division leaders (i.e. - Yankees, Dodgers) or basement dwellers (i.e. - Marlins, Mariners), I would imagine your numbers would be very similar. Naturally, the Phillies got a lot of those wins in bunches during periods when they were playing well. They won all three games I went to in 1993, the year they shocked everyone and made it to the World Series. In the 10 Phillies games I attended in 2011-12, they won nine of them.

2011 was also the year that saw a surge in my attendance overall. I’m not sure if I could even call myself a die-hard fan before then. I’ve attended just 68 big league games in my life, but 41 of those have come in the past nine years. 

All but five of those 68 games featured either the Phillies are Orioles (in one, they played each other), so even after 30 years, there are five major league teams I’ve never seen in person: Cubs, Diamondbacks, White Sox, A’s and Angels. Of course, before COVID struck, I was planning a crazy baseball trip to Chicago that would have scratched the Cubs and Sox off my list. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for next year.

Exactly half of those 50 Phillies games I saw with dear, old Dad, and when you add in three Orioles games, I’ve attended more games with him (28) than anyone else by far. I’ve also gone to 11 Phillies games with my long-time friend, Bill G., a fellow dedicated fan who joined Dad and I at the Phillies’ World Series parade in 2008. Baseball games are fun no matter what, but they’re even more enjoyable when you go with go with other baseball fans. They cheer just as loudly and are just as familiar with the players on the field. It’s unique kind of camaraderie that keeps me coming back season after season.

I’ve compiled quite a lot of numbers and memories, only a fraction of which I’ve shared here, so stayed tuned for future posts. And who knows? Maybe by the end, some of you will be encouraged to put together your own crazy baseball lists!

May 9, 2009: Phillies vs. Atlanta Braves

Two months after moving back to the east coast, I got another sports writing gig, this time in the historical town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This new job permitted me the freedom to write about the Phillies, and it was a Philly-focused column I penned in April 2009 that earned me my first Pennsylvania press award, but I can’t take credit. Harry Kalas basically wrote the piece for me.
 

My dad and I went to our first meaningful Phillies game together in nearly five years that May. Our first live look at the World Series champions in action fared worse than we hoped. The Atlanta Braves jumped all over starting pitcher Joe Blanton en route to a 6-2 victory. The only Philly runs came on two solo shots, one by Chase Utley and the other by new Phillies acquisition, Raul Ibanez, who took over for the departed Pat Burrell in left field.

Those home runs gave us two chances to hear Kalas’ “outta here” call ringing through the loudspeakers at Citizens Bank Park. My dad and I smiled each time, though our hearts hung heavy. It was just one of many ways the Philly organization honored a team icon who left us all so suddenly the month before.

My dad and I caught a glimpse of Kalas during the World Series parade in October 2008, but we had no way of knowing he was less than six months from his death. Even as his health deteriorated, a fact kept hidden from the public, nothing could keep Kalas from the broadcast booth, which was eventually where his heart gave out just prior to a Phillies road game against the Washington Nationals on April 13.

Later that afternoon, I was informed of Kalas’ death by my friend Bill Gribble, my first college roommate and fellow Phillies fan who also attended the parade with my dad and I. We both struggled to put our grief into words as we expressed how much this man meant to us. We felt like we had lost a family member.

It seemed like fate intervened when the high school sporting event I was scheduled to cover that evening was canceled, and I wrote the aforementioned column instead. It’s not like I could get my mind to focus on anything else anyway.

After moving to Gettysburg, I tried to make it back to Wilmington at least one Sunday per month to watch the Phillies with my dad, but watching them would never be the same. We knew that our love for the Phils stemmed just as much from how Harry called the team’s games than the team itself.

Kalas had long been considered an honorary Phillie, and the players dedicated the rest of the 2009 season to him, wearing an ‘HK’ patch on the front of their uniforms. Shane Victorino also came up with the idea to hang a pale blue suit jacket of Kalas’ in the dugout, along with his trademark white shoes.

