on the prevalence of certain apparitions in spring

The New York Mets’ early season success has stirred certain regular readers to ask for a post about our heroes of the diamond.  We’ll pass for now saying only we’ve been pleased with the starting pitching – can I get an amen for R.A. Dickey, the game’s most literate player as well as its best knuckleballer? – but even more delighted with the team’s feisty battling in the face of injuries and a travel-heavy early schedule. Do any of you know that the blue and orange, though near the very bottom of the bigs in homers has manufactured 104 two out rbis, the most in the majors?  They’re hitting when it matters most and should the bullpen stiffen a bit, our Mets might hang around for awhile in the less than overwhelming NL East.  Memorial Day weekend found them taking three of four from the punchless Padres which should mean they’ll begin June well in the mix.   Though we know some facts and have some less than fully formed opinions,  we’ll hold our peace for the moment.  Our reticence also derives from the mission of this site – to provide an in the stands experience of sport for our readers.  This seems a worthwhile endeavor in a world that sometimes feels like a wholly owned subsidiary of ESPN.  Rest assured that Mrs. Smith and I are scrutinizing the Citi Field schedule and will report from those precincts soon.

But this season’s baseball journey is already a quarter over and we feel compelled to write about one of the sadder events so far.  Bill “Moose” Skowron, the power hitting, sure handed first baseman for the Yankees from 1954 through ’62 passed away on April 27.   The team he played for must surely be on the short list of any discussion about the greatest squads ever and Moose was one reason for its astonishing quality. I remember him for a more personal reason.

Walking back to our Chrysler after game five of the 1960 World Series, my dad spotted a familiar face.  “That’s Skowron,” he said, hightailing it across the street.  “Bill, can we get your autograph?” he asked holding out our 5 cent? 10 cent? program. I like to think that Bill engaged us in some quick repartee, but he quickly and silently scribbled his name and continued searching  for his car. That enhaloed memory serves as an emblem of the distance between now and then. The players used to park among us.  Try to imagine Mark Teixeira, today’s perhaps superior version of the Moose, parking in a public lot.  Or Ike Davis, even.  Try further to imagine that Skowron, despite earning  a world series winner’s bonus share in ’56, ’58, ’61, ’62 and ’63 (this last with the L.A. Dodgers) had to make his mortgage in the off season painting houses in Hillsdale, New Jersey.

An additional irony of that memorable autograph is that I was, and remain, a Yankee hater.  Imagine my terrified pleasure that afternoon as the Pirates whipped the home team 5-2 behind the perplexing Harvey Haddix and Elroy Face.  They stifled all the vaunted Bombers save Roger Maris who launched a second inning home run.  Moose himself took an o’fer that day, which might explain his reticence when signing our program.  Picture my delighted, if mute,  response to every Pittsburgh score and every Haddix K.  Craning my neck to see around one of the iron pillars that obstructed viewing lines in the old stadium, I silently exulted in the immense throng’s growing frustration over the Yank’s inability to score.  62,000 plus fans left the Bronx miserable.  No doubt I was gleefully spewing some Yankee hate when my dad spotted Big Bill.

Mention of Harvey Haddix will take us a bit deeper into memory’s briar patch.  For Messr Haddix tossed what some critics consider the greatest game ever – 12 perfect innings against the Milwaukee Braves before losing 1-0 in 13 to Lew Burdette.  It was Lew, a buzz cut coiffed hurler from the evocatively named Nitro, West Virginia, who stifled the Yankees three times in the ’57 World Series, the first fall classic of your correspondent’s memory (and another low point in Yankee history).  But it was Lew’s southpaw partner, Warren Spahn, who was my especial favorite.  Featuring a delivery with a very high leg kick, the prominently nosed “Hooks” rang up 363 wins, making him the most prolific lefty in major league history.  He twirled two no-hitters in his career, but his finest effort might have been a 16 inning complete game 1-0 loss on a Willie Mays homer to the San Francisco Giants’ magnificent Juan Marichal (who, by the way, kicked high from the right side).  And here’s the thing, Spahn was 42.

Just to bring this baseball ramble full circle, I’ll point out a circle in Hooks’ career.  He was sent down to the minors in 1942 by then Boston Braves manager Casey Stengel for being “gutless” and refusing to throw at Pee Wee Reese – in a spring training game, no less.  Having served heroically in WWII and labored prodigiously for the Braves, he found himself in Flushing to start the last season of his career, this time pitching for Stengel’s Mets.  He was thus perhaps the only big leaguer to work for the Old Perfesser both before and after Casey was a genius.

They’re mostly ghosts now – Moose, Hooks, Casey, my dad – but they stir when the umps start brushing off home plate.

Peace out, paulieb