Aussie Alignment
Mark Lawrence On The Announcement By Curt Schilling
Australia—The sun came up here in Oz a few hours ago and with it the sad news about Curt Schilling. Talk about a lousy start to my day. I don't know if Schill ever checks out this website - but I wanted to take the opportunity to let him know that it's not just America that appreciates all he's done for the team.
I've been around a bit over the years - I've been inside the Vatican and I've seen the White House and I telephoned my sweetheart from the top of the Empire State building. But the most emotional moment I've had came from a display case in the Baseball Hall of Fame. As I stood there looking at - of all things - an athletic sock, I thought about the guy whose blood had stained it and what he'd been through in that amazing period. Not many guys could've stood that tall.
People will no doubt remember Curt's stats and use them as indicators towards his Hall of Fame future. They are right to do so. But when I'm sitting in a pub here in Sydney, trying to explain baseball to someone, those great stats are not going to help. But the story of the bloody sock and the man who wore it makes the hair stand up on the back of their necks and they suddenly understand.
Schill has said a lot of things over the years but my favorite quote is this one:
"I'm not sure I can think of any scenario more enjoyable than making 55,000 people from New York shut up."
Well, as we all know, he made that scenario a reality. He shut those 55,000 people up, alright - and then some - but in the process, he inspired countless others with his determination to do his utmost for his team, regardless of the cost.
So, Curt, if you're reading this, sincere thanks for all you've done and my very best wishes to you and your family.
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot. See you next year, okay? Best regards from the 51st State of Red Sox Nation.
Mark Lawrence On The No-No Viewed From "Down Under"
Australia—What a phenomenal effort from John Lester! I was hanging on every pitch right up until the final out. Which - incidentally - made me late for a very important meeting this morning (One of the weird things about being a Sox fan here in Oz is the time difference - the night games are happening from 9:05 in the morning here - when I'm hanging out at a little place called Work). I walked into the meeting room, apologized for being late (fifteen minutes - ouch) and decided to be honest about it. "I'm late because Jon Lester threw a no-hitter and I had to stay for the last out." Blank looks - then: "Who's Jon Lester?" "What's a no-hitter?" Well, when the people you work for ask you questions, you're supposed to answer, right? And then it struck me: How do you explain to these non-baseball people just how amazing Lester's performance truly was? These guys are bankers, so I put it into numbers. In both Leagues, there's a total of 30 teams. Each team plays a total of 162 games in the regular season—that's a total of 4,860 games played In 2007, how many of those 4,860 games were no hitters? Three. Or a miniscule 0.062% - Pretty damn impressive, dontcha think? Last week, we were swallowing hard as the Sox struggled through Minnesota and Baltimore. Today, we're back on top o' the world and breathing a little easier. Thanks a lot, Jon. Nice work. Regards from Oz.The 51st State of Red Sox Nation.
Of Saturday's Win And Papi
by Mark Lawrence—(Red Sox Nation Citizen No. 6059)
April 12, 2008. It's early Sunday morning
here, ten thousand miles from Fenway and I sit at my PC, drinking too much
coffee, smoking too many cigarettes and sweating a one run lead over the Yanks
in the eighth – and what happens? Rain delay! But it gives me some time
to think. It's been a little painful watching Papi's ongoing struggles this
morning, but in the back of what passes for my mind these days, I just know
he'll come good soon, as we say here in the Antipodes. Like every other soul
in The Nation, I'm pulling for him – I find myself encouraging him out
loud as I watch the game on the PC – c'mon big guy, get a hold a one
- but the look on his face as he trudges back to the dugout is getting close
to heartbreaking.
As someone geographically removed from the situation,
it's been bothering me how the home media is getting on Papi's back so early
in the season. The Dirt Dogs are hammering him about the endorsement trip
to New York, the personal email thing, even the work Ortiz does off the field
– any damn thing they can use to explain this slump. But where are the
pep talks? Some cliches about early days and going out there and winning just
one for The Gipper? Some speculation about what kind of season Ortiz will
wind up having when he finds his game and gets going? Nope, just doom and
gloom and a lot of nonsense suggesting that a plane ride and a TV shoot has
somehow robbed the giant of his powers.
I don't get The Globe delivered daily – but I know there's a certain
sports writer there who isn't exactly revered by Red Sox fans. This morning,
I thought I'd get more of a sense of why that is when I clicked on a link
that took me to an article entitled “Lowly Ortiz is Hitting Rock Bottom”
- by the infamous Curly Haired Boyfriend, Dan Shaughnessy.
Here we go, I thought, another smack in the mouth for
Big Papi. And there it was - from the last place I would've expected –
some subtle encouragement. Shaughnessy has penned a succinct summary of what
David Ortiz has gone through lately and what he is likely experiencing right
now – and what is most likely going to happen next. I got that “personal
message from David Ortiz” email the other day. Cute. Here's one from
me to Mr Ortiz, all the way from The Emerald City: Relax, enjoy yourself and
just play ball. We're all behind you and we know you'll do it.
Corny? – sure. Saccharine Hollywood Baseball sentimentality? - of course
it is. But I'll bet a case of James Boag's Premium Tasmanian Lager that most
folks in the Nation are feeling the same way right now.