My dad and I enjoyed the good fortune of meeting Kalas once in May 2006. He was invited to the Wilmington Flower Market as a guest of WDEL 1150 AM, the radio station that broadcasted Phillies games in Delaware. Kalas was there to sign autographs of his picture for any fans in attendance, an opportunity the announcer rarely turned down.

At the most, I would say there 40 of us there to see Kalas, probably because his appearance wasn’t well advertised. I preferred the intimate feel, even though I would have gladly stood in line for six hours to see him.

Before sitting down to sign autographs, Kalas took the mic and spoke to us about how much he appreciated our support of the Phightin’ Phils, particularly during a recent winning streak that pulled them to within a game of first place. As his velvety voice rang out all over Rockford Park, I couldn’t believe I was this close to it, and I was about to get a lot closer.

The anticipation burned like fire in the pit of our stomachs as my dad and I waited in line with our photos. When it was my turn, I scurried up to the table and showing a nervous grin, I placed my photo in front of Kalas. I hadn’t met very many famous people in my life, so I wasn’t sure what to say. I finally blurted out something to the effect of, “I’ve been listening to you call games since I was a little kid.” He had probably already heard that from the 10 people before me, but he smiled warmly and said, “Thank you,” as he handed back my freshly-signed photo.

In the end, my words to him were appropriate. Part of the thrill of watching Phillies games growing up was tuning in 10 minutes before first pitch to hear Kalas welcome the fans to the telecast. I remember Harry and Whitey's pre-game acting as the soundtrack to my 11th birthday as my mother lit the candles on the cake. Though my Phillies fandom was still in its infancy at that point, Harry's unofficial presence at my party just felt right. It’s the wish of anyone who puts him or herself out there for the public’s consumption that their product keeps people coming back. Kalas was the best in his field at that.

As we left Rockford Park, my dad and I kept glancing down at Kalas’ autograph to make sure we hadn’t dreamt the whole thing. We were blown away that we got to hear that classic voice in person, and it was actually speaking to us. I’m embarrassed to admit that my dad and I lost our autographed photos after only a few weeks, but they were merely secondary to the experience of meeting one of our idols. It’s a meeting I treasure over any Phillies player. That is what he meant to the fans and to the art of broadcasting.

We won’t see another like Kalas again, but I’m so glad that my dad and I got to meet him, and I’m glad that he was alive to both see and call their second world championship. The Phillies made it back to the Fall Classic in October 2009, but lost in six games to the New York Yankees. I think the greatest moment of another Series win would’ve been when the players hoisted that trophy over their heads and said in perfect unison, “This one’s for Harry.”

April 30, 2011: Phillies vs. New York Mets

In 2011, I became more of an involved Phillies fan than ever before.

I wrote about them on an almost-daily basis for a startup sports website that unfortunately never got off the ground. Colleen received a major promotion at work that allowed me the financial freedom to attend six Phillies games that season, including trips to Pittsburgh and Washington (my first time ever seeing them on the road).

By now, I had a small group of people on my Phillies game invite list, but I still planned a game with my dad before anyone else.

I entered Citizens Bank Park that Saturday afternoon with more confidence about a Phillies win than at any previous game since 1993, and for once, I wasn’t looking for a Phillies blowout. The reason? His name was Roy “Doc” Halladay.

The Phillies struck fear in the hearts and minds of every other batting lineup in the National League prior to the season when they magically brought back Cliff Lee after losing him in 2009 – second sweetest Christmas gift ever behind the signed Cal Ripken ball Colleen gave me. The deck was now stacked in the Phillies’ favor with a rotation that included Lee, Halladay, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt.

