Some context: as I write this I have just watched the final game for the Oakland Athletics in a venue we used to referred to as the Oakland “Mausoleum” back in the day. It was a cold, grey concrete fixture that looked like a place you could be interred. That was no more truer than today with emotions running high and the feeling that a loved one has died. It made me think of my decades of memories starting in 1968 where I would go early with my mother who ran the centerfield concession stand to my friendship with Mark McGwire and Tony LaRussa. But what I want to share here is from the diary I kept in 1989. Being friends with a major league ballplayer gives you full access to the clubhouse and the field, and on this day that old saying, “when you come to a game, you may see something you’ve never seen before,” emerged.
I have never shared my diary publicly until now not wanting to betray what goes on in a major league clubhouse but…it’s time.
August 2, 1989
Summer vacation. It never lasted long enough when you were a kid. You tried to squeeze the most fun out of every day but before you knew it you were at a department store with your mom picking out back-to-school clothes.
Remembering this, I picked up Lisa and David (my niece and nephew) and brought them back to my sister JoAnn's house in Dublin so they could play in the pool. It was a gorgeous day. My sister stayed inside watching game shows and smoking cigarettes.
I called McGwire on the sly, waiting for a moment when the kids weren't paying attention, and asked him for three tickets. Then I called Betty (their mom) to get her permission to take them to the game.
David was on the diving board when I said, "Well, I just called your mom and it looks like you're going to have to go to the A's game with me tonight."
"Yes!" David screamed then belly-flopped into the water.
Lisa lifted her arms in silent triumph.
To see the reaction of the kids was the reason you take them to the ballgame. Summer to a kid meant being so exhausted that you fell asleep in the car on the way back from someplace fun. What are Uncles for if not to achieve that?
The A's won 2-0 but that wasn't the memory I'll take with me from this night.
With a runner on second and a left-hander coming into pitch, LaRussa decided to pinch-hit for Dave Parker sending up the right-handed hitting McGwire. Now Dave Parker has been in the league since 1973 and part of the “We Are Family” Pittsburgh Pirates once ending a season batting 338. A veteran. A stud. An MVP. Dave would never be asked to sit no matter who is pitching and never when his team had the lead.
Through the binoculars I saw Mark pass Dave in the on-deck circle as Dave was preparing to bat. I could clearly see Parker look at McGwire and say, "You're kidding?"
Mark shrugged his shoulders and Parker dropped the bat and walked directly into the clubhouse without saying a word.
Mark popped out on the first pitch.
Section 221 where we were sitting is known as the “family section” where the wives, family and friends sit. In the 9th, Eckersley was about to throw to the first batter when out of the corner of my eye I see a well dressed lumbering big man come down the steps with a serious look on his face. It was Dave Parker! One by one the fans started to notice him. There were more double takes than in a Jerry Lewis movie. I watched as he tapped his wife on her shoulder, "We're goin' home!" He then walked back up the steps without her.
Kelly Parker (Dave’s wife) gathered her kids and said to Debbie Honeycutt, "I'm just going to have to tell him they pay him too much money for him to get riled up."
I’m not sure I’ll ever see that again during a game.
I looked at my nephew. "Well, David, that's what a baseball player looks like up close."
He just smiled, his big brown eyes still searching for an answer to it all.
Rick Honeycutt got the save. On the last batter he threw a wicked pitch that dipped then curved out of site. His wife shot me her baby blues, "Wow, that could have been one of these,” she said, licking her two fingers. I assumed it was her pitching hand.
On the drive home, I glanced in the back seat and saw David sleeping, his head slightly bouncing with the motion of the car. Summer vacation.
August 3, 1989
Met McGwire at his house around 9:00am. It was a travel day so he was dressed in the standard sport coat and tie that the players are required to wear to the airport.
On the drive to the park I asked him why does he shake his bat back and forth before each pitch.
"Anything, Mark. I'll try anything to get me out of this slump.”
Parked in the "F" lot located in-between the stadium and the arena.