And if the damn rain would stop, maybe – just maybe – Big Papi will justify our faith. Two hours and eleven minutes later........well, he didn't do it, but so what? It's just a matter of time, this early in the season. And when it does happen, those pinheads booing him now will act like it never happened. That's the view from down here – Ten Thousand Miles from Fenway. Keep the Faith, alright?
10,000 Miles To Fenway – An Australian's Take on America's Game
by Mark Lawrence—(Red Sox Nation Citizen No. 6059)
Americans are always surprised – and more than a little bemused
– when I tell them my main reason for visiting their country is baseball.
Usually, they can't fathom why someone would willingly spend sixteen hours
crammed into economy class with fat people and squealing babies just to see
a ballgame. For most Americans, it's even more unbelievable when I tell them
my team plays not on the Left Coast but the East. That puts another six hours
flight time on the tally. Twenty hours in the air just to see a couple ballgames?
Whaddayou, an idiot?Well, in a way, yes. I'm a Red Sox fan.
And – for a few seconds – they seem to get it. But, the next question is always the same, no matter what part of the States I happen to be traveling through; How in the heck does an Australian become one of the Fenway Faithful, complete with official Red Sox Nation citizenship? How – exactly – does that happen?
In September, 2005, I flew from Sydney to the United States specifically to see Red Sox Baseball at Fenway Park, something I hadn't done for eleven years. But on the way, I stopped off in Chicago to visit my old friend Phil Latka. Phil lives in a wonderful little place called Naperville, about thirty miles west of the city. I had a few days before I had to catch the Lakeshore Limited over to Boston and I quickly found a great little bar called Jimmy's Grill.
Jimmy's – where the staff's T-shirts read “I know Jimmy, too!” - is a home-away-from-home kind of bar. The folks who work at Jimmy's are just like most other Americans I've met – friendly and open, people you'd be happy to meet. Guys like Jason, the big, big guy who couldn't convince me he was too small for the NFL; Ryan, the quiet young ex-cop whose solid, dependable demeanor somehow reminds me of Sox pitcher Curt Schilling and Jim the manager, who graciously stood me free drinks on my last night in town, telling me I was always welcome. And the gals – Holly and Abby – who made me feel like a guest in their homes. They also made me wish I was twenty years younger. And while they'd all be embarrassed to hear it, they represent to me the best part of America. The interesting thing is, I met people like these all the way from Chicago to Boston to Cooperstown and beyond. And they all wanted to know why I like baseball so much.
I'm not quite sure myself. But, like Cameron Diaz, there's
definitely something about it that appeals to me – big time.So, what
am I trying to say about baseball? Wells, it's something more than just a
game, a pastime that has attracted the love and devotion of scientists, writers,
historians, doctors, professors, cops, robbers, men, boys, women and girls,
firefighters, soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. And don't forget the
Coasties.
Burt Solomon, author of The Baseball Timeline, said “this most American
of sports possesses you from the first time you are introduced to it and never
lets you go.”Burt is absolutely right. You could say he's battin' a
thousand.I found baseball in 1994, the year I got out of the air force and
decided to go see the world. It was the year of The Strike. And, for me, it
was also the year of The Siren.
After spending a month of so trudging through South East Asia – de rigeur for young Australian travelers – I hurried over to Europe, longing for the aged beauty of the French capital, the exuberant style of Rome and the gray elegance of London town. This was all very well and certainly contributed towards the expansion of my 34 year old, militarily-atrophied outlook on the world. But as I sat in a smoky English pub one wet afternoon in early May, I was quietly excited about the next stage of the journey. You see, I am – contrary to popular belief – a little smart. And occasionally, I'm even capable of pulling a plan together that surprises even me. I had cleverly saved the best for last. After months of meeting my obligations as a first-time world traveler, I would board a plane bound for the land I'd wanted to see since childhood – the Continental United States of America and a little place called Boston.
I'd explore this historic city for a few weeks, then acquire a vehicle and spend the next three months – which was all US Immigration would give me – crisscrossing the nation, visiting places I'd only ever seen in my kiddy's encyclopedia until, finally, and with my thirst for Americana almost quenched, I'd arrive at Los Angeles, tired but happy, ready to finally return home. Of course, like most meticulous plans, mine had a major, unforeseen flaw. Months earlier, a chance encounter in a Singapore hotel would nor just affect my plan, it would throw it right out the window. And – no surprise – the encounter was with a woman. Her name was Donna and she was on vacation – taking a break from running her guest house, a lovely inn in a place called Boothbay Harbor in the great state of Maine. When I told her about my plans to visit the States, she leaned across the table seized my wrist and gave me what sounded a little like an order.“You must come visit when you get to the States. It's just so beautiful in Maine! You have to come!” Yes, ma'am. I dutifully recorded her name, address and telephone number (the civilian equivalent of name, rank and serial number) and promised I'd visit.
