Welchie and Reggie on a Chilly Ballpark Night

The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate;

He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate.

And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,

And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.

From Casey at the Bat by Ernest Thayer

It was awfully late in the year to be attending my first baseball game of the season; nearly mid-June, a Tuesday evening game against the Washington Nationals. I usually manage to get to the yard in late April; certainly no later than mid-May.  This game was a birthday present for my son and a present for myself.  There aren't many better ways to spend an evening than taking in a ballgame with your son.  It’s the American way.  There are a lot of “American ways”; some good, some not so much.  This is one of the best.

I arrived at the ballpark early; 5 o’clock for a 7:15 first pitch.  My son would be getting off his train from San Jose at 7 o’clock.  Long lines had already formed at the still closed gates, now fitted with metal detectors, that homage to Bin Laden and all of the other assholes that have terrorized the world and changed our way of life even though we vowed we wouldn't let them change our way of life.  I did some shopping at the Dugout Store; promising myself that Giants aloha shirt for a future purchase.  I left the shop and walked past the statue of Willie Mays.  Sitting on a bench below the slugger was former A’s and Giants pitcher Vida Blue.  He was a skinny 20 year old when he came up in 1970 sporting the gaudy green and yellow of the A's and a 100 mile per hour fastball.  Now he's a burly guy in a stylish suit; and on that night he was a local legend literally sitting at the bronzed feet of a local legend.

BP is kind of a special time; watching the players go about their business; crack of the bat, some chatter on the field and shouts of legions of kids lining the fences hoping that a player will offer up a ball.  I found my seat in the second level club section and then found some garlic fries; fresh out of the fryer, still glistening with oil.  Many years ago my BP ritual at the Oakland Coliseum before A’s games was a dog, a beer and the New York Times.  The doctor’s since put me on the water wagon so now it’s a dog (or those garlic fries), water and the news on my phone. 

Twenty minutes or so before game time and I was in the enclosed concession area at the charging station rejuvenating my phone and exchanging small talk with another fan.  When she left I looked up through the thick club windows at the scoreboard and was stunned: BOB WELCH 1956 – 2014.  Fans standing in silence, hats off, some heads bowed.  I've only know of two famous men named Bob Welch and the other, the former member of Fleetwood Mac, was already dead and gone. 

Bob Welch,Welchie he was called; Dodgers vs. Yankees; ninth inning of game two in the 78 World Series and the Dodgers clinging to a one run lead. Two men on, two out and Reggie Jackson steps into the box.  I was a Dodger fan in 1978; a nail biting wreck, alternately standing and pacing in the living room when the rookie Welch pitching for the Dodgers would begin a five minute dual against Jackson, the seasoned World Series vet. It would be the kind of electric drama that only baseball can generate.  Each pitch an edge of the seat and hold your breath set piece with the potential to end the contest with one swing. There would be no finesse in this dual that would forever join the two in baseball lore.  Welch threw nothing but heat and Jackson took mighty cuts, screwing himself into the ground the way he often did; a drama played out in the crescendo of the cheering crowd. On the ninth pitch Welch threw another fastball, Jackson took a rip, connected with air and it was done, leaving a cheering crowd, a furious Jackson and a lasting memory.  It was Casey at the bat come to life. Some years later Welsh would pitch for the A’s and as he warmed up before game time I would watch; enjoying a dog and a beer, with a copy of The New York Times in my lap.  Later on the day that Welch passed his battery mate, former Dodger catcher Mike Scioscia would be in the news as manager of the Angels challenging the call made when Yoenis Cespedes, playing for Welch’s former team the A’s threw out a runner at home from over 300 feet away in left field.

Welch deals

Reggie swings

Game over

In the seventh inning, down two runs, the Giants put on a rally with two on and the big bat of Michael Morse stepping in.  It was one of those classic baseball moments in which the fans cheer at the prospect of the slugger hitting a game changer.  Just as in that 1978 series game, the crowd grew louder with each pitch until Morse took a big cut and, like Mr. October in 1978, connected with air, screwed himself into the ground and took the long/short walk to the dugout.  Strike three the collective groan and a realization that this wasn't the night for the home nine.

Game’s end and folks are rushing this way and that like orange and black ants; heading for the parking lots, the train, the bus or the bars.  A young woman in a plunging neckline and short skirt is probably rushing to wherever it’s warm.  Funny how many fans still get fooled by the warm daytime temps to rediscover the chill of the San Francisco waterfront.  By mid-game they've found they can’t buy enough alcohol to ward off the grey chill of the fog and wind.  

