Baseball Place No. 48: Ripken Center; Alternative Place No. 48A: Memorial Stadium

My brother played catch with Cal Ripken Sr. Really.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Josh Pahigian takes us to the Ripken Center in Aberdeen, Md. as spot No. 48 in his “101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out.”

It sounds like a pretty glorious place. The legendary baseball family has a compound hosting a minor-league team, four scaled-down replicas of major-league parks, camps, clinics and a museum.

Never been there, but I did spend a wonderful evening at a park with the Ripkens.

Alternative place No. 48A) Memorial Stadium

Baltimore was a stop on our epic 1991 ballpark tour for a Journal story about stadiums. We toured an under-construction Camden Yards and arrived at Memorial Stadium for a July 23 game against the California Angels.
Will, John and my brother John toured Camden Yards then enjoyed a game at Memorial.

Memorial Stadium, where the Mets played their first two World Series games, was in its final year.

The Orioles were incredibly accommodating, granting credentials to all four members of our party.

Naturally, we enjoyed this to the fullest, getting down to the field for batting practice. And as we know, I take photos of everything moving and not moving.

Memorial Stadium was in its final season.

Dwight Evans

Wally Joyner and Lance Parrish

Wally Joyner in the cage.

So does my brother, who actually looked like a photojournalist in his khaki vest.

Cal Sr. was hitting fungos, with players tossing the balls back to him so he could again toss them up and smack another fly.

As John was shooting, he felt something bounce off his foot. A throw had gotten away from Cal Sr. and rolled to John.

“Son, can you throw that over here?” Cal Sr. said, ever the gentleman.

John picked it up and tossed it back. Eighteen years later I remain insanely jealous.

Cal Jr.

After shooting everyone and everything we moved up to the press box area for some snacks. The dining room was pretty small and very crowded. A staff member was standing behind a counter.

“Are those crab cakes?” Of course they were. We were in Baltimore. They seemed like the frozen variety, but I did not complain.

Memorial Stadium was such a realxed place that event the grounds crew was having fun and playing catch.

I moved into the press box for the game, which was great because Jim Abbott, a Flint native, was on the hill for the Angels. Seeing Abbott effortlessly transfer his glove from his hand to the end of his arm was simply amazing.

Press boxes aren’t always fun places. Basically there are a lot of openly surly people up there. I got a sense that the athletes don’t treat a lot of these guys all that well, and when you spend all that time in such an environment you tend to pass it on to whomever you come in contact with.

You need to know that there are semi-assigned seats. Some of the little desks bear the name of the news outlet, and others are just kind of claimed because the same people sit in them every game. Visiting media usually sit in the last couple rows.

So I had my seat in the last row and was enjoying my crab cakes -- seemed like the frozen kind, but they were free -- and about two innings into the game the staff ushered in a dad and his elementary school-aged son.

I think there were contest winners or something, and both were dressed in Orioles gear. The staffer scanned the box, saw a couple open seats in the first row and placed them there. Both seemed thrilled.

It wasn’t too much later when a late-arriving writer -- I didn’t catch who it was or who he worked for -- saw these two in his seat and went nuts. I don’t mean some grumbling, this guy was yelling.

The Orioles media relations guy told him to calm down and pointed him to a spot in the last row, next to me. The guy walked up and slammed -- and I mean slammed! -- his stuff down on the desk."Do you believe this?" he said, as if I would share in his outrage. Since he was all worked up and all, I was going to ask him if I could eat his crab cakes, but I thought better of it.

The Orioles media folks are first-rate, and handed me all kinds of information about the under-construction stadium.

But after a while I picked up my folders and headed out to explore the rest of the stadium and catch up with Will, John Munson and my bother. We settled down in the upper deck behind home plate. It seemed odd that the seats were metal bleachers.

Abbott pitched brilliantly, throwing seven shutout innings, striking out seven with five hits – one of them to Cal Jr. – and just one walk while his teammates scored five.