So, some six months later, sitting in a bar on Boylston
Street, Boston, sipping a Sam Adams and poring over my shiny new road map,
I happened to notice that the mystical Boothbay harbor wasn't all that far
from where I was sitting. Encouraged by the beer (Sam Adams wasn't just a
brewer, he was also a patriot – it says so on the label) I decided on
the spot to take up Donna's invitation. I'd simply delay my departure on the
Great American Road Trip – and why not? I had a whole three months before
they'd kick me out – that was like twelve weeks!
Arriving at Donna's Atlantic Ark Inn, I knocked on the screen door and in
the sunshine and shadow of the fly wire I saw – for the very first time
-the face of the woman I would later almost marry. And at that moment, I decided
that Mount Rushmore and the Grand Canyon could wait. Hell, it wasn't as if
they were going anywhere.
I spent the next three months in Boothbay Harbor. I
also spent the last of my money and had to take the Greyhound from Boston
to Los Angeles – four days in the same shoes and socks – just
so I could make the flight home. Price of Love, I suppose.
And while it was the blond Siren of the Inn who kept my soul bound to New
England, there was something else, another entity at work on my heartstrings
that would ultimately bind me to a city – and a team – long after
the Siren had given me the bum's rush mere yards from the altar.
You see, my affair with the Siren was narrowly preceded
by another love-at-first-sight experience. It cost me the grand total of twenty
or so bucks and began with a red plastic seat – third base, top of the
aisle – at a place called Fenway Park
It was May 30th, 1994 and for the first time in my life, I saw Red Sox Baseball
and, as with the Siren, something rotated within me and locked into place
and it felt good. Of course, I'd had a fleeting interest in the game –
you don't just decide to go to a ballgame, knowing nothing about it –
and my interest had been piqued a few years earlier by Barry Levinson's film
fable, “The Natural”. Levinson gave me an near mystical experience
with that flick and - aided by beer - I convinced a few of my similarly addle-headed
Air Force colleagues to try to form.......a Team.
We were checking the Base library for a book of baseball rules – a forlorn
hope in Australia – when someone looked up the game in the Encyclopedia
Britannica. We found a rich vein of baseball history and, more importantly,
the Rules of the Game. The huge amount of information fueled our enthusiasm
and spurred our efforts to make the fledgling “Glenbrook Majors”
(I know, I know) a reality. At least we were inspired until someone read out
the baseline distances.
“Ninety feet? Are you sure it says ninety feet?”
“Says here ninety feet.”
“Jesus, I'd have trouble walkin' that - “
“You can walk it if you get four balls, apparently -”
“Four balls?”
“Anyway, how're we gonna fit a ninety foot diamond on the football field?
This was an important point.
It should be noted that the only sports ground available to us were sized
for soccer and rugby, narrow rectangular swards, much smaller than their American
counterparts.But we were Australian Airmen – brave and true, but more
than that, we were beered-up Australian Airmen. No obstacle was insurmountable
to us, nothing would thwart our plans. We wanted to play baseball, dammit,
and we wouldn't be beaten by anything as insignificant as a narrow playing
field. Hell, no!
We signed out a softball kit (all we could get) and,
over the obligatory beers-in-the-Mess, eagerly sorted through the equipment.
Two chipped and splintery bats. Two fat, battered softballs, scuffed and grimed.
Three lumpy gray bags of mattress ticking that would serve as bases. Half
a dozen sausage-fingered leather gloves of different hues – black, brown
and in one case an odd combination of the two. And one salty-sweaty-smelly
catcher's mask No one immediately volunteered for catcher, but the Majors
were cocked, locked and ready to rock and roll.
I'd located a sports store in the local township that actually had a single
baseball in stock. It later occurred to me that it may have been ordered in
by some other long ago, alcohol-fueled attempt at forming a team. We set up
our bases on the soccer field, a patchy block of land, the long side of which
edged up to a scrubby, gumtree-filled ravine. And, being Australia, the ravine
was undoubtedly home to a variety of things poisonous. With the checked-out
copy of the encyclopedia propped open on the hood of someone's car –
and with their beer coolers stocked – the self-appointed umpires were
ready to go.
“Are you guys gonna play ball or whut?” yelled one of them. Then:
“How was that?”
“Very authentic.”
It was like an old Bugs Bunny cartoon – onetwothree - yerrrrrout! onetwothree -yerrrrout! - guys swinging at any pitch that even remotely approached the strike zone. They were swinging themselves into future back problems, all crossed-up legs and corkscrews, looks of disbelief on their sweating, red faces – how the hell could I not hit that?? - and all to the taunts and jeers of the in-and-out fielders who knew there wasn't a chance in hell a ball was ever going beyond the baselines.But, hey, it was fun. And, of course, the beer helped enormously.
The game, probably the shortest baseball game ever played
in Australia, lasted less than an hour. The brand new baseball would up –
inexplicably – being smacked across the field and down into the ravine,
never to be seen again and, in an uncommon flash of prudence, it was decided
not to risk the air force-issued softballs – after all, if we lost them,
we'd have to replace them. A few guys tried a form of catch, while others
fired up the barbecue, but our throws were pretty sloppy and we soon grew
tired of stooping and setting down our beers to chase after wild pitches.
And so ended the Glenbrook Majors' tilt at glory's windmill and baseball immortality.
Just as well.
