“Ripken will never be Gehrig, even if he dies and comes back 3 times!”
A Tuesday night in the Bronx, and the Mariners were polluting the town. History was being made all over baseball on that night – Cal Ripken Jr was busy tying Lou Gehrigs consecutive games streak at home against the Angels, and elsewhere around the circuit Marvin Benard and Matt Lawton were making their major league debuts. So much going on, and I dont know which story is bigger! Coming in we were 1 ½ out of the wild card, but as I pointed out to all within earshot that night that was “along with almost everyone.”
Queen Bee Tina was in one of her characteristic sour moods, regarding the Ripken/Gehrig link. “Ripken will never be Gehrig, even if he dies and comes back 3 times!” she barked.
Security was in a frowny-face mood, which was not helped when we sang (to the tune of Horse’s Ass) “What’d you get on your police ex-am...you – got – a D!” Security Saddam himself came storming up after a time and told us to quit it with, and I quote, the “Up the Ass - No Vaseline” song. This caused someone to make one Hell of an observation, “Hey, he’s Iraqi. No mentioning any kind of petroleum products!” As Saddam strolled back down the steps someone shouted, “someone throw a SCUD at him!”
I mentioned I was going to donate my liver, or what was “left of it.” With Lou Gehrig’s streak being the talk of the town someone took the occasion to point out a sketchy looking fan (they were crawling all over the place back then) and smirk, “for ever $1.00 you give to Lou Gehrig’s disease that guy gets 30 cents.” Speaking of donations and livers and the like, someone cracked before the game “there will be no National Anthem tonight…Eddie Layton donated his organ.” (GROAN)
Talk turned to that “goody” bag we got the day before, a day I had dubbed “Load of Crap Day.” When I typed up that card I could not remember what was in that bag, but I did write the contents on this scorecard - the game after. In my “party bag” was a little box of Viva paper towels, a mini mouthwash, and a May 1995 issue of the Sporting News. Yeah, I really needed all that stuff to “party hard!”
Before the game Ken Griffey Jr exchanged pleasantries with us, going so far as to call our friend and fabled old-schooler “Jungle” a drunk. He also pulled the old “rear back and make like you are going to throw us a ball but turn around and toss it into the infield instead” trick, which made him a lot of friends in the general area. His buddy Jay Buhner was subjected to an insult we had not heard before, a volley of “Buhner, your mother smokes cigarettes at Yankee Stadium!” Griffey ended up having a busy night…aside from homering off of Mo Rivera this was the game where a fan ran onto the field in the 5th inning and ended up shaking his hand out there in centerfield.
Talk turned to current events, and OJ. In our drunken hues we sort of agreed at the time that OJ did NOT do it, and blame as the actual culprit ranged from Ricardo Montalban to Ron Goldman, and someone even chimed in with “the dog.” Ah, what the Hell, he had blood on him. A couple of denizens reminisced about watching the Bronco chase right out there in the bleacher seats. (I myself was at a Metallica/Danzig/Suicidal Tendencies show in Middletown, New York that night) We then started talking about computers until someone finally snarled, “Why are we even talking about his malarky?” and we decided to get back to watching the game.
For whatever reason old Ali the Cowbell King decided he did not want to ring the bell, and he spent the night telling fans who came up to ask him “no" and not always in the rosiest of terms. Ali, who passed away the following May, God bless his soul, was one of the friendliest and happiest fellows around, but when he would get petulant like that crowds could start to hound him, and he would turn around from the rail and exchange harsh words with them. Ah, the dark side of Ali Ramirez…who woulda knew?
Other notes of interest on here include a mention that we were all getting a “cheap contact high” off of a beer that was spilled on the concrete right in front of us, and the very first ECW wrestling nod, with a simple ECW! on the lower right-hand portion of this crowded card. There was a Vince Colemen firecracker reference as he was leading off for Seattle (“he left New York with a bang”) and a Simpsons reference from when the Simpsons were funny all of the time (“Sit down, Dancing Homer!”) And an homage to The Zoo Bar, which was then between 82nd-83rd Street...who knows if it still is. There is a reference to that as well. I was also carrying around my Yankee bear, “Bear Ass” which caused someone to say, “If I carried that thing around I would be ‘em-BEAR-ASS-ed.”
As for the action on the field – the Yankees dropped this one 6-5, downing my mark in attendance for the year to 17-10. The Yanks had been trailing 6-0 after the top 5, but their plodding comeback fell short. Mariano Rivera started and took the loss, giving up 5 runs on 7 hits in 4-plus innings. Rob MacDonald and Scott Kamienieki mopped up his mess. Bob Wolcott got the W for Seattle, and was followed on the hill by a veritable parade of Bill Risley, Lee Guetterman, Jeff Nelson, and Stormin’ Norman Charlton, who notched his 6th save on the year.
The Yankees did muster 12 hits, so that was not the problem. Boggs, Bernie, Dion James and Don Mattingly all had a deuce, with James and Mattingly each parking one into the seats. The Yankee lineup read 3B Boggs, CF BW, RF O’Neill, DH Sierra (anyone file the missing persons report on D Strawberry yet?) LF James, 1B Mattingly, C Stanley, SS Fernandez, and 2B Velarde.
The Mariners scored their 6 runs on only 8 hits, including 3 home runs. Jay Buhner hit a critical 3 run shot off MacDonald, and Griffey and Luis Sojo added blasts of their own. The Mariner lineup was LF Coleman, 2B Cora, CF Griffey, DH E Martinez (batting .365 coming in), 1B Tino, RF Buhner, 3B Doug Strange, C Wilson, and SS Sojo.
As for a profile, why not Battlin’ Bob Wolcott? 95 was his rookie campaign, and he stuck around till 99, working for Seattle, the Diamondbacks (Seattle lost him in the 1997 expansion draft), and closing shop with Boston. Lifetime mark of 16-21, with a hefty 4.75 ERA to show for his efforts. In 325 innings he was torched for 391 hits, walking 113 and striking out 178. Not all that sharp. Born in 1973, he was a 2nd round draft pick (or should I say bust) for Seattle in the 1992 draft. Did manage to start a game in the 1995 playoffs against Cleveland, and hurled ONE complete game in his time. His baseballreference.com has only been hit a putrid 2,300 times as of 11/8/2010. Good for him! Happy to have seen him ply that trade!
A putrid crowd of only 15,340 were on hand, which I dubbed “a fu*king ghost town.” The game was played in 3:08, and your umpires on hand were none other than Jim Mckean, Vic Voltaggio, Jim Joyce, and Dale Scott.
As always, thanks for reading! And fear not, the playoffs are coming!
LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, BOB WOLCOTT!
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