Sheriff Tom Brown

Jul 19, 2012

Scorecard Memory: Grown Men Slapping Each Other, the ‘Gang Bang’ and Rusty Greer

Sheriff Tom goes back to April 12, 1996 in Section 39 of Yankee Stadium for a Yankees-Rangers game.

This is the first of a recurring series of recollections, where I will be marching though my old scorecards from my halcyon days in good old Section 39 of the Yankee Stadium bleachers. Let’s pick this up in 1996. You’re invited to join me. Please bring beer.

April 12, 1996: Yankees host the Texas Rangers. (My first game in ’96 and on a Friday night to boot!)

This year was huge. Obviously closing with a World Series win, but along the way we saw a no-hitter, the debut of some of your favorite Bleacher Creatures of lore, the passing of our beloved friend Ali the Cowbell King, vicious fights in the stands and all kinds of hubbub. To top it all off, in regards to scorecard fodder, my love affair with the beer bottle was seemingly at its zenith this year. Leafing through some of the cards without peeking too deeply at the jokes, I see a lot of scraggly, drunken scrawl and a lot of cards look beyond repair. But let’s get past that and kick this mother off!

I had big plans for ’96. On the top margin of this evening’s scorecard I confidently wrote “my first of 50+” however, as I type this, I’m not sure of my exact number of scorecards when it was all said and done, but I know I sailed through 50-plus games, and that was sans playoffs. On the other hand, I was far from midseason form coming in. I lost my voice early on during this evening game, actually before 8 p.m.! It was a frosty April night causing at least half-a-dozen people to walk up the stairs and crack the same joke, “Is it spring yet?” Heck of a time to recall this too, in the midst of a spate of heat waves here in New York, but in marking down the crisp nature of the evening air, I can understand the cynicism as to the missing spring.

I’m getting ahead of myself. Before the game there was a madcap slap-fight outside on the bleacher line when some drunkard decided to take a tinkle right there on the sidewalk and peed on another guy’s leg. The guy getting sprayed slapped him in the face like they were wearing pigtails in a playground and the peeing guy stopped what he was doing long enough to slap him back. They exchanged a flurry of slaps, much to the amusement of everyone on hand that managed to stay dry through the whole encounter. “Throw a punch, for Christ’s sake!” someone hollered. I turned to a crony as things were broken up and said, “That’s going down on the scorecard.”

Let me address the idea of the “bleacher line” as it may confuse some used to the bleachers of today. Back then we had a “GA” situation going on. (General admission seats! You could sit wherever you want!) The gates opened at a certain time and until then you snaked along the sidewalk, patiently. Well, except the guy who was too impatient to hold in his pee. Most of us did not yet have a ticket, so we queued up to grab one once the grumpy guys opened the windows. It was long a favorite tact of bleacher legend Gang Bang Steve (that’s him pregaming to the left of me in the picture above) to get to the window and ask fervently, “Can I have a seat right behind Bernie? It’s my first time in town and I’m a longtime fan!” The ticket guy would snarl, “It’s general admission, sit wherever you want,” and Steve would throw his arms up in the air in mock exasperation, blustering, “You don’t understand! He’s my favorite player ever! I just want a seat right behind him. It would mean a lot.” It was like a Laurel and Hardy routine. This would play out all the time, and Steve used to walk the line here and there asking others to pitch in and ask the guy for a seat “behind Bernie.” (No wonder the ticket guys were so grumpy.)

It was a surreal scene outside on this night, which was par for the course. There was even a licensed pretzel vendor proudly wearing a Red Sox cap. I remember a few brazen Yankee fans not only cursing at him, but also taunting him that they were going to get him fired. All the while these same guys were buying pretzels from him.

Ah, I see we touched upon current events, a consistent scorecard theme over the years. Anyone remember the seven-year-old girl that crashed the plane? At the time she had been attempting to be the youngest person to pilot a plan across the United States, and I was one of many who had been howling about how ridiculously dumb this idea was. I was soliciting jokes for the scorecard, pretty much asking, “Anyone have any jokes about the seven-year old that crashed the plane?” Thankfully, there were none.

Random crack written down on here from Tina (the revered “Queen of the Bleachers” to this very day and beyond) that simply says, “Sit down already! We know you’re Puerto Rican!” to some mope that kept standing up at any and all times, and I would assume holding a flag aloft to claim this lineage. Someone else promptly dubbed the offending stander-upper “El Sucko.” This “standing up for no reason” was inherited by a Panamanian long-timer, who still haunts the seats to this day, named Junior. He would stand up if someone pointed out a pretty cloud. Junior is also known to go on beer runs for the crew and return with the one beer we told him not to get, or crashing on the floor of my old Long Island City apartment back in the day, only to wake me up at 7 a.m. the following morning because he would be watching Matlock with the volume up too high.

In regards to special guests for this game that made the scorecard, there was a George Foreman look-alike, and a gigantic gawky woman we promptly dubbed Big Bird. There was a Jim Leyritz look-alike, too.