I start the long lone walk back to my car, passing over the trolley tracks, followed by windblown ballpark trash; urban tumbleweeds crossing the city's iron horse trail.  The denizens of the post-game night are settling in.  A grizzled black man plays The Battle Hymn of the Republic on the saxophone.  Beggars; the sometimes sad, often mad supplicants in Giant’s caps, wrapped in ratty blankets look up at the passing throng waiting for a little spare scratch; a too young woman with a droopy eyed dog and further down the guy I've seen often in these parts, holding a sign that admits he’s just looking for beer money.  Over on the big lawn just north of the stadium some young men in t-shirts are tossing a baseball around; laughing, shouting; working off a beer buzz. 

It comes to mind that the sounds of the game have changed since I was a kid.  It used to be that fans brought transistor radios to the game to listen to Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons broadcast the game on KSFO.  Anywhere you went in the stadium there was a low, almost subliminal hum of the radio broadcast punctuated now and then with Hodges' home run call; "Tell it bye-bye baby." Now there has to be some sort of diversion on the big screen and “walk up” music accompanies hitters to the plate.  A guy gets his own “walk up” theme song even if he isn't hitting his own weight. Oh and KSFO; it’s devolved to being a right wing talk station featuring hate filled blowhards like Michael Savage. 

On the edge of the lawn where the young men are playing ball, “entrepreneurs” are spreading out counterfeit Giants caps, T- shirts and other trinkets mere yards away from patrolling cops who pay them no mind but should be moving them along or hauling them off to the stony lonesome.  The cheap souvenirs, priced at a fraction of the price of the real deal are guaranteed to last at least as long as your walk to the car before the colors bleed or they become threadbare. 

I don’t dwell on the Giants’ loss but take pleasure in a nice evening watching a game and chatting with my son.  That’s the great thing about baseball; you can concentrate on the game and still talk about the game and anything else in the whole wide world like when did Pablo Sandoval start sporting the long socks and oh, did you hear that Adidas might not sponsor the Dubai World Cup.  

Sadly there’s a lot of time to talk between innings.  That’s when the TV money is made with ever more commercials lengthening the game; the game that ends up taking the rap for the extra twenty minutes it takes to play nine innings.  During the commercials, which Comcast still broadcasts at decibels high enough to make a jet plane sound like a whisper, the fans at the park are “entertained” by nonsense; hokey races on the giant screen between cartoon boats in a cartoon San Francisco Bay, or Lou Seal the mascot standing on the dugout throwing free peanuts to the people in the field club section; folks who pay 150 dollars and up for their seats and still scramble for the free goodies as if they’re Spanish doubloons.  And in the end the game gets blamed for being too long even though the game itself has had to develop rules to move it along and make way for commercials.  The umpire breaks up the mound conference after a few seconds and each game must devour a couple hundred balls because every time one barely touches dirt it gets thrown out.  Why?  Because it saves time.  Used to be a pitcher worth his salt could make good use of a little scuff or cut on the ball, until the batter asked for the ball to be inspected.  But inspecting the ball takes time so a ball is automatically thrown out. And so a little gamesmanship is banished because in the 15 seconds it takes for the umpire to check the ball Budweiser could be shilling their bad beer.  Another “innovation” from Commissioner Bud Selig who seems to be trying single handedly to ruin the national pastime.  The latest is a ridiculous replay rule.  Is it really so bad to leave the game and then argue with a buddy over a beer about a botched call?  Still it’s mostly the game I remember when Tommy Lasorda hugged Bob Welch after his ninth inning heroics.  But it’s inexorably changing.  My son is predicting that balls and strike will soon be called electronically and I hope that by the time they've painted that mustache on the Mona Lisa I’ll be dead and gone.

A comely woman looking bored behind a desk in the bright reception area of one of the condo complexes stares, expressionless, out at the passing fans. Passing by one of the trendy restaurants that line The Embarcadero; some servers are leaning against the bar waiting for a few straggling diners to finish up so that they can clear up and clear out.  I catch the whiff of sizzling grease that I know can’t be coming from the restaurant and meet the the hopeful expression of a Mexican vendor huddled in the windy dark near the warmth of a little grill.  He offers me one of the bacon wrapped hot dogs he’s cooking for fans who need one more dose of sodium for the road.  Normally a bacon wrapped dog would sound good but I right now I'm barely holding down the garlic fries and nachos I had at the game. 

Hunched in the cold, I pull my cap down low against the wind and I trudge on in the gloomy shadows of the posh waterfront businesses with the sad remembrance of a skinny Bob Welch, 21 years young and staring down Mr. October in the fall classic.  God I love baseball.

"Bobby Welch was just one of my all-time favorite pitchers. He had a lot of heart … He had tremendous ability, he was a great guy and everybody loved him."  ~ Tommy Lasorda