Birthday 1965

Play enough APBA baseball replay games and you’re bound to roll a game on a date on which you lived.  That’s unless you roll more games from the early eras.  If you’re still alive and remember an actual day in your life that corresponds with a game played on a date in 1919, well then, good for you.

I’ve done several replays in years that I was alive. My first baseball replay was 1998. I also did seasons for 1964, 1974, 1977, 1981, 1987 and 1991.

This time, I’m rolling 1965 and I hit games the other day on the date that I turned 5. It was June 29. My family lived in Madison, Wisc. Then, I was a little over two months from starting kindergarten and, while I was still unaware of baseball at any real level, I knew who Henry Aaron was because I lived close enough to Milwaukee.

I remember my fifth birthday, too. My parents got me a Daniel Boone toy musket and a plastic container that replicated the horn-shaped flask pioneers used to carry their gunpowder.

In the days before political correctness, my friends and I ran around our West Lawn neighborhood playing cowboys and Indians. We’d shoot at anything that moved.  Birds, cats, cars and people. At first I even shot at the nuns who walked near our home each day to their nearby Catholic church until I realized you could go to hell for picking off holy people.

In my replay, the White Sox clobbered the Twins, 9-3, in the first game of June 29, 1965, Don Buford hit a grand slam off Twins’ pitcher Camille Pascual in the second inning and the game was pretty much over then.  In the real life game, Minnesota beat Chicago, 7-6, when Zoilo Versalles hit a sacrifice fly with one out in the bottom of the ninth to drive in pitcher Dave Boswell who came in as a pinch runner.

Milwaukee was in New York, pounding the hapless Mets in both my replay game of the day and in the real contest. Aaron went one for four in my game; he went two for four with a home run in the actual game. Cleveland upset Boston and San Francisco edged Los Angeles, 3-2, in 13 innings in my contests.  In the real games of that day, the Dodgers beat the Giants and the Indians scalped the Red Sox.

The games we play overlap life and it gives a chance to reflect on our own lives.  Here, 56 years later, the act of rolling a few games for that day in 1965 brought back the memories of being a child. I didn’t realize it then, of course, but my entire future lay ahead. My dad was enrolled in the University of Wisconsin pursuing a doctorate in music. A year later, we moved to northern Minnesota when he got a teaching job at Bemidji State University. It was there I learned my obsession of sports, fueled by watching Twins’ games on a Duluth television station. I began playing replays, in a sense, on an electric baseball game my parents got me for Christmas in 1969. (Wait until I do a replay of the 1969 season. Nostalgia will flow freely in this blog then!)

The date links us. On June 29, 1965, I was a 5-year-old toddler taking potshots at nuns with Daniel Boone’s musket. There were no worries, other than the approaching wonderment of going to kindergarten and if rain would limit our playing outdoors.

Now, playing more than a half century later, I’m old and a tad more cynical about life. My knees hurt all the time and I worry about making the house payment on time each month. I just got my second Covid-19 vaccination shot, the same concept as in 1965 when I received a polio vaccination. It’s hard to fathom so much time has passed since that fifth birthday.

I’m the same person, but time has changed things. I’m grown up, but there’s still a spirit of the 5-year-old inside of me at times. Playing these APBA games brings back memories of those earlier days. Days of walking to the nearby Henry Vilas Zoo, of playing  with my friends on the block and taking shots at the line of nuns as they marched along Allen Street.

Dingy Ninja

Of the four favorite television shows I have, I sure don’t fit the demographic targets of one them.

"Columbo," the 1970s detective show starring Peter Falk, is one that does fit. He, like I, wears wrinkled clothes, appear scatterbrained and is forgetful. When I was a newspaper report I would always call back a source with the obligatory, “Oh, one more question…”

I also love watching “Dateline.” I’ve covered enough murder mysteries during my news career--including one that made it on Dateline--and I enjoy the storytelling techniques the NBC correspondents use to drive the show.

And the other favorite show, “The Twilight Zone”—the older 1960s version on MeTV—is a given. I greatly appreciate the writing of the show and it, like "Columbo," reminds me of earlier, better days when I was a kid.