Despite this, I still maintained a keen interest in the game, although at that time there was a paucity of information available, to say the very least. The Sydney papers paid scant attention to America's Game, the sports pages instead stuffed with cricket scores, racing results and, of course, microscopic detail on rugby league, Aussie Rules and soccer. They reported on the British Open, Wimbledon tennis, cricket in South Africa, England and Pakistan; motor racing in the south of France, for God's sake and – sometimes – if you were very, very lucky (and if there was a tiny space available) they'd print a brief summary of games played in the American League. Brief, tantalizing fragments of intelligence – New York 8, Toronto 2 – and nothing else. To me, this was important stuff. Not the scores themselves – in this context they were almost meaningless – but the fact that someone was working for the Sydney Morning Herald who actually acknowledged that American Baseball existed gave me some slim hope. The cryptic names and numbers proved it. Sadly, the scores could be days old and the standings were rarely, if ever, revealed. And then, as we approached our Summer months, a small wire service article would appear, all but hidden to the casual observer, announcing that the vaunted New York Yankees had won the World Series. Again.
This was the late eighties. When those rare nuggets
of baseball ephemera surfaced in the Herald, I wasn't following any particular
team – certainly not the Yankees – but I always checked to see
how Thomas Magnum's Detroit Tigers were doing. I hadn't yet formed any specific
allegiance simply because the flyspecks of information wouldn't permit it.
But my interest in the game – and my curiosity – remained undiminished.
Early in 1988, the Big Blue Machine decided I'd had just enough time to settle
into my current posting and issued orders sending me to the city of Melbourne,
an entire state away, to help produce flight manuals. I would – for
the first time in my so-called career – supervise not only civil servants,
but female civil servants. And before you pigeonhole me as sexist –
let me assure you that these ladies were tough broads. Okay, go ahead and
pigeonhole me. In any case, the prospect hardly cheered me as I drove the
seven hundred odd miles south. We employed civilian draftsmen to produce airfield
diagrams for our flight planning documents and I quickly made friends with
one of them. Hugh Bird was not only an excellent draftsman, but a fine artist.
He was also a staunch Red Sox fan. Some years earlier, Hugh had realized a
dream of his own and visited the United States. He wound up in Boston where
he found both the Red Sox and the girl he'd later marry – talk about
your parallel universe concept. Unfortunately, Hugh's marriage didn't last
but he remained faithful to the Red Sox. He'd swing by my desk, a grin splitting
his salt-and-pepper beard - “Boston beat the Yanks five two,”
he'd say. “Wish I knew what the standings were.” You and me both.
See, this was way before the internet. As an American-born
baseball fan, try to imagine the frustration we were feeling back then in
the Antipodes. Intermittent scores (not even box scores, just a win or a loss
reported), no standings, nothing at all, just the bland entry: Boston 5, New
York 2. It was like poring over pages of World War Two code intercepts and
finally seeing a phrase en clair – exciting, to be sure, but just another
jigsaw piece. Hell, we didn't even know what the players looked liked. So,
we struggled on into the nineties. I was posted to our excuse for the Pentagon,
Air Force Office in Canberra, our bucolic if not boring national capitol.
The shunted me off to Campbell Park Offices – where NCO's go to die
– an ugly, multi-storied gray rectangle that butted up against some
scrubby country hills. I could look out from my third floor window and watch
herds of big red kangaroos cavorting amongst the gum trees – probably
the only time the wildlife-in-the-streets cliché had any validity.
Although, one morning I had to take the long way out of the car park because
a four foot long brown snake was sunning itself on the footpath. It was about
this time that I started to hear dark rumors about a sinister new supercomputer
application that was being developed by the US Military. They called it the
World Wide Web and it would revolutionize the we traded information globally.
Yeah, right, I sniffed. And I can't even get the damn standings.
But this was 1993 and Al Gore's internet was still a few years in my future.
Meantime, my penchant for shooting off my big fat mouth had finally begun
to endanger my future in the military, eroding a fifteen year career that
had skyrocketed me to the rank of Corporal. There was talk in the Mess of
redundancy packages for old, bold bigmouths like me. This was my chance –
my last chance – to change the direction of my life before I was committed
to becoming the world's oldest serving NCO. Or just plain old committed. So,
I took the package and decided to go see The World.
Of course, the United States loomed large in my thoughts. Of course I must
go to America – after all, every thing's free in America. But as an
Australian, I had an unwritten obligation to see Europe – and to a lesser
extent Asia, first if I was to travel at all. The usual practice for young
Australians was to take the Grand Tour on completion of university and receipt
of the degree he or she would use upon their return as their entree to the
shiny marble columns of the Corporate World and everlasting riches and happiness.
And all this at the relatively tender age of twenty four or so. In the Summer
of '93, I was three months away from my 34th birthday birthday and –
ergo – officially ten years late. Then again, I hadn't been to university,
either. Hell, I hadn't even finished high school.
My redundancy package bought me a round-the-world airline
ticket and imbued me with a mix of excitement and fear that was both exhilarating
and liberating. I promised myself I wouldn't get a haircut for at least six
months. So, on a bright blue morning in January '94, Qantas zoomed me skyward,
heading towards Indonesia and points beyond. Sure, it'll be exciting, yeah,
yeah, Europe'll be a real kick, absolutely. But, always in the back of my
mind was the thought of America – and some honest-to-goodness baseball.
