My luck was so great on that fabled night 28 years ago, the last time the Philadelphia Phillies won a World Series. But my luck and timing was so rotten this time, when the Phillies managed to win their second world championship, last night.
For the first event, I managed to get into Veterans Stadiuim and witness history. For the second, I was sitting in a high school bleachers seat, watching a soccer game that began, and thus ended, much later than I had anticipated.
Yes, my lifestyle has changed somewhat in the past 28 years. I love my kids and their soccer games. I wouldn't miss it for anything. But couldn't I have been in two places at once, somehow?
This was an odd one for many of us, this World Series. You had two teams -- the Philadelphia Phillies, the Tampa Bay Rays -- who were traditional underdogs, and so you had no bad guys. There was nobody to root against.
But I chose the Phillies, because I like ballparks that don't have roofs (Tropicana "Field" in Florida is a ridiculous structure) and I prefer the old town teams to the Sunbelters.
I'm a night owl, but even I was unable to hang in for Saturday night's game, which the Phillies won at about 1:45 a.m. Sunday. Then, after a boring 10-2 Phillies win Sunday night, the rains came. Game five got as far as the 6th inning Monday night (a 2-2 tie) before the storm forced it to be suspended. They couldn't play Tuesday night, as the monsoon continued.
That brought us to Wednesday night, when my two daughters had an important soccer game, playing for the Southern Connecticut Conference high school championship. Their team, Wilbur Cross High School in New Haven, had never made it that far.
I figured I could see their game, which was to start at 7:30 p.m. at Shelton High School, then get back home in time for the climax of the World Series. But the boys' championship went into double overtime -- nobody could score -- then a penalty kicks shoot-out. (For those keeping score at home, Amity 1, Guilford 0). This pushed back the start of our game to 8:15 p.m.
Making the night even more unpleasant was the outcome of the Cross game vs. Daniel Hand High School of Madison. They beat us, 2-0.
While consoling my daughters afterward, I was also thinking about that Series game. Could I possibly make it back in time? It was 10:00; they had started playing in Philadelphia at about 8:30. It was a long shot.
When I ran into my house, the game wasn't on and I knew it was over. I had to go to my computer and check on-line to get the news that the Phillies were world champs. What a way to find out...
I cast my mind back to 1980, when I was a young reporter (I was 30) for the New Haven Register, unmarried and always up for an adventure. Realizing the Phillies could win their first world championship in their long history that night, I spontaneously decided to hop an Amtrak train out of New Haven and take it to Philly. Maybe I could buy a scalper's ticket, I fantasized.
I wish I remember more about that crazy day. I don't keep diaries but I do keep calendars with details of every day. And because, as Casey Stengel said, "You could look it up," I did look up my calendar from 1980, the night of Oct. 21, and I read: "Philly! A $40 scalper. Phillies 4, K.C. 1! World Champs! STREET PARTY!"
The entry for the following day: "I love a parade!"
I do remember staying over that night with my buddy, Dick Wood, then a student at Wharton Business School in that old city. I do remember great exuberance and celebration in the streets. I do remember sitting in the bleachers and seeing Tug McGraw toss his glove into the air and start jumping around as he recorded the final out.
But the scalper? I have no memory of him.
Life was simpler then, eh? Imagine trying to buy a World Series face value ticket today for 40 bucks, let alone a scalper's ticket. Imagine just walking up to somebody outside a ballpark on the night the hometown team is on the verge of winning a world championship that has never happened before, and obtaining a seat for 40 smackers.
No matter what else happens to me, I'll always have Philadelphia and that unbelieavable night.