The legendary cowbell mix master Ali Ramirez showed up late enough to where it became a topic of discussion. Ali was the kind of guy whose absence could not go unnoticed, and sadly we lost him a month later. On this night he rang up the first cowbell at 7:25 for the 7:30 game, and even “shook his ass” for the crowd while he did it. For a while (until the number of jokes scrawled on the card became beyond too voluminous for mundane minutia) I used to keep such archaic notations as actual times of cowbell serenades, vaunted entrances of the notoriously late and random bursts of the litany of songs that added to the festive atmosphere back then. So if you wanted to know how many times Ali clacked his bell, and more importantly at exactly what time on a certain date, I inexplicably had this information.

Apparently there were a lot of “Chinese guys” out there as well causing me to muse how cool it would be if we could get a Chinese guy to sing the “Gang Bang” sometime. For the uninitiated, the “Gang Bang” was an early staple that had a run of quite a few years, surprisingly so given the general surliness of the security staff through the years. Here’s a video of Dr. Dirty John Valby for you to get the picture. Now take that picture and imagine that song being belted out nightly by dozens of rowdies in the bleacher seats. Better yet, here’s vintage footage of this very grandiose presentation with our own Gang Bang Steve leading a very raucous crowd through the bouncing ditty in Section 39 in 1996. (You can even spot yours truly, expertly multitasking as I can be seen scribbling away on my scorecard while lustily partaking in verse.)

In oddball bleacher trivia, this is how Gang Bang Steve came upon his moniker, as he was a noted ringleader for this caustic tune, although the air of mystery as to how he got his name always added to the frivolity when he would be introduced to people over the years. Eyebrows would raise when anyone was offered a handshake to someone introduced as “Gang Bang Steve” and many times I’d hear, “He sure doesn’t look like a swinger.” (The reaction upon introduction was a hit at my wedding.) Speaking of the “Gang Bang” song and the aforementioned Steve, I commented proudly on the card that Gang Bang Steve was back at my side, helping keep score and providing some of these very jokes. So blame him if you’re not entertained! One of the first things he did upon settling in for the night was draw the “Joey Cora infield” on the scorecard, including a first base line that takes a hard right and loop back towards first, in a nod to Cora’s getting away with running out of the baseline during that sickly playoff the year before.

Time for a story. For years Steve was entered into my cell phone simply as “Gang Bang.” This passed by without incident to a time where I was training at what was then my new job, sitting pretty much shoulder-to-shoulder with my new boss, who was teaching me some things on the computer. Well, my phone, just to right of the computer on the desk, started blinking that a call was coming in. It was on mute, so I was just going to let it go until I saw the words “Gang Bang” flashing on and off the screen. My boss never asked and I never told, but I know she saw it as it was directly in front of her, and human nature would surely make one wonder why someone’s phone would flash such a tawdry remark. She must have thought it was an appointment reminder. Add to this that only days before I had shown up for my first day at this new job with a black eye and my boss must have really been wondering what the hell was going on with me, and how I passed the background check.

Ah, back to the night’s affairs. One guy came up bedecked in a stunning array of bling, and I remarked that he “Looks like a real G.” This guy Chris promptly responded, “No, he looks like a real A.” He then added, “As in a–hole” though that was superfluous.

DING, DING! Looks like Gang Bang Steve got the first home-run ball of the year that was tagged out to the bleachers, and it came off the bat of none other than Ruben Sierra. I don’t know if it was on the fly or a series of bounces off empty seats as I was too busy marking times that Ali clanked on his bell to recount this admittedly more interesting factoid, but Steve got it and it’s mentioned multiple times on the card. I need to ask Steve if he still has that ball, though I’m sure he amassed quite a collection over the years from our drunken forays into the Stadium for BP. Ironically enough, just before Ruben’s jack, someone said (and I quote), “I want to see Ruben go yard!” and we laughed at the phrase “go yard.”

Not much more on here, which I suppose I shall attribute to the cold temps making writing not fun. We busted on a fellow fan ID’d as “Lee” for his “Little Rascals haircut.” We ripped into some Coneheads, the wacky crew with dunce caps on their head, who were back for more with David Cone on the mound. “School’s over, put the dunce cap away!” A “Dickheads! Dickheads!” chant sparked up as the Coneheads sat there with sad expressions at this vitriol. They wore out their welcome fast. I remember them being met with mostly apathy and tolerance in 1995, but by ‘96 their fellow fans had had enough of them, and Tina especially was on the warpath when it came to them. I guess our sort of exclusive pack were the only ones out there allowed to have nice stuff. The same thing befell the folks who would show up in “Moose” antlers when Mike Mussina would take the mound. They were not exactly “fan favorites.” To cap off the card I also mentioned we actually got to hear some Loverboy (one of my favorite old-school bands, bless them) over the Stadium PA. I suspect I was doing some air guitar, too, and hopefully others joined in.

Some interesting names from the past on here include our elderly and mysterious friend “Godfather” (who used to skulk around in the old days putting the “voodoo” on Yankee foes) and on this night he muttered, “He’s doing bad, take him out,” as John Wetteland was imploding in the ninth. We let Angel, the ex-girlfriend of the previously mentioned George (Big Nose/Little Drummer Boy), keep score for an inning somewhere on here. She was well known for once gazing at Cal Ripken Jr. out at short with a long-sleeved black sweatshirt on under his jersey and saying in a confused manner, “I didn’t realize Cal Ripken Jr. was black?” Tina, who was considered more of a strict boss back then than the honored elder she is these days (much more on her to come), had one of her patented temper tantrums at 9:25, but sadly the reason for this particular outburst is lost to history.

