by Lee Gutkind
No way, he said to himself, over and over again, as he shifted his weight from foot to foot, trying to balance himself on his heels and lift his toes off the ground; no way was he going to give those rats any satisfaction. What would it accomplish anyway? What would it prove?
When one of the players got hurt, his teammates would gather around offering sympathetic advice, and his trainer and manager would jack-rabbit out of the dugout ready with first aid and soothing consolation. Even the fans would murmur in sympathetic suspense and the play-by-play sportscaster in the radio booth would speak of the injured player in reverent tones. But should an umpire show he is hurt, just once, no matter how serious the injury, the fans would cheer and the sportscaster would pause for a commercial.
Worse, the players would never forget it. For the rest of the year they would blame whatever call that might go against them on the ump’s injury, attributing their own inability to get on base to the umpire’s inability to move fast enough to see the play accurately. Because of his injury. It had happened before, a hundred times before to other umps, but it wasn’t going to happen to him.
At the stretch during the seventh inning, Wendelstedt watched Colosi walk around the field. He was standing very straight, moving his chin up and down like a pigeon pecking at its food, and swiveling his hips tentatively back and forth. Back must be bothering him again, Wendelstedt thought, and then he smiled, remembering.
In his hotel room in Houston one afternoon before a game last year, Colosi had stood in the bathroom shaving. Inadvertently, he had inhaled some shaving cream up his nose and it made him sneeze. He sneezed again a little bit harder, rested, then sneezed a third time harder still. The fourth time he sneezed so hard he stamped his foot and his head came down almost to his knee in the ricochet. Colosi froze right there, his leg up and poised in stomping position, his head almost resting on his knee. He couldn’t move. A muscle had gotten pulled or tangled up with another muscle, he didn’t know exactly, but either way he was stuck there, balancing himself on one foot, his body folded almost double.
God knows how long it took him to realize he wouldn’t be able to straighten up in the very near future, but after a while Colosi looked at his watch, and decided to get to the phone by crawling. He inched his way out of the bathroom, stopping periodically to breathe and to moan, and by the time he reached the phone to call for help, an hour and a half had passed. The worst hour and a half of his life, he said later. Wendelstedt had eventually gotten into Colosi’s room and lifted him onto the bed and a doctor was later able to straighten him up and get him into good enough shape for that night. But that sneeze had been the beginning of a long and torturous year of pain and anxiety, of fear that people would find out, fear that he might be forced to quit the game temporarily. Now once in a while there was a relapse, and Colosi would have to go scrambling from trainer to trainer for pain pills and muscle relaxers, but as the season progressed, his back seemed to be steadily improving.
Wendelstedt, standing behind first base, leaning his hands on his knees, continued smiling as he began thinking back to the first time he and Nick had officiated together. They had first met at the Al Somers Umpire School back in 1959. Nick was then a floor captain—something like an assistant maitre d’—at the Copacabana night club in New York; he also did some part-time umpiring during the day in sandlot ball for extra money. At the time, Wendelstedt was a first-year science teacher at a junior high school in Baltimore. They had gotten along well together in umpire school, mostly because Nick was so interesting to listen to as he talked about all the stars he knew from the Copa—people like Sinatra, Gable, Jayne Mansfield, and Ethel Merman. Both men had enrolled in the six-week course at Daytona Beach, Florida, with a great deal of apprehension. Neither had any idea of committing himself to a life-long career in baseball; that came later. Then it was just a question of becoming more skilled in a profession which had frequently provided them both with moonlight money.
Still and all, as the weeks went by, they grew more excited. Long before graduating they had sent away for their mail order, bargain-basement, “official” umpire’s uniforms: the dark blue pants and jacket and the pale blue short-sleeved shirt. They had already purchased and modeled, in the privacy of their rooms, second hand catcher’s masks and shin guards, steel-toed and steel-tongued coal miner’s shoes, as well as umpire balloons and inside protectors. All they needed was a job to go with the accoutrements, no easy matter considering the competition.