The Angels pen darn near wasted his effort, giving up a grand slam to Randy “Moose” Milligan, who started his career with three games with the 1987 Mets, before traded to the Pirates for Mackey Sasser.

It was a beautiful park on a beautiful night, looking out into the residential neighborhood beyond the field.

A glorious piece of Opening Day arrives by surprise

My cousins spoil me wildly.

Watching Citi Field's first game on ESPN last week, I was thinking how cool it would be to have a program from the historic games.

And having been to some other historic games, like the last game at Tiger Stadium, I've seen the mad scramble from speculators to get such programs. It was pretty ugly.

Several days after the game, my wife called and and said a package arrived from my cousin Mike. I knew Mike was lucky enough to get to the game with is son Conor.

There was much joy when I opened the package and found:

Thank you, Mike and Conor!!!

Yankee fans: Don't mess with my team, it's home or my cap

I avoid conversing with Yankee fans whenever possible. It just doesn’t end well.

We went the mall after church today so my daughter could use her Justice gift card. I maintain that no male has lasted more than five minutes in Justice, which attracts tween girls the way chicken wings attract adult guys.

So I let the ladies rush ahead and slipped into Lids across the hall to see some of the new baseball caps.

I noticed two employees, as I scanned some of the unstructured caps looking for any thing with the Mets on it, which they have on occasion.

“Anything you’re looking for?” the guy worker asked.

“Just looking. Do you have anything for the Mets?”

“Mets?” the female employee said, practically sneering. “I’m a Yankee fan. We can fight now.”

I looked up, and sure enough there was a woman wearing a cheesy unstructured Yankees cap, the kind that looks intentionally “distressed.”

Now, I’d rather look at the Lip Smackers and Web Kinz at Justice than fight with a Yankee fan because it’s not like you’re going to change their minds.

Anyway, I went back to looking at the caps, and there were a couple Mets ones there.

“The Yankees opened their great new stadium last week,” she said. “Maybe the Mets can get one someday.”

OK, I bit. I don’t know why. Maybe I feared the Jonas Brothers t-shirts more than the conversation. But I’m not going to allow these people to start belittling Citi Field with my sweet brick right there on the FanWalk.

“They have a new one, it’s beautiful. And they don’t get beat 22-4 there.”

“Ooooh man, that hurt!” the male employee said with a grimace. I don’t think he was a Yankee fan, and probably suffers greatly by being exposed to co-workers who think Derek F. Jeter has range or that Robinson Cano is a good player

It was a one-punch knockout.

The humbled Yankee fan walked over and showed me the new Mets caps, and said she could special order caps with the Citi Field patch. She special-ordered a Yankee Stadium cap for her husband.

We discussed the merits of putting the patch on the side, like the Mets did, and on the back, like the Yankees did. Naturally I think the Yankee cap looks ridiculous from any direction, but kept that to myself.

I slipped over to Justice, ready to face the “girls rock” t-shirts and flip-flops, my team and its home properly defended.

Baseball Place No. 47: Cardinals Hall of Fame and Museum

Now that the Mets have won a game at their beautiful new home, we can head back on the road with Josh.

And once again, we find ourselves in the same place, and that would be the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame Museum.

Technically we’re setting aside spot No. 46 in the “101 Baseball Places to See before You Strike Out” because I have to take some photos of an historic place here in Grand Rapids.

So we’ll go right to No. 47, which sadly, is closed for now.

The Cardinals had a wonderful Hall of Fame in the lower levels of the old Busch Stadium. It later moved it across the street into the National Bowling Hall of Fame.

I suspect this was because the bowling hall lacked visitors. In fact, the bowling hall packed up and headed to Texas in November. A new Cards museum is expected to be a part of a new development across from the new stadium, should the retail-office-residential complex get built.

But all was good back in 1993 when my wife and I caught up with Tony for a day of adventure.

We learned a lot, too. For instance, it used to get so hot on the Busch Stadium artificial turf that players would run off the field after each inning and jump — spikes and all — into tubs of ice water kept in the dugout.