For the record, the first “MO” of the season (Mystery Out, of course) was hung on Joe Girardi, during his at-bat in the sixth. (I can and will do a separate column on the wonders, and the astounding frequency, of the infamous “Mystery Out.”) The “Mystery Out” was another longtime friend in the bleachers that never left and one we would visit time and time again. I’m happy that Phil Rizzuto shared this same propensity on his own scorecards, although he earmarked his missed plays as “WW” for “Wasn’t Watching.”

Always like to see this: I noted that Yankees history was made on this same day, as the team signed Juan Rivera to a contract as a non-drafted free agent.

As for the game action, the Yankees took this one 4-3 behind a strong performance by David Cone (one run, unearned, in seven innings) and solid setup work by new Yankee and former foe Jeff Nelson, who recently enjoyed a visit to the bleachers, where he sat for nearly eight innings with the modern crop of Creatures. I like to think he would have had more fun back in ‘96 when we were allowed to carry on without the shackles of security, but cheers to him for the gesture and nod to the merry. Wetteland almost coughed it up in the ninth – a recurring prospect – getting tagged for a deuce, but escaped with his first save of the season, albeit amidst some grumbling from the crowd. That relic Ken Hill took the loss for the Rangers, and we got to see none other than the likes of Dennis Cook and Matt Whiteside also toe the rubber for Texas.

The Yankees only mustered six hits on the night with two off the bat of Sierra, who homered and plated two runs. Your Yankees lineup was:

1. Wade Boggs, 3B
2. Mariano Duncan, SS
3. Paul O’Neill, RF
4. Ruben Sierra, DH
5. Tino Martinez, 1B (Welcome!)
6. Bernie Williams, CF
7. Dion James, LF (He was still here?)
8. Joe Girardi, C
9. Derek Jeter, SS

The Rangers countered with:

1. Darryl Hamilton, CF
2. Pudge Rodriguez, C
3. Will Clark, 1B (Just this week he was being touted for the freakin’ Hall of Fame by some delusional fan online)
4. Juan Gonzalez, RF
5. Mickey Tettleton, DH (We deemed him a racist for putting up a “KKK” line on the scorecard with three whiffs)
6. Dean Palmer, 3B
7. Rusty Greer, LF
8. Mark McLemore, 2B
9. Kevin Elster, SS (LOL)

The Rangers only managed five hits with Palmer nabbing two of them, including a mighty clack off of Wetteland to scare us in the ninth.

How about a quick profile? I always enjoyed doing these to add to the shine of those old days. (Fear not, I’ll keep it brief.) Rusty Greer it is!

Greer was quite the gamer, and he’s looked upon fondly. He stuck around Texas from 1994-2002, getting out of there with a .305 lifetime batting average. In 1,027 games (3,829 at-bats) he knocked 119 taters and drove in 614. His aggressive play could never be credited for art of speed, as he managed only 31 stolen bases in his nine years, while being nailed 15 times. He walked almost as many times as he struck out (555 strikeouts, 519 walks), which is an admirable feat in itself, but he was a better player than I gave him credit for. Well, come to think of it, his estimated salary data has him pulling in nearly $40 million over his career, so he made his bones. In ‘96 and ‘97 he batted .332 and .321 respectively, so we saw him here in a flourish. Born in 1969, he was originally a 10^th-round pick in the 1990 draft and the only player ever drafted out of the University of Montevallo in Alabama in his native state. As of July 17, 2012, his monumental page on Baseball-Reference has been viewed 30,582 times, which sounds shamefully low to me. His passion for the game and his firebrand style of play is sorely missed!

Only 20,238 were on hand for my first Friday night game of the year in the cold, and the game took 2:51 to play, so at least we got out of there in reasonable fashion, (most likely to drink the night away). Thank you, Red Sox, for not being in town, and getting us out of there before 11:30. Your umpires on hand were none other than Dale Scott, Rocky Roe, the late and lamented Durwood Merrill and Gary Cederstrom.

Welcome to 1996. Please enjoy your stay.

Blogs

Jul 12, 2012

An Old Man Fell Down the Stairs in the Bleachers

Sheriff Tom tells about how he became a Bleacher Creature at Yankee Stadium and what happened to change the way he used his scorecards during games in Section 39.

It all started because an old guy fell down the stairs. Thankfully, he wasn’t hurt. If he was, I would be keeping it to myself.

So how does this fit into the story of me, the bleachers and how I ended up documenting 600 games worth of nonsense from Section 39 in the right-field bleachers of Yankee Stadium through the 90s and vaunted championship run (most of which was totally unrelated to the actual game on the field)? And how does it bring me here?

It was April of 1993. I was young, wild and possibly in hiding at the time. New to the city and trying to figure out how someone who hadn’t yet charmed or bought anyone off yet to be his friend could go somewhere without standing out and being “that guy.” Ah, how about the Yankee game?