Somers selected a dozen of his best students from the more than eighty graduates of his school each year to work major league spring training games in Florida; the best men would be offered jobs by the minor league organizations needing officials. Colosi, who was thirty-two at the time, and Wendelstedt, twenty-four, were teamed together. Their first scheduled game was between the Detroit Tigers and the New York Yankees. A New Yorker since arriving in the U.S. thirty years before, Colosi was especially excited to be working, officiating, on the same field where his boyhood heroes like Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford of the Yankees, and Al Kaline and Harvey Kuenn of the Tigers would be playing.
The two young umpires had arrived at the ballpark early, dressed quickly in their tight-fitting uniforms, modeled them for each other, then stripped and folded the pants, jackets, and shirts neatly so as not to wrinkle the newly pressed cuffs and creases ahead of time. They rubbed up the balls, spit an extra shine on their new black shoes, and took turns going to the bathroom. But when the time came to dress and get out on the field, Colosi couldn’t get off the toilet.
“I can’t do it, Harry. I got the shits. I got them bad. Every time I get up, I get so scared I gotta sit back down again. I’m tellin’ you, I just can’t do it. Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Al Kaline. Al Somers is in the stands. I’m telling you, I just can’t do it.”
“C’mon Nick, you’re thirty-two years old,” Wendelstedt said.
“Every time I get up I feel like I’m going to burst. You do it without me.”
“How in the hell can I umpire a game by myself?”
“Tell them I went home.”
“Jesus, Nick, Sinatra, Charles Boyer, Lauren Bacall—all those big stars are your friends. With those credentials, you sure don’t have to worry about meeting Harvey Kuenn. Besides, you won’t meet him. All you have to do is call him safe or out.”
Colosi shook his head and sighed, then lifted himself slowly and sheepishly, pulled up his pants, and hobbled outside. His temporary fright had affected Wendelstedt positively, however. Doubly confident now that he had detected and cured Colosi’s weakness, he swaggered out onto the field, walked quickly and soberly to the plate, and yelled “Play ball!”
On the first pitch to lead-off batter Harvey Kuenn, Wendelstedt leaned down low, peered over the catcher’s shoulder, set his cleats solidly into the dirt to brace himself—then split his new, blue, mail-order umpire’s pants. To this day he could not remember whether he first heard the sickening rip or the wild cheering of the three thousand or so Floridians as they saw the rip. The first picture in his scrapbook, clipped from a local paper later that evening, is of those pants and his underwear glaring white in the bright sun, as he leaned over to call a pitch. Under it, the caption reads: “Official Opening.”
When the Mets scored two in the bottom half of the ninth, the game moved into extra innings; Wendelstedt felt as if his whole left leg was going to fall off, it was throbbing so hard. He kept blinking his eyes, continually attempting to redirect his concentration on the game, only the game, not on the players talking it up from the field; not on the hollering from the dugout; not on the first base coach clap-clapping his hands to induce a rally; not on the middle-aged fan with the potbelly who took off some of his clothes and streaked through the box seats behind home plate and caused a delay in the game. Wendelstedt didn’t want to know about the fight that erupted between the Shea Stadium security guards and the long-haired dirtball hippie behind him in the right field stands; he didn’t want to think about
anything except the game and his wish that it would be over with, somehow, some way, and soon!
An umpire’s prayers are hardly ever answered, but this time, for some unexplained reason, Providence was on the side of the men in blue. Seaver served up the fattest, prettiest, birthday-cake ball Wendelstedt had ever seen and Bobby Bonds hit it a mile, maybe two miles, and out of the park.
Mercifully, the game ended quickly after that. The Giants went down in order and the Mets, after putting two men on with only one out, trudged with heads hanging into their locker room after pinch hitter Ed Kranepool hit into a game-ending double play.