Like I'd planned, I was saving the best for last.
And all of this, in a roundabout fashion, brings me back to Fenway Park on
the 30th of May, 1994, and Section 26, Box 148, Row N, Seat 5 – top
of the aisle on third base. (I still have the ticket). I was enjoying my first
Fenway Frank (which kicked off my ongoing appreciation for Gulden's Spicy
Brown Mustard) and sipping cold beer from a plastic cup, awaiting the start
of my very first, real, live baseball game. I crane my pointy little head
around what's been called the nostalgic little bandbox of Fenway Park. I've
never seen it before, only heard its name, invoked in tones reserved for Valhalla
and Olympus. The field is all criss-crossed green turf, Technicolor Green,
like the turf must be in Ireland. The warning tracks are a wonderfully rich
and creamy loam, carefully tended and racked into perfection. There are the
bases, bright white linen squares anchored into precise position. The baselines
are arrow-straight and as bright as icing sugar. And, over there to my left
It stands, iconic, symbolic, amazing – that vast green expanse of wall
that seems to tower much higher than its actual thirty seven feet...The famous
Green Monster, housing the oldest hand-operated scoreboard in all baseball,
dimpled from the impacts of hundreds of hits, would-be homers, snagged at
the last instant by the Monster's implacable visage. But not quite high enough
to frustrate men with names like Ruth and Williams, Yazstremski and Fisk.
And Bucky Bleeping Dent.
The Park isn't quite as full today as it would become
– consistently – a decade later. No, today is no 35,000 plus sellout,
although the stands are quite full for a Monday in Boston when most people
are at work. But work is the last thing I'm thinking about – I'm eating
hotdogs and drinking beer in the middle of the day and watching a young woman
from the Shawmut Bank preparing to render the National Anthem, as the Honor
Guard troops the Colors on the infield. Oh, Say Can You See? I follow the
example of those around me and rise to my feet. I don't have a Red Sox cap
– yet – so I have nothing to hold over my heart. Diplomatically,
I switch my beer to my left hand and use my right. I hear the words in my
head and wonder about the appropriateness of a foreigner singing someone else's
national anthem and it occurs to me that I'm very probably the only Australian
at the game and certainly the only one who knows the words to The Star Spangled
Banner. Then – all of a sudden – it's Play Ball!
The Boston pitcher, Aaron Sele fires off a fastball – it's so fast I
don't even see it. Later, I'll find that my brand new video camera couldn't
see it either. Some pitch. And old Aaron was still working in 2005 –
right up until a 13 game losing streak cost him his job with the Mariners.
Vince Coleman led off for the Kansas City Royals that day, followed by Brian McRae and Wally Joyner. KC didn't score, but Boston racked up three in the bottom of the first. More dogs, more beer. Hits, misses, strikeouts, ground-outs, foul balls, line drives and a bunch of walks. But by the fifth inning, the Royals are up, five to three. Things aren't looking good for my newly adopted team. Then, blessedly, the seventh inning stretch arrives and the beer is turned off – probably a good thing – and I make a long overdue pitstop. I get back to my seat in juts enough time to see what I'd been waiting for – Mike “Gator” Greenwell (who would spend his entire career with the Red Sox) blasts a home run – the first I've ever seen and his eighth of the year. Scott Cooper steps up to the plate – the crowd chanting “Coop, Coop” - and fails to get on. Then finally, happily, Andy Tomberlin gets his only homer of the '94 season and ties up the game. KC fails to score in the top of the ninth. But I feel sure that the Sox will come through – after all, it's my chance to witness the cliché: a desperate struggle towards victory with two out, nobody on, in the fabled Bottom Of The Ninth. By now, you're probably thinking I know my baseball. The truth is I can't remember which player drove in the winning run that day back in '94. I do know that Boston won, six to five, in the tenth inning – after all, I was there – but it happened twelve years ago and I've eaten too much food prepared in aluminum cookware to retain a razor sharp recall. So, I refreshed my memory a little at www.baseball-almanac.com – and personally, I think it makes for a better story!
So ended my first live baseball game and thus began
my infatuation with the team from Boston. I lingered on the Fenway concourse,
buying souvenir baseballs and one last hot dog before spilling out onto Yawkey
Way with the rest of Red Sox Nation – even before the term had been
coined, they were always there, the Fenway Faithful, the guys and gals who
believed not in curses, but in the irrefutable fact that – someday –
their Boys of Summer would rise above the ruck and make it all the way to
the mythical World Series, bringing the pennant back to Beantown for the first
time since 1918.
The cabdriver immediately recognized as being from way out of town. I guess
my appalling Crocodile Dundee accent gave me away.
“So where you from?”
“Australia. Sydney.”
“No kidding? And you're a Sawx fan?”
“Well, I am now”
I fielded the usual questions about kangaroos and koala bears and then, naturally,
came the question du jour:
“So, who won?”
“We did.” I'd already attached my self to the Team. “Beat
'em six five.”