But one show I make a point to watch is an oddity. Each Monday, I park in front of the TV and stare at “American Ninja Warriors,” the show that features people using their strengths to navigate a hellish obstacle course of balancing while running across rolling beams and small steps, swinging on trapeze-like bars over pools of water, finger-gripping along thin edges while suspended above another pool and running up a 14-foot embanked wall.

By definition of who I am, I’m the least likely to be interested in that program. I’m old and fat. I don’t enjoy getting hot and my fingers get tired typing for long period of time. I’m sure not going to able to inch my way along a ledge with them.

The only way I’d get through that is if they’d put a harness on me and lift me with a helicopter, like you see rescue teams hoisting cattle from South Dakota blizzards.

And those outfits they wear? I think it’s illegal to stuff my fat ass into shorts in at least 27 states.

My idea of an obstacle course is pulling myself up out of the couch I’ve sunken into, weaving around our coffee table in the living room, stepping over the cat that’s stretched out on the kitchen floor and popping open the refrigerator for another Pepsi. The challenge is to do that all during a commercial break so I don’t miss another contestant’s attempt.

The athletes also focus strictly on the course. I, like our friend Columbo, am always somewhat rattled. I spend a lot of time thinking of both the day’s job and future story ideas I can freelance write to the various magazines I file for.  I fret over the light bill, not working my way over a Ferris wheel-looking thing while thousands cheer and family members on video screens make that heart-shaped motion with their hands. I’d be happy with the heart-shaped hand sign for just making the house mortgage on time. Hear that, Wells-Fargo? Oh, right, because of Covid you aren't really dealing with customers much anymore and refer them instead to the automated pay system. 

(Those who are locked into the ball and chain of Wells-Fargo Home Mortgage will get that lame reference. [When I first bought a house, I was in a three-year revolving loan with Wells-Fargo, which meant every year for three years someone with the company would revolve their hand around and slap me in the face.])

American Ninja Warriors? How about American Ninja Worrier?’

So, why do I like this show so much? Maybe it’s because of the stories each contestant has. There are vignettes portrayed for each person; most have some sad story in their past that they overcome. They are tales of hope, and we sure need that now.

Maybe it’s the enthusiasm of the two anchors, Matt Iseman and Akbar Gbaja-Biamila, when people work their way through the course. These guys make a Game Seven Stanley Cup call by Doc Emrick seem like a quiet reading in a library.

Maybe it’s because the contestants are all rooting for each other and there’s no real competition between them. After watching the rough and tumble Stanley Cup series that included more skirmishes than 10-cent beer night in a Traverse City, Mich., bar last week, it was nice to see calm people.

Maybe it’s that hope. Hope that I could even dream of being healthy enough to be an American Ninja Warrior. 

Like my wife, Holly, said when watching it the other day, she’d get to the first obstacle and say, “Nope. I’m out of here” and then wave and walk off. And she’s healthy. She can get up off the couch without making grunting noises simply by standing up! Me, with my useless knees, have to push off the couch’s arm, and have that momentarily sense of weightlessness, wondering if I’m going to continue on my upward voyage, or if I’ll plop my ass back in the chair.

It’s a bad deal when climbing down that first step of the Ninja stage on the way to the course would tucker you out.

My chances of being a Ninja are Dingy, but come Monday, I’ll still be deeply immersed in the program, and the sunken sofa watching it.

Ball Four, Fifty Years Later

Fifty years ago my aunt bought me Jim Bouton’s classic “Ball Four,” and everything changed.

Bouton’s book chronicled his 1969 season with the expansion Seattle Pilots and, after a trade late in the season, with the Houston Astros. It shocked the baseball establishment by showing what really went on in the locker rooms.

It wasn’t always the Pollyanna view of All-American boys playing the game. Instead, it portrayed the players as real. Mickey Mantle was truly a turd. Pitcher Mike Marshall was an intellectual. Coaches were often seen as dumb louts who epitomized the concept of double standard.

