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.

April 10, 2000: Phillies vs. New York Mets

My support of the Phillies renewed, I eagerly counted down the days to the 2000 season.

I even bought a magazine that previewed the new season in the form of one-page breakdowns for all 30 major league teams, and I read it cover to cover. I was aware that despite my great knowledge of baseball, I still didn’t know it well enough to converse about it at length with my peers at school. My window on that potential boost to my popularity was nearly closed, with high school graduation just two months away, but my recent acceptance to Penn State University earned me a new and much bigger group to impress.

My dad still came first as far as attending games was concerned, and we crossed off another wish list item when we acquired tickets for the Phillies home opener, my first game at the Vet in nearly five years. We didn’t know quite what we were in for.

In my eyes, the Phillies’ biggest rivals were the Atlanta Braves, but that probably stemmed from my own hatred of the perennial division winners, and their fans’ insufferable and racially offensive Tomahawk Chop. I know now that the Mets are the main foe by simple proximity. Philadelphia, Boston and basically the entire state of New Jersey constantly deal with living in New York City’s shadow.

We entered a fog of tension that engulfed all of Veterans Stadium. Thousands of Met fans made the trip down the New Jersey Turnpike, and Philly fans expressed extreme displeasure of their presence in a variety of ways. My dad and I could hear the noisy taunts all around us, and more than once, we saw security guards leading the worst offenders out of sight.

The guards couldn’t respond fast enough to two different groups of Phillies and Mets idiots (they don’t deserve the label of fan) who leapt onto the field between the sixth and seventh innings to pummel each other into the Astroturf, an effective weapon against any enemy as I learned the previous December. It was impossible to believe in that moment that my dad and I shared anything in common with those mindless barbarians.

This was the first time I felt ashamed to be a Philadelphia fan, and given our general reputation, I knew it wouldn’t be the last. I admit that I get a little too critical and worked up at times, but I feel fortunate that on the whole, my dad raised me to be a respectful fan. If given the opportunity, we would have both personally apologized to the Phillies for the selfish acts of those brawlers, who not only behaved without regard to the people around them, but also disrupted the game.

The contest on the field was pretty wild as well, though it only got physical once when Phillies bench player Kevin Sefcik collided with the Mets’ Mike Piazza at home plate. A total of 16 runs crossed the plate in the game, all before the sixth inning.

New York scored four times off Paul Byrd in the first (the exact opposite of what occurred at the previous Phillies game I attended, also against the Mets), but Philly batted around in the bottom of the second, taking a 5-4 lead. The Phillies rebounded a second time in the fifth after the Mets retook the lead with three runs in the top half. Philly had already knotted the game at 7 when catcher Mike Lieberthal stepped to the plate with two outs and a man on. As he had done so many times the year before, Lieby launched a two-run shot to put his team in front to stay. It was his first bomb of the season, and the only one in the game.

I still wrestle with deciding between Bobby Abreu and Lieberthal as my favorite player from this era. Lieberthal was the new Darren Daulton, and he had proven as much in 1999 with an All-Star performance. He played a career-high 145 games behind the dish (earning his only Gold Glove award) and hit .300 with 31 home runs and 96 RBI. He would never achieve that kind of production again, but he remained a presence in the lineup and behind the plate for several more years, and contrary to Abreu, he was well liked by the fans.

The Phillies’ win jump-started a week full of excitement for me. I attended my senior prom, as well as a Boys and Girls Club scholarship award presentation. That organization, which my dad helped me join to avoid the dangerous streets of our neighborhood, played a pivotal role in my development as a youth, even on the baseball diamond with two years of T-ball.

The Phillies, meanwhile, beat the Mets again the following night to reach .500 (4-4) for the only time during the 2000 season. I eventually allowed my social life and preparations for college to occupy my time, as it was clear the Phillies were going down, not up. Their two newest recruits failed to deliver. In fact, Mike Jackson didn’t throw a single pitch in 2000 due to a bad shoulder. In the lineup and the starting rotation as a whole, only Abreu, Doug Glanville, Robert Person and Randy Wolf avoided serious injury or trade in 2000, and the Phillies languished in last place for all but 10 games.