I got this from a pretty good source: former Cardinals outfielder and future Met Bernard Gilkey.

My editors at The Flint Journal knew of my love for all things St. Louis and sent me to write a travel story about the city. Armed with an expense account, we enjoyed all St. Louis had to offer, all in the name of research, of course.

Naturally, a game at Busch Stadium was on our list of things to see, and the Rockies, in their inaugural year, were in town.

Even more exciting, we found out that the Cardinals offered stadium tours.
Check out all the dents in the dugout wall from foul balls.

This was too good to pass up. We were not allowed in the clubhouse – there was a game that night, after all -- but we got some behind-the-scenes peeks of the press box and other areas.

Tony, a would-be base-stealer.

The highlight, by far, was going out on the field and hanging out in the dugout. The artificial turf was indeed like fuzzy concrete with very little bounce. That didn’t stop us from doing sweet Ozzie Smith flips.

Well, more like Tony holding my feet while I did something resembling a handstand for a photo. But properly cropped, me and Ozzie are one and the same!

After exploring the field, the tour took us into the Cardinals museum. The Cards have a pretty rich history, and it was all displayed well.

There was much to see, with jerseys, equipment, championship pennants, stadium models and other artifacts. The Cards have a pretty impressive history, and they present it without the in-you-face-bow-before-the- Yankee-gods another team adopts.

Much to our glee, we found that on some Saturday afternoons, a Cardinals player is in the museum to meet fans.

And there, as if he was one of the exhibits, was Bernard Gilkey.

There wasn’t a big crowd that day, so we had plenty of time to chat.This was a surprise, so I wasn’t prepared with a ball for Bernard to sign. I offered the bill of my Cards home cap as he gave us the inside scoop about the turf, and that the temperature on the field sometimes reached 110 degrees, hence the ice water.


We also popped into the bowling museum, which brought back flashbacks of my high school years when I was the show and score sheet kid at 300 Bowl in Massapequa Park.

It was clear that the people running the place took bowling very seriously. We did not, but had fun playing on the old fashioned lanes in the lower level.

I was in St. Louis again in October, and saw the signs that the museum was closing and popped in to squish some pennies for my daughter and grab some very discounted souvenirs.

I didn’t have time to walk through the Cardinals museum one more time, but I expect to take another tour when the new version opens. Maybe Bernard Gilkey will be there again.

Saying hello to Citi Field by holding on to a piece of Shea Stadium

My slice of heaven arrived.

With my in-laws serving as prime enablers and spoiling me wildly, my family decided I should bid on a piece of Shea Stadium as a birthday present. It was fitting since the stadium made its debut about two weeks after I did in 1964.

The team’s Web site has been trickling out directional and informational signs, photos, ads, banners, flags and other items from our favorite ballpark for an online auction.

And there are bricks, napkin dispensers, dugout bench slices and even visitor lockers in a “buy it now” section where you can obtain artifacts without having to compete.

I have some ballpark remains in the baseball room, with seats from Milwaukee and Cleveland, a brick from Milwaukee and small section of Riverfront Stadium turf. Also some infield dirt from Wrigley, Milwaukee and what was then Joe Robbie Stadium, and some of Tiger Stadium pitcher's mound.

All are wonderful, but none of them came from Shea.

So I scanned the list of items available to select a target. None of them are bad, obviously. And I was able to eliminate about 90 percent of the items because they were already crazy expensive.

I also decided I wanted something that was attached to the actual stadium. So the parking space nametags for Mets executives and the vinyl signs that hung from the light poles were eliminated.

I also thought the Diamond Club check presenters also didn’t cut it, since there will likely be items just like it in Citi Field, and I wanted something more stadium-related.

Then I decided I wanted something that was permanent, something that was a part of the stadium from its first game to its last.

That narrowed the list to three items: a brick, a brick that was a part of the outfield wall, and metal elbows from the railings in the stands.

Bricks are very cool. And paired with my Citi Field Fanwalk brick from Cousin Tim, it would have been a neat display.

