Column: It felt like the big leagues in our small town

In my humble and usually misguided opinion, the logo for the Shelter Island Bucks is missing just one item. I think that a piece of a grille from an F-150 pickup truck should adorn one of the antlers. But let’s not let that serious omission take anything from the moment. Even though there wasn’t actually one during their first game on Sunday, to this writer nothing more aptly describes the Bucks opening day than “home run.” We’re talking upper deck here, if not clear out of the park.

The seemingly endless list of jobs, managed and executed by several key individuals and overwhelmingly supported by the entire community, resulted in an almost storybook event. It was baseball the way it was meant to be played and enjoyed.

The field, complete with home run fence and foul poles, has never looked better. A concession stand, rock ‘n’ roll between innings and the playing of our National Anthem were but only a few components that brought a big league feel to a small town park.

Lightning-quick infield plays, diving catches and 80-plus mph heaters popping the catcher’s glove had me longing for maybe an inning or two more as the final out was played.

Having spent 13 years as a school baseball official, I often reflect on what a thrill it was to be behind the “dish” during a close game between two top teams. I would follow the teams in the news for the balance of the season to see who made the playoffs. On more than one occasion, I saw men wearing terrible hats scribbling in notebooks and aiming speed guns at the pitches of a young prospect. I also remember thinking, “I hope they don’t get spoiled if they turn pro.”

Back when the earth was young and I was a die-hard Yankees fan, pro sports were different. A neighbor who lived across the street from us in New Jersey worked in an office where Whitey Ford was also employed during the off-season. That’s just what they did.

During the winter they were just ordinary nine-to-fivers.

My dad used to take me and my brothers to watch Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris. I remember sitting in front of an excitable fan who stood to roar at an officiating injustice, spilling a large Ballantine ale on my head in the process. We once went up to the press box between innings to get Mel Allen’s and Phil Rizzuto’s autographs, way before any hyped-up security made it impossible to do so. Like legions of other youngsters, we’d spend hours and hours playing Wiffle ball and home-run derby on our driveway, or Strat-o-matic baseball inside when it rained and watching or listening to as many games as we could.

My brother Don, who was and still is one of the biggest Yankee fans ever, used to be taken to the stadium on his birthday, every May 14. The day he turned 13 in 1967 also happened to be Mother’s Day. Dad taught Don about priorities and told him they would go to a game the following week, so they watched the game at home … the game when Mantle hit his 500th home run.

Unfortunately for my Dad, I was never a very good ball player. I don’t ever remember getting a decent base hit at any level except maybe T-ball. But he never missed a game. He would show up a little late sometimes, but he was always there standing quietly with the other parents, watching their boys.

I watched my boy too. Happily for him he did not inherit my complete lack of physical prowess. I watched him once strike out 16 batters in one memorable JV game. I remember calling Dad immediately.

At the Bucks game, I remarked to another dad and fan who also happened to be a former coach that it was so cool to hear the baseballs resound off of wooden bats, which are slowly regaining popularity at the college level. We did a little thinking and figured that the Bucks were playing certainly the first Shelter Island nine-inning regulation game in decades, possibly ever, and that it’s been almost 40 years since wooden bats have been used in league play here.

One of the things I think that makes baseball different than other sports is that there is always a chance, no matter how small, that a team can be down to its last strike and still turn it all around and win the game. Just ask the ’86 Mets. Other sports, particularly football, leave me yawning at the end of the third quarter, when one team is ahead by a lot to nothing and the rest of the game is anti-climactic.

I am not a huge pro sports fan. Particularly when it comes to baseball, I think that free-agency, bloated team payrolls and way too much beer have taken a lot of what was good out of the game and it will never be the same. I also worry about the toll lacrosse is taking on school baseball nationwide.
But I agree with Charlie Brown, who once said that a hot dog just tastes better with a ball game in front of it. Sportswriters often lament that a lot of the joy has gone out of baseball but, as I watched both the fans and the players, it seemed to me that, on this particular Sunday afternoon, there was plenty of that to go around.