In random trips to the Stadium before my solo ventures, I would sit in the uppers – the old “top eight rows of the Stadium have the cheapest seat” gag. I’d be behind home plate, in another stratosphere, closer to planes up above than Matt Nokes on the field. Well, on my own accord, in 1993 I bought a bleacher seat (probably because all my scant cash was going towards single guy staples like macaroni and cheese and tuna fish) not knowing anything of what wonders went on within.

So there I sat with my scorecard in the bleachers. People sure seemed to know and, for the most part, like one another out there. I immediately felt left out of the loop. I saw Tina, the Queen of the bleachers who has since become a lifelong friend, holding court. (Trust me, if you have been in the bleachers, you know her.) These were the general admission days, and if you weren’t in, you weren’t in. A few wayward souls were steered clear to seats on the periphery, as outsiders weren’t welcome.

I watched this dance with mild amusement, and sort of wondered what exactly made these people boss. I had my scorecard and I was sitting there, keeping to myself for possibly the last time ever, when I heard the unmistakable sound of … song. What the hell? These people were singing. I knew all about drunken bursts of song since I grew up in a volunteer fire department family, and spent many nights hearing the “Horse’s Ass” ditty on the bus home from a parade, but here I was in the seats at the venerated Yankee Stadium, hearing people singing my beloved “Horse’s Ass” song. I knew the words, so I joined in with gusto. Then, out of the blue a portly sort got up and screamed, “Box seats suck, jerkoff!” I was enamored. They had me at “Box Seats Suck!”

And then the old man fell down the stairs.

Before this night my scorecards were kept neat and tidy with succinct game-scoring action, and trivial facts like “sunny but chilly” or “Cap Night here at the Stadium!” How timid and staid I was. Well, it all changed on this first night in the bleachers when this old man fell down the stairs. He was up as soon as he went down, steered to a seat and fawned upon with such fervor by a couple of young women that I started mulling over the idea of falling down the steps myself. Anyway, I felt a need to document this. So I wrote, “old man falls down the stairs.” I then checked my work, liked what I saw, and decided to fill in the columns of my scorecards with such factoids going forward.

That same night I saw fit to mention we were told in no uncertain terms to “STAY OFF THE SEATS!” by security when we stood up to do some such thing. Considering what was to come over the years on the seats not involving sitting on them (from Creatures making speeches or doing stripteases to me dancing in wild gyrations or reading children’s books to a rapt audience to people doing tumblesaults or using them as a diving board to seats below), this is now amusing to me on so many levels. I’m sure I had a grin as I documented that Brian McRae was serenaded with chants of “Daddy’s Little Girl!” I pointed out “a big fat guy” in the box seats, and I didn’t even bother cracking a joke, which was beyond lazy of me. I just documented he was there for posterity. Ruminating on this now, I wonder how many guys scoring in the box seats look over now and see me out in the bleachers of today and write out “big fat guy in the bleachers” – you know, the student becoming the master sort of thing.

When the Daddy’s Boy himself made a snag on a Pat Kelly liner, I gave out a “star” on the play, which I had always done on my scorecards, but my new unabashed self, freed by the carefree atmosphere of the bleachers added a descriptive, “an unbelievable leave-his-feet catch.” My scorecard, before my very eyes, was transforming itself from a neat archive of a relaxing night in the park to a random spate of verse, jokes and remarks with snark. And what a game to start my run with.

That night I learned, along with joy, a sense of community, and a chance to sharpen my rapier wit … rage! The freakin’ Yankees had a chunky 4-0 lead going into the ninth behind eight shutout innings by Jimmy Key, and Steve Howe and Steve Farr COUGHED THE DAMN THING UP! This was the metamorphosis for a snide that would used in the future of “Oh, here comes the bullpen … HOWE FARR will they hit it?”

So yeah, Howe comes in to start the ninth, gives up a single to Wally Joyner, a double to Hubie Brooks of all people, and a bases-clearing double by Felix Jose to make it 4-2. That is when Steve Farr came ambling in. Everything from trepidation to menace hung in the air. And sure enough, in no time at all, we are tied, as Mike McFarlane hoisted a homer. I sat in a sea of boos and groans, stewing in rage. After some more assorted lunacy and two outs that gave us hope we may get through this turmoil, Brian McRae got the last laugh on us with a dinky infield single that somehow plated a run, and the Royals were up.

I inexplicably had one of those doofy souvenir bats that soon went the way of the dodo when people figured out they made nifty weapons, and I not so inexplicably slammed it on the empty seat next to me (there were lots of those about as only 14,091 fans were listed as attendees that night, quite possibly the smallest crowd I was ever a part of) and broke the damn thing. As Farr left the field to a cascade of boos and I surveyed my splintered wood, someone shouted with aplomb, “Joey Gasoline! Fireman of the year!” That too made the card.

And I’ve never looked back. Over the next few games I moved closer and closer to this inner circle that I had watched with a wary eye. I was soon recognized, and from what people recall, respectful. I started adding my own quips to the sea of sarcasm, joining in the songs, chastising the meek as they shuffled up the steps, trying to figure out where their “general admission seat” was located. I’d point out the furtive Boston fan peeking over the upper deck rail, sparking off a booming chant for him to jump, which would then win me backslaps and handshakes for pointing out this chance for us to all be merry. I began chatting with the likes of Animal, Captain Bob, “Big Nose” George (The Little Drummer Boy), Tina, the legendary cowbell man Ali Ramirez, Fat Daddy Chico and it went on and on. Soon I was sitting right in there, helping Tina hold the seats for the established regulars, looking forward to the day that was surely coming where I too would have a seat held for me while I glugged a couple of last brews outside.

