One of the only benefits of the current shutdown is that all of the sports networks are running old, classic content. As a result, my DVR is recording stuff around the clock on all the channels, and my online video library now rivals any Hall of Fame's. I was flipping through the MLB Network's offerings and stumbled across the 1978 Sox-Yanks one-game playoff, and hit play, outcome be damned. It was baseball, and it featured many of my childhood baseball heroes; the chance to see them again outweighed having to relive the tantalizing yet ultimately tragic see-saw battle fought that day. It's been over 40 years and 4 World Series titles since then, I figured I could appreciate the game for what it was.
And I rejoiced at seeing Yaz, ever the warrior, hit that 2nd inning homer off Guidry, stepping up when it mattered most. Ortiz before Ortiz.
The score remained 1-0 until the bottom of the sixth, when Burleson doubled, Remy bunted him over to third, and then the 1978 MVP-in-waiting came to the plate. And as Rice singled cleanly into center to drive The Rooster in, I saw it: saw it for the first time in many, many years. The signature casual bat toss after the follow-through. Not even a toss, really, just sort of a hand flick to get the piece of ash out of the way, the coda to a compact swing, the dot on the i that was a well-struck sphere of horsehide. That spry release that sent the bat suspended in midair for what seemed like an eternity, a gently falling space station from Kubrick’s 2001, Strauss providing the soundtrack.
That was Jim Rice to me. And that flip is embedded in my memory, as much anything from that era is.
Watching the broadcast, Rice actually seemed small in comparison to today's sluggers. Not tiny, but he wasn’t a hulk. He wasn’t 6’ 4”. He didn’t have improbably bulging arms. But he wasn't small or wiry, either. He wasn’t Hank Aaron, a slight Everyman whose supernatural gift was lightning wrists. He was a carnival strongman in a normal-sized athlete's body. And he was a beast. For three years (1977-1979) he was the Most Feared Hitter™ in baseball, rightfully so, driving baseballs out of the park with impunity and leaving PTSD-wracked pitchers in his wake. Had some good-to-very-good seasons outside of those years as well, even if he never reached that Beast Mode pinnacle again (who could?), but his career fizzled out rather abruptly at the age of 36, which denied him the opportunity to pile up the kind of counting stats that would have made him a slam-dunk Hall of Famer. He was finally inducted in 2009, in his 15th and final year of eligibility. I'm glad for that. Glad for him.
Rice was drafted and signed by the Sox three weeks after I was born. As I watched the MLB Network rebroadcast, I pondered this man whose professional career (both on-field and up in the TV booth) encompassed my entire existence.
My 11-year old son, watching the game with me and subjected to all of this, asked me at one point, “You saw him play?”
“Yes. He played when I was a boy. Like you.”
And I looked at the TV screen as Jim Rice sent a frozen rope up the middle, knocking in Burleson and chugging up the first base line in a polyester double-knit V-neck, bold cherry red helmet leaving a technicolor streak across the screen due to the bad late-'70s video production.
He played when I was a boy.
And I rejoiced at seeing Yaz, ever the warrior, hit that 2nd inning homer off Guidry, stepping up when it mattered most. Ortiz before Ortiz.
The score remained 1-0 until the bottom of the sixth, when Burleson doubled, Remy bunted him over to third, and then the 1978 MVP-in-waiting came to the plate. And as Rice singled cleanly into center to drive The Rooster in, I saw it: saw it for the first time in many, many years. The signature casual bat toss after the follow-through. Not even a toss, really, just sort of a hand flick to get the piece of ash out of the way, the coda to a compact swing, the dot on the i that was a well-struck sphere of horsehide. That spry release that sent the bat suspended in midair for what seemed like an eternity, a gently falling space station from Kubrick’s 2001, Strauss providing the soundtrack.
That was Jim Rice to me. And that flip is embedded in my memory, as much anything from that era is.
Watching the broadcast, Rice actually seemed small in comparison to today's sluggers. Not tiny, but he wasn’t a hulk. He wasn’t 6’ 4”. He didn’t have improbably bulging arms. But he wasn't small or wiry, either. He wasn’t Hank Aaron, a slight Everyman whose supernatural gift was lightning wrists. He was a carnival strongman in a normal-sized athlete's body. And he was a beast. For three years (1977-1979) he was the Most Feared Hitter™ in baseball, rightfully so, driving baseballs out of the park with impunity and leaving PTSD-wracked pitchers in his wake. Had some good-to-very-good seasons outside of those years as well, even if he never reached that Beast Mode pinnacle again (who could?), but his career fizzled out rather abruptly at the age of 36, which denied him the opportunity to pile up the kind of counting stats that would have made him a slam-dunk Hall of Famer. He was finally inducted in 2009, in his 15th and final year of eligibility. I'm glad for that. Glad for him.
Rice was drafted and signed by the Sox three weeks after I was born. As I watched the MLB Network rebroadcast, I pondered this man whose professional career (both on-field and up in the TV booth) encompassed my entire existence.
My 11-year old son, watching the game with me and subjected to all of this, asked me at one point, “You saw him play?”
“Yes. He played when I was a boy. Like you.”
And I looked at the TV screen as Jim Rice sent a frozen rope up the middle, knocking in Burleson and chugging up the first base line in a polyester double-knit V-neck, bold cherry red helmet leaving a technicolor streak across the screen due to the bad late-'70s video production.
He played when I was a boy.