It was the bottom of the ninth at RFK. The hometown Nationals were down by one, had runners on the corners and were down to their last out. Walking to the plate was Jesus Flores, the Nat’s rookie catcher and number eight hitter. Flores wasn’t having a good game: he’d committed two errors, dropping two sure-out foul ball pop-ups, and been stolen on twice in the game.
Jeff W and I had seats in the second deck behind home plate. It was an exquisite early-September night with midnight blue skies and languorous, soft-flowing air. It was the kind of night that linked present to past; we could have been at Fenway in 1941 watching Ted Williams hit .406, or the Polo Grounds in 1954, awed by a young Willie Mays robbing Vic Wertz or the old Met in Bloomington where Rod Carew crouched over home plate, compressing himself into a six inch high strike zone, and flirted with .400 for most of the 1977 season. It could have been any ballpark in any city on any summer’s night…and into this singularity stepped Jesus Flores, emerging from the dugout behind the third baseline, climbing the steps into the warm evening air, leaving behind the same dugout I had stretched across to reach Joe DiMaggio a very long time ago.
“I was here twenty years ago,” I said to Jeff in the sixth inning. “I guess it was twenty years ago this summer, with my dad. We came here together to watch an Old Timer’s game.” I pointed at the home team’s dugout. “All the AL players were hanging out over there.”
“Which guys were there?” asked Jeff.
“Luke Appling, Warren Spahn, Bob Feller, Brooks Robinson, Al Kaline, Harmon Killebrew…some other guys I don’t remember…and Joe DiMaggio.”
“Wow, those were all great ballplayers.”
“Bob Feller was funny. He’d only sign baseballs. Kids were screaming at him to sign their programs but he refused. I brought a ball to the game and tossed it out to him and he signed it. Then DiMaggio came out and the place went nuts. A lot of the old timer’s nobody knew, but everyone knew DiMaggio and wanted his autograph. They pressed forward against the dugout and smashed other people up against it. Joe signed a few programs and baseballs and chatted for a few minutes and then turned to go back inside the dugout. I stuck my arm toward him, pushing it through the crowd, holding my baseball. He saw it and took the ball and signed it, then he put the ball back in my hand and went inside. I was the last person he signed for.”
“That’s pretty cool. Did you ask him what it was like with Marilyn?”
“Nah, I wasn’t close enough,” I said, laughing. “But what a lucky guy, huh? Married to THE sex symbol of the entire 20th century.”
“That is pretty good.”
“Most glamorous athlete with the most glamorous starlet.”
“And the dumbest.”
I took a sip of my beer. “I wonder if Marilyn shaved,” I said.
“No way,” said Jeff. “It was the 1950s.”
We debated sex symbols from different decades. Angelina Jolie and Raquel Welch and Pamela Anderson and Brigitte Bardot and Jane Fonda circa Barbarella and Bo Derek, Sophia Loren, Farah Fawcett and Ursula Andress.
“I think the Sixties was the Golden Age of the sex kitten,” I said.
“I disagree. I think your influenced by nostalgia,” replied Jeff.
“Come on. You’d argue that Raquel Welch, Brigitte Bardot, Ursula Andress, Jane Fonda, and Sophia Loren don’t define the term?” Jeff considered and shrugged non-comittaly.
“I think Marilyn has lasted so long as a sex symbol because we never saw her age,” said Jeff. “She’s frozen at the height of her fame and attractiveness. We never watched her get old and fall apart, like Elizabeth Taylor.”
“Or Brigitte Bardot, now that she looks like a leather handbag from all the sun damage.”
“Have you heard the theory that no matter how rich or good looking or famous you are that you will always have one major flaw?” I shook my head. “For example,” Jeff continued, “you could be the best looking male movie star on the planet, and be married to the best looking female movie star on the planet, but your best looking movie star wife will be addicted to adopting third world orphans and won’t shut up talking about granola.”
About this time the catcher walked out to the mound for a conference with the pitcher. “Candlesticks are always nice,” I said, and we laughed.
I thought about how nice it would be to retire someplace where they had a big league team and just spend the days going to the ballpark, eating bratwurst with onions and drinking beers and Cokes and looking for young ladies spilling out of their tops. We talked about it, Jeff and I, at the last Nationals game we attended and we agreed that that would be an enjoyable way to spend retirement. I mocked-up a conversation between us as old men, Ã la the old Jewish couple in When Harry Met Sally, how they reminisced about how they met, talking all over each other to tell their story.
“Look at this guy run…”
“…he moves like a gazelle…”
“…like Guerrero…do you remember Guerrero…?”
“…he ran like the wind…”
“…he didn’t run, he glided…”
“…like a gazelle…â€
“…it’s a shame we couldn’t keep him…”
“…we didn’t have the money…”
“…it’s a challenge for small market teams…”
“…Oh! The peanut man! Peanuts!“
Then came the bottom of the ninth. Dmitri Young walked to put the tying run aboard and was lifted for a pinch runner. Austin Kearns struck out. Wily Mo Peña singled and the runner advanced to third. Then Ronnie Belliard popped a bunt foul to the first baseman and Jesus Flores started his slow march from the dugout to the plate. “This guy’s had a lousy game,” I said to Jeff. “I hope he wins this thing right here.”
“He’s had some clutch hits,” he said.
“America loves a redemption story,” I said in a nasal old-time-sportscaster voice. “The rookie catcher is coming to the plate with runners at the corners and two out here in the bottom of the ninth. He’s had a bad night defensively but he’s got a chance to redeem himself here. The pitcher’s winding up and now here’s the oh-oh pitch…”
Two pitches later Flores ripped a screaming shot down the third base line that stopped dead in the deepest corner of left field. Ryan Langerhans scored easily from third to tie the game. Wily Mo Peña rounded second from first and labored toward third. The left fielder reached the ball and dug it out of the corner while Peña touched third and turned toward home. The crowd rose to its feet. The throw came in and Peña chugged toward the plate looking like he was lugging a fridge full of frozen meat on his back and as the throw came down the line toward home Peña hit the dirt and slid across the plate.
The throw was not in time! Peña jumped to his feet, the winning run in and I saw Jesus Flores, the rookie catcher, leap high in the air over second base, pumping his fists in the air while his teammates rushed from the dugout and mobbed him, pummeling him with their fists. The crowd stood, roaring and clapping.
“When they get a hit like that they all run out and punch the guy who made the hit,” Jeff shouted.
Probably the best beating he ever got, I thought.