But it wasn’t just a baseball book. It was so much more. Although Bouton’s work contained a lot of curse words (Manager Joe Schultz used many in alternating combinations) and it may not have been deemed suitable for a kid, like me, of 11 years old, it was a training primer in life, a glimpse into how the real world worked and how there were so many personalities we’d meet along the way.

It was on July 4, 1971, when I spotted the book in a rack at the Itasca State Park gift shop between Park Rapids and Bemidji, Minn., where I lived. My aunt and uncle were visiting us from Arizona that week – a trip to coincide with my June 29 birthday and the Fourth of July—and we went to the park for the day.

The paperback book was the first one showing in the rack; others were behind it. It had a simple cover. “Jim Bouton” was in bold black letters at the top, above a larger green font “Ball Four.” Below was a simple photograph of a right hand holding a baseball in the grip of a knuckleball.

Published by Dell, the book cost $1.25.

My tattered copy of 
Ball Four from 1971

My parents objected to my want of the book. But my aunt stepped in and bought it for a late birthday present.

It was a fitting metaphor to buy the book at the Headwaters of the Mississippi River. The 2,318-mile long river begins there and makes it journey south, much like I did. Life, like the river, has its curves, currents and changes. The book, bought near the trickle of the start of that river, began my own journey that probably defined a lot of who I am.

That night, we sat on the shore of Lake Bemidji and watched fireworks. One of the displays featured the spelling of “Hello” in the sky. Each firework, when exploding, spelled a letter in smoke. The “O” faded quicker than the rest and we were left with “Hell” drifting overhead for a moment. The crowd laughed.  And I, having seen that word in “Ball Four” on the way home, along with several other words I filed in my ‘do not use in front of adults ‘ mental cabinet, felt like I was in on the joke like the adults were.

I entered sixth grade that fall. While the rest of the kids were using words like “fart blossom” and “butthead,” I was firing off zingers I gleaned from the book. 

But I also watched people more closely, learning that maybe all adults weren’t always right. Maybe they didn’t know the answers all the time. I also watched myself more closely and, in a sense, became a tad paranoid and saw myself from outside myself and through others’ eyes.

We moved to Arkansas three years later. The book, of course, came with me. In defiance of the southern culture and in honor of the book, I refrained from using the drawled out “BS” word that all the classmates used and deferred instead to the version that used the “horse” word.

Seattle pitcher Marty Pattin used that word when describing Pilot outfielder Steve Hovely’s hair in Bouton’s June 28 offering. Look it up if you want.

I remember once I left the book in my eighth grade English class when we changed classes. I was shy and tried to be invisible; coming from the north with an accent akin to characters on the movie “Fargo,” I wanted to stay quiet in the land of twang. Even though his name is pronounced “Bow-ton,” like taking a bow in front of an audience, I said it with my northern accent as “Boo-ton.”

The next class was in session when I realized my book was in that classroom. I boldly got up from the next class’ seat, told the teacher I left something and strode into English class, disrupting it and finding my book. It was that important to me.

The book’s been with me since. After I got the book, I moved about 23 times in my life. I know where “Ball Four” is at all times now. I’ve also bought the anniversary copy “Ball Four Plus Ball Five,” and a friend found a softback of the book at a used book shop and bought it for me recently.

Years later, I found Bouton’s phone number online somewhere and called his home. His wife answered the phone and nervously, I asked to speak with him. This was 1998, so he was 59. He came on and I simply thanked him for writing the book, taking the criticism that followed its publication and making me think so much differently than I had before.

I’m sure he got calls like that often. But he was polite, thanking me for the compliment and saying he had no idea how the reception of the book would be years later.

Now, 50 years later, I still use phrases from the book like the drawn out “Yeah, sure,” the Alvin Dark comment, “Take a hike, son” and  “well, it doesn’t make me a bad person,” whenever anyone criticizes something I do.

Bouton died on July 10, 2019. His book lives on, though, and every few years I pull one of the copies off the shelf and read it again. I’ve probably read it 20 times now—yeah sure--and have memorized most of it, but it is still impacting.