“No kidding, that's great.” The driver paused a second and eyed
me in the rear view like I was some kind of talisman he'd been searching for.
“You should go to tomorrah's game – we need the luck.”
But, unknown to me at the time, I wouldn't be able to make the next day's
game. Sometime between leaving Fenway that day and falling into my noisy dorm
room bed at the Hemmenway Street Youth Hostel, I'd have made the decision
to head north into Maine – and to Boothbay Harbor, where The Siren lay
in wait, ready, willing and completely able to distract me from anything but
her.
Luckily for me, the players decided to strike.
My Grand Tour ended in late '94 and I returned to Australia brimming with
enthusiasm and confidence that my second chance was about to begin. And why
not? I had no formal qualifications and I was broke.
Everything changed – I quickly found work with a big advertising agency
and got myself a small apartment on Sydney's north shore – I may have
been aiming a little above my station. But I was getting a regular paycheck
that kept me in beer, food and King Edward Invincible cigars, and The Sire
– still very much on the scene – had agreed to fly down under
for New Year's Eve. Everything had changed, matured, evolved.
Baseball reporting had not.
If anything, the time between those maddeningly cryptic one-line reports –
NYY 7 -BOS 2 – seemed longer and longer. Consequently, what little intelligence
I was receiving was even more useless – especially without knowledge
of the standings to help pull the strands together.
My job at the agency (Senior Vice President in charge of Light bulb Changing)
didn't come close to meriting one of those new-fangled desk top computer gadgets,
chances to explore the burgeoning world wide web were scarce. Indeed, the
cost for this new technology was prohibitive for anything but legitimate business
research. And of course, surfing porn. It may be difficult for you young kids
to believe, but back then, internet access was restricted to a favored few
– and you can be sure they abused the hell out of it.
Of course, the emerging breed of IT professional all had access – and
in some cases, an almost sociopathis need for friendship. So, judicious cultivation
could result in some limited access to those far away places with the strange-sounding
names – like dubya dubya dubya dot em ell bee dot com.
But these opportunities – like glory – were somewhat fleeting.
They merely served to whet an ever-increasing appetite and leave you wanting
more. Like box scores. Like DL reports. Like any other damn thing you could
get. Hell, I wanted to see a game again! Improvements in our sports reporting
would be nice, sure, but it wouldn't quite cut it. I needed to see a game
again, like I needed to have a cigarette with my morning coffee. Take me out
to the freakin' ballgame, pleeaase!
The something approaching a miracle occurred
Some guy got Australian semi-pro baseball of its parochial butt and into the
sports pages. Based along lines similar to the American model, there'd be
major league teams (funny, considering there were no AAA, or AA or even plain
old single A teams) and, eventually, some form of play-off for a pennant or
a silver cup or some damn thing.
Now, this wasn't the first time that baseball had been attempted as an organized
sport In Australia. Way back in the late nineteenth century, they were playing
a form of organized ball and – whaddya know? - it had been pretty damn
popular. But cricket had always been the dominant sport. And why not? We were
a nation of convict descendants who had always aspired to be as good as the
Britishers who'd banished us down under in the first place. Baseball got plain
old relegated – cricketers would play baseball in the off-season just
to hone their skills. Some of them still do it today.
The Sydney team called themselves the Sydney Blues – and you can take
that any way you like. Their home field was an old show ring at the now defunct
Royal Agricultural Show grounds on the fringe of the inner city – roughly
the same distance as Fenway is from downtown Boston. Incidentally, this is
now the site of Fox Studios, the place where they shot The Matrix and where
young Tommy Cruise proved that some missions were indeed possible, given the
right amount of good old American know-how, can-do spirit and special effects.
Put it this way – Tom and the Wachowski Brothers had more luck there
than the hapless Sydney Blues ever did.
When I heard that the Blues were about to kick off their season, I was filled
with curiosity – could this new league possibly approach the same level
of excitement and razzamatazz as their US counterparts or would they just
be another Glenbrook Majors? Would I be able to root, root, root for this
particular home team?
The short answer is no.
First mistake – the season started in what seemed like the dead of winter.
Now, given that Australian winters are hardly as cruel as those in New England,
this might not appear to be a problem. But, imagine this, Boston sports fans:
Opening Day at Fenway is changed to late October. Larry has had all the plastic
seats removed in a cynical cost-cutting exercise, so all there is to sit on
are cold concrete slabs. There are no hot dog vendors either – you have
to stump along on your frozen feet back into the concourse and queue for a
bright red dog swimming in grease and served in a starchy, stale bun with
ketchup, for pity's sake, not even mustard. Gulden's?? What the hell is Gulden's??
- and beer that while tasty and chock full of alcohol to be sure, has shards
of ice floating in it and is served in aluminum cans that'll tear the skin
off your lip if you're not careful.
And, if you haven't had the cosmic foresight to bring along a cushion, chances
are you'll wake up the next morning with a terribly unfortunate condition,
treatable only by bed rest and generous application of something called Preparation
H.
But this was hardly the worst of it.
The thing was, Sydney baseball just didn't have it. Even the Kansas City Royals
can generate at least a little excitement for their fans, but our home town
team was, well, ordinary. There was no spark, no thrill, no real excitement.
