RMJ 73 April 28

MONDAY, APRIL 28 ● Houston, vs Colorado

Drayton McLane is a self-proclaimed cheerleader. His upbeat personality is among his major assets. I have seen him proselytizing for baseball at breakfast, lunch, dinner, and after a night game. He is tireless and persistent.

I have my assets too. They are paltry by comparison, and my appetite for stumping is whetted only by evening libations.

For this reason, I was none-too-thrilled to learn that Judy volunteered me to give not one, but two motivational speeches at Ryan’s junior high school this morning. But as with most dreaded events, it proved not so difficult when I got going.

The purpose was to encourage the students to do well on their national achievement tests. I simply used my life as an example, saying that most of my teammates wanted to stay in baseball after they retired, but that only the ones who had a college education were able to. This was a little white lie, but by the time these kids get to be adults, it will be true.

The teachers seemed happy, and Judy — who is in charge of the volunteers at the school — was fairly beaming. These things that I dread — school assemblies and hospital visits — are almost always rewarding in the end.

 

It was noon when I finished, so I had time to kill before meeting Dick Hite of Norton Ditto for a fitting of suits and sport coats.

I went to the store early and looked around. Lo and behold, they had quite a few Hawaiian shirts. And this is a privately-owned high-fashion store in Houston, Texas.

Maybe I am ahead of the trend.   

           

I got to the ballpark about three o’clock — half an hour later than I if I was with Cubby. As I suspected, there was still plenty of time to prepare for the game. The Rockies were our opponents, and they were 8-3 on the road, after having nightmares away from home last year. I felt pretty good about our chances, however.

The Rockies started a youngster, Jamey Wright, and we countered with Mike Hampton. I really thought Mike was due for a good game, and The Perfessor said that he had his best warmup of the year.

So much for warmups.

Hampton showed the good stuff in the second, when he gave up a single and a triple and then got three outs without letting the second runner score. Then he singled in a run with two outs in the bottom of the second, which turned out to be his last gasp in this game.

In the third, the Rockies greeted him with three singles that were hit so hard they would have been home runs if they had any loft. Then Hamp uncorked a wild pitch and gave up another screaming single and a sacrifice fly. He was lucky to get out of it with only three runs scoring. 

Bobby Abreu hit his first big-league homer in the bottom of the frame, but the Rocks came back with two more on a homer by Ellis Burks. Down 6-2, it didn’t look so good for the home team.

But then we got an opening when Eric Young booted a double-play ball. Bobby Abreu followed with a two-run double, and we ended up scoring three to make it 6-5.

At this point, I thought we would win the game.

Ramón Garcia came in and pitched well for us. Abreu hit another home run to tie it, and I still had Hudek and Wagner ready to slam the door. As it turned out, we pinch-hit for Garcia and did not score.

Because the pitcher’s spot was way down in the lineup as we started the ninth, I went to Wagner, because I was still trying to limit Hudek to one inning.

Wagner was faster than ever: 97-98 MPH with every pitch. The Rocks went down easily. We got the bases loaded against Steve Reed, and Jeff McCurry came in to face Bagwell. I anticipated a walk, a wild pitch, or a hard-hit ball. Instead, Bagwell struck out.

In the tenth, Vinny Castilla hit a 98 MPH fastball deep into the centerfield pavilion. Bruce Ruffin shut us down for the save, and a good comeback was ruined.

It was a tough loss for me, but not as tough as yesterday’s. To me, the Rockies look like a better club than the Giants. And we almost beat them after having our starting pitcher shelled.

There is scant time to dwell on defeat. This game took almost four hours, and I didn’t get home until midnight. Now I have to pack and get to the Dome by 10:00 in the morning for a 12:35 businessfan’s special.

I had a cigar and a glass of wine, and I listened to the abstruse wailings of John Prine to make myself sleepy. I left a note for Judy to wake me up: “I have to be up by 8:30,” I wrote. “Please disturb me.”