Realizing their fate, the Phils traded away their last tie to the 1993 team, Curt Schilling*, at the end of July. He was finally rewarded for his great talent by winning the World Series, once with the Arizona Diamondbacks and twice with the Boston Red Sox. He joined ’93 teammates Mariano Duncan (’96 Yankees) and Daulton and Jim Eisenreich (both ’97 Florida Marlins) as the only players to get a ring after leaving the Phillies. Given how much joy and excitement they brought their fan base, they all deserved a taste of ultimate glory.

 

*Mickey Morandini also played for the Phillies in 2000, but he spent the previous two seasons with the Chicago Cubs. After being traded to the Toronto Blue Jays in early August, Morandini retired at the end of the season. I saw the writing on the wall in this game. During the eighth inning, I ventured down to the 200 level of Veterans Stadium to get a closer look at the action. I arrived just in time to see Morandini get picked off first base. The look of panic on his face as the first baseman's glove swiped across his diving hand seemed to say, "Oh man. I think I'm getting too old for this."

December 10, 1999: Phillies Holiday Fair

In 1998, baseball and I took a little break.

Life was happening very quickly for my family. Thanks to my dad’s new job, he and my mom brought in enough money to move us to a house out in the suburbs away from my sports-obsessed friends and within walking distance of my high school. We then purchased our first computer, as well as access to the Internet – I hear the dial-up bells ringing – through America Online, the service provider that nearly everyone was using. We also took two extended vacations that year to Williamsburg and Rehoboth Beach, and by year’s end, I had my driver’s license.

With so much of my time spent going different places, browsing chat rooms and trying to meet girls - the latter two activities occasionally coinciding - baseball took a back seat. I could not be bothered by the Phillies or Orioles, both of whom fielded sub-.500 teams.

The only baseball event that held my attention throughout the entire season was the home run race between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa. Their successful pursuit of breaking Roger Maris’ single-season home run record had us all scrambling for the box scores every morning to see if they hit another one. Future discoveries placed a big stain on this whole period of slugging prowess in the game, but ignorance is bliss. McGwire and Sosa were thrilling to watch, and they single-handedly brought back the millions of fans who had denounced the game following the strike.

When I finally allowed myself to take a deep breath from all of life’s recent changes, I decided to become a Phillies fan again. Given the team’s recent success, it’s easy to forget that the Phils fielded an exciting group of the players at the turn of the millennium. The ’99 squad featured young players like Scott Rolen, Bobby Abreu, Doug Glanville and Mike Lieberthal, who excelled in multiple aspects of the game. The big difference between these players from the ones in 1993 was I got to watch them play every day.

Though it had been around for two years, Comcast Sports Net was brand new to me. This wonderful channel broadcasted every game that wasn’t on WPHL 17, so virtually every night of the week during the spring and summer was Phillies night at our house. There was no sneaking off to my room anymore. Despite the fact that I was 16 years old, I still enjoyed my parents’ company.

Any Phillies fan brought up in the 1980s or 90s learned a lot about baby-stepping their expectations. I adopted my father’s mantra of “I’ll just be happy if the Phillies finish the season over .500.” The ’99 team had the potential for a winning record, but as was becoming the case, the Phils fell apart in the second half.

My dad and I didn’t make it to a game in 1999, but we did the next best thing. On a frigid, December morning, we traveled to Veterans Stadium, and not to see the directionless Philadelphia Eagles (on their way to a 5-11 season in Andy Reid’s first year at the helm). The Phillies held their annual holiday fair, giving fans a chance to meet players and get a behind-the-scenes look of the ballpark.