As we walked toward the clubhouse under the tunnel, Mark turned to me and said, "What are the chances of Dave Parker showing up today, huh?"
I walked into the food room and was astonished to find donuts and coffee lining the tables. All the pitchers who had the day off stole one or two.
There's always a game on the TV in the food room. Dave Stewart sits and watches intently making notes on a yellow pad. These are the things you don't get to see: Dave Stewart, the student. Another TV has Shelly Winters plugging her new book. “I did it with Brando…”
A stack of the San Jose Mercury News sits on a table waiting for players to gut out the sports section. The front page always sits untouched.
Dave Parker walks in. No one makes a big deal but reliever, Gene Nelson says something to Parker and Parker snaps, "What are you talking to me for? You don't talk to me all season now you want to be buddies?"
Eyes raise from newspapers. Players stop chewing their bagels in mid-bite. Nobody is saying a word except for Shelly Winters who can be heard from the TV. “And then I had sex with…”
Nelson says something I can't make out and Parker leaves the room. The players trade looks with each other in the aftermath.
I stroll over to Rick Honeycutt who says, "And he's supposed to be a leader on this club?"
It's time to hit the field which means I scrounge around for a uniform. Curt Young's pants, Weiss' shoes, McGwire's very large pullover windbreaker.
I dressed and listen to Terry Steinbach's opinion of August:
"This is the worst time of year. You go through spring eager to start, then after a couple of months you wait for the All Star Break, then after the break you're jazzed but that wears off and it's August. Nothing to look forward to until the stretch drive."
Carney Landsford walks through the clubhouse with his neck and shoulder heavily wrapped, looking like The Thing With Two Heads.
There was a black and white health club ad in the paper of Dennis Eckersley posing with a barbell in his fist, flexing his muscle. I watched the moment as Ron Hassey cut the ad out and taped it to Eck's locker. On the front he wrote in felt pen, "BEFORE." Then he taped the same ad next to it and wrote, "AFTER," covering up Eck's bicep with a color photo of a huge one with veins popping out.
Eck came in, took one look, and tore it down. "Who did this?"
Hassey looked puzzled. "I thought it was funny," he said walking away with his tail between his legs.
Baseball never has morning games. The park takes on a different complexion in the a.m. The sun had a glow that you normally see in impressionist’s landscapes. It made me appreciate the Coliseum that much more.
I stood on the third base side with Dennis Eckersley and Terry Christman, who sometimes pitches batting practice, and watched Dave McKay's son, Cody take some swings in the batting cage.
"How old is he?" Eck asked.
"Fifteen, I think. He's got a good swing."
I strolled over to take a closer look.
"Two more!" Dave McKay yelled from the mound as he threw to his son.
Whack! Cody almost made the warning track with that one. Now it was my turn. I grabbed a bat and dug in. I didn't know what the hell I was doing. Dave only had three baseballs left in the bucket. The first ball came in tight and I checked my swing sending the ball toward the hole at short. He threw the next one and again I checked my swing bouncing it weakly to second.
Dave just looked at me, "Take a swing!" I did and fouled it off my foot. Now I know what that feels like. It fucking hurts.
At twenty minutes to noon, thirty-five minutes before game time, the clubhouse is quiet. Players sit around bored, antsy, waiting for the signal to take the field. Angel, the towel man, feeds dirty clothes into the washing machine. Curt Young peddles a stationary bike. McGwire sifts through more of his mail.
12:02pm. One by one the players exit the clubhouse. McGwire taps me on the shoulder with his glove. "Well, I'm going out there. See ya later, buddy. Have a good flight back to L.A."
I wait until the placed is empty and change into my street clothes. The TV was off and I was alone. Infielder Glen Hubbard had just been cut the previous night and I think this must have been what it felt like.
The A's lost 6-4 never recovering from Landsford's two throwing errors on one play that caused two runs to score. When he threw the ball high over McGwire's head I thought of Carney's stiff neck and the heavy wrapping I saw him in earlier. Error - The Thing With Two Heads.
Nice! Thanks for sharing.