But Halladay was an ace among aces. Not only did he run away with the Cy Young Award in 2010, his first year with Philadelphia, he tossed a perfect game in May and threw just the second postseason no-hitter in major league history that October against the Cincinnati Reds. He displayed a full arsenal of pitches that he could throw with absolute precision in any count. I had never seen a pitcher who looked in complete control every time he toed the rubber. Halladay was one of those rare hurlers who became even more unhittable with runners on base.

The New York Mets lineup looked befuddled against Doc over the first three innings. He retired nine of the first 10 men he faced on just 23 pitches, 21 of which were strikes. The Mets got to Halladay in the fourth, leading off with three straight singles to take a 1-0 lead, but he stopped the bleeding there. He bounced back quickly, collecting five of his eight strikeouts in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings.

The Philly offense finally rewarded Halladay’s strong outing in the bottom of the seventh with a pair of runs. Home plate became a harder destination to reach for the Phillies by 2011 – 4.4 runs per game, compared with 5.1 in 2009 – but scoring wasn’t as pressing of an issue when their starters were going seven or eight innings every night.

Even guys like Halladay tire toward the end of a game, and Doc made things interesting in the ninth before tying down the 2-1 victory. He threw six straight balls to start the inning, and Carlos Beltran nearly took him deep on a fly ball for the first out. After Halladay struck Jason Bay out, the game ended on an unlikely flash of the leather by well-below-average first baseman Ryan Howard. He made a diving stop on a sizzling ground ball by Ike Davis, and then flipped to his pitcher for the 27^th out. Similar to 1993, it seemed like no matter how they got it done, the Phillies were going to win.

It was Halladay’s second complete game of the young season, and he also owned five of the team’s 18 wins in April. My dad and I agreed Halladay’s gem was one of the best games we had ever seen together.

Prior to 2011, my dad and I were convinced we were bad luck for the Phillies. Of the nine games we went to between 1994 and 2010, our boys had won just three of them, and one of those was with backup players. The Phillies lost the three additional games I went to with friends over the same period.

Now that the Phightins boasted one of the best pitching rotations in baseball history, my luck suddenly changed. They won all six games that I saw from the stands in 2011, and three of those wins were the team’s only victory in that particular series. The icing on the cake came in September at Citizens Bank Park. I was there with my friend, Bill Paulino*, to witness the Phillies clinch their fifth straight NL East title. They would go on to post the best regular-season record (102-60) in team history.

That magical rotation made it all possible. Halladay, Lee and Hamels all finished in the top 6 in Cy Young voting after the season. More importantly, they helped me truly discover the beautiful art of pitching and to appreciate the 2-1 pitchers duels like my dad.

 

*Bill and I became friends through our love of the Phillies. How we met was stuff of legends. It was May 29, 2010, and we were gathered with mutual friends at a sports bar in New Castle, Delaware. We were there to watch the Philadelphia Flyers play in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals, but we wound up watching Halladay throw a perfect game against the Florida Marlins.

August 18, 2002: Harry Kalas Hall of Fame celebration

Major League Baseball offers its fans numerous opportunities during the regular season to honor the most cherished members of their team’s extended family, be they former players, coaches or front office executives. Dad and I made sure we were present for Phillies’ most anticipated of these occasions during the 2002 campaign, and for many in attendance, the celebration recognized not so much a person, but a voice.

The calming baritone to which I refer belonged to none other than Phillies play-by-play announcer Harry Kalas. Despite hailing from the Midwest, Kalas was as Philadelphia as cheesesteaks. He endeared himself to the fans and the players with his easy-going personality and blue-collar devotion to his craft. In the days before he gave up drinking, he could be frequently found at the local watering hole until the wee hours, belting out classic oldies for his listeners, but he always somehow turned up to the broadcast booth on time with a clear head.

And that voice. It carried you to a special place that made baseball an inviting and comforting diversion from life’s daily grind. Kalas also stirred up the adrenalin in just the right doses on every exciting play. Whenever he raised his voice to an enthusiastic yell, particularly on his trademark “outta here” home run calls, he showed his genuine love for the game and his job. I owe my appreciation of baseball to my father, but Kalas played a definite role as well, as he did for multiple generations of Phillies fans.

