What its all about;...

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Posted By: DaveL

I remember playing catch with my dad. He had an Earl Torgeson first base mitt. I have a George Brett .390 model Rawlings glove. My father loved Joe DiMaggio, his dad, who was an immigrant, watched Babe Ruth and Wally Schang. I have a T207 card of Arlie Latham, who played in the old American Association in the 1880's. I watch C.C.Sabathia pitch to Kaz Matsui. And I will play catch with my grandchildren, who may just see the twenty-second century. The Cards, the Game, Fathers, Sons. America. What else do you need to know?

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Posted By: MVSNYC

best post in awhile...

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Posted By: joe

Nice post, anyone who can remember playig catch with their Dad. Or playing ball in the field outside their house.

Joe

Ty Cobb, Spikes flying!

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Posted By: sagard

Thanks for the reminder of how much I got. My seven year old at the hockey game asked me to play some catch tomorrow if it is nice.

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Posted By: H Murphy

It`s all about, listening to a DAY world series game over your elementary school intercom speaker. It`s all about, the "invisible man on second". It`s all about, "automatic grand slam" during wiffel ball in the back yard. It`s all about, cards in your spokes. But mostly it`s about forgetting life`s daily tribulations and being able to enjoy a game now just as you did all those years ago. GO SOX and thanx Dad!

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Posted By: peter chao

It's going to a Giant's game with your dad and sitting far up in the bleachers with your dad on a freezing Candlestick night. It's about buying your first hotdog at the park. It's your dad buying you your first baseball glove. It's about opening your first wax pack with your friends. It's good clean American fun.

Peter C.

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

Great, Dave.

I heard someone talk once about how baseball is not a game. It isn't 9 innings. Not even a season. It is a continuum. I'm a Cardinal fan because my Dad listened to the games on the radio, and took me to St. Louis to see games, over 250 miles away. He was a Cardinal fan because his father was, having again listened on the radio.

I can close my eyes and see Dad hitting me a fly ball in the back yard, so I'd be ready for little league. I can smell the leather of that first glove. Can't we all? I think of those thoughts when tossing ball with my son, or with a kid when I coached. I hope to throw ball with my grandson one day, but he's just now 5 months old. And I like to think that he'll think of me when he's playing catch with a grandson of his.

I remember the sounds of the vendors selling scorecards when I went to my first game, the drabness of the steel girders and concrete in the back walkways, contrasting with the vivid green of the grass, brightness of the sky, the whiteness of the home uniforms... vibrant colors and sounds, as a BP ball would leave the bat and sail lazily out to a nonchalant fielder.

Baseball is a continuum that spans lifetimes, spans generations. Only at the ball park can the lawyer, the construction worker, the nun, the school teacher, the janitor, and other folks; folks who disagree about so much, only at the ball park can they all agree on cheering their team on to victory.

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Posted By: Jason L

It's the feeling you get when...

this past weekend, I hung a shelf in my 5 year old son's room, and I hadn't even unplugged the drill yet before he had already started grabbing his Starting Lineup figures from his dresser to bring them over to arrange on his new display area.

As a lifelong Cubs fan, I felt both pride and some sort of eternal sadness and guilt at having to try and explain to my 5 year old son why the Cubs playoff games were no longer on TV.

Somebody sees your son playing ball with you in the yard and gives you the name of a children's private coach that he thinks he should see...

...he wants to play soccer instead of baseball...ah, -the change of seasons, -and the patience of fatherhood!

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Posted By: Paul S

I remember my father taking me to BIG 5 sporting goods in LA. He bought me a Rawling's Brooks Robinson Model XPG17 -- lefthander version believe it or not (I'm a southpaw) -- for $20, big bucks in those days. I used it to play catch with him as well as games with my friends. That glove later sat in a box for years. Then, when I began playing adult softball I took it out, and a friend told me I could send it to Rawlings, and for a small fee they relaced and reformed it and gave it a nice general tune-up. I'll bet they still do that. Now, on the rare occasion my son wants to play catch, that's what I use.
Jason -- my son's the same with soccer...travel team and all that stuff. Baseball is once in a great while.

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Posted By: Dave Snyder

.........My Dad teaching me how to pitch with a tennis ball becuase I was too small to reach home plate with a baseball at 5 years old. Taking me to my first Red Sox game and getting a banner where he wrote the final score in pen on the top: Red Sox 11, Angels 7. My Dad convincing my mom that I could still play a game at third base after having 4 teeth pulled a couple hours earlier. Taking me back to his hometown in Iowa and showing me the soda stand where he met Louis Aparicio as a kid when he came through town. And me getting him a throwback Stan Musial jersey for his birthday a couple years ago......It's nice to give back.

Thanks Dad!

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Posted By: Jerry Hrechka

My Dad taking me to see the Phillies play at Connie Mack Stadium. Ahhh that magical season of 1964 - When the Phillies blew the pennant. Gene Mauch, Jim Bunning, Chris Short, Johnny Callison, Richie Allen's rookie season. I'll never forget that year.