Many times over the years I would hear the question, “How the hell did you sit through 600 baseball games?” This question would be asked with that tinge of derision one would get as if the question were “Why would you pick up garbage on the side of the road if you weren’t forced to?” The thing is not only did I love baseball, which bought me to the bleachers of Yankee Stadium in the first place and has me watching Kansas City-Seattle games on the MLB package to this day, watching a game in the bleachers was akin to going to a bar where you knew your best friends, and other characters out and about would surely be there. There would be lies and laughs, jokes and songs, fights and flirts, but the thing was there was a baseball game going on right in front of us. What a selling point!

Night after night security was busy admonishing the rowdy, escorting the drunken pugilists to the gate under a canopy of hoots and hollers. Outfielders would sneak a peek over their shoulders, only to be buried in a barrage of insults and just plain old-fashioned boos. Fathers with your young kids would go from covering their children’s ears to the naughty ditties to patting us on the back for a particularly funny line. It was a wonderland. Throw in the beers, and in those early-days cigars, and we were the proverbial pig in a poke. Tickets were cheaper then (Hell, I’m thinking they were six bucks when I started going) and the beers were cheaper too! If I could afford them back then, anyone could!

I learned the wonders of going in for batting practice (remember beer was sold in the bleachers at one time, but once beer was banned for a stint that lasted a few years it was the end of me and a bunch of cronies making it in before first pitch) and hooting and hollering with players from the road. In times I will recant tales of “Dancin’” Tony Phillips, Bo Jackson, Ben McDonald, the late John Marzano, the foul-tempered (and fouler mouthed) Bobby Ayala and the likes of Todd Jones and Phil Nevin, who attempted to draw a few Creatures into actual fisticuffs before a game. What a place! I saw the phenomena of “holding seats for friends” (in a world where Tina ruled with an iron fist) and there was even a game where someone commandeered some yellow police tape to rope off our section within a section to make sure the friends could sit together.

In time I will discuss what really killed the rowdiness of the bleachers (and yes, the bleachers as I knew them are dead). While the banning of beer in the late 90s was a big part of killing the spirit, it was the doing away with the general admission seating that blew the whole thing up. Back then you sat in your gaggle of goons, where you could share a private joke without making it public by shouting it four rows and five seats to the back and left. I have never laughed louder in my life than the nights I’d be there in a row with Big Tone Capone, Grover, Gang Bang Steve, Angry Teddy and Donahuge, all in a line like the Little Rascals on a curb, but firing them off one after another. And, lucky you, the results of these ended up in what are now five binders of scorecards on a shelf in my closet, preserved forevermore. I could (and I have) randomly pulled these books out in times of dismay to sneak a guffaw.

So here is where Scorecard Memories comes to play. Over the years, starting on a message board that became a ghost town, I documented the storied years of 1993-1995 in Section 39. In time I may revisit them here, and you will surely get the stories in a fireside chat style regardless. But I’m going to pick it up here in 1996 for a myriad of reasons, and of course, 1996 holds a special place in the heart of any Yankees fan. It’s a great place to start to share the bleacher journey with many of you for the first time. But even more so this is when true characters came creeping out of the woodwork as I had in 1993. The jokes were funnier and more biting. Security was as lax as ever and just about every single night an astounding array of lunacy prevailed. We had a World Series to see, a no-hitter and a tragic loss of one of our own out there in Section 39 when longtime cowbell man Ali Ramirez passed away that May. The emotion that came out of that, reached a crescendo on the night Gooden tossed his no-hitter on the same day Ali was laid to rest and it brought us together as a family and created a bond that has morphed into the most dysfunctional, and dare I say the BEST DAMN FAMILY out there.

At my wedding I had a series of family tables, a friends table, and a Bleacher Creature section. Since my run kicked off in the early 90s, folks have come and gone, but more have stayed. Couples have met and broken up. New relationships have flourished and some have married and there are now Bleacher Babies running around. I myself met my own wife out there, and have a Bleacher Baby of my own.

This month is the 10^th Annual Ali Ramirez Bleacher Creature Softball Tournament held on the Heritage Field on the grounds of Yankee Stadium. Over the years, 90 different people with bleacher connections (as in “sat there and became a part of this” connections and not “I have connections out there” connections) have played in this game, and another couple of hundred or more have come out to see the games and join in the day, and the inevitable trips to the bar afterwards.

So what am I going to be doing here? I’m going to take you through a stint in the stands, recounting seasons and baseballian memories through the art of the drunken scorecard. I’m going to be regaling you with all kinds of madcap capers involving my Bleacher Creature friends, from road trips to vaunted destinations like Toronto and Baltimore, Staten Island and Coney Island (where I brandished my scorecards). Your average scorecard would contain anywhere from a half-dozen to half-a-hundred witty cracks, and allusions to fights, bottle throwing, drunkards passing out or falling down the stairs, ejections, folks in costumes, flashing women and some of the strangest characters ever seen in public. I will intersperse these accounts with abbreviated game recaps, to stir up memories of names gone by like Yankees stars Mike Gallego and Mark Hutton, to visiting wunderkinds like John Jaha and Troy O’Leary.