We went on a tour of the cavernous Vet’s underbelly, including the player’s clubhouse. Our guides also set us loose on the field, where we tested out the comfort of the dugouts. Luckily, it was the offseason, so the bottom of our shoes we spared the wrath of discarded chewing tobacco.

My head wasn’t so lucky.

As we walked on the unforgiving Astroturf, my dad suggested I get up close and personal by laying down on it. I really wanted to test out the turf’s resistance, and figured the best tool was the back of my noggin. The turf easily won that battle, and the resulting bruise filled me with equal doses of humility and a new respect for the players for gutting out 81 games on that surface.

We got to meet one of those players in the press room. My biggest reason for attending this fair was that my favorite Phillie, Bobby Abreu, would be there fielding questions. He played the game with such ease, and he almost always had a smile on his face. Many fans accused him of laziness, but few players in the game displayed his mix of speed and power, and every time you looked up, he was on base.

Phillies color commentator Chris “Wheels” Wheeler hosted the Q&A, and I probably failed miserably at hiding the shock on my face when he chose me to ask Abreu the first question. After I quickly collected my thoughts, all I could think to ask was how his shoulder was feeling, referring to a recent surgery. Abreu simply flashed his recognizable smile and said, “It’s good.” His short response immediately made me wish I had asked him something more profound, but I soon got a reprieve to show Abreu how much appreciated his talent. When another fan had the audacity to ask him what he felt he could improve on, I looked right at Abreu and said, “Nothing.” He glanced back to me briefly and let out an obligatory chuckle.

I wasn’t just blowing smoke. Abreu put up numbers in 1999 that he never topped, including hits, batting average, triples, on-base percentage and slugging.

Recently-signed free agents Andy Ashby (starting pitcher) and Mike Jackson (closer) also answered questions about the upcoming season. The Phillies were coming off their highest winning percentage in four years, and the addition of two proven veterans to an already formidable roster was expected to help them turn the corner in 2000.

I yammered away like a child on Christmas morning as my dad and I left the fair. Baseball has an uncanny ability to dig down into the deepest part of me and transport me back to that moment of passing through the turnstiles at Veterans Stadium for the first time. My dad facilitated most of those moments from childhood through my early 20s, and the holiday fair still ranks near the top of that list.

After a short break, my love for the Phillies was stronger than ever, and I was ready to show them in person again.

August 24, 1997: Baltimore Orioles vs. Minnesota Twins

When I was 13, my parents helped me carve out my own little baseball world by giving me a 13-inch television for Christmas. During the remaining two years that my family lived in our third-story apartment in Little Italy, the TV sat haphazardly in the middle of my bedroom, sinking deeper and deeper into its foundation – the box it came in. However questionable the setup, that TV was freedom, an increasingly vital thing as I entered high school and adolescence. I could play my video games without distraction, and I could watch all the mature programming on HBO that would have sent my parents scrambling for the remote.

The TV also allowed me to watch baseball by myself and gain a deeper understanding. The father-son dynamic was still an important part of my passion for the game, but my dad didn’t follow the sport outside of the Phillies, and the team’s performance in 1996 further encouraged me to branch out. That’s when I remembered that Baltimore Orioles games were broadcast on Channel 2 (long before the launch of the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, a.k.a. MASN). It also helped that Phillies players Todd Zeile and Pete Incaviglia were traded to Baltimore in late August.

The onset of Interleague Play was still a year away, so my only knowledge of the American League came from my baseball card collection. My dad harbored an intense dislike for the Junior Circuit ever since it instituted the Designated Hitter in 1973. To this day, he roots for the National League in both the All-Star Game and the World Series.

After a few days of watching the O’s, I didn’t mind seeing a little extra offense, and that 1996 Baltimore lineup was something special. The Orioles bashed their way to their first playoff appearance since they beat the Phillies in the 1983 World Series. I was quickly in awe of this team that featured eight players with more than 20 home runs*, four with 100 runs scored and four with 100 RBI. The O’s set an all-time record for home runs hit by a team in a single season with 257 (the 1997 Seattle Mariners promptly surpassed that total with 264, a mark that still stands).