In the comments below, fell free to share your impressions of the book. It is a classic that all sports fans have read over and over, I’m sure.

APBA Eclipse

APBA players who replay a full baseball season know it takes a long time to complete one, rolling game by game and ensuring each team plays 162 games, or 154 in the earlier seasons before 1969.

And there comes one day during each replay that really serves as a reminder of the length of the replay and the dedication needed to do this. Mine came yesterday, June 16. It’s the same date as the day I’ve reached for the games in the 1965 baseball season I’m on.

I call it the APBA eclipse—the point when the actual date coincides with the game date of whatever season I’m doing. During my replay of the 1991 season, which took four years, I experienced an APBA eclipse three times.

I thought I’d prolong the eclipse for a day and finish out games for June 16, 1965, last night and be ready for June 17, 1965, games on the same day 56 years later. But I failed to roll any games and the APBA eclipse occurred yesterday.

When I do replays, I set up team schedules based on the games they’re set to play, not the games that they really did play. Remember, there are no rainouts in my APBA games (although the game actually does have a dice roll outcome that does result in a rained out game). I play games based on the actual days. For instance, on June 16, 1965, all 20 teams played games. So, I play each game for that day and then move on to the next day.

I began this 1965 replay on Dec. 11, 2020, and I reached Game 610 when the eclipse happened. The actual season began on April 11, 1965. Obviously, I can’t play all games on the same days they were played in the real season. Often, all teams play on the same day, so that means there will be 10 games to roll for a day. Throw in Sunday or holiday doubleheaders and there could be up to 16 games in a day. I’m lucky to roll three or four games a day, so that means it’ll take at least three or four days of rolling games to finish out an actual day’s schedule.

It sounds confusing.

Tonight, June 17, I’ll roll a few games for June 16, 1965, but I’ll never catch up to the real date again. And that’s one of the drawbacks of doing replays, I guess. There are so many seasons to experience, and there are the other sports of basketball, hockey and football I’d love to replay as well. If I were independently wealthy and retired, I may find time to get more games in. I had thought of replaying each of the sports when they were in season, but that would take years to do one season for each sport and it would kill any momentum and continuity of a season replay.

One of the more fun aspects of doing a replay is watching the teams jostle positions in the standings and seeing teams develop. In this 1965 season, one of the main story lines is the play of the St. Louis Cardinals and how San Francisco is trying to catch them. Pittsburgh beat the Cardinals the other night, dropping the Redbirds into only a game and a half lead over the Giants.

So the APBA eclipse comes and goes. I’ll continue rolling the games, maybe getting a few in each night and rolling maybe a dozen during the weekend. Work, mowing the yard, trying to keep my side job of freelance writing developing and general life take time.

During each replay there comes the APBA eclipse reminder that these replays take a while to do. But it’s well worth the time.

1965 Replay Update: June 12, 1965

I haven’t updated the 1965 APBA baseball replay I’m doing in a while. I haven’t posted any blog in a while for that matter. I’ve been busy cranking out four stories for one magazine, another for a second one I contribute to, a piece for an online site and a lengthy feature for a news service in the state.

But that doesn’t mean I’ve not been rolling the games. The pace did slow a lot; I was averaging four games a day during the first four months of my replay. That’s dwindled some, but I still manage to get a game or two in every so often.

I’ve played all games through June 12, 1965. I use the original schedule (found on Retrosheet.org) for the games and don’t have rainouts, so every team is guaranteed to play 162 games in the season as intended.

So far, the St. Louis Cardinals are the surprise team of the replay with the best record in the majors at 39-19. The Minnesota Twins started off slowly, but aided by a 22-4 run in May, they’ve jumped into the lead in the American League.

So, here’s a brief team-by-team look at a season I’m ranking as the best replay I’ve done. I know, I know, I always say the replay I am doing is the best ever, but so far, this tops ‘em all.