But I focused on the metal elbows. I’ve seen people with bricks, but I’ve never seen railing sections like this before on display.

The pipe is about an inch-and-a-half across, and the section is just shy of a foot. There’s a company name tag for the firm that held the box seats -- thought the first one I bid on was blank – and a metal number riveted to the top.

MeiGray Group, the auctioneer, tries to attach players to the box numbers, which is kind of silly since it’s not like Mike Piazza has any connection to this elbow because it was No. 31.

I felt kind of a personal connection to the railings. They’re a part of the stadium I was very familiar with, having leaned on them and banged on them all those years.

They’re a part of Shea I recall vividly from my childhood. And unlike the concession stand signs or even the gate markers, these elbows where there when Jack Fisher threw the first pitch, when Cleon Jones caught the fly that ended the 1969 Series, and when Buddy and Pete went at it.

They were on the job when all we had to cheer for were Pat Zachary and Doug Flynn, when Tom Seaver came home in triumph in 1983 and throughout the domination of 1986.

They held firm and strong through homers including Mike Scioscia’s sucker punch, Robin Ventura’s grand slam single, Mike Piazza’s grief release in 2001 and when Yadier Molina earned “Bleeping” as a middle name.

They were there for my first game – Banner Day with my family in 1971 – and the final game last year with Dad and Tim.

The railings were at Shea for the first game through the last.

With the brick as a back-up, I bid on an orange elbow with a blank sign, got out-bid in the final hours, and found another, bid late and crossed my fingers.

“The rubble,” as my family calls it, It arrived over the weekend and was waiting on our porch when we arrived home.

Apparently workers or clients from D.F. King & Co. Inc. sat there for years, judging from the condition of the nameplate. The company’s Web site says it is a “leading full-service proxy solicitation and corporate/financial communications firm, specializing in proxy contests and tender/exchange offers for corporate control.”

Not exactly sure what that is, but I hope they enjoyed their seats as much as I’m enjoying the railing that enclosed them.

As all this planning and plotting was transpiring, My Aunt Dorothy and Uncle Jim surprised me with a medallion that has some glorious dirt from Shea’s infield. What a treasure!

So now I have Shea’s field and stands represented in the baseball room. Actually on the fireplace mantle in the living room, but I’m not sure how long my wife is going to allow that.

But with something to hold and keep, I can reluctantly let go of Shea today as the Mets play their first game in their new ballpark.

It’s a blank slate, with only one layer of still-drying paint on its railing, ready to be the setting for new memories, all starting tonight.

Baseball Place No. 45: Joe DiMaggio's Italian Chophouse; and 45A) Montgomery Inn

There’s no truth to the rumor that we tried to open the frame holding a Tom Seaver Reds jersey at the famous Montgomery Inn so we could rub our hands on its polyester glory.

Oh, sure, we contemplated it. That was back in 2002 at we embarked on our second BaseballTruth.com Executive Game, taking in games in Dayton and then Riverfront – OK, Cinergy Field, if you insist -- in its final year.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Josh Pahigian is taking us to Joe DiMaggio’s Italian Chophouse in San Francisco for spot No. 45 in his “101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out.”

Damned if I know why.

It’s not like DiMaggio ever set foot in the place. He died in 1999, and the restaurant opened in 2006.

The company owns it specializes in celebrity themed restaurants. Josh says this is the most upscale of the company’s places. It sounds like the memorabilia consists of old photographs.

Snore.

I’m starting to doubt Josh’s cred as a Red Sox fan. He seems to be bending over backward to list Yankee shrines, even pretend ones like this.

Naturally, I have no intention of checking out this place, so I’m offering up:

Alternative Place No. 45A) Montgomery Inn, Montgomery , Ohio

Like I was saying, we headed to Cincy for our second Executive Game, and Will noted that it would only be proper to start our adventure at the most famous rib place in the state.

And while there are several Montogmery Inns now – and even concession stands in Great American Ballpark – Will insisted that we needed to dine at the original, where Ted “Rib King” Gregory first concocted the amazing sauce to coat the pork.