“You’re out!” Wendelstedt cried, swinging his fist up and down sharply. Then he sighed and slumped, and hobbled slowly off the field. He entered the shadowed concrete tunnel through the visiting team’s dugout and walked quietly and inconspicuously behind the clattering spikes of the victorious Giants, listening as they joked and whooped. He was very tired now, both from the ten inning, three hour and fifteen minute contest, and, more so, from fighting the pain. His whole body ached and felt sticky. The Giants turned into their dressing room and Wendelstedt continued up the concrete canal, illuminated only by two shadeless, teardrop-shaped bulbs. He entered the umpires’ room silently and winked at Harvey, Colosi, and Williams, who were waiting for him. He sunk down into a chair, took off his hat, then his shoe and his blood-soaked sock. And finally, after six and a half innings and almost two and a quarter hours of painful baseball, big, bad Harry Wendelstedt leaned back in his chair and howled.
Hurry Up and Wait
THE MAN RATED BEST umpire in the National League opened his sticky eyes slowly, forced his way through the jungle of blankets and pillows on top of him, and rolled out of bed. He hobbled over to the window and looked through the glass at the sky. The clouds were ugly, big and black and bristly, like ragged pads of Brillo. As he stared into the polluted panorama of the Manhattan skyline, he tried to mumble a few expletives, but could only bring to the surface of his mouth a couple of dry, hacking coughs. Still on unsteady legs, he made his way into the bathroom and turned on the water in the tub, adjusting the hot and cold faucets to a soothing lukewarm. Then, flipping up the shower knob, waiting briefly till the spraying water crackled against the curtain, he stepped inside.
The water attacked his face like strong wind, washing the grit of sleep from his eyes and awakening his still-drowsy limbs. He rubbed his face vigorously with both hands, then ran a forefinger over the red line that lashed to the right down his thigh where a German Shepherd had bitten him last winter while he was vacationing with his family in Mexico. Even with the scar, though, Doug Harvey was a handsome man, tall and slim save for the small paunch that had collected over the years at his stomach. His face was sharply sculpted and slender. And the circles under his eyes were well obscured by the beginnings of a golden suntan which, at the same time, beautifully accentuated his wavy silver hair. Even his teeth were white and perfectly straight, or at least the open and completely boyish way he smiled made it seem so. As he traveled from city to city along the National League circuit, many women—particularly airline hostesses, who seemed to find him especially attractive—told him he should have been a movie star instead of an umpire. He liked that, and usually would say in reply, “Well, thank you darlin’, but I believe I’ll just stay here instead of goin’ to Hollywood. That way I can enjoy myself just sittin’ and lookin’ at you.” In fact, those were the very words he had once recited to one especially pretty girl he met a little more than eight years ago, a girl with blonde hair, blue eyes, and dime-sized dimples; she had eventually become his second wife.
The water ran down his face for an indeterminate length of time before he washed, rinsed, and stepped out springily, shut off the shower and toweled himself down hard. After shaving and brushing his teeth, he moved into the other room, pulled on a pair of dark maroon trousers and a shiny black silk shirt with white buttons, and stepped into a pair of burgundy-and-white patent tasseled loafers. He was feeling better now, much better than he had felt in days, but still not like the Doug Harvey of the past, not as good as he had felt last season or during the early part of the winter when he had been able to rest with his family.
For one thing, his feet and his legs were aching all the time and it was terribly difficult for him to run without grimacing. He didn’t think it had influenced his speed or his reflexes on the field, but it certainly was affecting his stamina. After every game he was so damn tired he could hardly gather the energy to shower and dress and make it back to his hotel room. He slept a hell of a lot these days, too. And he couldn’t drink anymore: liquor put him to sleep. Worse, he was jumpy and irritable at times—not the perfect disposition for any umpire, let alone the chief of a major league crew.
When the German Shepherd had ripped open his thigh in Mexico, the one nurse in the little town where they had been staying had panicked and injected him with a ten times normal dose of penicillin to kill the infection. By the time he had reached the nearest hospital, seventy-five miles away, the penicillin had indeed dealt with the infection, but it was also taking its toll on Harvey’s body. Constant waves of nausea and pain kept passing over him; he was in and out of a coma for days. He recovered slowly over the next few weeks there; after traveling home, he remained on heavy medication and in relative vegetation for the remainder of the winter. To make matters worse, the bed rest, along with the medication, had bloated him by twenty pounds. He felt like a dumpling. But what were perhaps the worst two weeks of that winter came when the medication was cut off. Harvey underwent a torturous period of withdrawal. He felt he could now understand something of the agony in which drug addicts were forced to live day after day.
