Roberto & Me

by Dan Gutman

  Clemente held one arm up to let the umpire know he still wasn’t ready. The ump called time. Clemente scraped at the dirt in the batter’s box with his toe until he had it just the way he liked it. Finally, when he got into his stance, the pitcher stepped off the rubber. The umpire called time again.

  He was deep in the batter’s box. It didn’t look like he could possibly reach a pitch on the outside corner.

  Pittsburgh Pirates

  “What’s taking them so long?” Sunrise asked me.

  “They’re playing head games,” I told her. “It’s like poker.”

  Clemente positioned himself very deep in the batter’s box, as far back as you could be without crossing the chalk line. It didn’t look like he could possibly reach a pitch on the outside corner, even though his bat appeared to be longer than a regular bat. Also, Clemente’s bat had no knob at the end. It was like one of those old-time bats with a thick handle and large barrel.

  He was not a big man. The catcher and umpire were both taller than him. He held his hands back and low, near his waist. Stargell took a lead off second base.

  The pitcher finally decided he was ready and looked in for his sign. He delivered the first pitch, and Clemente took it for a called strike. It looked like he had no intention of swinging no matter what. He was checking the timing, trying to figure out the pitcher.

  The two of them fidgeted around some more, and the next pitch came in. It looked high to me, but Clemente liked this one better. I recalled reading somewhere that he was known as a “bad ball hitter.”

  Clemente took his stride forward impossibly early but somehow managed to keep his bat cocked until the last possible instant. His front leg was off the ground as he lunged at the ball. He didn’t have a classically perfect swing like Joe DiMaggio or Ted Williams. It looked like he was throwing the bat at the ball.

  It was a violent, furious swing, and it missed. Clemente spun around and grabbed his batting helmet so it wouldn’t fall off his head. Strike two.

  A few fans on the third-base side began chanting. At first I couldn’t tell what they were saying. Then I figured it out.

  “¡Arriba! ¡Arriba! ¡Arriba! ¡Arriba!”

  That was on my Spanish vocab quiz just last week. It literally means “upstairs,” but Señorita Molina told us it could also mean “lifting” or “arising.” They must have been Pirates fans who came all the way from Pittsburgh to see the game. Either that or they were taunting Clemente. He didn’t seem to mind.

  Everybody knows what to do on an 0-2 count. The batter has to protect the plate, swinging at just about anything close so he won’t be called out on strikes. The pitcher will throw a ball out of the strike zone, hoping the batter will swing and miss at a bad pitch for strike three. I didn’t bother explaining any of this to Sunrise. She wouldn’t understand.

  As predicted, the next pitch was outside, at least a few inches. I didn’t think Clemente was going to swing at it; but at the last possible instant, he reached across the plate. It almost looked like his bat ripped the ball right out of the catcher’s mitt.

  When Clemente hit the ball, it made a different sound than when anybody else hit it. It sounded like a rifle shot. I didn’t even see it leave the bat. But I did see the second baseman leap up with his glove fully extended. The ball went over his head, took a hop off the rightfield grass, and skipped all the way to the wall.

  Stargell was sure to score from second, so I kept my eyes on Clemente. He didn’t run like other people. As he broke from the batter’s box, his legs were churning, his knees were pumping high, and his elbows were flailing out in every direction. But even so, he was fast and graceful. He ran like a wild colt.

  As Clemente took the big turn around first, his batting helmet flew off his head. He didn’t slow down. He hit the dirt feetfirst and slid past the second-base bag, reaching up over his head to grab it with one hand. The throw coming in from the outfield wasn’t even close.

  His legs were churning, his knees were pumping high, and his elbows were flailing out in every direction.

  Pittsburgh Pirates

  “Wow!” Sunrise said after the umpire made the safe sign.

  I think even she could appreciate the beauty of what we had just witnessed. The Cincinnati fans, of course, weren’t nearly as appreciative, and they let loose a chorus of boos. Clemente jumped up and slapped the dirt off his pants. Stargell trotted across the plate for the first run of the game.