American League

1 Minnesota (38-20, GB --) I don’t know how the Twins are doing so well. Jimmie Hall leads the Twins with 12 home runs, followed by Killebrew’s 11. Tony Oliva has 8 and then there’s a large drop-off for power. Jim Kaat is 9-1 with 50 strikeouts, but the rest of the pitching is mediocre when it comes to whiffing batters. They began the season 7-1 and then got swept in a three-game series at Detroit and, after beating up on Cleveland, lost all games in a four-game set in Chicago to look pretty meek early on. Ahead for them are a game at Detroit and then three games at Chicago, four games at New York and three games at Cleveland before returning home to host the Tigers and the White Sox. The rest of the month could be a pivotal time for Minny.

2 Detroit (35-22 GB 2.5) Norm Cash is a front-runner for the American League MVP. He has 10 home runs and, although I’m not tracking RBIs like I did for the previous 1947 replay, Cash has hit several game-winners. Pitching is key for Detroit with Dave Wickersham leading the team with eight wins. Lolich, at 7-4, has 99 strikeouts.

3 Chicago (32-24 GB 5) The most consecutive games the White Sox have won is six and in June so far, they have gone 3-8. Floyd Robinson leads the team with five home runs. To get an idea of the lack of power they have, pitcher Tommy John has the eighth best home run record so far with one dinger.

4 Boston (30-28 GB 8) Watch out for the Red Sox. Carl Yastrezemski has 17 home runs for second place in the AL home run race. Tony Conigliaro has 13 and a young Rico Petrocelli has 11.The pitching is bleak and if the Sox can get it together, I think they could make a run for the pennant. Earl Wilson is the best hurler with a 6-5 record, indicative of the team so far. He does have 85 strikeouts.

5 California (28-31 GB 10.5) Dean Chance is tied with Kaat with nine wins for the AL pitching lead. In an oddity, Fred Newman, who has pitched in 13 games so far, has five home runs. Jim Fregosi leads the team with eight. If Newman gets in more games, he may end up leading the team in blasts.

6 Washington (29-33 GB 11) Three players have made the Senators better than expected. Frank Howard, of course, is a monster with 22 home runs. For those uninitiated with APBA’s game, players are given cards with dice roll results on them. The iconic roll of “66” generally results in a “1.” But home runs can occur with other results with men on base. It seems Howard is taking advantage of that. He’s rolled several “5s” with a man on first or second for a homer. Pete Richert is the ace with an 8-4 record and 92 strike outs and Ron Kline leads the league with nine saves.

7 Cleveland (25-29 GB 11) Ugh. Other than Sam McDowell and his AL leading 121 strikeouts, this is the least exciting team to play. The only fun with the Indians is when Max Alvis hits a home run and I can say, “Alvis has left the building.” He’s done that five times so far.

8 New York (26-33 GB 12.5) For every good, there’s a bad with the Yankees. Al Downing tossed a no-hitter against Boston and had 16 strikeouts at Kansas City. But, Jim Bouton, whom I root for because of his classic book “Ball Four,” is 0-7. Mickey Mantle has 13 home runs, but outfielder Roger Ropez has none.

9 Baltimore (24-34 GB 14) I keep waiting for the Orioles to wake up. They finished third in the real 1965 American League, but they're far from the real Birds. It may be my managing. I keep playing Boog Powell at first. He has seven home runs, but more strikeouts than he can wave a stick at. Well, despite the dumb euphemism, you get my drift. Baltimore’s longest winning streak is at four games. They promptly lost eight in a row after edging Kansas City in three games and California in the first game of a double-header before dropping those eight.

10 Kansas City (21-34 GB 15.5) Ken Harrelson’s 16 home runs are good enough for third in the AL. That’s as far as it goes with the Athletics. None of the pitchers has a winning record other than spot relievers Don Mossi and Jack Aker, who are both 1-0. They began the season promising, going 10-7. They realized who they were and have gone 11-27 since.