This squad was bursting with All-Star names like Roberto Alomar, Bobby Bonilla, Eddie Murray, Rafael Palmeiro and the Iron Man himself, Cal Ripken, Jr. All eyes in the baseball world were on Ripken the year before when he broke Lou Gehrig’s consecutive games played streak, and he was arguably the most respected player in the game. His presence alone made this an easy group to like. Though I maintained throughout this period that the Phillies were still my favorite team, by the end of the ’96 season I was a full-fledged Orioles fan.

My dad never took the traitorous plunge with me, but he supported it. And so the following season, we made plans to see a game at Camden Yards, which was only an hour south of us. We caught the O’s at their absolute best. They didn’t come close to matching their prodigious offensive numbers from the previous year, but the starting and relief pitching dominated, and the Orioles pulled off a rare feat, staying in first place every day of the 1997 season.

My major league ballpark experience had been limited to a facility two decades behind the times. The moment I laid eyes on Oriole Park at Camden Yards in all its retro-classic splendor, I knew this was what a baseball stadium was supposed to look like. The red brick on the outside glowed in the sunlight. The park was only five years old and felt like it had just opened upon our arrival. Nestled between the stadium and the B&O Warehouse, Eutaw Street popped with excitement. The sounds of the game from shouting vendors to laughing children fit so much better here than Veterans Stadium.

And the beautiful field. Watching the players go through their pre-game warm-ups as nature intended, with natural grass sparkling beneath them, it made me wonder, “Who in God’s name ever thought Astroturf was a good idea for this sport?”

A few days before, I informed my dad that we needed to arrive at the stadium earlier than we ever had for a game because I was determined to get autographs from all the Orioles players for whom I had baseball cards. I came armed with all of the cards and a pen. Alas, Ripken was the only player who came over to sign the fans’ various paraphernalia. What my dad and I thought was an early arrival was still too late as it turned out. Ripken had already been there for a while by the time I forced my way to the front of the pack. I desperately held out my hand with the card and pen amongst dozens of other hands. Ripken headed back to the dugout a minute or two later. Though my mission went unfulfilled, it was exhilarating standing that close to a legend.

The legend was growing literally every day. Nearly two years after beating Gehrig’s streak, Ripken had still not missed a game. My dad and I saw game No. 2,443 – Ripken would end the streak himself the following year at 2,632 – and it also happened to be the Iron Man’s 37^th birthday.

For the first and only time in my life, I bought a program and kept score of the game from the stands. I had kept score from home several times and I decided to emulate the more technically-minded fans I occasionally witnessed at games. Plus, the Phillies and Orioles amazingly won every game I scored to this point (a streak that held for another two years), so I wanted to see if the good luck would transfer live. I quickly discovered, however, that grabbing the program and pen and carefully placing it on my seat every time I jumped up to cheer, an often occurrence in this game, was more hassle than it was worth.

The O’s jumped out to an early lead against the Minnesota Twins with some help from the birthday boy. Ripken was a dead duck at home plate on a fielder’s choice, but he somehow avoided the tag. The Orioles also clubbed three home runs, one of which came off the mighty bat of Palmeiro, prompting the loudest cheer of the day from me.

Truth be told, “Raffy” was my favorite Oriole. Ripken brought the longevity and the clout, but Palmeiro brought the swag. He seemed to come through with a big hit every time he stepped to the plate, and I loved his long, effortless swing. This was, of course, years before the legitimacy of Palmeiro’s power surge in the latter half of his career came into serious question. He was a slugger to idolize at a time when the Phillies had none.

The Orioles beat the Twins 5-1 to maintain their chokehold on the AL East. It would be the last time in 10 years that a team not named the New York Yankees won the division.

