by Bob Mitchell
So does older Seth.
“Now close your eyes, my Setharoo, and get some sleep. It’s time to visit the Yami of Yawn. Close your eyes now, that’s my good boy…sleep….”
And younger Seth closes his eyes and goes to a place far away.
And older Seth does the same.
Seth Stein opens his eyes.
For once, he is not surprised to be where he is, in light of Sol’s bedtime story, passion for his newly adopted team, and propensity to attend important ball games.
Seth is once again sitting in the lap of History, sitting on the field level in foul territory, even with first base, at Shea Stadium, home of the New York Mets, in Flushing Meadows, Queens.
He scans the outfield, recognizes the steep, five-tiered grandstands; the Newsday sign in left; then, behind the fence in center, the famous upside-down Mets Magic Top Hat, out of which rises a red Big Apple whenever a Met hits a homer; and, in right-center, the gargantuan 175-foot-long, 86-foot-high scoreboard with the Bulova clock on top and the huge ad:
THIS BUD’S FOR YOU.
His eyes gravitate to the running score at the base of the scoreboard:
Red Sox 110 000 100
Mets 000 020 010
Yep, it’s the top of the tenth inning of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series all right, Seth thinks, verifying the numbers in his computer mind and filling in the final two that are missing:
Red Sox 110 000 100 2
Mets 000 020 010 3
One of the greatest baseball games ever played, one of the grittiest comebacks under pressure ever staged, and here he is, right in the thick of things.
Seth’s eyes pan from the scoreboard to himself, identifying the Mets players in between, one by one: Mookie Wilson 1, Lenny Dykstra 4, and Darryl Strawberry 18 in the outfield; Ray Knight 22, Kevin Elster 2, Wally Backman 6, and Keith Hernandez 17 around the horn; Gary Carter 8 behind the plate and Rick Aguilera 38 on the mound.
The outfielders are pegging to one another, Hernandez is throwing grounders to his infield colleagues, and Aguilera is taking his eight warm-up pitches. The Changeless Face of Baseball, Seth is thinking.
What he is really thinking about is the historical significance of this particular game in the context of the fateful year of 1986. What his historian’s brain is thinking about is the fact that in this year, there were four cataclysmic catastrophes that occurred on the planet, four disasters that brought sadness and anguish to a great many people. The technological disaster of January 28, the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger seventy-three seconds into its flight that killed teacher Christa McAuliffe and six other crew members. The nuclear disaster of April 26, the explosion and meltdown at Chernobyl that killed fifty-six people, with another nine thousand expected to die from solid cancers. The natural disaster of August 21, the limnic eruption of carbon dioxide at Lake Nyos, Cameroon, that killed more than seventeen hundred people. And the baseball disaster of October 25, perhaps the most tragic of all the catastrophes—the squirting of a ball through Bill Buckner’s legs that killed the hopes and dreams of the many millions of inhabitants of Red Sox Nation throughout the world.
Which is about to transpire in approximately twenty-eight minutes.
Seth makes a mental note of the differences between the Polo Grounds and Shea. The Giants’ ballpark was old and quirky, with odd dimensions, whereas Shea is more modern, more classic, with less character. There is a lot less smoking going on here. Baseball caps have replaced fedoras. Many more women are in attendance.
Sadly, thirty-five years later, one thing hasn’t changed: Although there are a lot more black players in the majors, there are still, here and now, only two starting players for the home team who are African American (Strawberry and Wilson). Come to think of it, he computes, only two, as well, for the visitors (Jim Rice and Dave Henderson).
A low-flying plane rumbles overhead on its way to La-Guardia Airport.
Seth gets around to looking at his more immediate surroundings, namely, who is sitting next to him. Sure enough, there’s fifty-eight-year-old Papa Sol seated to his left.
“Come on, Hendu!” Sol yells, as Dave Henderson, a dangerous Bosox hitter, strides up to the plate. “Hit one outta here!”
Historian Seth knows that Papa Sol will have his fervent wish granted in about two minutes.
As Hendu takes his warm-up swings and Aguilera fidgets on the mound, Seth notices that Sol is sitting next to, and chatting with, a woman. Not just any woman, mind you, but an extremely attractive woman, a green-eyed, dark-haired beauty of a woman, in her late thirties probably. Shades of Ava Gardner.
