July 4th, 1994 - "It doesnt take a bloodhound to smell a scam"

Monday, July 4th, 1994 - Yankees host the A's
"Happy Birthday George Steinbrenner! Oh, and USA too!"

This was funny, and I can get the intro out of it. The day I first put together this Scorecard Memory, while shopping at Target with our daughter Emma, Dana got me a Beckett Baseball Card collectors tin. It contained 250 random baseball cards from all brands and any of the last 20 or so years for $20. It included a random MLB autographed card, a signed prospect card, and a "Graded 10 STAR" card (which turned out to be a special Greg Maddux card, numbered 4 of 6 - I rule)

Reason I bring this up is that oddly enough, as I pulled out this crinkly scorecard to continue forever onward on my scorecard memories, the winning pitcher that day was Oakland A-hole Steve Ontiveros, and the autographed major league card in my box that I opened up minutes before I set to work on this was...a 1987 Steve Ontiveros. As Mel Allen would say....how bout that!

Moving on from that...I used my old "more people at a 1928 high school reunion than here" gag at the top of this scorecard. The Yankees never drew on these July 4th games, despite all the fanfaronade surrounding the day. Under date, keeping with the theme, I wrote "beat the British", and perhaps thinking wistfully of where I would probably have seen more action then on another slow afternoon at the Stadium which saw the Yankees shut out, under 'played at' I put...the beach. The scant showing actually stirred me to call the overly-optimistically announced attendance of 22,021 "pathetic" and added that "no one's here but us."

That could not stop Robert Merrill, who was in a boisterous enough mood to preface his version of God Bless America with a sweeping wave of the arm and an "Everybody!" invite to join in before he started singing. "Nice to see him come out of his shell." I noted.

Fat Daddy Chico was working the small crowd, shilling his home run and attendance pools, and not having much luck. Howard the Lawyer aka Howard the "anti-comic" explained this away by saying, "It doesn't take a bloodhound to smell a scam." As he shuffled his way in front of the bleachers with a goofy grin on his face someone stood up, cupped their hands over their mouth and shouted "Chico's a crook!"

For some reason Ali, the old cowbell King, was sitting on his hands, I dont think the empty seats thrilled him so he was in no mood to clank tin. It got bad enough to where as he sat there in stoic fashion he was bombarded with a chant of "Ring the God-Damned bell! Ring the God-damned bell!" When that failed to stir him a pack of lads started hitting him with an "Ali's a Mets fan!" chant instead. At this Queen Bee Tina hopped up and snarled, "You want the bell? Shove it up your ass!"

The old-school Creatures were not in the mood for any nonsense. When a beachball started bouncing around in the 8th old hangdog Jeff grabbed it and put the poppin' to it, almost causing a riot. Some guy actually wanted to beat him up. 2 innings later, as the game was wrapping up in the 9th, Jeff was at it again. I mean, this guy could not beat an egg, and here he was raising dukes, causing my final mystery out of the afternoon. While all this was going on, an outraged Tina was hollering at a lot of the nitwits out there, and one of them barked back with the schoolyard favorite "Can I have some cheese with that whine?"

Seems I just hung out, kept out of it, and drank by all the crooked letters on this thing. I spent my time wisely, putting little cracks next to the A's player names on the card. Next to Stan Javier I snidely remarked "Julian was better!" (you old baseball fans getting that?) Next to McGwire I wrote "hit him in the ankle!". I also mentioned that Tina dismissed Brent Gates (who played 135 games the year before and was established as the A's starting second baseman by now) by waving her arm in disgust, giving him the old "pshaw" and snarling, "I've never heard of him."

There was a group of kids huddled together wearing purple shirts...looking at this now I suppose it was some camp or little league team or something. Whatever they were they were welcomed with a good old rousing "Purple takes it up the ass, doo-da, doo-da" serenade.

The highlight of the day for me was seeing Yankee Stadium stalwarts Fat Daddy Chico and Freddie Sez sharing the same table at Steve's Greek eatery across the street after the game, having a bite to eat, and not acknowledging one another in the least bit.

The Yankees did not escape the scorecard wisecracks either...after Elster flied out harmlessly to right in the 5th I remarked "thats as good as Elster's gonna be." Seeing he went 0-20 as a Yankee in 1994, I was not too far off, huh?

My mind was drifting. I actually missed a Troy Neel home run off the bat cause I was reading Joey Adams' column in the New York Post. I ended up with 5 "mo's" - all of them with the A's up at bat, so at least I was paying attention with the Yankees swinging the bats. If you can call getting shutout 4-0 "swinging the bats." Walkman John, here were my 5 mo's...Sierra in the 3rd, Bordick in the 4th, Gates in the 5th, Neel in the 8th, and Michelin Man McGwire to lead off the 9th.

Not much more here worth salvaging. I apologize. I just dont get some of the jokes...as I mentioned the Yankees put up the donut, getting shut out by the 35-45 Jokeland A's. The aforementioned Steve Ontiveros started and handled the first 6.1 before giving way to a cavalcade of relief help. Marc Acre, Dave Leiper, that yutz Billy Taylor, and Ed Vosberg finished the job. The Yankees ended up with a piddling 4 hits, and only Paul O'Neill worked out a walk. Nothing much happening on the pinstripe side of things...

The anemic display was put on by LF Polonia, 2B Velarde, 3B Boggs, DH Tartabull, RF O'Neill, C Matt Nokes, CF BW, first baseman Mike Stanley (lol - first base), and the aforementioned Kevin Elster at short. Dave Silvestri, who in time we found out went to his prom with MSG/FNC anchor Deb Kaufman as his date, pinch-hit and struck out for his efforts.

The A's banged out 11 hits, with Neel and McGwire hitting skyshots. Those two were also the only Oakland hitters to have 2 hits in the game. Scott Kamienieki started and was roughed up, before making way for Xavier Hernandez in the 7th (so much for the closing role), that nerd Paul Gibson, and none other than Greg Harris, making one of his only three appearances as a Yankee. He had been released by the Sox on June 27th, and only signed by the Yankees the day before. He worked an uneventful 1.1 innings. Good job, deek!

The A's fielded a lineup of LF Rickey Henderson, CF Javier, DH Neel, RF Ruben Sierra (taking LOTS of abuse from us), 1B McGwire, C Steinbach, 2B Gates ("Ive never heard of him!"), SS Mike Bored-dick, and usual catcher Scott Hemond at third. (he could not hit there either)

I suppose we will go with Mr. Ontiveros as our profile, autographed card and everything.... Logged time from 1985-2000, with a bunch of holes in there...he did not pitch on the major league level in 91, 92, or 96-99. I know he had some sick arm injuries along the way...but thats his problem, not ours, I suppose.

He pitched in 211 games in his career, 200 in the American League, mostly for Oakland, but he also had short stints in Seattle and Boston. He hurled in 11 games for Philadelphia in the National League in 89/90. Finished with a winning 34-31 mark and an impressive 3.67 ERA. Too good to be profiled in my jokey profiles, but the baseball card commanded it! He started 73 games, walking 207 and striking out 382 in 661 career innings. A 2nd round draft pick, he came out of the University of Michigan, a school that also bought us Jim Abbott, Steve Howe, Chris Sabo, and his foe on the mound that day, Scott Kamienieki. I will never forget him!

I mentioned the pittance of a crowd already...you would have thought that at least the game went by quickly so we could go on with whatever else we had planned that day - um, no...it took an Austin 3:16 to play this one, and your umpires on hand were Jim Joyce, Terry Craft, Ed Hickox, and Jim McKean.

Thanks for reading, yo!