I look back on my two years as an O’s fan with almost as much nostalgia as I do for the ’93 Phillies. I shamelessly confess to my front-running ways as an unwise teenager. Besides, now that my wife and I make our home in Baltimore, and our children will probably grow up rooting for the Orioles, I can easily forgive myself.

Note: This would not be my last time getting up close and personal with Ripken. I happened upon him at a fundraising awards banquet in Baltimore in November 2012. I didn’t know beforehand that he would be there, so I obviously had nothing for him to sign, but it meant more to me to shake his hand and tell me how great of player he was.

The following month, I ate my cake, too. For Christmas, my wonderful wife got me a baseball signed by Ripken after the Orioles won the World Series in 1983. It was his only title during his two decades with the O’s. It’s a shame it had to come against my Phillies, but considering I was only a year old at the time, I didn’t have much to say about it.

 *Orioles center fielder and leadoff hitter Brady Anderson thrilled fans and analysts alike in 1996 by hitting 50 home runs, 26 more than he managed in any other season in his career. His single-season mark remained an Orioles record until Chris Davis broke it in 2013 with 53 bombs.

May 21, 1995: Phillies vs. New York Mets

I would be willing to wager my entire collection of autographed baseballs that there is nothing cooler a 12-year-old kid could wear to a major league game than a Little League uniform.

You look just a little more important than the other kids in their normal threads. Other parents think it’s utterly adorable. It also brings a smile to the faces of the players on the field to see a child following – albeit distantly and unlikely – in their footsteps.

That cool kid was me on this sunny day in May. I got up bright and early to don my Orioles uniform (wonderful foreshadowing, as I would soon become a fan of the American League team 75 miles to the south) for the purpose of team photos. I loved my Little League team. I got along extremely well with my teammates, which was a refreshing change from the daily torment I received at school. I was also proud to be the third baseman, a position I picked as an homage to the best Phillies player of all time, Mike Schmidt.

To the relief of my dad and I, the photo session went much quicker than expected. That meant we didn’t have to cancel our plans to go to that afternoon’s Phillies game with his co-worker, Greg, who had two extra tickets. That’s always the best way to go to a ballgame. It’s typically unexpected and it’s like finding treasure. I also chose the game over attending the birthday party of my best friend at the time, Brian, but being just as big of a Phillies fan, he understood.

Unfortunately, the actual experience failed to live up to the promise. As is the case with any big city, traffic was atrocious, and the photo session robbed us of the extra time we needed to factor into our trip. We had to settle for cheering to the car radio as the Phillies scored four first-inning runs against the Mets. I was doing most of the cheering, while Greg and my dad lamented about our predicament. It’s much easier to see the silver lining in most situations when you’re a kid.

Parking was another issue since we obviously arrived at Veterans Stadium after all the other fans. By the time we finally got to our seats, the game was in the sixth inning.

The Phillies made our ordeal worth it by letting the Mets back into the contest. The 4-0 whittled to 4-3, and the bullpens on both sides were left to duke it out.

Darren Daulton started some two-out magic in the eighth with a double. Charlie Hayes followed with a catchable line drive to right, but the ball bounced off the webbing of Chris Jones’ glove, allowing Daulton to score. The Phillies won by that 5-3 score, and it came as no surprise to us.

Though the pitching staff had changed dramatically in two years, the Phillies still retained most of their starting lineup from 1993, and they returned to form over the first two months of 1995, jumping out to a 35-18 start. But injuries and a general lack of team chemistry eventually took their toll, and the Phils took a nose dive out of contention in July.

Sadly, those four innings in 1995 would be my last live look at Dutch, The Dude, Dave Hollins and Jim Eisenreich in a Phillies uniform. All things in professional sports seem to go full circle, and the basement from which Philadelphia furiously emerged would become their residence once again in 1996 and 1997.

My bandwagon allegiance to the superstar Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League around this time proved that I had yet to learn the value of loyalty, and so it’s no wonder I turned my attention away from the Phillies. My dad and I curtailed our viewing of them on television, and we stopped going to their games. In a way, I was saying goodbye to my childhood. This incarnation of the Phillies was at its end, and the Little League costume hung in the closet, never to be worn again.