Why would anyone care about bleacher scorecards (even ones with jokes) from over 15 years ago? For one thing, funny jokes are funny at all times, and who doesn’t like baseball stories? They tell stories about the barnstorming Cincinnati Red Stockings! I may stir up some memories of childhood heroes and guys you used to laugh at. There will be snapshot style profiles of luminaries of the time. There will be tales of on-field brawls, triple plays and a whole ton of mystery outs (or as Phil Rizzuto used to score them, “ww” for “wasn’t watching”). You will simply be amazed at some of the arcane factoids I shall present between the oddballs who threw out first pitches or sang the anthem here and there (including Barry “Greg Brady” Williams and our own Suzyn Waldman, who belted it out in the mid-90s before we realized she was theater trained, and not just annoying) to absolutely doofy polls taken in the seats like “What would you rather smell like: pee or poo?” and “Who was your favorite character in Winnie the Pooh? (in which Christopher Robin inexplicably got three votes). The fun never stopped.

The Bleacher Creatures have had road trips to just about every city in the baseball world, though I pretty much only made it to Boston, Baltimore, Shea and Toronto, and you’ll hear those stories too. And oh, the get-togethers in the bars, pregame hangouts in the bodegas and the park and even trips to the clink. There will be fights and affairs and some names will be changed to protect the guilty. But you’re gonna hear it all along with how I morphed into the “Drunk Guy That Does the Tom Tom Dance on the Benches” while wearing a plastic toy Sheriff badge.

The next time you hear from me it will be April of 1996, and you will be in the bleachers. Enjoy the ride.

Blogs

Jul 3, 2012

Bouncing Around Boston with the Bleacher Creatures

Sheriff Tom and the Bleacher Creatures have made a lot of trips to Boston to see the Yankees and Red Sox over the years, but they haven’t always made it into Fenway Park for the game.

Some Yankees fans long to go to Fenway Park and never do. Others make a pilgrimage and speak in reverent tones of days of yore in golf voices as they gaze in awe at the Green Monster. Others win contests and go on someone else’s dime. Then there are people like me, who leave the comfy confines of Section 39 in the Yankee Stadium bleachers, armed with beer and bluster, and go up there and annoy all these other people.

I made my first storied excursion to that baseballian wonderland in 1996. We Yankees fans were about to become even more overbearing to our friends up north with all those rings coming up on the docket, so to get in some practice for this inevitability I headed to Boston with bleacher cronies Big Tone Capone, who currently holds a position of note in the New York media world, and George, who was burdened with two of the worst bleacher nicknames ever bestowed on a person. (Big Nose George for … well … moving on … and before that the “Little Drummer Boy” which came from the mouth of John Sterling on the air from George’s annoying habit of banging on the bleachers with giveaway bats until threats from both security and annoyed fans around him mercifully ended the practice.)

If you travel with the Creatures long enough, a bad sketch comedy show will begin. Hopelessly lost in the area as we tried to find a spot to park for the day, George pulled alongside a cop directing traffic on those interminable roads around Fenway. Down rolled the window, and he asked to be pointed towards a comfy parking spot near Fenway as Capone and I scrambled to hide our open containers. The cop started blathering away, culminating in a “You make a left when you come to the fahk in the road.” George’s eyebrows shot up at this and he giggled like a girl, raised his hand as if to make a point, and blurted, “You mean there are two people f-cking in the road up there?” Capone and I looked at one another and rolled our cloudy eyes. The cop, no longer amused, simply answered, “Move along, buddy.” George rolled off, bemused, until we patiently explained there is such a thing as a “fahk” in the road – otherwise pronounced outside of Boston as “fork.” The reason George couldn’t comprehend this was he had actually never heard the term “fork in the road before.” For the next 10 minutes we, and a healthy chunk of Boston, had to deal with George yelling out the window asking where he could find the “f-ck in the road.”

I have only scattered memories of this venture. No scorecard survived in my stash of 600-plus messy scorecards preserved from my decade or so of scribing this stuff. We spent some pregame time in a park, tossing a ball around. Where we got a ball and how we found a park is beyond the likes of me. At one point (and whenever Capone and I are deep into our cups this tale comes back up, so it will live as long as us) out of the woods burst an old lady dressed head to toe in white – her hair was a ghostly grey and she looked like a gargoyle off a stone wall. We stood agape as she spun around and danced to no music. After a minute or so she promptly disappeared back into the woods. Whether it was a ghost, or an old lady, or some sort of hallucinogen, it was still pretty freakin’ cool.

Capone was bounding up and down the thoroughfares, armed with a “Boston Sucks” T-shirt in hand, waving it like a flag until a tourist trolley would come around and then he would promptly hold it out for display, as people shook their heads in disgust. The shirt also dangled over highway overpasses, in restaurant windows and in front of a church. We proudly stood in front of the Yankees’ hotel as Capone stood like a sentry holding up his shirt, as if they didn’t already know Boston sucked.

