Major Leaguers Haven’t Forgotten the Little Old Days

Many adults who would never sit still on a Saturday afternoon to watch children or baseball will find a television set today to watch both. At 3 p.m., Channel 10 will show the annual Little League World Series final from Williamsport, Pa.

They will watch not because they care about 12-year-olds who are the size of economy cars, or about cute little aluminum bats that flail at cute little fastballs. They will watch because they care about memories.

They will watch because for one or two summers, back when summers really meant something, that was the game they played.

Among those watching will be men who now make baseball their career, who these days play more baseball in a week than they did in an entire youth league season. For these men, the memories mean even more.

Just ask the Padres.

“Nobody forgets Little League baseball,” pitcher Mark Grant said. “That was the happiest time of my life. All summer, no pressure, beating the heck out of everybody . . .

“I remember my first Little League practice, I was out in center field, acting real cool, when a fly ball comes at me. I camp under the ball, being real cool and checking the runner at second, then look up at the last minute and-- wham --the ball hits me right in the nose. Breaks my nose. Little League, the best times of my life.”

Most of them were great pitchers because the unwritten rule is that the best kids always pitch.

And, at the plate, most of them averaged just less than a home run an inning.

But to clear up one misconception about these big leaguers who reached stardom before puberty: No, not everybody’s father was the manager.

“I was the only kid in the world whose father was the umpire ,” explained outfielder Tony Gwynn, who played in the Elks League in Long Beach. “One time I went in hard to second base, and I thought I was safe, but Dad called me out. I got up and stomped my foot and then just when I got ready to say something, he gave me this terrible look. I knew then, either I go back to the bench, or when we get home, I get my butt whipped.”

As youth leaguers, how good were these major leaguers?

- In Burlington, N.C., Greg Booker was given intentional walks at age 8.

- In the Bronx, N.Y., Stanley Jefferson officially played shortstop, but he was moved around the field throughout the game depending upon the strengths of each particular hitter. “When the best hitter came up, I would go to the outfield, make the catch and then go back to shortstop for the next hitter,” he said.

- In Joliet, Ill., from age 10 until he played in high school, Mark Grant was never knocked out of a game he pitched. Complete games. Four years’ worth. “Six innings then, nine innings now, a complete game is a complete game,” said a proud Grant.

- Every team on which Tony Gwynn has played has won some championship. It didn’t hurt that, at age 10, he once hit a ball 200 feet over a light tower.

- Tim Flannery set an East Anaheim Little League record with 37 hits one summer. Trying hard to imitate a major leaguer, before each game he would sit in a warm bath. “I pretended it was a whirlpool,” Flannery said.

Yet some of their sweetest youth league flashbacks did not deal with the playing field.

Booker recalls his father and coach, Harold, introducing him to the concept of the team bus.

“He had this old pickup truck, and before every practice and every game, he would drive by every player’s house, pile all 10 of us in the back, and drive us to the park,” Booker recalled. “Afterward, for the ones whose parents didn’t show up, he would drive them home.”

What happened next has ensured that Booker will appreciate youth league baseball beyond baseball:

“When the truck was empty, Dad would drive me home, eat two of the biggest hamburgers I’ve ever seen, take a nap, and then go to the hosiery mill to work. He’d do the graveyard shift every night after he coached us. I’ll never forget that.”

Youth league is good for things like that.

If it weren’t for his youth league, Jefferson would have entered his teen-age years with a little less understanding.

“Our neighborhood was racially mixed, and we all got along fine, and never thought anything of it, until an all-star game in Throggs Neck (N.Y.),” he recalled. “Everyone there gave us a hard time. There were racial slurs, everything. I had never heard anything like it. It was a side of the world I had not seen. I learned where I grew up wasn’t like everywhere else.”

If it weren’t for Little League, Flannery said he would never know how to handle his children.

“My dad was a preacher. I never remember him even playing catch with me,” Flannery recalled. “But I tell you, if I ever needed a new glove, I had it. If I ever needed new cleats, I had them. He gave me everything but never pushed me, and that’s how I want to be with my kids.”

Flannery paused. He laughed.

“But it’s not going to be easy. I’ve already got my little boy hitting off a tee, switch-hitting off a tee, so they can never platoon him.”

“Oh yeah,” Grant repeated. “Greatest time of my life. Once we were one out from winning the state championship, leading the biggest, baddest team from Chicago, 7-2. And we lost. We blew the lead and the game and never got a shot at Williamsport.

“I cried my eyes out. I stood there at shortstop and cried my eyes out.

“What times those were, huh?”