August 2, 1979 (Part 1) -- The Death of Thurman Munson

[richiebee]

[This unfortunately long narrative owes itself to the New York Post of Sunday
August 1, 2010. In the sports pages of said NY Post was a photograph which had
been missing for nearly 30 years.

The photo was taken in Commiskey Park on August 1, 1979. It showed Reggie Jackson,
then a Yankee, standing on home plate after blasting a home run against the
Chisox. Thurman Munson, who had been on base, is waiting to congratulate his arch
rival, his hand extended. Lou Piniella is seen walking towards the batter\'s box
from the on deck circle; in the background, Yankee first base coach
Lawrence \"Yogi\" Berra is near the coaches box, arms folded. This was the last
game of Munson\'s tragically shortened career.]


I am not a Yankee fan. In the past few years, following New York City\'s National
League franchise, I have secretly wished that my father was a Yankee fan, which
may have prevented much aggravation over the past few years following the
horribly mismanaged Mets.

I will however always associate the towns of Saratoga Springs and Malta, New York
with Thurman Munson. On the night of August 2, 1979, when it was announced that
Munson had tragically died practicing takeoffs and landings in his small private
airplane, I was in a Caroline Street dive (probably Desperate Annies) with two
of my chums, Wayne Marcus and Ed Freeman.*

Wayne was a produce manager at a supermarket on Avenue J in Brooklyn; Eddie spent
his summers spreading hot tar over the roofs of crumbling buildings in Brooklyn.
I had two semesters remaining at a large midwestern law school, which is kind of
a moot point now because by that November I was hot walking horses at the Fair
Grounds in New Orleans for $90 per week.

The three of us were up at the Spa on a spur of the moment basis. We had been
hanging around Midwood Field, waiting for softball practice, when an older woman
who was friendly with Eddie\'s mother approached us. She needed help moving 3
large pieces of furniture-- a sofa, a chest of drawers and a piano-- down three
flights of stairs. She told us to meet her at her apartment in 45 minutes. She
told us she would pay us $50.

\"Eddie do you think she means $50 total or $50 apiece?\"

\"I dunno. She\'s pretty cheap. She throws nickles around like they were manhole
covers.\"

Just to be prepared, we pooled our resources and gassed up my 73 Buick \"deuce and
a quarter\" with the factory equipped 8 track player. We went to the newsstand
under the Kingshighway train station and picked up 2 copies of the next days
Racing Form. We filled up the cooler in my trunk with ice and Ballantine Ale.

The furniture move was excruciating, back breaking, knuckle scraping work. We were
all music lovers so the piano was handled delicately; the other two pieces were
more or less bounced down the last flight of stairs. Our benefactor inspected her
furniture, and finding no major structural damage, gave Eddie $150. We were
northbound within minutes. Girlfriends, wives, parents, bosses were not consulted
about the journey; in the circles I traveled in at the time if you turned up
missing during the month of August it was pretty well understood where you could
be found.

We were on Caroline Street by about 10 PM. We had gone through most of the
Ballantine in the trunk and were pretty sick of the Allman Brothers and George
Benson by then, \"Live at the Fillmore East\" and \"Breezin\" being the only two
eight track tapes we had brought along with us.

A table of 3 big old country girls, the smallest one linebacker sized, were
looking in our direction, probably at Wayne, who was the ladies man of the group.
I asked Eddie, who stuttered a little after a few drinks, if he thought romance
was in the air, to which he replied \"I\'d rather f-f--k them than try to f-f-fight
them.\"

Later, Eddie and I were at the jukebox and the news of Thurman Munson\'s death
came on TV. Eddie was wearing his ever present Mets cap. Like many Met fans,
Eddie\'s disdain of the Yankees equaled his love of the Mets. After digesting the
tragic news Eddie stuttered, loud enough  for half of downtown Saratoga Springs
to hear \"I g-g-guess he didn\'t st-st-stick the landing.\"

Within about five seconds four drunken Yankee fans had Eddie and me pushed up
against the jukebox; the needle skipped clear across Van Morrison\'s \"Moondance\".

\"You f--kin Met fans. You think its motherf--kin funny that the Captain is dead?\"

A brawl of NHL proportions was imminent. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed
that Wayne had sidled over to the country gals\' table, which made me madder than
anything. Eddie and I didn\'t have the numbers here; our asses were about to be
kicked.

I thought quickly. I hit Eddie hard with an open palm, somewhere between his
shoulder and throat, both shocking him and dropping him to the ground. \"Yeah,
Eddie whats the matter with you? Where\'s your respect?\"

The Yankee contingent was kind of taken aback by my violence towards my pal.
Their confusion allowed Wayne, who had a running start, to knock down two of them
with a cross check which employed a horizontal bar stool instead of a hockey
stick.

After about a minute or two of brawling, law enforcement was on the scene. The
jukebox glass was cracked neatly down the middle. Wayne and I were pretty
bloodied; Eddie was relatively unscathed, having assumed the fetal position after
being knocked down by friendly fire. The bartenders identified the Yankee
contingent as the aggressors and they were taken away muttering vile threats.

The police checked our IDs and made sure none of the injuries required
hospitalization. They then suggested that we get some coffee, sober up, and head
back home.

Which was highly unlikely...

------
*Names slightly altered, innocence not a factor.

[magicnight]

Nice variation on the old Nazi trick of shooting one of your own, Richie. Or, am I mistaking that with \"Routine 23\" from an old Bowery Boys episode?

Great story, even if I don\'t believe it is possible to ever tire of listening to \"Live at the Fillmore East\".

[TGJB]

Richie--

1-- If we ever do a collection of posts from this board, you will have a few in there, and this will be one. (Another will be the \"Womanly Woman\" post by someone else, who has posted under a few different names, and which those who have been around more than 5 years will remember).

2-- There\'s a \"West Wing\" episode where Toby goes to the hospital to see his newborn twins, who are lying in their beds, with baby size Washington Nationals caps on he bedposts. He replaces them with Yankee caps, saying \"You\'ll thank me one day\".

3-- That story made me think about the night John Lennon died. It was after I left Ragozin and before I opened this place, I was bored to death, and I spent a lot of my time getting very good at the early video games, Asteroids in particular. I had decided that night to get the high score on every Asteroids machine I knew in Manhattan, starting on the upper East side. I was up there when the story broke, and I followed it on the TV\'s from bar to bar, as I worked my way down to Tribecca. No brawl, though.

[plasticman]

I was in my cousin\'s basement playing with my siblings and cousins and my mom opened the door and told me about Thurman. I was frozen in a state of disbelief, these guys seemed larger than life, i was too young to understand how this could happen. I couldn\'t stop crying. This was a flashbulb moment for me, i remember it like it was yesterday.

[moosepalm]

magicnight Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

>
> Great story, even if I don\'t believe it is
> possible to ever tire of listening to \"Live at the
> Fillmore East\".

Going on forty years for me, and it hasn\'t happened yet.

I echo your sentiments:  great story, Richie.

[Leamas57]

Thanks for that Rbee, thoroughly enjoyed it!

Leamas

[marcus]

Don\'t remember exactly where I was but can remember how I felt - devastated . I caught through American Legion Post ball and Munson was invariably an idle of mine and also one of the all time best catchers imo . Ironically enough , I had received last rights 3 times myself some years earlier on an August 2nd in 1974 after getting run over by a truck ( three strikes and your out ) - so the news about Munson that day really hit home hard  . ..