National League

1 St Louis (39-19 GB --) The Cardinals keep finding ways to win in come-back fashion. Lou Brock hit a homer in the bottom of the eighth to go ahead of the Braves in a recent game. Mack Jones hit a solo shot in the top of the ninth to tie it for Milwaukee and then with two outs, Tito Francona drove in Ken Boyer with a double to win it in the bottom of the night. Two nights earlier, the Cards were down 3-1 to the Reds but fought back to win it 4-3 in 12 innings when Mike Shannon singled in Curt Flood. It’s been that kind of year for them. In the real 1965 season, they finished seventh in the National League. It’ll take a collapse for them to fall that far, although …

2 San Francisco (37-21 GB 2) … the Giants have come on strong lately with Willie McCovey’s 17 and Willie Mays’ 14 home runs. Juan Marichal is 8-4 with 109 strikeouts and the Giants have gone 27-14 since April 30

3 Los Angeles (36-23 GB 3.5) The Dodgers seemed pretty weak at first and were mired in sixth place at the end of May. Since then, they’ve gone 10-2 as Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale has each won their last four starts. (Drysdale began the season with a 1-5 record. Koufax has 135 Ks to lead everyone.) Ron Perranoski leads the league with 10 saves. The Dodgers are the likely challengers, along with the Giants, to knock the Cardinals off their nest.

4 Pittsburgh (34-26 GB 6) Vern Law has no-hit the Cardinals and the Phillies and has 112 strikeouts, good for second place in the National League strikeout leaders. Willie Stargell has 14 home runs, but the Pirates are on a four-game losing streak to Houston and San Francisco – at home.

5 Cincinnati (32-25 GB 6.5) Frank Robinson leads the Reds with 14 quiet home runs. I say “Quiet” because they come at inopportune, meaningless times. In a recent game, he struck out and popped with the bases loaded. Sammy Ellis is 10-2 and Jim Maloney is 7-3 to pace Cincinnati on the mound.

6 Milwaukee (26-29 GB 11.5) This is the most disappointing team in the replay for me. Maybe it’s because I started kindergarten in Madison, Wisc., in 1965 and Henry Aaron and the Braves were the first team on my baseball consciousness. Aaron only has nine home runs in the replay and Tony Cloninger at 6-5 is the only winning pitcher for the team. Cloninger did toss a no-hitter against Philadelphia, the victim of two no-nos so far.

7 Philadelphia (27-31 GB 12) The Phillies resembled contenders at first but now look like they are doing an early version of their 1964 swan dive. They are 3-9 in their last 12 games and were swept at home in a four-game series against the Dodgers in which they were outscored 21-4.  Jim Bunning is their only hope with an 8-4 record and 97 strikeouts. Dick Allen, who hit 20 home runs in the real 1965 season, has seven so far.

8 Chicago (27-32 GB 12.5) Billy Williams leads the NL with 18 home runs. Ernie Banks has 16 and Ron Santo has 13. The Cubs started off well, then realized they were the Cubs and sunk to eighth place. Only Bob Buhl at 7-4 has a winning record for the team.

9 Houston (24-36 GB 16) Rusty Staub leads the Astros with only seven home runs, ace pitcher Bob Bruce is 2-7 and only a young Larry Dierker, at 3-3, doesn’t have a losing record. The only thing keeping Houston from being the cellar dweller is…

10 New York (10-50 GB 30) … this team. Jack Fisher leads the Mets in wins with three. He has nine loses. Al Jackson is 2-8 and Gary Kroll is 1-9. The Mets may have four 20-game losers. If they can replicate their actual 1965 record of 50-112 it will be a miracle. The only bright spot is Ron Swoboda and his 15 home runs.

So, there you have it-- a super long run-down of every team in the 1965 replay. The National League looks like a dogfight. San Francisco still has 12 games remaining in the season against the Cardinals and the Dodgers play St. Louis 13 more times.

Howard is on pace to hit 62 home runs and Koufax could reach his actual season total of 382 strikeouts.

In the 11 full season APBA replays I’ve done since rolling baseball games in 1998, only two of my World Series featured the teams that met in the actual Series of those years.  St. Louis faced New York in my replays of 1942 and 1964. Will this be a third replay that has the actual teams facing each other if Minnesota holds on and Los Angeles overtakes St. Louis? Will the Cardinals continue to defy odds and win the National League? Will Mays and McCovey power the Giants?  Will the Mets win 30 games? All these story lines are what make this season so compelling.