  Pirates 1, Reds 0.

  12

  Royalty in Rightfield

  AFTER CLEMENTE’S HIT, THE PIRATES WENT DOWN QUIETLY in the third inning. A vendor came around hawking popcorn, and Sunrise bought a bag. We munched on the popcorn while waiting for the Reds’ turn at bat. I put my arm around her shoulder like guys do in the movies. She didn’t push it away. All in all, things were going pretty well for a first date.

  “How are you going to talk with Roberto Clemente?” Sunrise asked me. “You can’t interrupt him in the middle of the game, can you?”

  I had been asking myself the same question.

  “Here’s my plan,” I told her. “I’m guessing the Pirates will be taking a bus back to their hotel after the game. We’ll find the bus outside the ballpark and try to talk to him before he gets on it. If that doesn’t work, we can try to go to the hotel.”

  “I’ll help,” Sunrise said.

  The pitcher for the Pirates was Bob Moose. I recognized his name because one year I did a school project about baseball players who had animal names. There were a lot of them: Rabbit Maranville, Rob Deer, Catfish Hunter, Hippo Vaughn, Mule Haas, Steve Trout, Frank “Dodo” Bird. There was a guy named Turkey Tyson whose entire major-league career consisted of one at-bat for the Phillies in 1944. You could look it up.

  And Bob Moose, of course.

  Anyway, in the bottom half of the third, Moose didn’t have his best stuff, and the Reds started a rally. It ended with Bobby Tolan smashing a three-run homer to give the Reds a 3-1 lead.

  “I feel sorry for that guy,” Sunrise told me as Tolan came around and stepped on home plate.

  “You feel sorry for Bob Moose because he gave up a homer?” I asked.

  “No,” she said, “I feel sorry for the other guy. The guy who hit the ball.”

  “Tolan? He hit a three-run homer!” I said. “Why feel sorry for him?”

  “Because he had to run all the way around the bases,” she explained. “If you strike out, you get to go back to the dugout and sit down. It’s not fair.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. She couldn’t help but punch me in the arm.

  Roberto Clemente came to bat again in the fifth inning. This time he hit an easy grounder to shortstop. Even though it was obvious to everyone in the ballpark that he was going to be thrown out, Clemente hustled down the line at full speed, as if somebody was chasing him with a knife. It was actually a close play at first.

  That’s what Flip always tells us: run hard, all the time. You never know when the shortstop might muff the play or the first baseman might drop the ball.

  Clemente got two more singles in the game, but it wasn’t his hitting that made him stand out from everyone else. It was the work he did in rightfield. He made a few plays that were just…impossible.

  Like this one: In the fourth inning, the Reds had a runner at second base with one out. There was a left-handed batter at the plate, and he stroked a screaming liner to right. It was slicing as it streaked toward the rightfield corner.

  A few feet away from the wall, he leaped.

  Pittsburgh Pirates

  Clemente was off with the crack of the bat, sprinting toward the foul line. A few feet away from the wall he leaped, his body fully extended and his back to home plate. The ball somehow stuck in the web of his glove, and he crashed into the wall at full speed.

  But that was only half of it. The runner on second, seeing Clemente make the miraculous catch, tagged up and headed for third base. Clemente picked himself up off the dirt, spun around, and came up
throwing. His arm was a blur. It was like a bullet flew out of it. All you could see was a white dot that came shooting out of the rightfield corner. The ball took a perfect one-hop and landed in the third baseman’s glove. He didn’t have to move it an inch. He swiped a tag on the runner as he slid into third.

  When the umpire called the runner out, there was a gasp in the ballpark. Clemente had thrown the ball the length of a football field…for a strike. Nobody can throw a baseball that far, that accurately.

  “¡El magnifico!” somebody shouted. Even the Reds fans were on their feet cheering after the play.

  “Did you see that?” I asked Sunrise.

  “Unbelievable,” she agreed.

  Then, picture this: In the fifth inning, a guy on the Reds hit a routine single to rightfield. Every outfielder knows what to do in that situation. You throw the ball to second base so the runner doesn’t stretch a single into a double. Well, Clemente didn’t play it that way.