Now in his 32^nd season with the organization, Kalas received baseball’s highest honor for broadcasters, the Ford C. Frick Award. It’s akin to a Hall of Fame induction for players, and a plaque signifying Kalas’ award is displayed in Cooperstown.

The Phillies commemorated this special recognition with Harry Kalas Day, resulting in Veterans Stadium’s only sellout in another disappointing season. Kalas, donning in a white suit jacket and purple lei around his neck, was honored with a touching pre-game ceremony on the field. Hosts Glenn Wilson and Darren Daulton led the crowd through several of Kalas’ most memorable calls, including Mike Schmidt’s 500^th home run and the last out of the division-clinching game in 1993. Kalas’ family and several members of the ‘80 and ‘93 Phillies teams joined him on the field, and he received a lap around the edge of the field while perched in the back of a red convertible. At the end of the ceremony, we finally got to hear Harry the K himself when he took the microphone to thank the fans for their support over the last 31 years. Kalas’ words carried a special weight for my dad, who had been watching and listening every one of those years.

One of the most touching moments of the ceremony for me occurred when Scott Rolen, who was traded to the visiting St. Louis Cardinals just three weeks earlier, emerged from the visitors dugout, gave Kalas a hug, and then opened the car door for him just prior to the lap. It’s a shame that Kalas and Rolen’s soundtrack to this moment was a chorus of boos from a majority of the crowd. Rolen’s difficulties with Philadelphia manager Larry Bowa were well documented, and some fans never forgave Rolen for his unceremonious departure, but for this one magical event they should have taken the high road.

Rolen wasn’t the only Cardinal under fire.

J.D. Drew became public enemy No. 1 in 1997 when he rejected the Phillies drafting him second overall because they refused the $10 million signing price that Drew’s evil agent, Scott Boras, demanded. The Cardinals gave into Drew and Boras when they drafted him the following year. During Drew’s first visit to Veterans Stadium in 1999, the fans famously showed their displeasure by throwing countless objects, including D-cell batteries, at him.

When Drew came to the plate in the top of the sixth inning to the usual round of boos, some fans sitting near my dad and I in the upper deck took things too far. I guess they counted on Drew to possess X-Ray vision because they stuck up their middle fingers while screaming obscenities. Other fans seated several rows below began shouting up at them to knock it off in deference to the children trying to enjoy the game. That only encouraged the offenders to scream louder, which prompted security to remove them from the area.

My dad and I and the people immediately around us could only shake our heads and laugh. One guy in the row behind us perfectly summed up the situation. Channeling his inner Rodney King, he pleaded innocently, “Can’t we all just get a Bud Light?” I couldn’t believe fans were still getting this worked up over Drew, but at least they provided me with better entertainment than the Phillies, who lost the game 5-1.

Every fan who attended the game received a special item: a bobblehead of Kalas and his former partner in crime, color commentator and Phillies Hall of Fame centerfielder Richie “Whitey” Ashburn. The two of them worked together in the booth for 26 years until Ashburn’s untimely passing in 1997. Their chemistry and humor on the air remains wonderfully unique.

And what would Ashburn’s response to that day’s celebration be?

 

As His Whiteness would say, “Great job, Harry. Now, let’s order a pizza!”

August 16, 2001: Baltimore Orioles vs. Kansas City Royals

I would be heading back to college for my sophomore year at the Penn State Hazleton campus in a few days, and I packed as much fun as I possibly could in the last week of what had been a dismal summer.

My dad, a regular drinker and smoker all his adult life, suffered a mild heart attack in January 2001. An angiogram revealed an 80-percent blockage in his arteries, requiring quadruple bypass surgery that June. The technology of the time required surgeons to remove my dad’s heart from his body while keeping him alive with machines. This fact terrified me, despite the minimal chance of death. My dad was only 46 years old, but this surgery made his mortality more real than it had ever been.