 

Radio Days

The other day while at work in Arkansas, I listened to the Minnesota Twins play the Detroit Tigers by tuning into an online feed of the Crookston, Minn., radio station and watching the Gameday feature on MLB.com.

I had instant season stats, albeit early in the baseball year, available and with a click of the mouse, I could see a player’s career totals. The Gameday feature showed where each pitch was located and included the ball’s speed – both at the release and when it crossed the plate. It provided a nice backdrop for a busy day.

I then realized how far it’s come in the realm of following a baseball team. I was in Arkansas, listening to a game played in Detroit. Later, I found an Illinois station and heard part of the Chicago Cubs’ game against Pittsburgh. Had I wanted to, I could have tuned in to games with Atlanta, New York, Boston and Oakland that day, too.

It was a vast difference half a century ago when I was a kid listening to Twins’ games on the static-filled AM radio I kept on a stand by my bed. I had no access to stats then, relying instead on my handy Official Major League Baseball Record Book published by Fawcett for $1.25. I had the 1972 edition that featured statistics for the 1971 season, team rosters for the 1972 season and all-time records. It was my sports Bible, my go-to source for any information.

I remember being the clichéd kid of that era, listening to late night games on that radio and using an earphone with a braided wire snuck under the covers so my parents wouldn’t know I was awake. Often, when Harmon Killebrew hit a long fly ball or when Wayne Granger was about to strike someone out to end the game and earn the save, the signal would fade into static. I’d have to wait, hoping the station would come back and I’d see how the play turned out.

The only updated stats we had were found in the Sunday newspapers, unless we wanted to clip box scores from the daily papers and calculate the batting averages and earned run averages ourselves. And I did that, keeping a three-ring notebook with box scores taped on pages corresponding with the days the games were played. It was tedious keeping up with them all, but the payoff was knowing that Twins’ third baseman Eric Soderholm was batting a woeful .180 during most of the season.

Now, we have instant access to all of that with the internet. I can immediately find out a batter’s average against right-handed and left-handed pitchers and during day and night games. OPS? OMG, it’s right there. The Gameday even shows a picture from the catcher’s point of view complete with the actual stadium, day or night skies, and any buildings and landmarks past the outfield walls. It leaves little for the imagination, eliminating my own thoughts of what stadiums looked like when I listened to Twins’ games on my little radio 50 years ago.

Is it a good thing, the advances in technology? Well, sure, knowledge is good anytime. It allows me to listen to my favorite team, despite sitting in a northeast Arkansas office building some 775 miles from Target Field. I can see how teams are doing any time of the day by checking sports websites and I can get updated immediate standings, rather than waiting for the next day’s paper to arrive with incomplete standings. (Remember the letter ‘n’ next to the west coast games indicating they were played too late to make press time?)

But I’m finding as I get older, I often look back in nostalgic ways. This isn’t some grumpy creed from an old-timer saying “We had it tough in those days, having to wait overnight for scores.” Instead, it’s just a thought of how things differ.

The Twins will play several upcoming day games. I’m sure I’ll find the Crookston radio station at work, click on MLB.com and “watch” the game. But part of me would rather be huddled under my covers as a youngster with the world still ahead of me, my braided earphone cord snaking beneath the sheets and bring the world of sports to me.

The Pepsi Kid

As much as I drink Pepsi while rolling APBA games, I should do an advertisement for the syrupy, caramel, burp-inducing pop.

I’ll generally buy a 1.2-liter bottle of the elixir under the guise of needing to quench the writing muse when I have magazine stories I need to crank out on deadline. But, I find myself drinking the Pepsi quite a bit during the games I play. There are a lot of, shall we say, brief “rain delays” by the seventh inning stretches during games when I’m hitting the bottle hard.

The advertisement would fit well while I’m playing the 1965 APBA baseball season.

VIDEO: APBA card of New York Mets’ outfielder Joe Christopher. A red and white dice lie next to it with a “4” and “1” roll. The corresponding number on Christopher’s card is a “24,” the roll for a double play.