He had visited doctors and endured a number of physical examinations over the past few weeks, but all gave him a perfect bill of health (“considering the circumstances”). Or was it a bill of goods? After sixteen years of professional baseball, twelve of them in the major leagues, he knew himself well enough to know when something was out of whack. At forty-four, in his first year as a crew chief and the first in which he had been rated best official in the National League, he didn’t want anything to alter his reputation, his feeling of satisfaction, or his ever-increasing sense of accomplishment. After all, he was at the top of his profession, one of the lucky forty-eight who comprised the umpire roster of the major leagues.
So until he discovered the reason he was feeling this way, or until he was feeling better, he would keep the information to himself. His crew, especially Colosi and Williams, had enough problems, and this wasn’t the best time for their chief to show weakness. Besides, any hint that Doug Harvey wasn’t in top form would be detrimental to the high degree of control he exercised on the field. For precisely that reason, most umpires keep longstanding illnesses to themselves, whenever possible, during the course of a season, then deal with them surreptitiously during the winter.
Harvey closed the door to his room, walked down the hall, and pushed the button for the elevator. He found himself thinking of his wife. Her face emerged as in a mirage, then her long legs, curled on the grass in the sun, bronzed and slender. He hadn’t seen her for six weeks and didn’t expect to see her for another two. Last season, he had managed to visit his family at home a total of eight days out of seven months. Visit was certainly the right word: it was as if he had to reintroduce himself to his children each successive time he came home. (“I’m your daddy.” “Daddy who?”)
If there had been a phone in the elevator, Harvey would have called his wife—just to talk—all the way from the thirty-sixth to the first floor. He was feeling that lonely.
Harvey, Wendelstedt, and Williams gathered approximately two hours before game time in the lobby of their New York headquarters, The City Squire Motor Inn, and walked two blocks up the street. Colosi, home in the Bronx with his family, would meet them at the ballpark. The sun had taken a sabbatical that week in New York and each day had been cold and windy, as gray as the pavement on 49t
h Street and Seventh Avenue where the umpires descended into the dungeon of the subway station. Two trains later, they emerged across from Shea Stadium. A cold rain had started somewhere between 53rd Street and Shea and now, as they walked under the loop of seats and concessions around the playing area, it began coming down with dogged persistence.
Almost the first crew of umpires to work in Shea Stadium when it opened in 1964 had discovered the subway as the most reliable and efficient way of traveling to and from the ballpark. The umpires could surely afford other ways of transportation, if they so desired, for in addition to their salary, spread out over a period of seven months, they receive $47.50 in expenses for each day of the baseball season. They are also issued an air travel card by their respective leagues to use through the season. Umpires use their own money to visit their families during an off day or to detour to another town to visit friends. Except in serious emergencies, they will not travel on a chartered team plane or on a commercial flight with players. In fact, they will go out of their way to avoid being with players. Umpires will usually stay in the same city for no more than three days, then move in the opposite direction of the two teams with whom they have just worked. On the average, umpires will travel approximately 100,000 air miles each year.
Harvey’s crew took a taxi to Shea only when they were leaving town directly after the ball game and needed someone to carry and coordinate their personal baggage. Otherwise, no matter how uncomfortable, they remained loyal to the New York City subway system. Many substantial taxi fares and long waits in traffic had been wasted in the past by umpires involved in needless experimentation, searching for the better way.
In other towns the situation is different. In Houston, a motel courtesy wagon transports umpires back and forth to the Astrodome every night. In Chicago, Willie Rooks, an ancient black taxi driver with steel-gray hair, has been chauffeurring both American and National League umpires for the past twenty-five years. In Pittsburgh, Joe Petraglia, a boilermaker by profession and an “umpire freak” by choice, does the driving. In St. Louis, a mortician, enamored of umpires for some unexplained reason, often sends his hearse and uniformed driver to provide the necessary transportation. In Philadelphia, a long-time friend of umpires lends his wife’s car.