It was the end of an era for sure, but my baseball tutelage was just getting started.

May 18, 1994: Phillies vs. Montreal Expos

Larry Anderson, left, giving us a
shallow thought on Phillies Photo Day.

The following year, my dad and I raised our commitment to the Phillies another level.

It was on a gloomy day in May 1994 that my dad gave me a get-out-of-school-free card to attend a game for the first and only time. I welcomed any break that came my way because sixth grade was the first of three years that I endured taunting and bullying from my peers on an almost daily basis.

The Phillies, fresh off a National League title and their first World Series appearance in 10 years, were going through hardship as well, and that day’s overcast skies and occasional chilly drizzle amplified their struggles. As the year unfolded, it became increasingly clear that the 1993 season was a flash in the pan. Nearly every player had his career year, and then fell back down to earth. This reality hit the starting rotation particularly hard. Terry Mulholland was traded to the New York Yankees in the offseason, while Curt Schilling, Tommy Greene and Ben Rivera all battled injuries.

Danny Jackson was the only starting pitcher on the top of his game in 1994, and he happened to be on the hill this day. He came into it 5-0 with an ERA well under 3 and was named an All Star that July.

We were also hoping Jackson’s dominance would bring an end to the “Curse of the Blue Hats.” Prior to the season, the Phillies unveiled their new blue hats (to be worn during day games), giving more prominence to the team’s forgotten third color. It turned out it was forgotten for a reason because to this point in the season, the boys in red, white and blue were still looking for their first win in the new hats.

My dad and I got to the game early, and I came armed with a baseball. My good luck with securing autographs the year before at Wilmington Blue Rocks games encouraged me to try at the major league level. I gathered with dozens of other fans in the front row along the first-base line. Greene and veteran relief pitcher Larry Andersen were kind enough to grace fans with their John Hancock. Andersen, who was in his final season in the majors, took the ball from my offering hand and signed it just before he and Greene left the field.

For mostly nostalgic reasons, I regret that I misplaced that ball years ago. Andersen was a big part of that ’93 squad as the setup man for Mitch Williams, and he is still beloved in Philadelphia thanks to his insightful color commentary on the radio during games. I even crossed paths with him again in recent years. He is an amiable person with a wonderfully odd sense of humor. Back in the late ‘90s when he was part of the television broadcast team with Chris Wheeler and the legendary Harry Kalas, my dad and I exchanged anticipatory grins whenever HK would ask Andersen, “LA…do you have a shallow thought for the day?”*

Andersen’s autograph would end up being the highlight of our day. The Montreal Expos scored two runs off Jackson, who was clearly not immune to the curse, in the top of the first inning, and that would be all they needed in an eventual 6-1 win.

Any slim chance Philly had of returning to the playoffs was reduced to zero, along with every other team, that August when the Major League Baseball Players Association went on strike. For the first time in 90 years, baseball had no World Series. My one solace was that due to the strike, the Phillies were the reigning National League champions for two years.

Oh yeah, and those damn blue hats were gone for good.

At the time, I was too young to understand the greed of the players in refusing to accept a salary cap from the owners. I simply felt disheartened that I was cheated out of two months of watching the sport and team I had grown to love.

The owners finally gave in the following March, and baseball resumed. Since then, salaries have grown to ridiculous proportions, and a league-wide drug scandal has rocked the integrity of the game to its core. It almost makes me wish I grew up in another era of the game, but I’m glad that the rowdy “bunch of throwbacks” that first caught my eye in the early ‘90s showed me baseball in what I still believe to be its purest form.

Even if their caps were cursed.

 

*When I saw Andersen at the 2013 Phillies Fan Photo Day, I politely asked for a shallow thought for old time’s sake. Without missing a beat, he replied, “We all know the speed of light, but what’s the speed of dark?”