Dad made it through the procedure fine and was home from the hospital five days later. He wasn’t cleared to drive or return to work until August, though he began driving again after only two weeks (a rule that apparently all male patients break, according to my dad’s doctor).

My stressful home life made it difficult to enjoy the Phillies’ promising season. Amazingly, they were best team in baseball through the first two months – off to their hottest start since 1993 – and they remained in first place at the All-Star Break. Young and speedy shortstop Jimmy Rollins became an instant fan favorite and motored his way to Rookie of the Year honors. Philly ended the season just two games out of first in a down year for the NL East, and it secured its first winning record since ’93.

You may be wondering why, as a last-day-of-summer treat I chose to see a team floundering 20 games under .500 over a team battling for a division title. The reasoning was simple; it was my last chance to see Cal Ripken, Jr. before he retired. That summer’s All-Star Game pushed me in that direction as well. All eyes were on future Hall of Famers Ripken and Tony Gwynn. Ripken homered in his first at-bat and was named the game’s MVP.

It would have been nice for my dad and I to see Ripken on the field that day, but he took to his DH position well, going 3-for-4.

This game also sticks out in my memory for an unpleasant reason. During one inning when the Orioles defense was on the field, some fans sitting near my dad and I began hurling verbal taunts at Brady Anderson, who was the closest player in view. They singled out the offensive struggles of the former All-Star, whose batting average tolled the Mendoza Line for most of the season.

For a reason I can’t fathom, I found their taunts amusing and joined in with them. I suppose I had yet to grasp that all major league players’ skills decline once they reach a certain age, and for Anderson, it was 37. Very few get to bow out as gracefully as Ripken, and Anderson did not deserve such harsh treatment, especially from his own fans.

By the time I got to college, I rarely received my father’s stern tone, but I heard it loud and clear when he told me to stop yelling at Anderson. I complied immediately, and though I didn’t reflect on my behavior until years later, I knew I had done something wrong. I had broken the code of respect that my dad always followed when he attended games. I not only violated the code but set a poor example of conduct for any younger fans sitting around us. I learned my lesson, and that was the first and last time I heckled a player on the team for which I was rooting.

The Kansas City Royals broke a scoreless tie with three runs in the sixth inning and three more in the seventh. Though my dad was mostly recovered from his surgery, watching a baseball game under the hot, summer sun was quite taxing. We left after the seventh, which would become a recurring practice over the next several years. The decision is easier to make when your team is losing.

2001 was a scary year for me and for the country after the terrorist attacks on 9/11, but life continued in New York and Washington, D.C., and I still had my father. We were lucky to build countless more memories together, with some of the best taking place in view of a baseball diamond.

Note: This game coincidentally featured some of the Phillies’ past and their future. Paul Byrd, who started the 2001 season with Philadelphia, won the game for the Royals. Future Phillies left fielder Raul Ibanez backed Byrd’s strong start with a three-run shot.

April 30, 2000 & July 26, 2005: McGwire vs. Sosa

Some hometown fans go to baseball games to get a glimpse of superstars playing for the opposing team. I never considered myself among them until Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa came along.

The home run had not been in such high demand since Babe Ruth popularized it in the 1920s. Eighty years later, seemingly untouchable offensive records were falling left and right by these slugging freaks of nature, and I rooted for them every time they stared down their helpless enemy 60 feet and 6 inches away.

In recent years, I have grown to appreciate the delicate art of pitching, but it still does not compare to the thrill of a baseball leaving the yard. A player whips his large, wooden stick through the strike zone and connects with a ball that flies 400 feet to its destination. The crowd bellows a collective, “Woah…,” upon contact, and then hurls a cacophony of cheers into the atmosphere after the ball clears the fence. Four seconds of pure elation.

