Opening Day Magic in Baxter Springs
“People ask me what I do in winter when there’s no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.” How true.
Those were the words spoken by Hall of Famer Rogers Hornsby, who became one of the first five players elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown in 1936.
When I was a growing up in Newton, MA, those long days of winter could not disappear fast enough. I’d pore over Red Sox Spring Training Box scores in the Boston Globe. I pined for Little League registration, counting down the days. I could not wait for my season to start. A half-century later, I still remember getting up early, long before the ceremonies, to put on my wool uniform and cap, and my Converse sneakers, waiting to start the season.
That feeling never faded. During my 33 years in baseball with the Red Sox, Yankees and the Hall of Fame, I wore a green tie with butterflies on it for virtually every opening day. Opening Day butterflies.
When Grassroots Baseball traveled to Baxter Springs, Kansas for Opening Day of Little League, I felt like a kid all over again: A sea of smiling families and fans, bunting on the railings, the smell of popcorn, and an elevated level of giddiness among the players.
Baxter Springs is a town of 4,000 residents situated along the 13-mile stretch of Route 66 that shoots through the southeast corner of the state, serving as the elbow connecting the arm of the Historic Highway from Missouri to Oklahoma.
The town’s residents eat, breathe and live baseball. Nearly a quarter of them were crammed into picturesque Wayne Metcalf Field during the late afternoon on the final Saturday in April as Little League belatedly kicked off its season, with a national pandemic finally starting to slowly fade like a Christy Mathewson curveball.
The small, pristine ballpark at the corner of 14th and Grant streets is what you’d call cozy. Since the 1960s, the field has been meticulously-maintained by Wayne Metcalf, a devoted volunteer who served as league president for 36 years and still today, at age 84, is the Little League District Administrator in Kansas. There’s a small press box that’s perched atop a concession stand behind home plate, and a museum beyond the first base grandstands recounts the history of youth baseball in Baxter Springs, the town where Mickey Mantle was discovered by Yankee scout Tom Greenwade while playing in a semi-pro league in 1948 at the age of 15.
The festivities began with close to 200 players marching out of the first base gate with their coaches as their teams — from T-Ball to the Majors — filled the infield and then the outfield.
The public address announcer called off the names of the players from each age group who raised the most money for the league during the winter, and each trotted in to home plate to receive a gift card. A drawing was held and one of the Little Leaguers was presented with a color television that was bigger than him.
I was asked to deliver opening comments and let the players and crowd know just how special a community Baxter Springs is. I reminded the players to try their hardest, but to enjoy the experience and have fun.
I was given the honor of throwing the ceremonial first pitch, and even though I’ve known how to throw a baseball since I was 5 years old, I still get nervous. I harkened back to the sage advice that the late Hall of Famer Robin Roberts gave me, when I once told him about my nerves.
“Just relax, kid,” he said. “When you walk out to the mound as they are introducing you, toe the rubber and wave to everyone in the stands who will be cheering. Walk down in front of the mound to the flat surface. Throw your pitch, aiming high, and as the ball is traveling to the catcher, start to jog to him so that when the ball bounces short of home plate, the amount of time the fans have to boo you is condensed.” Sage advice from the ace of the Whiz Kids’ rotation.
My catcher, Riley, was introduced and trotted in from the outfield. As he joined me at home plate, I put my arm around him and asked him, tongue in cheek, how he was at blocking pitches. “Pretty good, sir,” was his response.
I went to the mound and thankfully delivered a sinking, sinking, sinking, low strike that landed softly in Riley’s mitt. You would have thought that former Pirates pitcher Rip Sewell, the master of the eephus pitch, was my pitching coach.
The short ceremony was followed by three games, the last of which was umpired by Flora Stansbury, a native of Seneca, MO who 20 years ago became the first female umpire to call a Little League Championship Game in Williamsport, in 2001. What a treat to be in the presence of not only a solid home plate umpire, but a pioneer, as well.
Opening Day is special, no matter who or where you are. And for me, the tradition never gets old.
Follow us!
Instagram: @grassrootsbaseball
Twitter: @GrassrootsBB
Facebook: @GrassrootsBB