I mean a little break, for a little fan such as Avery, at his first Minnesota Twins game. Let me, as they say in baseball (and to recalcitrant teens before Thanksgiving dinner), set the table (or you won’t get anything to eat) before I try for a grand slam.
I recall the day that fresh-faced Bert Blyleven, whom the Twins drafted right out of high school, took to the Major League mound after only 21 starts in the minors. He was that good. Young he was, a lanky lad who threw a curve like nobody’s business.
Well, perhaps not quite as tricky as THIS pitch, mind you:
But Bert chalked up plenty of Ks in his Hall of Fame career. Slender he was (as was I) when his curves started freezing batters like so many statues of ice. Fans loved the 19-year-old (I wasn’t much older), and they voiced their disapproval whenever the coach pulled him. (Back then, there were no middle relievers to coddle the multimillion-dollar starters like nowadays; fortunately, there also weren’t any vuvuzelas to harass the coach with deafening buzzing noises, or he might have left Blyleven in and worn out his arm.)
Of course the grand old outdoor Met Stadium went dark long ago, memorialized now only with a home-plate plaque in the floor of the Mall of America, the mecca to excess that now stands where the likes of Blyleven and other Twins Hall of Famers such as Harmon Killebrew and Rod Carew, not to mention opposing greats such as Yankees Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford, whom I saw hit and play there when I was a lad myself.
Replacing the outdoor park was the indoor monstrosity known as the Metrodome, a leaky-roofed, sorry excuse for a ballfield, in which players frequently lost sight of fly balls in the light background of the Teflon bubble that served as its roof. And, as opposing players could tell you, it was as noisy in there during World Series games as those dadgum vuvuzelas at the World Cup.
Now, happily, the Twins are outdoors again, although the wisdom, weatherwise, of that choice remains to be seen if Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau and clan can become the boys of October any time soon.
And now we come back to the boy of June: Grandson Avery’s first Twins game, where proud papa Brendan had his heart set on having Blyleven circled the infant as part of his schtick as the Twins’ color commentator these days. It traces back to the 2002 season, when he circled a fan carrying a sign.
Nowadays, fans of all ages trek to the stadium with signs of varying shapes and sizes, pleading, “Circle Me, Bert.” Thus it was that Brendan and magnificent mamma Erica produced a large and, I think, superior sign hoping that Bert’s eagle eye would spot Avery and circle him with his telestrator.
Brendan totes the sign touting Avery's first game, as well as Brendan and Erica's third anniversary.Alas, it was not to be, although, perhaps attesting to the artistic merits of the sign and/or the cuteness of the kid, one of the wandering cameramen spotted Avery and gave him and Erica a moment of glory on the Jumbotron.
Take THAT, Bert Blyleven. You may have a reputation as a great prankster, but the Jumbotron took you downtown on good judgment, putting Erica and Avery up in the big lights.Pox on you, Bert, and, although I believe you SHOULD be in the Hall of Fame, you’ll have to settle for now for the Tighe Hall of Shame for not circling Avery. This umpire, possibly by virtue of being a proud grandpa, penalizes you with a passed ball.
As I recall, Bert, you challenged Cy Young award winner Johan Santana to pitch a shutout in 2007, and you lost the bet. And THAT time, your punishment was a head-shaving.
Believe you me, Bert, I’m gonna buy Avery some clippers, and you could end up as bald as you were when Santana clipped you.
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