ANNOUNCER: When playing New York Mets games, nothing makes their tasteless season a bit more palatable than a nice, cold Pepsi. When manager Casey Stengel reaches for the bullpen phone to summon a relief pitcher yet again in the sixth inning, I reach for my bottle of the refreshing soft drink

VIDEO: Shot of Washington Senator’s outfield Frank Howard’s card in the background with a glass of Pepsi in the foreground. The two APBA dice show “66,” the universal roll for a home run.

ANNOUNCER: You’ll be rolling 66s every time you open a bottle of Pepsi.

I actually remember the first Pepsi I ever had. My family was traveling from our northern Minnesota home to western Arkansas on a vacation when I was about 10. We stopped in Joplin, Mo., for the day, partly because my father had been stationed there while in the Army and wanted to see the area and partly because he had heard of the mysterious “Joplin lights” legend that had people believing in flying saucers.

We went inside a roadside dinner next to the motel and ordered food. I was craving a pop and asked for a “RC Cola,” the staple of soft drinks in northern Minnesota. The waiter looked at me like I was a Joplin light.

“What about a Canada Dry ginger ale?” I asked.

Again, the look.

He picked up on my northern accent. His name was “Tom,” based on the nametag on his shirt. How I remember that after 50 years, I have no idea. I can’t remember to tie my shoes half the time and there are days when I get in the car to go to work and realize I forgot my keys. Maybe it was because I had a friend named “Tom” who lived next door to me back then.

“Son,” Tom said in a southern drawl. “We’re in the south. We don’t have any of those Yankee drinks. How ‘bout a Pepsi?”

And so it began.

I got a second one and Tom called me the “Pepsi Kid.”

“Pretty good stuff, isn’t it?” he said. And I agreed.

Now, half a century later my kidneys probably look like some decrepit sponge under the kitchen cabinet and my liver may have the consistency of a brick, but I keep chugging Pepsi. Thanks, Tom.

I once quit drinking it for a year in 1997  just to see what would happen. I lost about 30 pounds during that time, but I missed the flavor. I used to travel with my first wife to craft shows before she passed away 15 years ago. She’d sell women’s hair wrap things we made and I’d spend long hours sitting in convention centers or booths or under tents at shows.  (Once I sat in a mule pen at the Nashville, Tenn., fairgrounds where they held a craft show.)

We were in Jackson, Tenn., one hot afternoon and I put my book down, got up from my chair and asked for change. It had been a year since I had a drink and the craving, the addiction, became unbearable. I walked to a pop machine in a near trance, fed the change slot and pushed the button for “Pepsi.” Somewhere, a chorus of angels sang.

It was one of the best Pepsis ever.

I wrote about my addiction to the drink and the Jackson, Tenn., experience in a column I had at a weekly newspaper. I equated to falling off the wagon like an alcoholic and waking up in an alley, covered in syrup and goo, bottle caps strewn around me.

It wasn’t that flattering of a column, but the local Pepsi bottling plant loved it. They sent me coupons for several crates of Pepsi and a nice tee-shirt. Sadly, the shirt was too small for me – probably because I had quaffed so many Pepsis. It was a Medium. I wanted to call the plant and ask them if they had one in a size Circus Tent, but I was a bit embarrassed. Instead, I just drank away my sorrows with more Pepsi.

I’ve now turned my wife, Holly, into a Pepsi fan. She’ll pour some of the drink from my 1.25-liter bottle into a coffee cup and then put a sandwich bag over it to save it. She may take a drink and then place it into the refrigerator, returning to it later. Later? I’d drink a coffee cup-worth of the stuff in one gulp.

There’s a window ledge by the desk where I write my articles and roll the APBA games. I keep the bottles of pop on the ledge within easy grasp. But as I look now, there’s only an empty bottle.

The two saddest things in life are an empty prescription bottle of Tramadol for pain and an empty bottle of Pepsi.

Looks like I’ll have to make a run to the grocery store to get another round of drinks.

It’ll make the 1965 NY Mets games I play a bit more tasteful.