It comes around every spring. Hope for the year all over again. Football season has finally ended, and baseball returns. I’ve been a baseball fan forever. Which is another way of saying for longer than I’d like to remember. My earliest memories of going to a game are of my father and I watching the San Francisco Giants at Candlestick Park in the early 60’s. My father only had daughters, so, as the oldest, I got chosen to be the “son.”
Candlestick is no longer. It was blown up by a group of volunteers a few years ago. It was a terrible ballpark for players. Example? During the 1961 All-Star Game, pitcher Stu Miller was blown off the mound by the wind. Umpires called it a balk. Also, the layout of the dugouts didn’t allow the visiting players to go anywhere except the field. There was no access to the clubhouse, as in no bathrooms. The only exit was down the first base line past the Giants dugout. Whenever a visiting manager was thrown out, he would have to walk in front of the Giants dugout to the door. I saw Tommie Lasorda take that walk once, and blow kisses to the crowd on his way.
Candlestick was a challenge for the fans too. The best part for my father and I were the amazing players. We saw Willie Mays, Willie McCovey and Juan Marichal, among others. We usually sat in the bleachers. At this point Candlestick was still an open wind tunnel. They hadn’t closed up the back yet and turned it into the mother ship. So, we would bring our cold hot dogs and partial sodas to the benches and nail ourselves to the boards. But what a view. The Say Hey Kid was right there in front of us.
Willie Mays had style. It seemed like he could run faster and jump higher than anyone. My favorite memory of Willie is of a time when he was on first base. Naturally, the pitcher wanted to pick him off. Willie took his lead. The pitcher threw over to first, almost coming out of his socks. Did Willie panic? Hardly. He lifted his left arm in the air and fell gracefully to the base, easily beating the throw. That’s style.
Years later, my husband and I took our son to Candlestick to see the Giants. By then it had been modified several times. For a few years the Forty Niners shared Candlestick with the Giants which meant the park was a stadium during football season. That was weird. They installed some strange stands that could be rolled in or out depending on the sport. The good thing was they charge less money for baseball game tickets in those stands.
They called them “the family pavilion,” and didn’t allow smoking or drinking, swearing was still okay. We went several times. Our son was little and liked to run around. We’d go early and watch batting practice. Eat hot dogs. Read the Chronicle that we brought with us. It was nice.
One Sunday when my husband and son were off getting food, I starting watching the players on the field. The Giants were playing the Philadelphia Phillies that day, and the Phillies were finishing batting practice. Now, as you are reading this, you know that I’m a writer. I’m also a big baseball fan. Those two things collided at that moment.
Baseball isn’t just a sport to me. It’s a memory of my father. It’s the sappy way I feel when I was the end of Field of Dreams. It’s the excitement I feel every time I look through that archway to see a baseball diamond again. The field is a color found nowhere else.
So. I was watching baseball players walk to the dugout. Phillies players. One player walked out of the door next to the Giants dugout and started walking toward the visiting dugout. A Phillies player with a bat on his shoulder almost strolling through the infield. He pauses at second base and looks around. For me, it’s almost poetic. (I’m sorry, it was). I wondered who it was, so I dug out my binoculars, to see. Mike Schmidt, the Phillies third baseman.
I told my husband about it when he got back, and he shrugged. We watched the Giants win the game. That evening, we watched some highlights, and then saw Mike Schmidt announce his retirement. He never played another game. I can still see him standing on the infield by second base taking in all in.