  He came charging in quickly to field the ball. But instead of picking it up with his glove hand, he barehanded it on the run. That way he didn’t waste any time switching the ball over to his throwing hand. And instead of throwing to second base, he whipped the ball behind the runner to first. The runner had already made a turn at the first-base bag that was just a little too wide. By the time he realized the throw went to first, it was too late to get back. The first baseman tagged him out. Clemente had turned a hit into an out.

  In the sixth inning, there was another single to right by the Reds. This time Clemente went to field the ball, but it ticked off his glove and bounced about ten feet away. The runner, seeing that the ball had been bobbled in rightfield, decided to try for second. But Clemente picked up the ball and gunned him down. I had no doubt that Clemente muffed the play on purpose, hoping the runner would take the bait and he would have the chance to throw the guy out at second. I had never heard of an outfielder deliberately making an error to fool a runner like that.

  But the most amazing play of the game was in the bottom of the seventh inning. There were no outs. The Reds had runners at first and second. The Cincinnati pitcher was up. It was an obvious sacrifice situation. As expected, the pitcher squared around and bunted. It was a good one, past the pitcher’s mound on the right side of the infield. Bob Moose couldn’t field it. The Pirates second baseman was running to cover the base, so he couldn’t get it. And the first baseman was covering the bag, so he couldn’t get it either.

  So who comes rushing in all the way from rightfield to grab the ball? Clemente! He scooped it up and fired to third in time for the force play.

  An outfielder involved in a bunt play? Unheard of!

  Clemente even had a flair when it came to flipping the ball in to the infield. He looped it in underhand. Nobody else did that.

  I couldn’t take my eyes off him the whole game. There was something different about the way Clemente swung the bat, ran the bases, chased after a fly ball, and threw, and even the way he walked out to rightfield. It was recklessness combined with grace. And there was a quiet dignity to his manner.

  “There’s something almost royal about him,” Sunrise said as Clemente jogged back to the Pirates dugout at the end of the seventh inning.

  Royal. That was the word Flip had used when he’d been talking about Clemente. Flip said it was impossible to describe in words the way Clemente played the game. You had to see it with your own eyes. He was right. Now I had seen it.

  I was glad that Sunrise got to witness such a great game for her first baseball experience. It was a seesaw battle the whole way. The Pirates scored once in the fourth inning to make it a one-run game, but the Reds picked up a run in the sixth and another one in the eighth. Then Pittsburgh tied it up in the ninth with three runs.

  By that time, Clemente had been taken out of the game. I figured he might have injured himself making that circus catch in rightfield.

  At the end of nine innings, it was tied at 5–5. Sunrise figured the game was over. I was explaining to her what “extra innings” meant when the Pirates went crazy in the tenth. A bunt, a couple of hits, an error, and a bases-loaded double by Carl Taylor, who had replaced Clemente, sealed the deal. The final score was Pittsburgh 12, Cincinnati 5.

  Before Roberto Clemente left the game, he had three hits in four at-bats, one RBI, and a handful of amazing plays in rightfield. Not a bad day’s work.

  Sunrise and I got up to file out with the rest of the fans. She took my hand again. It had been a great game, and a great first date. I would always remember this night.

  But I had something more important to think about. As we pushed through the exit turnstile at Crosley Field, I looked around for the Pirates’ team bus. If I was ever going to talk to Roberto Clemente, this would be the time.

  13

  Fanatics

  WHEN WE GOT OUTSIDE THE BALLPARK, WE HAD JUST ONE problem. There were at least 15 buses waiting for passengers, and there was no way to tell which one was waiting for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

  Sunrise and I walked almost a complete circle around Crosley Field, hoping to find a bus driver we could talk to. A few of the buses pulled away. I had a growing sense of desperation. Maybe we had missed the Pirates. Maybe they weren’t even going to a hotel. Maybe they would be heading straight to the airport to catch a flight to another city. Maybe I blew my chance to meet Roberto Clemente.