Soon after we entered this hotel, which was attached to a mall. Our intention was to stalk the mall and let Capone hold up his shirt some more. Obviously we had beer, so we parked ourselves in the lobby to finish them off before entering the mall, and here comes Bernie Williams, strolling around the other side of the lobby. Recognizing us from all the pregame hobnobbing we would do when they still sold beer in the bleachers, so that we would be inside for batting practice, his face lit up. “Don’t you guys have jobs?” Bernie asked. We all chucked in uncomfortable fashion, wished him well, and he was gone as mysteriously as the crone of the woods.

My first impressions of Fenway Park? From outside it looked nondescript. At the time I was shopping in porno stores that had nicer outdoor facades. I grumbled about the grass poking through the cracks in the sidewalk, even though I was used to stumbling into and out of potholes right outside our beloved Yankee Stadium. The greens on the wall were more reminiscent of bile than lush greenery. The seats were rickety and cramped, and there were poles in the way. But, all this said, we knew the history there, and we respected that. Though, at the same time, we were sort of pissing all over it.

At one point during the game a beefy guy in front of us noted Capone’s New York Rangers shirt and asked if he liked hockey, which when you think about it was a brilliant question. After it was established that yes, the guy in the Rangers shirt liked hockey, the drunk mentioned his friend played hockey, and was quite accomplished to boot. He looked back at us like a puppy wanting a treat, waiting for us to ask who the hell his friend was. Losing patience fast, we asked, and he beamed and said with a flourish as if he was a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, “Scott Lachance!” Capone promptly choked on his beer and hooted, “Scott Lachance of the Islanders? He sucks!” Meanwhile, Scott Lachance was sitting in the row in front of us and two seats to the left with his drunken friend, and he shook his head in dismay.

Ah, the game! The Yankees lost 12-11, which was bad enough. They blew an 11-9 lead in the ninth after they had come back from a 9-7 deficit in the top of the ninth, which was worse. As you can imagine, when the Yankees took that ninth-inning lead, we were full of vigor and mirth, and not making many friends with our particular brand of hoot and holler. And, as you can further imagine, after the Red Sox stormed back and pretty much told us all to put it back in our pants, our night was done and we were showered in a potent mix of mock.

Our good friend John Wetteland was the catalyst for disaster, serving up three hits with a side of two walks, to plate three runs, in 2/3 of an inning. The legendary Vaughn Eshelman got the win that night to pour salt in the wound. Other interesting asides included a home run from clod Jose Canseco for Boston, another by Mariano Duncan for the good guys, a pinch-hitting appearance by Mike Aldrete and Wade Boggs swiping his first bag on the year. It was also yet another “near” four-hour affair for these two clubs, clocking in at 3:58. Upon further review, I see that this win put Boston a solid 15 games behind the Yankees in the division hunt. Good job, way to go, fellas!

There was a sad side note to the trip on that 17th day of July back in 1996. We had flipped on 770-WABC for the postgame, which was coming in clear up the East Coast, only to have Curtis Sliwa break in with the news that TWA Flight 800 had gone down off the coast of Long Island. We pretty much rode the rest of the way home in silence, which may have been a first and a last for the three of us.

A few years later someone was daft enough to rent a bus for a Creature trip to Boston. At this time we were the scourges of, well, everywhere. Baltimore politicos were publicly imploring locals not to sell those damn Yankees fans their extra ducats, and even our kindly friends up north in Toronto had tired of us by then after a series of road trips gone awry. I hopped on board for this one and drank all the way up. Hell, I even drank on the way to where we were meeting the bus for the ride up! I was quite the cock of the walk by the time we rolled into Beantown.

All went well until we were approaching the gate for entry into the storied park. I’m a noted critic of lines. I don’t’ like them, and usually make that point known while I’m in them, which endears me to few. I successfully handed off my ticket, which was an accomplishment in itself, considering how much I had to drink. Then I subjected myself to someone rummaging through my nifty vinyl Yankees giveaway duffle bag. Why I had a bag with me is beyond comprehension since all I really needed was my scorecard to make messy notes on that no one (including me) could read later. After my bag was checked I moved on my way. Well, four feet anyway. I was then stopped to have my bag checked again, and this flustered me to no end. Of course the easy thing to do would have been to open the bag, chuckle, and ruminate how this was already done while it was being done again. The proverbial no harm, no foul. I tended to veer left when a simple right turn would do. I balked about this transgression, insinuating it was an outrage, and that I was being discriminated against because I was decked in Yankees gear with a spiffy vinyl bag with a Yankees logo on it. No Boston fan would suffer such an indignity! I was causing quite the scene, which by then I was used to.

Someone in a position to make my life miserable walked over to find out what was going on. I continued my harangue until I was asked to leave. At this point I realized I might have flubbed. My apology was ignored. My initial attempt at begging was scoffed at. As I was led to the door I saw some fellow Creatures not only heading in, but trying to hide behind Boston fans to avoid getting involved in my plight. Once I was back at the exit reality sank in and I started playing the sympathy card to the police officer, who by now had walked over with a smile on his face. He was obviously a man of action and here was some to be had in spades.