I hoped for that feeling 20 times over as my dad and I ventured to our second Phillies game in 20 days. We arrived nearly two hours before first pitch, and I went down to the 200 level ready to see some batting practice blasts, for which McGwire had become legendary. I stood and watched behind home plate for a good half hour as Cardinal after Cardinal took his hacks, but Big Mac never appeared. As we would see during the game – and by McGwire’s eventual confession 10 years later – it’s not like he needed the practice.

To be clear, I wanted the Phillies to win this game. I envisioned a meaningless Big Mac homer in a 10-1 blowout, but McGwire ended up being a much bigger factor in this one.

Curt Schilling started the year on the Disabled List, so this was his season debut. He looked in mid-season form, striking out eight and holding the dangerous St. Louis lineup at bay until the sixth, when McGwire batted with one out and one on, and the score 2-1 in the Cardinals’ favor. With one mighty swing, Big Mac hit the 530^th long ball of his career, giving St. Louis a lead it would not relinquish.

I had missed McGwire’s record-breaking 62^nd home run of the 1998 season by seconds on TV, and I missed seeing this one live, as I was stuck in line at the concession stand. Given what I know now, I don’t mind failing to experience these moments in baseball history. Mickey Morandini’s grand slam seven years earlier remains a much better story.

The only thing that mattered was the Phillies were now down by three runs. My dad certainly didn’t feel good about seeing McGwire’s homer, and we both left the Vet shaking our heads. A month into the season, our team was in dead last with a record of 7-17.

I saw Sosa live once as well, five years later, in the twilight of his career with the Baltimore Orioles. By this time, reports of rampant steroid use in baseball were well known. That March, Sosa and O’s teammate Rafael Palmeiro had both testified before congress (along with Schilling) that they had never taken performance-enhancing drugs. Palmeiro famously emphasized his point with a defiant index finger.

I was actually in my seat when Sosa went deep in this game. Though the Orioles were fading fast from contention in the AL East, the general mood at Camden Yards was high thanks to the four white banners hanging up on the B&O Warehouse, reading the number ‘3,000’.

I obviously didn’t know it then, but I picked a crazy time to go to an O’s game. It fell a week after Palmeiro reached the 3,000 hit milestone and a week before he was suspended for 10 games for a positive steroids test.

The news hit me pretty hard, not only because Palmeiro was my favorite Oriole, but his suspension peeled the first layer off an onion of deceit. Major League Baseball is just as at fault for allowing the steroid culture to thrive with no threat of punishment, but I can’t ignore that these players made the choice to poison their bodies to give them an unfair advantage. They accepted endless adoration, smiling through their lies the whole way through it. When they were finally caught, they made the innocent who played alongside them guilty by association.

There are arguments on both sides of the great debate on whether or not stars from the Steroid Era deserve election into the Hall of Fame. All I can say is, I’m glad I’m not a member of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. My gut reaction is that steroid abusers have no place in the Hall, but I’m sure there are members in now who cheated in some form or another. Amphetamine use in baseball predates the Steroid Era by several decades, and there are players like Ty Cobb, a well-known racist man with a violent temper that he unleashed on other players.

On the other side, Pete Rose is denied eligibility at all for betting on baseball. As far as the sport is concerned, he’s considered more of a villain than McGwire. I have always stated that baseball will eventually lift the ban on Rose, but probably not until right after he dies.

 

It’s unfortunate that the fans of my generation were brought up on a fixed game, but we learned that the stars we held up so high in our youth turned out to be flawed human beings, just like our parents.

My dad and I never really talked about the steroid scandal, apart from the obligatory "that's a shame" lament whenever a new juicer was revealed. We were both on the same page concerning the guilty players’ fates. The unsuccessful teams the Phillies rolled out during the height of the scandal gave us the excuse we needed to believe that they were all innocent.

Luckily, in a few years, the game would clean itself up to give the Phils a fighting chance. And boy, did they ever take advantage.