I almost gave up right there.
But then I landed a job where management didn't give a rat's derriere how
many employees had internet access – as long as we didn't surf port
– and suddenly I was in ballgame heaven. I could peruse the players'
stats. I could scope out the opposition and read a dozen opinions about a
dozen teams. I could check the standings any damn time I wanted. I could even
see what the players actually looked like! It couldn't get any better –
but, then it did.
They introduced Cable Television to Australia.
The only thing I was missing was the chance to see a living, breathing game.
But I had everything else I needed – Pardon The Interruption, This Week
In Baseball, Fox Sports Channel – and right from the beginning, I started
to wonder just who the hell this Tim McCarver guy was anyway – but there
was Joe Morgan and Jon Miler calling the plays over on ESPN, so I was happy
and content.
Saturday mornings, I would make a pot of coffee, fire up a cigar and –
thanks to the time difference – tune in the Friday night Sox game on
the computer and spend the morning listening to the colorful calls of Joe
and Trup on WEEI, Red Sox Radio Network – one eight hundred fifty four
GIANT – and watching the play-by-play on MLB Gameday.
Until – finally – I made it back to Boston, clutching a handful
of tickets I'd purchased online months earlier.
And that's how – one late September day in 2005 – I came to be
sitting by myself at a table inside Fenway Park's Hall of Fame club, waiting
for famed sportswriter Frank DeFord to speak about his new book, The Old Ballgame.
The event was part of the Great Fenway Writers' Series, created by former
Kennedy press guy, George Mitrovich.
I was traveling alone at the time, and when three heavy-set somewhat goofy
looking old guys came up and asked if they could join my table, I obliged,
glad of the company. But, they sat down with their free lunches and tucked
right in, discussing the problem of pahking their cahs around the Fenway precinct,
ignoring me. After a while, though, they acknowledged my presence again and
belatedly introduced themselves. In the process, my accent was noticed and
the questions started – so, where you from, Sydney? No kidding? And
you';re a Sawx fan? Really? How'd that happen?
“I saw my first game here back in '94 and I've been a fan ever since.
So, what do you guys do?”
“Well, I teach economics and Fred here teaches political science and
ole Whitey over there teaches law.”
And just where did these knucklehead-looking guys teach? A little place over
by Cambridge called Harvard. To look at them, you'd think they were just three
reasonably educated white collar stiffs, with middle management gigs in the
Prudential Building or down in the Hub, and all with a mutual love of the
Red Sox. And this is what I'm trying to tell you – baseball transcends
all lines of community division, it's the one common interest that connects
Harvard professors and bank clerks and allows them an opportunity to enjoy
a conversation together that they otherwise would never have had.
But while baseball can do that, Boston baseball is unique. So far, I've not
mentioned The Curse of The Bambino – mainly because I've tried for ages
not to believe in it. Last century when Boston owner and apparent knucklehead,
Harry Frazee got the urge to become a Broadway producer, he needed cash and
the easiest way to raise it was to deal one of the Red Sox best players to
the Yankees. The decision came shortly after Boston's 1918 World Series win
and the player in question was another knucklehead called Babe Ruth, the eponymous
Bambino. And Boston took another 86 six years to win their next World Series.
And thus – or so Mr Shaughnessy would have you believe – was born
The Curse. But in all that time, the Fenway Faithful were always there, stoic
in ongoing defeat, confident that there was always “next year”.
It wasn't as though the Sox were losing regularly – on the contrary,
they could play terrific ball, five or six game winning streaks, grinding
away at the standings, clawing upwards towards October – and sometimes,
they'd even win the division. But World Series wins, while heartbreakingly
close, still eluded the team and often in the most tragic ways. Eighty six
years is a long, long time – aww, gee, ya think?? - and there were fans
who were born and lived and died, waiting in vain for the next Big Win.
Like every soul in Red Sox Nation, I experienced my own bitter disappointment
with the Red Sox in 2003. Throughout the season, the boys played some pretty
good ball, winding up with 95 wins and 67 losses at the end of the regular
season to clinch the wild card berth for the Divisional Play offs. And who
did they have to defeat to progress to the World Series?
The New York Yankees.
The Spankees, The Bankees, call 'em what you will as long as it's disrespectful.
George Steinbrenner's Evil Empire. In fact, every time Big Stein shows up
in Seinfeld re-runs, I smile quietly to myself, knowing somehow that the real
George is probably every bit as nuts as the TV version.
October 8, 2003. In front of 56,000 rabid New Yorkers, the Red Sox kept the
Yanks scoreless for six innings, going deep for homers three times and winning
Game One of the Divisional Championship Play offs, five to two.
This was what New Englanders apparently call a wicked good staht.
The following night, New York bounced back and beat the Sox, six – two.
Series tied.
Game Three, they beat us by one lousy run. Game Four, with the home ground
advantage (and some great defense), we beat them. By one lousy run. Series
tied again.
Game Five, the Six returned to the House That Ruth Built and promptly lost.
But Game Six, we kicked their butts, nine to six and – deep, calming
breath – Series Tied again, forcing Game Seven.
