Monday night, I made the trek down to Wrigley Field to see my beloved Pirates take on the Chicago Cubs. It was the night before the trade deadline, so I spent the first few innings obsessively checking my Twitter feed to see if the Bucs had made any moves. After Reed Johnson was pulled from the game, I spent nearly a half hour trying to figure out if he was headed across the diamond to the visitor's dugout. As is traditionally the case, I was also busying myself with keeping score. My wife was with me, too, but her attention was understandably occupied by the adorable baby in Cubs gear sitting directly in front of us in the nosebleed section.
While all of this was going on, I began to notice that there were some Pirates fans sitting a couple of seats down, but I was so preoccupied with everything else, I didn't really pay them much mind. Then, the unexpected happened. The Cubs scored nine runs in one inning. Already down 4-2 in the fifth inning, Erik Bedard and Chris Resop combined to give up nine runs on eight hits to the lowly Cubs. A wave of disbelief washed over me. I stopped checking Twitter. I stopped making faces at the baby. I just tried to process what had happened on the field.
Then, I noticed him. The patriarch of the family donning Pirates gear just a couple of seats over. He was smiling. He turned to me and said, "I see you wearing the gold 'P' on your chest. Have you been a Pirates fan for long?" His accent startled me. He spoke in a deep Texas drawl. His conversation was folksy, but intelligent. We began chatting. I told him that I had been born and raised in Pittsburgh and that the Pirates had always been my team. He told me that he grew up on a farm near the small city of DeKalb, Texas. He became a Pirates fan as a youngster just after WWII. There was not a local team at the time, but he loved baseball. In the evenings, on a good day, his family could just make out the Pirates broadcasts beamed halfway across the country by the powerful KDKA signal.
In Little League, he and his friends dreamed of becoming Pittsburgh Pirates. He was a catcher and one of his battery mates was a young man named Luke Walker. For Luke, that dream came true. Those into baseball trivia might remember that Walker threw the first pitch in a night game in World Series history. That was game four of the 1971 Worlds Series. My friend at the game chats about Walker in an easy and proud manner. There is no hint of jealously or sarcasm in his voice. He was happy Luke made it to the show and was proud to have caught him.
Through the years, my friend closely followed his beloved Buccos. He talked lovingly of Clemente and Stargell and especially Mazeroski. "You see Walker out there?" He was now talking about current Pirates second baseman Neil Walker. "The Pittsburgh kid. Great Athlete. I hear he was a terrific football player in high school. He's a pretty good defender now. That's because of Maz. You can't find a better person to teach you how to play second. There was nobody like him." My friend shared with me that he had made the trek to Pittsburgh just a few times. He lamented that he never got a chance to see Forbes Field in person, but he went to Three Rivers Stadium a couple of times and make his first trip to PNC Park just last year. "Beautiful stadium." I asked him about the Mazeroski statue. "Have you seen it? You've got to get back home to see it. Amazing."
The word "home" struck me. Here was a man from Texas sitting next to me at Wrigley Field rooting on the Pirates. I asked him if he was in town for some special reason. "Of course. I came to see the Pirates. I've never been to Wrigley Field. Seemed like a good time to come." This man traveled over 800 miles to a city he'd never been just to see the Pirates play. He wasn't alone either. "I brought my grandson." He was beaming at this point. "Three generations of men in my family here to root on the Pirates. Happy to be here." And he was. It didn't matter that his team was on its way to losing 14-4. It was spending time with his Pirates that he cherished.
Casey McGehee was pinch-hitting in the sixth. "I can't figure this guy out," he muses. "He looked real good for a couple of weeks, but he's just not doing it for this team. A shame." McGehee promptly killed a potential rally by grounding into an inning-ending double play. The next day, McGehee was gone in a trade to the Yankees. My friend went on to say that he hoped the Pirates picked up a right fielder at the trade deadline. "This team's got a history of great right fielders. It's important. Dave Parker was one of the best. Pittsburgh never really took to the guy. Maybe it's because he was cocky and wore an earring. All I know is he had a cannon of an arm. A lot like the guy he replaced." He paused. "That's the problem, though, nobody was going to be able to replace Clemente in that town. Too bad." It was fascinating to hear him talk about generations of Pirates players. He was a fan, a true and loyal fan, but he grew up somewhere else. He had a perspective that very few people have. "Remember Dale Berra? I bet you were just old enough to have remembered Dale Berra." I assured him that I did remember Berra, though I was pretty young. I mentioned that Berra was one of the first players I had a baseball card of. "I always liked Dale Berra. He played hard, with an edge, sorta. Nice infielder. Seemed a little high-strung maybe. Then years later, you find out he's on drugs...cocaine. I guess we should've seen it coming. Made sense, though. Really did."
The openness with which my friend expressed his feelings about his team, its history and its players was refreshing. The love he showed for his team was profound. The patient hunger he displayed for his team to be back on top was moving. You know what? He could have been my dad. He's probably about my dad's age. Talking to him, I found myself sharing stories about my dad. I told him how my dad would pick my mom up after school and they'd walk down to Forbes Field and catch a game. I told him how my dad and I would go to Pirates games together all the time, especially when PNC Park opened. I told him stories my dad told me about Clemente and Stargell and Mazeroski. The only difference is, he grew up over a thousand miles from Pittsburgh, in a small Texas town. But they both listened to Bob Prince call the games on KDKA as youngsters and they both developed a passion for the Pittsburgh Pirates. They are both true fans.
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