Huh?
Did Papa Sol lie to Elsie and sneak off to this ball game? To see this crucial contest, but also to be with…her?
Solomon Stein takes a recent photo of Seth out of his wallet and shows it to stunning Ava.
“Janet, you should see him. He’s so bright, so handsome. He gives us such naches!”
Janet?
Janet dabs a tear that has formed in the corner of her right eye.
Seth is speechless. Who is this woman? In fact, who the hell is this woman? A girlfriend of Papa Sol’s? An old friend? She seems too young. An old friend of Seth’s parents, perhaps? Someone Sol just met and befriended? No, she’s too emotional for that. Why is she crying over Seth? Does she know him?
“Thanks for sharing that with me, Solomon. Makes me feel good. Much appreciated.”
“Welcome. Hey, think your ol’ Mets can pull this one out?”
“You better believe it. Just watch.”
“Well, we’ll see about that,” Sol says, then, looking out, “Okay, Hendu, it’s your time to poke one outta here!”
Seth is trying to recall if he ever heard the name Janet uttered in the Stein household. Nope.
Strike one to Hendu. Then, on an 0-1 count, pow! outta here. Bosox take a 4–3 lead here in the top of the tenth. Soothsayer Sol is filled with mirth. Red Sox Nation is filled with hope.
And when, following strikeouts by Owen and Schiraldi, Boggs doubles to the wall in left-center and Barrett singles to right, making it 5–3 Bosox, the mirth and the hope blossom into ecstasy and optimism.
Buckner leaves Barrett stranded at first, but no matter.
“Let’s go, Mets!” shouts a die-hard fan behind Seth, Sol, and Janet. “It’s never too late!”
Shades of ’51, Seth observes, when a certain other New York ball club roared back in their last licks to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.
“Hey, Janet?” Sol says.
“Mmm?”
“I’m sure glad we share this passion. It makes things a lot easier, you know.”
“Yes, I agree, Solomon. We’re two lucky people.”
Seth can’t believe what he’s hearing. Or what he thinks he’s hearing.
Another plane swoops past the stadium, this time on its way from the airport. The poor 287 people on that big bird who are missing all the History down here, Seth thinks.
“Three more lousy outs, and we’re home!” Sol yells.
Janet flashes him a dirty look.
Seth recognizes the Bosox out there. Jim Rice 14, Dave Henderson 40, and Dwight Evans 24 pegging in the distance; Wade Boggs 26, Spike Owen 12, Marty Barrett 17, and Bill Buckner 6 on the infield dirt; Rich Gedman 10 behind the plate, catching the warm-ups of a confident-looking Calvin Schiraldi 31. Yep, only two starting African-American players. How sad.
Before another play ever happens on the field, the plot thickens. Joining Seth and Sol and Janet is a man who jostles past them to seat himself on the other side of Janet, three Buds in a cardboard holder in his hands. He keeps one, hands one to each of the other two in the party. Sol and Janet take sips of beer out of their cups as the man settles into his seat. Sol’s mustache is white now, and so is Janet’s, and they giggle at each other.
The man who has joined them is the poster boy for the Sesame Street song “One of these men is not like the others.” An impressive scar running down his right che
ek, a nose rendered crooked perhaps in the boxing ring, high cheekbones, an eight o’clock shadow, expensive Italian leather shoes and a double-breasted dark green suit with a solid pink shirt and a solid red tie—he has come straight out of the raucous pages of a Damon Runyon story.
“Anything happen while I was gone?” Nathan Detroit asks.
“Yeah, Hendu hit a dinger and then they scored again, so we’re in a 5–3 hole with three outs left to the season,” Janet answers.
“Crap!” Nathan replies, sinking down in his seat.
Seth’s mind is in overdrive. So who’s this hoodlum Papa Sol’s hanging out with?
Bottom of the tenth, Mets’ last chance, and the twenty thousand Bosox fans in attendance can just smell their first World Series title in sixty-eight long, excruciating years. Nineteen thousand nine hundred ninety-nine, actually, since Seth already knows better.
