Rob recently posted about his wistful memories of the 70's and 80's and today, by complete chance, I embarked on my own little one-legged hobble down memory lane. Flipping channels on my lunch break, I stumbled upon the Mid Atlantic Sports Network ( a recent fine addition to the Comcast Lineup). Apparently they fill dead afternoon air with rebroadcasts of old Orioles games packaged as "Orioles Classics". I was hooked the second I saw that cartoon bird on the helmet. This particular game was played on August 8th, 1986. You see, even though the O's were pretty pathetic in the late 80's, these were the years that cemented my fandom. It simply didn't get any better than spending a summer evening watching the Birds on TV or, even better, falling asleep to the games on the radio.
I was fortunate enough to catch the great inning of this game; the Orioles erased a 6-0 Rangers lead by scoring nine times in one inning which included two grand slams. 33rd St was rockin and for a half-hour I was ten again. Some brief snippets that stuck out from my short visit to Memorial Stadium:
*The announcer was talking about the "rookie phenom, one of the new heroes of Birdland, Jim Traber". Boy, was that short-lived.
*The O's were only 2 1/2 games out first place. In August. My, how times have changed.
*The announcer kept plugging "Three Buck Night". Now you can't even get a hot dog for $3.
*The grand slams were hit by the utterly forgettable(except to true fans) Larry Sheets and Jim Dwyer.
There were only two things missing. Chants of "Eddie-Eddie-Eddie" and the sweet baritone of the late, great Chuck Thompson.
Good Times. Thanks MASN.
3 comments:
We've got something special here tonight at Birdland...
out of complete coincidence, just yesterday, I was just rifling through a box of stuff that had, until recently been in my parents attic... tucked away, under a couple of Ford Fairlane comic books, and an autographed picture of Tom Wopat (thanks again B & Amanda)... my old cartoon Oriole hat, with the mesh back, its bill covered with Bird's autographs from the old "come meet the Orioles when they visit your town" nights... oddly enough, Dwyer's and Sheets' John Hancocks are there, but so was Chuck's, and Cal Sr's... and Ellie's too... great times
O-R-I-O-L-E-S
btw... Bob Melvin.
More coincidence- I too, happened across my autographed Tom Wopat photo yesterday. Awesome.
"Just the good ol' boys, never meaning no harm..."
wow talk about coincidences, tom wopat needed a room and he's my new roomate...tom wopat...really, you guys suck. but oh man magic magic magic magic O-R-I-O-L-E-S!! orioles magic feel it happen!!
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