  That’s when I spotted a cluster of people gathered around an unmarked door near Gate D. Some of them were adults, but most were kids who looked younger than me. And all of them were holding pens and papers. Obviously, these were serious autograph collectors.

  “C’mon!” I shouted, grabbing Sunrise’s hand. “Follow me.”

  We hustled over to where the group was standing and tried to position ourselves close to the door. There were about 15 or 20 fans.

  “Don’t these people have anything better to do than hang around waiting for a guy to scrawl his name on a scrap of paper?” Sunrise whispered into my ear.

  “That’s why they’re called fans,” I told her. “It’s short for ‘fanatic.’”

  A dumpy-looking lady and her dumpy-looking son were jostling for position in front of us. Both of them were wearing Cincinnati Reds hats.

  “Remember to smile, Tommy,” the mother said. “And always say ‘please’ and ‘thank-you.’”

  “Is this where the players come out?” Sunrise asked her.

  “The visiting team usually comes out this exit,” the lady replied. “The Reds use a different door, because most of them drive their cars home. But the security guards won’t let us near there.”

  “The Pirates should be here in about five minutes,” the boy added. “They have to shower and change their clothes first. I want to get Willie Stargell’s autograph.”

  The two of them seemed to know what they were talking about. The boy was flipping through the pages of his autograph book. He probably had a signature from just about every player in the National League. It didn’t seem to bother either of them that Sunrise and I were dressed like hippies.

  “Do you know if Roberto Clemente talks with the fans?” Sunrise asked.

  “Oh, yes, he’s one of the nice ones,” the lady said. “Some of these guys won’t give you the time of day.”

  Everybody was waiting patiently; but after a few minutes, some people started getting antsy. There was a little pushing and shoving. A guy next to me wearing a camouflage jacket stepped on my toe. As I tried to get my foot out from under his, my hand brushed against his back.

  “Hey, knock it off!” he said without even turning around to face me. “I was here first.”

  “Why don’t you relax?” I told him.

  “Yeah,” Sunrise said, “we don’t even want autographs.”

  The guy turned and looked at us. He was older than me, maybe 20. He had a crew cut.

  “Then what are you doing here?” he asked.

  “I want to talk to Roberto Clemente,” I told him. “It’s very important.”


  “It’s a matter of life and death,” added Sunrise.

  “Then why don’t you write him a letter?” the guy said. “The people who are here want autographs. We come to every game.”

  “It’s a free country,” Sunrise said. “We can go wherever we want. You don’t own this spot, you know.”

  “Hey, be cool,” I told Sunrise.

  I could tell that this was the kind of guy you didn’t want to get angry. Guys like him are just looking for somebody to fight.

  “Why don’t you go protest against something, buddy?” he said to me. “Dirty hippies.”

  I did look like a hippie, with my headband and love beads. And we were pretty dirty too, come to think of it. I couldn’t remember the last time I had a shower. Sometime in the twenty-first century.

  “Hey, why don’t you leave him alone, mister?” Sunrise said. “He wasn’t bothering you.”

  “Why doesn’t he make me?” the guy with the crew cut said, pushing my shoulders back. “You wanna fight?”

  The dumpy lady grabbed her son by the shoulder and pulled him away from us.

  “No, I don’t want to fight,” I said.

  “Of course you don’t,” the guy said. “You’re a coward, like all those other freaks protesting against the war. But it’s okay to let our soldiers fight and die so you can live in a free country, right?”

  “The war is stupid,” Sunrise told him. “Nobody should die. It’s not even a real war. Only Congress has the power to declare war, and they never did. Do you know how many of our soldiers died in Vietnam last year? 16,000!”

  “You know what’s gonna happen if the Commies win?” the guy yelled. “The whole world will go Communist. It’s because of unpatriotic traitors like you that our guys are dying and we’re losing the war.”

  “It’s because of morons like you that we have a war there in the first place!” Sunrise shot right back.

  The guy cocked his fist.

  “If you weren’t a girl—” he said.