Twenty Eight Years ago...

It was October 1980. I had been five years old for all of two months, and have no idea what the letter of the week was in Mrs. Hudson's afternoon kindergarten class. History classes later told me there was an election that year. Some guy who liked jelly beans beat a peanut farmer I believe. The only thing I recall about the election is that I voted for some guy named John Anderson in the Weekly Reader magazine poll at school.

What I do remember is my dad waking me up to see Tug McGraw on the mound for the Philadelphia Phillies in the bottom of the ninth to clinch the World Series over Kansas City. It is my first memory of watching a sporting event on TV. The Tigers have always been my team, but if I did pull for a national league team in my childhood it was certainly the Phillies. Born in Pennsylvania, and visiting my grandparents there each summer I fell in love with the unmistakable voice of announcer Harry Kalas on the television broadcasts, and we mangaed to catch one game a year at the old Veterans Stadium. The Philly Fanatic was the BEST baseball mascot by far (although the then San Diego Chicken's weekly appearances on The Baseball Bunch gave him a run for his money) and in my book there was no cooler player than "Michael Jack Schmidt" at third base. So even though I don't have strong attachments to these Phillies or the Tampa Bay Rays, I guess it was somewhere deep in my inner child that an "atta baby" came out of my mouth when Chase Utley hit his first inning home run to give the Phils the early lead in game one. It is fun to think that somewhere in the country within the next week the parent of some five year old sports fan will wake up their son or daughter somewhere to see the final out of the fall classic and create a memory that they may blog about twenty eight years later.