Wally Backman steps up to the plate with the Mets’ hopes resting squarely on his brawny shoulders. Just then, Seth’s attention is diverted from the action on the field to the action to his left. Papa Sol stretches his arm around Janet’s back and furtively hands what appears to be a bulging envelope to Nathan Detroit.
What is going on here?, Seth wonders. What kind of trouble has Papa Sol gotten himself into? Who is this guy? His bookie? His blackmailer? His rival in a love triangle? And what’s in that envelope? Money? Is it a payoff for something? A bet on the game? Is Papa Sol deep in debt? Paying off Nathan to buy his silence? Does this have something, anything, to do with Papa Sol’s sudden disappearance eighteen years hence?
Seth is the only attendee in the ballpark interested in a drama other than the one between the foul lines.
Before you could say, “Red Sox win the Series!” Backman hits a lazy fly to Rice in left, and Hernandez flies deep to Hendu in center. Two quick outs, and only one more to go before Beantown blows its top.
“Damn!” Janet mutters.
“Crap!” Nathan grouses.
“Yesss!” Sol hisses.
Seth admires the depth and the desperation of his grandfather’s caring.
The Mets’ last hope, Gary Carter, strides to the plate, oozing an eerie and inappropriate confidence.
In one of the most ironic exhibitions of prehatched chicken counting in baseball history, the scoreboard, in a premature inauguration, lights up:
CONGRATULATIONS RED SOX, 1986 WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS.
Carter fouls one off, takes two pitches for balls, and, with a determined look on his face that says, “I ain’t gonna make the last out, goddammit,” loops a single to left.
“Now batting for Aguilera…Kevin Mitchell, number seven.”
“C’mon, Kevin baby, keep it going,” Nathan screams with his gangster voice, his breast pocket bulging with Papa Sol’s presumable moolah.
Sol flashes him a look of disgust and whispers imploringly to the pitcher, “Let’s go, Calvin, one more stinken out. Just one more.”
After a checked-swing foul, Mitchell lines a hanging slider to center for a single.
First and second now, and the pesky Ray Knight is due up. Nervous Red Sox fans crumple their programs or order another Bud or both.
“C’mon, Cal, one more stinken out. Just hang in there!”
Knight goes oh-and-two, and the Bosox are at long last one strike away from the elusive Grail. But pesky Ray has other plans and singles to center, scoring Carter, moving Mitchell to third, and bringing the Mets to within one measly run of tying it up.
“Now pitching for Boston…Bob Stanley, number forty-six.”
While Stanley trudges in from the bull pen, Seth takes in the scene. He is trying not to dwell on Papa Sol’s ostensibly troubling situation, whatever that might be, and to soak in History instead.
The section he’s sitting in is populated almost entirely by Red Sox fans, and he watches and listens as Stanley takes his eight warm-up pitches.
Just as in his two other visits to the past, historian Seth senses the palpable atmosphere surrounding him. This time, it is an eerie combo platter, a strange mixture of the other two visits.
On the one hand, there is the paranoia and fear that were so evident to him in the Polo Grounds of the early fifties. The Sox fans at Shea are restless, with that “Oh no, not again, this can’t be happening again” sneaking suspicion. They have lived through too many close Series calls, and many of these fans have actually suffered through them in person. The recurring roller coaster first began in ’46, when the Sox were behind three games to two to the Cardinals and came back to win Game 6, only to lose Game 7, 4–3, after rallying from a 3–1 deficit. Then there was the ’67 Series, with Lonborg and Yaz, when they stormed back, also against St. Louis, from a three-games-to-one hole, only to lose to Gibby, 7–2, once again in Game 7. Finally, there was the ’75 fiasco, when they were trailing three games to two against the Reds, came back to win Game 6, 7–6, after being behind 6–3, only to lose Game 7 yet again, 4–3, this time after leading, 3–0.
On the other hand, there is the innocent hope still flickering at Shea, the same hope that imbued Candlestick in ’62, the hope that keeps Red Sox Nation going, treading water, refusing to go under for good.
Fear and hope, strange bedfellows, Seth thinks. All these passionate fans, including Sol, who have bled and sweated and cried for their beloved team lo these many years, through all the disappointment and all the shattered dreams, still clinging to the promise of a victory. And these same fans, deep down in their rooting bones, know somehow, someway, that this time, once again, something bad’s gonna happen.
