Bronx Cheer

The election of Rich 'Goose' Gossage to baseball's Hall of Fame means my two favorite players from the 'Bronx Zoo'-era Yankees have been given the ultimate reward for nearly killing me between the years 1977 and 1981.

I was 11 years old the night Reggie Jackson hit 3 home runs on 3 pitches from 3 different pitchers in the 1977 World Series. New York was suffering then, making the Yankees first championship in 15 years more than a sports story: It was sweet relief for a city on the brink of self-immolation. Between spurts of hysteria I sat on a green couch beside a wood cabinet TV the size of a washing machine, drinking RC Cola from a tall plastic cup. My dad sat quietly on a yellow fabric chair across the room. He was quiet, maybe shocked, maybe saving his voice for the football Giants (who were muddling through the Joe Pisarcik era). He'd taken my mother, brother and me to my first Yankees game at 'old' Yankee Stadium in 1972, a loss to the Chicago White Sox. Gossage was a clean-cut rookie on that White Sox team. I don't remember if he pitched that night, but I'll never forget absorbing the sad majesty of the Stadium from our box seats along the first base line. It, like the team and the city, was in steep decline.

And then came George. Steinbrenner, that is, who became principal owner in 1973 and who quickly became a pariah to baseball 'purists' with his bottomless check book and blustery media pronouncements. A renovated Yankee Stadium opened in 1976. The American League All-Star game was played in the Bronx in the summer of that season, a game I clearly remember watching on a black & white TV in the bedroom my brother and I shared. Fiery manager Billy Martin led the Yanks to the World Series later that year, where they were swept by Cincinnati's Big Red Machine despite the heroics of beloved captain and AL MVP Thurman Munson. Reggie's history-making performance the following year cemented his moniker of 'Mr October' and led to my first 'must-have' candy -- the Reggie Bar.

By spring training of 1978 I was certifiable. A 'Reggie Wall' dominated one side of my bedroom, Yankees posters covered every inch of wood paneling and I collected every sports mag featuring a Bronx Bomber on the cover. Relief ace Sparky Lyle won a Cy Young award as the American League's best pitcher in 1977, but that didn't stop Steinbrenner from signing Gossage before the '78 season. It was a wise investment, as the fu-manchu-sporting Goose induced pop-outs from Yaz in the Yanks victory over the Red Sox in their do-or-die playoff game and Ron Cey for their second consecutive championship over the LA Dodgers.

This should, of course, been a time of bliss for a 12-year-old die-hard. No no no no no no ... When Munson squeezed Cey's pop-up in his catcher's glove and the Yankees celebrated atop a jubilant Gossage on the mound, I felt not joy, but relief. What is now diagnosed as obsessive-compulsive disorder doesn't begin to describe my behavior when Reggie was taking dramatic, corkscrew cuts during that season, or when Gossage came in to hurl heat like a Wild West gunslinger in the late innings. If a certain routine 'worked' -- say, taking a sip of cola and putting both hands on the arms of the yellow cloth chair in between each pitch but making no other movements -- then it was continued. Without fail. Regardless of discomfort, pain, the doorbell, phone calls, a passing ice cream truck, a small housefire or Soviet missile attack. Like a believer seeking eternal salvation, my mind tabulated the ratio of gametime rituals to home runs, strikeouts and other favorable-for-NY results. That's a lot of strain for a budding brain over the course of a 162-game regular season -- 163 in 1978 -- plus playoffs and a World Series. Sitting at my grandmother's kitchen table in October 1977 reading a NY Daily News with its famous back page headline of "Reggie ... Reggie ... Reggie", I was more than a happy, 11-year-old Yankees fan: I was an exhausted, pinstripe-bleeding basket case.

Still, I'm glad milestones like the Goose's entry into the Hall of Fame stir these embers of childhood. I don't know Reggie or the Goose, the Yankees are a billion-dollar business entity and baseball is just a game, but they all contributed towards an unforgettable period of my life. They live on as memories of the heart. The best kind of all.