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A Tale of Two Curtain Calls

© Harold Friend

The Yankees were playing the Baltimore Orioles at Yankee Stadium and were leading 3-1 in the home half of the sixth inning. Leading off, Jason Giambi, the former Oakland Athletics slugger whom the Yankees signed to a long-term contract worth many millions of dollars, hit his first home run at the Big Ballpark in the Bronx.

Giambi had done poorly in his first four games at home and some Yankees fans booed him. When he grounded out his first time up, there were a few mild Bronx cheers. In the fourth inning, Jason hit a double and then, two innings later, he did what the home fans were waiting for when he lofted a high fly ball into the right field seats for his first Yankee Stadium home run.

Yankees manager Joe Torre said that he knew it was gone as soon as Jason hit it. Most of the fans were not as sure that the high fly ball would clear the fence, but when it did, everyone in the park stood and cheered the man they hope will lead them back to the Promised Land of World Champions.

The fans continued to stand and cheer for a full minute until Giambi made his way out of the dugout and waved to people for his first curtain call. There were 27,912 fans present and Giambi said the cheering sounded as if it were a packed house. "It's what you dream about as a kid, to get a curtain call at Yankee Stadium," Giambi said. "It doesn't get any bigger than that (www.Yankees.com)."

Turn the clock back to October 1, 1961. The Yankees are at home against the Boston Red Sox for the last game of the regular season. The outcome will have no bearing on the final standings since the Yankees ruined the chances of their closest rival, the Detroit Tigers, when they swept the Bengals in a crucial series at the beginning of September. But the game still could be significant.

It is the bottom of the fourth inning and the game is still scoreless. Up to the plate steps Roger Eugene Maris, a man who has had one of the greatest seasons any player ever had, and a man who has suffered and been maligned as much as any player ever in the game’s history.

The Boston pitcher is Tracy Stallard, a pitcher who has great potential but a pitcher who will never come even close to realizing the career predicted for him. Working quickly, Stallard delivers the pitch to Maris who connects and hits a 340-foot home run into the right field seats, giving the Yankees the game’s only run in an eventual 1-0 victory.

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