“I spent hours on a bus to get here,” I pointed out. “Hope it had a nice bathroom,” the cop retorted. “My wife is inside,” I lied, as I not only didn’t have a wife, but I could not even keep a girlfriend. “I hope she has a good time,” the officer said, openly smirking now.

It was time to break out the big guns. “Well, I’m Sheriff Tom,” I said, pointing at the plastic toy badge on my T-shirt that proclaimed this very thing. “Yes,” he said, “and I’m Officer Clancy. It’s been nice meeting you. Now move along.” Between this and the “fahk in the road” incident I realized Boston cops liked telling people to move along.

He ushered me back outside, and as I muttered something under my breath that sort of sounded like, “I’ll just go in at another gate,” he proclaimed, “Oh, by the way, if I see you coming in another gate, you’re going to jail.” He then backed up, looked at me with a grin, proud of his work, and ambled off, whistling a happy tune. I was stuck outside.

What to do, what to do? First, I called the only Creature inside whose number I had in my phone: the infamous Bad Mouth Larry. After interminable rings, I got his voicemail. Totally befuddled as to why he wouldn’t pick up, I left a message explaining I was stuck outside, had no idea how I would find the group or bus after the game, and to send help. I slumped against the wall, cursing my fate. I tried Larry again, got the machine again, and by now I was speaking in more clipped and grumpy tones.

This went on for another half-hour, and another five or six calls. Each message on his machine from me grew louder and angrier. Passersby stopped to watch me bark into the phone, and it only stopped after I dropped my phone on the sidewalk and broke it. Oh, and why wasn’t Larry answering my cries for help? Because I was calling his home phone the whole time! He wasn’t home. He was inside Fenway Park. About 15 hours later, when he got home and checked his answering machine, he had quite the laugh.

And what became of me? I meandered like Moses. I sampled those Boston bars everyone kept talking about, and you know what? For all the crap Boston fans take, I saw none of it that day. I was lauded like a conquering hero. My sob story, as only I could tell it, with curse words sprinkled within and accompanied by funny pantomimes (you should have seen me act out how I dropped and broke my phone) got me free drinks.

We talked baseball. We talked road trips. We talked women! I invited them back to the bleachers, where I promised to guarantee them a hassle-free time, and lots of laughs to boot. Who doesn’t like lots of laughs? Little did I tell them I had no say in the “hassle-free time” and even if I did, peer pressure would have gotten to me once they were inside Yankee Stadium and I would have turned on them and gave them crap. But for that night, we were cordial enemies, sharing ale, talking ball, singing along to the jukebox, and making fun of the Mets.

The game ended and in a panic I stumbled right into the group and the bus. I guess the story would have been more interesting if I got stuck in Boston, but that’s a story for another day and another venue. As for the game? I have no freakin’ idea. I don’t even remember what year this was.

There are more Boston trips mixed in from over the years. There was the time I saw vocalist Dickie Barrett of the Mighty Mighty Bosstones in a McDonald’s somewhere by Fenway. I looked at him, and he looked away (I was always good at that). This has since become the impetus for my “Dickie Barrett ordering a double cheeseburger at McDonald’s” impression, which has never gotten me anywhere or anything.

There was the time I was spent an overnight outside Fenway in a play for tickets for the next day with bleacher fixtures Justin and Grover, watching as a fan climbed up a pole in an effort to make “YAWKEY WAY” read “YANKEE WAY” with some stickers he brought along for this sole purpose.

And of course there was the time where a group of Creatures were whooping it up over dinner at a sports bar when someone hollered, “Hey, its Kenny Anderson!” and as I turned to look, my drunk ass tipped over the chair, and Kenny Anderson – otherwise busy that week in the NBA playoffs for the Celtics – had to save me from crashing to the floor. Not everyone can say Kenny Anderson saved them from falling out of a chair because they were drunk. (And I don’t even like basketball, so he was pretty much wasting his time.)

Finally there was the Boston trip, which ended with me somehow losing all of my money, staring at an empty wallet in absolute befuddlement. (I have no conscious memory of being robbed, but who knows with me.) So not only did I need to bum a good meal off of Justin at a Cracker Barrel on the way home, I had the balls to hit him up for another $16 on the way out the door so I could buy a harmonica out of their gift shop. Hey, it came with a book on how to play it! To show that most stories have a happy ending, I still have that harmonica … though I never did learn how to play it.

So yeah, I have memories surrounding the Yankees from out and about Fenway Park. Sure, they don’t involve Munson crashing into Fisk, Jim Rice going down on strikes with the bases loaded, or even a Yankees win, but they sure were fun. I have seen the Yankees beat Boston plenty of times right here at home. That certainly counts for something.

One day I’m sure I’ll make it back up to Boston, but this time I’ll have my wife and daughter with me, and the stories won’t have such an element of danger. But for now you can leave me with my memories with the Bleacher Creatures on the road to Boston, and I’m a happy man.

Cheers and beers … “Boston Sucks!”

Author: Sheriff Tom Brown

Scorecard Memory: Grown Men Slapping Each Other, the ‘Gang Bang’ and Rusty Greer

An Old Man Fell Down the Stairs in the Bleachers

Bouncing Around Boston with the Bleacher Creatures