After picking up Scott, we headed over to Montgomery, a Cincinnati suburb. The restaurant is kind of unassuming on the outside. But the interior is a spectacular show of wall-to-wall framed jerseys, most of them signed.

It’s almost hard to hold a conversation in the place because my eyes were constantly drifting some new treasure revealed above someone else’s table.

The waitress came and took our orders, and both Will and Scott requested a side of Gregory’s special sauce and suggested I do the same. Don’t the ribs come covered in sauce?
We dined at the Montgomery Inn concession stand at Great American last year. This is a pulled-pork sandwich, with an extra container of sauce, of course.

The side cup was for dipping, they replied. Of course, they were correct because that sauce is amazing. I was dipping the chips and bread, and would have probably dipped my salad, too, had I saved some.

The one slight disappointment was that I didn’t see a jersey for the greatest played every to step on a mound wearing a Reds home uniform, and that would be Tom Seaver. Everyone else was there.

But why would I doubt? Tom was in a place of prominence, a high-traffic area near the door. Alas, it was well-protected from out sauce-stained fingers.

We had a great time in Dayton, and I don’t think any of us hit a concession stand for food after our Montgomery Inn visit.

And Cinergy/Riverfront the next day was a thrill. It was looking almost Shea-like with its outfield seats removed and the new park rising just beyond the wall.

There was much joy when I discovered bottles of Montgomery Inn sauce in my local supermarket.

I confess that when I’m grilling at home, I fill a little cup with sauce and take it out to the grill with a slice of bread, dipping away as dinner cooks.

The Executive Board gathering in 2002: Will, Scott, me, Steve and Jim.

Baseball Place No. 44: Ty Cobb Museum; No. 44A: Ty Cobb plaque and statue, Comerica Park

Can you separate the player from the person?

That’s the struggle with Ty Cobb. Clearly he’s one of the best players to ever play the game.

But he’s also remembered as a racist hot head pushed by his inner demons to fight and claw his way to being the best.

Folks in Cobb’s hometown of Royston, Ga. work pretty hard to tell about his softer side. He donated hundreds of thousands of dollars for scholarships, and contributed to a hospital in his hometown that is now Ty Cobb Healthcare System.

Josh Pahigian tags the Ty Cobb Museum on the medical center’s campus as spot No. 44 in his “101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out.”

I didn’t get to see the museum on my pass through Georgia, but I have seen how the Detroit Tigers have worked to honor Cobb.

Alternative spots No. 44: Cobb plaque and statue Comerica Park

My favorite meeting spot at Tiger Stadium was the large Ty Cobb plaque that hung outside near the team’s offices. Everyone knew where it was.

Tyrus Ryamond Cobb
1886 – 1961
Greatest Tiger of them all
A genius in spikes

But that was about the only reference to the player that you saw, and he was rarely spoken about. Not that the Yankees are a model of proper behavior, but you couldn’t swing a foam No. 1 finger without hitting some reference to the Bambino.

Showing off my sweet game-used Bristol Tigers jersey before the final game at Tiger Stadium.

The plaque moved to Comerica Park in time for the All-Star Game in 2005, but it hung on the abandoned Tiger Stadium for five years after the team moved.

Here’s a good trivia question. Who was the last major-leaguer to play a game without wearing a uniform number? That would be Gabe Kapler.

For the final game of Tiger Stadium, the starting lineup wore the number of the best Tiger to play at their position. Cobb played before players wore numbers, and Kapler trotted out to centerfield without one on his back.

The Peach was one of the players honored with statues in the new park, and the team didn’t duck the reputation. He’s depicted sliding into a base with spikes high.

Baseball Place No. 43: Mavericks Stadium; and 43A, Lamphier Park

The path to Michigan minor-league baseball goes through Springfield, Ill. I had no idea.

Josh Pahigian takes us to Mavericks Stadium, home of the High Desert Mavericks in Adelanto, Calif. as place No. 43 in his “101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out.”