But Red Sox Nation takes heart, because when all is said and done, they are acutely aware of the incontrovertible fact that they are still only one out, one cotton-pickin’ out, from Heaven. From ending the Curse…of the BamBIno!
They are banking on this cheery thought as the ornery Mookie Wilson assumes his crooked stance in the batter’s box.
Unbeknownst to everyone at Shea except Seth, here comes one of the greatest, grittiest pressure at bats in the entire glorious history of the National Pastime.
It’s first and third and Mitchell’s only ninety measly feet away from knotting the game up and Stanley’s fidgeting on the mound and Mookie’s fidgeting in the box and Janet and Nathan D. are fidgeting in their seats and Papa Sol is glaring intently at pitcher Stanley, willing him to get this friggin’ thing over with, and Seth knows what’s about to happen and it’s breaking his heart.
Mookie fouls a pitch off and takes a ball and then another and he fouls off a second one and the count is now two-and-two and here we are, for a second time only one strike away from agony for Mets’ fans and ecstasy for Red Sox Nation. And Mookie hits his third foul ball of the at bat and then his fourth and it’s still two-and-two and we’re still one strike away and the tension is as thick as Boston chowder.
“Y’know,” Sol says to his two companions, “Mookie reminds me a little of a fellow named Richie Ashburn. Used to play for the Phillies when you guys were in diapers. One of the original Mets, in fact. Used to drive pitchers crazy, the way he’d stand in there on top of the plate and just keep fouling off pitches, hanging in there. He’d foul off six, eight, ten pitches, hell, he’d stay up there fouling off pitches all day and night it seemed and finally spray a single to the opposite field or squib a hit down the line or work the pitcher for a walk. Eventually, he’d find a way to get on, just like this guy up there now.”
Janet and Nathan nod their heads, return to the action. Nathan’s program is mauled beyond recognition, an origami auto crash.
Seth is suffering in silence and Papa Sol is still urging Stanley on under his breath, but to no avail, because here comes the wild pitch at Mookie’s knees that he somehow, magically, avoids being hit by and it gets past Gedman and rolls to the backstop and here comes Mitchell in to score and it’s 5–5 and Knight makes it to second, to the Promised Land of Scoring Position.
The count is full and Mookie steps in again, ready to receive his eighth pitch from the
shaken Stanley, and surprise! surprise! he fouls another ball back and then he hits foul number six just past third. And now he is ready for the tenth pitch of the at-bat and he bends over the plate, this dark-skinned, modern-day Richie Ashburn, and he swipes at the ball and barely tops it and here comes that world-famous little squibber of all squibbers tapped down the first-base line, that puny, measly, wretched, pathetic little bleeder of a ground ball that Seth alone in the universe knows about now but in three seconds billions will be talking about until the end of recorded time.
And everyone in Shea is standing and millions are standing up in their homes in front of their TVs and everyone is holding their collective breaths and praying, the Mets fans for one lucky break to happen and the Red Sox fans for the misery of sixty-eight long years of famine to end mercifully, and here comes the fleet Mookie sprinting down the line and Knight, he’s chugging toward third and there’s old Billy Buck, bum ankle and all, in the twilight of his career, in his eighteenth season and bad gam and all he’s still the best-fielding first sacker you’ll ever see with the possible exceptions of Gil Hodges and Don Mattingly and Keith Hernandez and Wes Parker and maybe you can throw ol’ flamboyant Vic Power in there and Buckner is bending down now with his hobbled old legs to suck up the grounder like a timeworn but reliable Hoover…
And at this very instant, at this momentous, historical instant, Solomon Stein, who is standing a mere fifty feet or so from the ears of William Joseph Buckner, yells out, with passion, gusto, and the very best of intentions, “You got it, Billy boy!”
Seth is watching the play closely and already knows the outcome. But what he doesn’t know and now learns—from a historical perspective—is that, simultaneous with Sol’s outburst, Billy Buck, the split second before the ball slithers tragically between his legs, lifts his head back barely, imperceptibly, not even a millimeter, and turns it slightly to the left, toward the stands, in the direction of where the sudden vocal outburst originated from, in the direction of rabid Red Sox fan Solomon Stein. Back and to the left…back and to the left…back and to the left…