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Posted By: Dave S

Indeed a great thread...
I remember being 10 in 1964 when my Dad took me to get a new glove and I had the biggest decision of my life: to get the Whitey Ford or Willie Mays model. I got the Ford, a Spalding TraPocket..and beat to death, it still sits in the center spot of my memorabilia. But mostly, the following night, Dad took me to old Municipal Stadium to watch Dean Chance pitch against Leon Wagner (my then favorite), Max Alvis, Vic Davalillo and those lowly Injuns! Don't remember the game itself much but remember Chance coming into the stands (he's from Wooster OH) and signing autographs. Still have it somewhere. But what I recall most was the following morning, Dad had a heart attack. Never so scared in my life, luckily he made it thru for another 25 years...
And I remember taking my 6 year-old son (now 23) to Three Rivers to see his 1st game. Naturally vs. the Cubs. Like my Dad, always got there early to hang out by the rail and watch BP. Standing right by the rail, Greg Maddux walks over and asks if we have a pen...and proceeds to sign a ball and give to my boy...
Memories of baseball never will cease...

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Posted By: Dan P.

Jerry--
As a lifelong Philly area resident, I remember connie mack stadium and the 1964 collapse well. My parents hooked me on baseball when they took me to connie mack stadium for my 8th birthday on 8/25/59.

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

Dan, Jerry, I feel your pain.

As a Cardinal fan, I followed those games at season's end on the radio. Listening through the static. I studied the standings in the morning paper. What a race... the Phillies lost the last 10 games they played in September.

My recollection of Johnny Callison was a strong-armed outfielder who always seemed to get the big part of the bat on the ball. Baseballs he hit always seemed to go about 50 feet further... I think he's a bit overlooked nowadays.

Tony Taylor was on that team, a smoothfielding second baseman. Richie Allen was a good match at shortstop. Back then, who would have imagined that Allen would pack his bags and move around as much as he did. Good batting eye, quick bat, and quite temperamental.

An 18 year old Rick Wise was out there in that bull pen. The 5 regular starters all had winning records that year.

I dreaded Callison at the plate when runners were on, he had 104 RBIs, Allen had 91. And if Short or Bunning were on the mound then it was going to be a difficult day, a quick day.

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Posted By: Jerry Hrechka

On Father's Day 1964 Jim Bunning pitched a perfect game.It was the first game of a double header at Shea Stadium. Rick Wise had the first start of his major league career in the second game. I remember the first few innings he pitched were perfect - I was watching on TV and both my father & I were going nuts.
The Phillies later traded Rick Wise for Steve Carlton.

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Posted By: Al C.risafulli

This past Father's Day, I re-laced my dad's old baseball glove. Then, he came over for barbecue. I took him outside with my son, gave him his old glove, and the three of us played catch in the backyard. We played for hours. It ranks up there among the best memories I've got. Grandfather, father, and son, throwing a ball around as the sun went down behind the trees. I don't remember ever feeling more content.

-Al

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Posted By: peter chao

Frank,

I remember that '64 Phillie team, however, I don't think Richie Allen was playing short any longer.

Peter C.

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Posted By: Frank Wakefield

Right you are, Peter.

Bobby Wine at short, Richie Allen at THIRD BASE.

5 teams in 15 years... he could put the bat on the ball, though.

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Posted By: Ed Ivey

My dad had no athletic ability. Could barely play catch. But he was a walking baseball encyclopedia with a huge box of T206s in his closet.

He always pulled out the Fred Snodgrass card and talked about the muffed fly ball and laughed at the guy's name.

Now, I laugh about Snodgrass. Sure would like to have his autograph.

I think, as Field of Dreams illustrates, baseball is but a premise delineating a father-son bond.

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Posted By: boxingcardman

Wish I had a few of my own. My father was always working. He never owned a glove and I can't recall him ever playing ball with me. So I make damned sure that I play as much as I can with my daughter...

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Posted By: Marty Ogelvie

I don't ever remember my dad playing catch with me.  He never had the time. He was a workaholic. He left for work before I woke up and never made it home before dark, even in the summer.  That didn't make him a bad father, he was just busting his hump to keep a roof over our heads. I can't knock him for that. 

I do remember him going to one of my little league games and after strkiing out 3 times I distinctly remember him yelling from the bleachers 'If you strikeout again, your walking home!' I think he was serious.  I closed my eyes and blooped a double into right field.  After I crossed the plate my dad met me at the dug out entrance sreaming 'atta boy, I knew you could do it'.  That was probably the best feeling in the world.  I will never forget that feeling.

martyOgelvie
nyyankeecards.com

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Posted By: RC

For me, it was about getting up early on a Sunday morning and taking the drive down to Cincinnati. It was the only day Dad had off, he would take us for breakfast before the game, nothing fancy, maybe even in the old Greyhound station. Then we would be ready for when the gates opened, in those days much earlier than now, and check out BP and infield practice.

Great memories and the Reds were pretty good also, we're talking 70's Big Red Machine.

It was also about sitting out the rain delays because I didn't want to leave, going to double-headers, and staying until the last out!

Thanks for the thread.

RC