He praises it as an intimate park in a beautiful desert setting, not too far from the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles.

My visit to California was brief, and I slipped in some Major League visiting. But I have been to another small park, and that’s when I discovered the Springfield-Michigan connection.

Alternative Spot No. 43A) Lamphier Park, Springfield, Ill.

Springfield’s just an hour from my in-laws, so naturally we went there in 1991 to check out a game, and even stopped at some Lincoln sites along the way.

Actually, it would be difficult to take a step in Springfield and not run into a Lincoln site, but I digress.

Lamphier Park had room for 5,000, though that seems generous. At some point it was named Robin Roberts Stadium at Lamphier Park after the Hall-of-Famer and native son.
Check out the houses just beyond the outfield fence.

It was a small park located in a neighborhood. You’d look beyond the outfield fence and see houses. It didn’t seem all that much bigger than recreation league complex. Heck, if they were short players they might have looked to the stands for volunteers.

The park opened in 1952, and was renovated 1977, and I can only guess what it was like before the renovations. The Springfield Cardinals, Single-A Midwest League, were there from 1982 to 1993.

I like the batter's eye -- evergreens growing behind a short, chain-link fence.

The Cards departed for Madison, Wis. In 1994, becoming the Madison Hatters. The Hatters, for all one year of their existence, had one of the coolest minor-league cap designs ever, with a mouse with a bat, wearing a hat like the Mad Hatter from “Alice in Wonderland.”

I suppose it’s a mouse because mice like cheese, and Wisconsin is famous for it. But I suggest this is the only team in baseball – in all of sports, perhaps – drawing inspiration from Lewis Carroll.

The team left Madison for Battle Creek Michigan, where it was scheduled to be named, and I kid you not, the “Golden Kazoos.” Battle Creek and Kalamazoo are pretty close.

But there was much ridicule – all of it earned – and legend has it that someone went and trademarked the name before the team could, and it opted to get a new name rather than pay what the name-owner wanted. I think they saw an opportunity to drop the name and grabbed it.

So they became the utterly bland Michigan Battle Cats. As if things weren’t bad enough, the team was later affiliated with the Evil Empire, and changed its name to Battle Creek Yankees. Would have been better off with Golden Kazoos.

With instability being a franchise trademark, the team was later liked with Tampa Bay, and became the Southwest Michigan Devil Rays.

Giving up altogether, the team moved across the state to Midland, becoming the Great Lakes Loons, which I suppose is better than Yankees.
Back to Springfield.

After the Cardinals departed in 1993 for their trail of discarded names, it appeared Springfield would be left with many Lincoln sites and no baseball.
But two weeks before the 1994 season, the Waterloo Diamonds could seal the deal on a stadium lease, and bolted to the conveniently open Lamphier Park, and became known as the Sultans of Springfield.

How a team can find a new home and create a new identity in under two weeks is a mystery to me, and “Sultans” is pretty exotic for a place like Springfield. I suspect that “Top Hats,” “Honest Abes” and “Railsplitters” were considered.

Also as an aside, Manny’s Baseball Land, the catalog company, had a warehouse in Hobe Sound, Fla., and used to sell things there at great discounts. So I had all kinds of cool minor-league caps before these were readily available to anyone with an Internet connection. I have both a Madison Hatters cap and a Sultans of Springfield cap, which I used to wear frequently because it was both obscure and fit absolutely perfectly.

The Sultans went to the playoffs their first year, but drew just 54,000 fans. The second year was worse, attracting fewer than 40,000 people.

But someone must have liked the idea of playing in a capital, because the team uprooted after 1995 for Lansing, Mich. where it became the Lansing Lugnuts, and remains there today.

If you see a Lugnut, please do not point out that the logo on his cap is actually a screw, and not a nut, lug or otherwise.

Lamphier Park attracted a Frontier League team, the Capitals, for 1996, but that team, too, departed after 2001 for a lack of fan support.

So there it sits, waiting for another team to come and stay for a while before adopting a nutty nickname and moving to Michigan.