November 1, 2006
Your typical professional baseball stadium features a concrete-framed dugout, a wooden bench, tobacco-stained turf "carpet", a bat rack and, a hat rack. Actually, the tic-tac-toe-like squares hold helmets, not hats, but I'll refer to it as a hat rack anyways.
My hat rack would start with the 1993 Palm Springs Angels red hat in the upper left - the last logo with the stylized "P" and "S" with the Palm tree bent around the first letter. To its right, the first Lake Elsinore Storm hat, blue and black with a silver "L" and "E" connected by a lightning bolt. I'm one of several who probably takes credit for scribbling a rough version on a napkin and "designing" that logo. Too bad it didn't last. The third hat is the familiar High Desert Mavericks' red "M" with a black cowboy hat - a brazen copy of the NBA Mavericks' old logo. Then, there's a blue shield intersected by six points surrouding a red "c". This logo looks a century old - it is an adaptation of the Chicago Fire Department - and the namesake soccer team has worn the badge produly for nine seasons now. Finally, the three-point shield of Real Salt Lake - the letters entwined in a throwback to the Yankees or Cardinals. A soccer ball and a crown adorn the logo. Regal, they say.
That's it - five hats in my hat rack in a professional sports career that now dates back 15 years. I've been fortunate enough to win two championships (Cal League 1997 and MLS 1998), but now I'm in a three-year rut without even making the postseason. It's a somewhat charmed life, I must admit. They call this work?
My places of work have included Angels Stadium (the Palm Springs version), the Lake Elsinore Diamond, Friendly Mavericks Stadium, historic (crumbling) Soldier Field, new (dysfunctional) Soldier Field, the erector set project known as Cardinal Stadium and now, Rice-Eccles Stadium.
My earliest memory of entering a stadium is Memorial Stadium, which the Orioles graced from 1954 to 1991, where long concrete ramps guided Dad and I up to the upper deck where the seats were more affordable... and I can't imagine forgetting the feeling of passing from the concourse through the section portals and seeing blue sky, rich green grass, yellow seats and that big left field scoreboard laid out before me in marvelous harmony. I was hooked on stadiums and the sports within them... and some of my most compelling memories are of Memorial Stadium (Todd Cruz' dropped pop-up costs O's victory in my first-ever World Series game in '83), Candlestick Park (Willie McCovey Day in 1980, two Giant wins in '87 NLCS, the Giants' last game in '99), the Rose Bowl (USA beats Colombia in '94, NU ends a 47-year drought in '96, the Fire's '98 title), RFK Stadium (Dips' games, the fifth game of the 49ers' unfathomable first Super Bowl season and Tony Freakin' Meola stoning the Fire repeatedly in 2000 MLS Cup), Home Depot Center and Columbus Crew Stadium (MLS had arrived) and even Visalia's RockPile (where the Mavs' once clinched a pennant).
I often tell people I dislike crowds, noise and big gatherings - but I guess I love putting on those kinds of events. Because it's all I know...
The people who populate these venues tell the greatest stories. In some cases, they passed away before their stories could be shared. And that's one of the goals of Not Just a Hat Rack, to chronicle the people who have blessed my life - more often that not in a stadium. You might read about James the Prospect, Jimmy Long Socks, Garrett Anderson, Mario Mendoza, Travis Lee, several actual Mayors and one proverbial one, the Pfeiffer clan, the Beast, baseball's most over-educated front office, Peter Pan & Snow White, managers, captains, concession stand arsonists & drug dealers, Scary Gary, Zola the Super Fan, Humo and his handlers and many, many others. If life's most important moments are encounters you share with other people, consider all of these characters VVIP's in my life.
Read on dear friend, and feel free to leave a comment.
