by Freddy C » Sun Sep 09, 2007 1:18 am
Hey Buggsy...wuz up? I remember that first year, too. I played for Liotta Bakery, coached by Steve Scalicky and Manny Alexander. We played a lot of games at Crotona Park. One sunny Saturday we were playing your Smyth Oil team. Back then I was full of determination, but low on skill. The pitcher for your team was having control problems that day, and the coaches had alerted us to be patient at the plate. I waited out a base on balls, and took second, and then third base on successive wild pitches. Now I was psyched for scoring a run, if only he'd throw another wild pitch. Sure enough, he threw one in the dirt, and I was off like a bandit. Only problem was that the ball hit that concrete border at the bottom of the backstop, and bounced right back to the catcher. I hadn't been paying much attention to who was on the other team in those days: big mistake. While I was racing for the plate, I saw the ball roll back to the catcher, and as he picked it up and turned toward me, all I could see was this mountain of a guy that I was running toward at full speed. I was probably all of 4 feet tall and weighed around 65 pounds soaking wet. This catcher was at least 6 feet tall even then, and built like a Sherman tank. And there I was, running full speed ahead right to the spot he was standing, which was on top of home plate.
I had seen the boy named Anthony Merendino around the neighborhood but had never been introduced. That day, as they say in the sports world, I got to know him up close and personal. You see, I never really learned how to slide yet, never really had to do it. So as I got closer and closer to this giant person with the ball in his right hand, the one I hadn't met yet, the one protected by shin gaurds, a chest protector and a mask, little ol' me felt like I was heading for a gang fight without a weapon. Where was a two by four when I needed one? In my mind I was yelling, slide you idiot slide, and my inner self was hollering back, how you dummy, how?
Now, I thought I was moving into some facsimile of a slide, but that was wishful thinking. For the last ten feet or so, all I could fixate on was this huge catcher's eyes. The closer I got to home plate, the wider and wider his eyes got, as if to say, this little squirt ain't stopping, and he isn't sliding either. WHAM ! I hit that wall at about 60 miles an hour. (Or so it seemed) I felt the impact, and everything went black. I don't know if I was knocked out or not. Next thing I know, I'm hearing voices. They were calling my name, but I was still in the dark. Suddenly, I could feel the dirt between my fingers, so I realized I was still here on earth, and not yet risen to heaven. All the while I'm saying, "I can't see....I can't see". And the coaches are repeating, "He can't see....he says he can't see" ! Just then someone says, "Well, open your eyes" ! Oh, I thought, that's a novel idea. So I opened my eyes, and behold the bright sun. What do you know, you're not dead, I thought to myself. So they picked me up off the ground, and I looked up at the kid I eventually came to know as Buggsy. He was looking a little shaken, but not near as badly as he had shaken me. He asked was I all right, and I nodded I was. Then they led me to the dugout, gave me a whiff of smelling salts, and told me next time I had better slide.
After the game, they told my Dad about it. I spent the next week wearing out a pair of jeans, while I learned to slide under a rope about 18 inches off the ground, held there by two sticks about three feet apart. Needless to say, by the next game, I was a sliding wizzard. I never had a baserunning collision like that ever again. I'm 59 now; many years have passed. But I'll never forget how weird it felt, back when I was in Little League, when everything went dark, somewhere between heaven and earth, the day I ran full speed into an immovable object named Buggsy.