It was the underside of the ninth inning, and I used to be on the top of agitation.
“Why did I do that?” I berated myself.
Regardless that this was again in 1971, I consider the drama yearly right now.
The Excessive Holy eve of Rosh Hashana was quick approaching at Yankee Stadium. Each good Jew could be within the synagogue earlier than sundown to greet the Jewish New Yr. However right here I used to be, within the press field, fists tightened over my Olivetti transportable typewriter, staring down on the baseball diamond. Positive, it was the perfect seat in the home. But it surely wasn’t the place I needed to be. In only a few hours, I used to be speculated to be on the Shelter Rock Jewish Heart on Lengthy Island, removed from the Bronx.
May I make it house in time? The rating was tied, 2-2. The Yankees had managed solely two hits all day. If the sport went into additional innings, I’d be out of luck.
Writing baseball was the gold commonplace for a sports activities journalist on the time. In spite of everything, it was America’s pastime, proper? To cowl a baseball sport for a newspaper was virtually an honor. This was 1971, and although I had been a reporter for eight years, I didn’t wish to flip down the possibility to cowl the Yankees — the New York Yankees, the Bronx Bombers, enjoying in Yankee Stadium, the Home that Ruth Constructed.
And so I accepted the project.
It had appeared so easy. I needed to be house by sunset. Most baseball video games in these days took below two and a half hours. The sport began at 2:04 p.m. I figured it will be over by 4:30. I am going to the locker room, get my interviews, come again to the press field, end writing my 800-word story by 5:30 p.m., drive house to Roslyn, Lengthy Island, arrive by 6:15, get my yarmulke to cowl my head, and bible, and Roz, 5-year-old Ellen and 3-year-old Mark and I stroll to temple — simply earlier than sunset.
I checked my notes. The Yankees had been in fourth place with the season winding down. However third place was value combating for. The gamers on a third-place workforce would earn $250 a person! Fourth place was value nothing. For a fellow like Ron Blomberg, who was incomes $12,500 for the season, that $250 was the equal of getting paid for 3 additional video games.
He wasn’t a lot on my thoughts because the Yankees ready for the underside of the ninth. The rating was tied, however the Yanks had generated solely two hits all sport. Blomberg? He had been hitless in three at-bats.
I at all times considered Blomberg as extra Georgia than Jewish. I had met him simply as soon as, 5 weeks earlier than. And that was on the Lengthy Island Railroad, of all locations. The Yankees had been conducting a advertising and marketing marketing campaign in Mets’ nation — Lengthy Island — to get followers to go all the way in which out to the Stadium within the Bronx. Historically, Yankee followers got here from the 5 boroughs (nicely, not a lot from Brooklyn) and North Jersey.
So right here I’m, on the practice with Blomberg, whose job was to wave to followers and say a number of phrases because it wended its approach by means of the suburbs.
The practice stopped in Ronkonkoma. Blomberg, who had complained earlier in regards to the warmth, requested the conductor to show up the air con and mentioned he was drained and hungry after having pushed to New York from New Jersey.
“Boy, I’m exhausted,” he whispered.
Somebody got here in with trays of party-sized cocktail sandwiches.
And so I watched Ron Blomberg, the Jew from Atlanta, eat eight ham and cheese sandwiches. He topped the banquet off by consuming an entire lemon.
Now, greater than a month later I squirmed within the press field. I simply knew this sport would go into additional innings. The Bombers seemed dangerous on the plate.
A fellow named Jake Gibbs led off, although, with a single towards Steve Dunning — the primary hit the pitcher had yielded because the third inning. Gibbs obtained to second when the ball skipped off the fitting fielder’s glove. Felipe Alou then sacrificed Gibbs to 3rd.
Subsequent up was Roy White. He was walked deliberately in order that Cleveland might get arrange a double-play state of affairs towards … sure, you guessed it, Blomberg.
What was left of the gang of 9,177 (I suppose many left to go to temple) was now roaring.
Blomberg, proportion hitter — however not a slugger — strolled to the plate, and immediately the whole Cleveland outfield left their positions and stopped midway towards the infield. Supervisor Johnny Lipon was figuring a deep fly ball would ship house Gibbs anyway.
And that’s what Blomberg hit.
Heart fielder Vada Pinson seemed on the ball crusing over his head for an instantaneous — after which headed for the Cleveland dugout. He knew it was over. The ball landed in deep middle, Bloomberg high-tailed it to first, Gibbs got here house. And the Yankees received.
Possibly I might make temple in any case.
I charged all the way down to the locker room and there was a jubilant Blomberg within the center.
“If the rely had been 3-2 and the solar went down, I might have left for temple,” he shouted.
Wow. What a quote. So he would have left the sport to go to providers? All of the writers had been scribbling on their notepads, and Blomberg seemed as if he had simply capped a World Collection sport. He was ecstatic. He was at that second a Jewish ballplayer who had simply received the fitting to go house and have a good time one of the necessary holidays of his faith. I shared his pleasure. I knew that whereas about 2 % of People had been Jewish, solely about 1 % of main leaguers had been Jewish.
“Nicely, Blomberg obtained an early celebration, huh?” mentioned Alou.
I had my quotes, obtained again to the press room, typed my story, handed it to the Western Union telegrapher who despatched it to The Occasions. And I made it to temple at 1 / 4 to 7.
The subsequent morning, I picked up the paper in anticipation. Would The Occasions, a paper that prevented non secular speak again then, go away in all my references to Blomberg, his Jewishness, and the vacation?
It unfold my story throughout the highest of the web page.
The eight-column headline learn:
Blomberg Offers Yanks 3-2 Victory in Ninth and a Pleased New Yr
Beneath it, the one-column subhead learn:
Sunset Child Hits
Deadline Single
Grinning all the way in which, I went again to Shelter Rock for morning providers. Rabbi Myron Fenster, a key determine in American Judaism, quickly gave his sermon to a temple filled with greater than 700 individuals.
“Sunset child hits deadline single,” he started. I used to be ecstatic.
The years handed and Blomberg continued his profession with the Yankees till a string of accidents curtailed his effectiveness. But, he made the Baseball Corridor of Fame, in a approach, by turning into the sport’s first designated hitter. The bat from that first look, in 1973, is in Cooperstown.
The Yankees launched him after 1976. He performed a season with the Chicago White Sox two years later, after which retired.
However yearly, l keep in mind sitting in that press field, trying down as he belted the baseball into deep middle, sending the Yankees to victory and me to the temple on time.