Last month, when I made my first trip in 2014 to Citi Field, I bought this year's edition of the New York Mets yearbook. Hey, after all, I bought one every year since Casey Stengel had his real teeth. When I got it home, I dove into it.
And was done within five minutes. I flipped through it like a baby scanned a nursery rhyme book. Translation: I looked at all the pictures. That's because there was virtually nothing to read in it.
Back in LA, I finally was ready to buy the 2014 Los Angeles Dodgers yearbook. When I got it home, I dove into it.
And I'm still not done. There's an awful lot to read in it. Heck, there's a twenty-page story on Vin Scully alone.
Now that's what a baseball team's yearbook should be. Something that lasts all summer.
Ah, I remember when....
When I was a kid, my dad took me to two, maybe three Met games a year. Of course, as you might imagine, the weeks preceding each game offered me glorious anticipation. Who was going to be the starting pitcher? I'd start tracking that weeks in advance. What was the weather forecast? I'd start looking for that on TV a week in advance.
And, of course, there was my allowance. I needed to plan my expected souvenir purchase.
And, if it was the right time of the season, I'd be scraping together two quarters to buy the Mets yearbook.
When I mention "the right time of the season," this was intricate guesswork on my part. You see the photo above? There is a notation in the upper right hand corner.
"Revised Edition."
If the Mets had undergone a lot of personnel changes in the first two months of the season, they would do a revised version of the yearbook to get the new guys in there. I never ever wanted to have an incomplete yearbook. So, I would want to have the book, but always needed to wait in case they did the revised edition.
Regardless, I needed to have that damn thing in my house by July 1. Because school was over and I was into my summer reading phase. And a major part of that was the Mets yearbook.
This is when there was more to the book than just player pictures. There were extensive write-ups on each and every Met. Other nifty articles. It kept this eight-year-old awfully busy. I'd curl up in my favorite hot weather reading spot---right next to the kitchen fan---and completely immerse myself in a cool breeze and some hot stats.
It would take me several nights to finish the Mets yearbook.
Yes, I have them all. Save for one yearbook. The very, very first yearbook from my very, very first season with the Mets. During my second season with the team, they went on what seemed to be a 25 game losing streak. I got so disgusted that I ripped up the yearbook from the previous season. Which you can now buy on e-Bay for about twenty bucks.
Oh, well.
I was so captivated by baseball yearbook reading that I branched out. You see, in my younger days, I always nominated an American League team to be my own each summer. Since most of the kids "up the block" were Yankee fans, I needed to talk on their level about teams in the same league.
Of course, I seemed to switch American League favorites every summer. One year, I was enamored with the Chicago White Sox. The next year, it was the Boston Red Sox. One summer later, it was the Detroit Tigers. I never stuck with one for more than a season. Hey, my fandom was valuable.
Naturally, I had to look the part. Back then, there was a place called Manny's Baseball Land across the street from Yankee Stadium. The cool thing about this souvenir store was that they had stuff from all teams. It was a different time and era. So, usually accompanied by my best neighborhood chum Leo, we'd pop down to Manny's on the subway. And I would officially adopt an American League team by buying myself their cap.
And, of course, their team yearbook.
For the next two weeks, I'd be back nestled against the kitchen fan. Learning all about Carl Yastrzemski or Jim Northrup or John Buzhardt. I mean, I had to be totally conversant, right?
For me, there was nothing like enveloping myself in a baseball team yearbook. I could read it for days.
I'm happy to say that I'm halfway through this year's Dodger book. And I will add it to a collection that just never seems to stop.
What else is better to do on a summer night?
Dinner last night: Carlo's finally get sausage and peppers right.
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