The Sox played like Division Champs in game Seven, up five to two in the top
of the eighth. The, the first crack appeared – Jeter, Matsui and Williams
all scored. And suddenly, sickeningly, the Game was all tied up.
I was sitting in the big trading room of the bank where I worked, watching
the game live – and only a non-fan would say I should have been working.
It was somewhere around midday, Sydney time, and I was getting kind of anxious
– vocal support for sporting events was discouraged on the trading floor
– and as we went into the Ninth, I had both low caffeine and nicotine
warning lights flashing, but nothing was taking me away from that TV screen.
After all, there was only one inning left and after the Sox scored just one
more run – and, of course, retired the final three Yankee hitters –
I could stroll outside, flushed with triumph and have smoke and a cuppa joe.
We got a couple of hits in the top of the ninth, but nothing came of it and
suddenly I'm thinking about extra innings. The Yankees stepped up –
Johnson popped out, Jeter struck out (sweet!) and Williams smacked a grounder
for the third out. Into the tenth and you want to talk about tension? I was
wringing my hands like an old woman, tapping my toes on the floor, grinding
my molars and wishing for a cigarette. Nomar gets called out on strikes –
can you believe it? - and Manny grounds out. David Ortiz strides to the plate
– Mr Clutch at bat. Under my breath, I'm chanting for him – come
on, Papi, just one hit, man, I don't care, just get a hit, sure a double would
be nice, even a triple, I don't dare hope for a homer, but, hey, if you got
one in you, Now Is The Time.
Ortiz doubled. I started breathing again. Then Kevin Millar, the lovable Texan,
didn't Cowboy Up – he popped up to Jeter at short. Side retired. Game
still tied. Bottom of the tenth and I'm squirming in my seat, wanting to stick
my face into the TV screen and out-scream the Yankees fans.
Matsui grounded out and the two fly balls from Posada and Giambi had me chewing
my knuckles until they were both caught, sending me, 56,000 Yankees fans and
the entire world-wide population of Red Sox Nation to a level of tense, rigid
anxiety that was almost unbearable. And people wonder why I love this game.
We failed to get a hit in the top of the eleventh. I'm already thinking about
the batting order for the top of the twelfth. Then Aaron Boone steps up to
the plate for the Yanks in the bottom of the eleventh. Boone had entered the
game earlier, pinch running for Sierra in the eighth. I didn't know much about
this kid, other than he came to New York from the mariners – no big
deal – so, there wasn't much to worry about. I was more concerned about
the hitters that might follow.
Tim Wakefield, the Boston pitcher, sets on the mound, winds up and deals.
And Boone connects. The ball soars high into the night. Home Run.
Yankees Win.
One of the traders, a Canadian and a Blue Jays fan, pats my shoulder as he
strolls by.
“Wait until next year, Mark.”
I open my mouth but nothing comes out. I have never felt this way before –
shocked, utterly stunned and acutely disappointed. Plain old sad. I switch
the TV back to Bloomberg channel and – with my shoulders even rounder
than usual – slumped out of the trading room and back to my office.
My colleagues didn't have to ask who won. Apparently, the dumbfounded goldfish
look on my face said it all.
As it turned out, I only had to wait one more year for the Red Sox to win
their first World series in eighty six long, hard, colorful, tragic, exhilarating
years.
But that's another story.
So, here I sit at my little desk, in my little studio apartment, living and
working in a city where The Old Ballgame doesn't mean a thing. It's late December
as I write this and my couple of games at Fenway back in September, '05 seem
long ago and far away. I've pinned my 2007 Year Planner on the wall of my
office, with the tentative Sox schedule penciled in, waiting for a check mark
or a cross, a win or a loss, when the regular season gets under way in April
next year.
And so, the Big Question I'm always asked approaches its answer. Why do I
like baseball? Look at all the things it gives me: entertainment, history,
athleticism, drama, comedy and tragedy. Things to collect on Ebay. Glamor
– Movie Star players with Movie Star looks and Movie Star wives. Those
terrific games where the losing side can rally in the last moments and win,
the best kind of victory, that come-from-behind, against-all-odds kind of
victory. Amazing one-of-a-kind plays, the guys doing things on the field that
you'll probably only ever see once in your life. Baseball can make you feel
like you're part of something important, something that matters to people,
undivided by class or culture, position or wealth. It can make you feel plain
great and – sometimes – it can break your heart. As the old saying
goes, you can love baseball, but it won't necessarily love you back.
And while I ponder the next few months without the game I love to distract
me from my daily travails, I think about Larry Lucchino and John Henry and
Young Mister Epstein, trying to rebuild the team for another year, another
tilt at the title of World's Champion. Like every year at this time, I wish
them the best and give up my thanks for the season just gone.
And to all those Americans who asked me where I was from and why I liked baseball
so much and who bought me beers at places like The Cask and Flagon, the Cooperstown
Pub and - of course – good old Jimmy's Grill – it's you hospitality
and kindness that I'll remember all through the off season.
And because baseball is in my heart and soul now, I'll be back there with
you next year. And the year after that. I'll be back again, all right. Just
like the Red Sox.
Just like baseball.