If you have read any of my previous posts, you will know that I no longer care about baseball. The the fact that the White Sox are owned by the worst owner in all of professional sports combined with the new "all or nothing" insanely boring style of play has completely killed the baseball angel that once sat on my shoulder.
But neither of those factors can take away my memories! When I think back, I have had so many awesome memories inside various baseball stadiums. I'm actually surprised at just how many of my fondest memories involve baseball in some way. I have shared games with friends, my grandpa, my dad, my little brothers (who are now 40 something year old men), and my own children. These will always be apart of me.
But today I want to reminisce about an opening day memory. Everyone knows I am not only a White Sox fan, but I am also a sworn Cubs hater. I briefly suspended this hatred in 2016 in order to try and be happy for my Cub fan friends... but that quickly died and I returned to despising them. But in 1983 I was about 13 years old so there was an advantage to having a team in town that had yet to install lights. Yes the Chicago Cubs did not install lights until 1988. Let that sink in. Anyway, the Cubs played all day games. This meant my buddies and I could go to the games all summer long.
You see, back in the 1980s, kids basically left their houses after breakfast and didn't come home until the streetlights came on. Parents didn't know (or care) where we were. As a result, we could jump on a bus to the train station, take the train into the city, transfer to another train and get to Wrigley field in less than an hour and a half... and our parents might not even know we were gone. So we did this all the time.
At this time you could buy bus and train transfers that allowed us to make the entire journey for less than 2 bucks. Throw in the fact you could buy a ticket for about $4 and it was a recipe for an awesome day! needless to say, we did this A LOT.
But one year, we did something special, a buddy and I each called the school on behalf of the other and we ditched so we could go to opening day. This really wasn't much of a crime as all we needed to do was to forge a note the next day and we were good to go. Spoiler alert: it was the 80s and literally nothing happened to us for ditching. So if you were looking for that to be part of the adventure, I'm sorry to disappoint. There is no crisis in this story... just happy memories.
My buddy and I got to the game and I bought a scorecard... because I was that kind of nerd. Up until very recently, I always kept score at the game and would never leave my seat during any action. If I couldn't pee in between innings I was just going to have to hold it. This also meant I never drank beer at games (and no I don't mean when I was 13... I'm not Kelly Leak!). I never wanted to miss or forget a moment of the game. But that is for another post.
It was April in Chicago so of course we needed our winter coats. I will never forget how empty the park was. Even though we only paid $4 for our terrible tickets, we easily found seats behind home plate. The Cubs took on the Montreal Expos that day so we got to see 5 Hall of Famers... plus one super hero! The Expos were stacked! The lineup included Tim Raines, Andre Dawson and Joe Carter while the Cubs had Ryne "The Most Overrated Player Ever" Sandberg and the great Fergie Jenkins. Oh and the Expos starting pitcher was none other than Steve Rogers. That's right. Good old Captain America himself.
As the card-carrying Cub hater I was/am, I was thrilled that the Expos beat the Cubs 3 -0 that day. And of course, because it was the 1980s, both pitchers threw a complete game. For Fergie Jenkins, it was one of the 267 complete game she pitched in his career. TWO HUNDRED SIXTY SEVEN!!!!!!!!! (Also 6-7!)
I will never forget how great I felt that day. We were so proud of ourselves for weaseling out of school to catch a ball game. Heck I'm still pretty proud of it right now... just don't tell my kids.
What's your favorite opening day memory?
