Senior Year

by Dan Shaughnessy

  "I didn't see anything special," he said.

  Harsh and embarrassing for me. Necessary, too. Sam was almost 18. Time for Dad to step aside and let him do it on his own.

  October

  Sam turned 18 on the second day of October. I told him this meant he could enlist in the army. He told me he could now buy scratch tickets at 7-Eleven.

  That weekend, the Red Sox and Yankees met at Fenway for the final games of the season, and I bought a pair of tickets for each game. Sam took the bus in from Newton for the Friday night series opener, and I was a little surprised when he showed up at the ballpark wearing his replica Red Sox jersey over a green hoodie. Replica jerseys are great for kids, but I've always held that there should be a cutoff for grownups. What's more pathetic than a 55-year-old man wearing his Curt Schilling jersey to the ballpark? Maybe you should stop when you are officially older than the youngest big league ballplayer. Whatever. Sam was still age-appropriate but not much longer, not in my book.

  He looked big, especially when he followed me onto the field during batting practice and I introduced him to Reggie Jackson. Reggie hit 563 homers in the big leagues. He was the Bonds of his day. He was The Man when I started covering baseball in the mid-1970s and due to ESPN Classic and Naked Gun movies, Sam knew who he was. Sam also looked bigger than Reggie, which seemed hard to believe. Clearly, Reggie has gotten a little smaller since his playing days, but seeing Mr. October at the cage alongside behemoths named Giambi, A-Rod, and Sheffield demonstrated how things have changed in major league baseball. The summer of 2005 was the year of the big league steroid scandal and nothing underscored the situation better than the scene at the cage, as ballplayers—then and now—rubbed shoulders of a decidedly different size.

  For parents and coaches, steroids presented a new frontier. Back in the day, our moms, dads, and coaches never wondered about us abusing performance enhancers. When you really think about it, what was available? Wonder Bread helped build strong bodies twelve ways. Wheaties was the breakfast of champions. Steak would make you big and strong. Orange juice gave you vitamin C. Milk strengthened your bones. But there was no weight training, no substance to swallow to make you big, strong, and immortal. Instead, ads in the back pages of teen magazines touted Charles Atlas and his program for building biceps to ward off bullies who might kick sand in your face and make you look bad at the beach. We worried about being 98-pound weaklings. Sometimes, we even did pushups with television's inimitable Jack La Lanne. But steroids? Never heard of 'em. Might as well have been talking about ATMs, Gameboys, or the Internet.

  In 2005, steroids were definitely something you discussed with your teen athlete. I told Sam he didn't need any help with muscle mass. He had plenty of natural strength. Getting bigger would only make him more inflexible and less attractive to college baseball coaches. I knew he was going to get teased about steroids because he hit the ball far and had a stocky physique. But in the end, potential steroid use was just one more thing that was out of my control—like teen drinking and drug abuse. I could give all my speeches, but I was never going to really know what Sam was doing. I hoped that meeting Reggie, a guy who hit homers without chemical assistance, would help bring home the message.

  It was hard to get any words in once Reggie started talking to Sam. I tried whispering, "Sam, this guy hit three homers in a game once, too." Didn't matter. The old man had the young man's attention and, God bless him, Reggie talked to Sam about hitting. It's like a secret handshake: two guys comparing stances, demonstrating their trademark positioning of feet and arms. Reggie talked about weight shift and seeing the baseball. He told Sam he should try switch-hitting. He told Sam he was still a baby, not yet a man. He told him he'd still grow another two or three inches, and we both later laughed at that because it was looking like Sam was going to top out at five foot eleven, same as Reggie.

  Sounding like Forrest Gump, Sam told me, "Reggie sure likes to use the F-word."

  I laughed. When I saw Reggie the next day after the Yankees had clinched first place in the American League for the eighth straight season, I thanked him for making me look good in front of my son. It is one of the nicest things a man can do for another man.

  On the night of Sam's eighteenth birthday, eight of us went to a restaurant called Fire + Ice in Cambridge. It's one of those trendy, teen-friendly places where you pick out raw meat and vegetables, buffet style, and give the bowl of uncooked food to a guy standing over a grill in the middle of the room, and later your food magically appears at your table. Sam inhaled a couple of plates of wings and steak tips, finished one of his sister's burgers, then gorged on chocolate cake. We all could do that when we were 18.

  The best present he opened was from his oldest sister, Sarah—the Harvard girl. Typical of the oldest, Sarah is the prototype "good Do Bee," raise-your-hand-in-class, overachieving A student. In the classroom, she is ever prepared, thorough, and always engaged in the subject at hand. Teachers love Sarah. In the classroom, she is everything Sam is not, and we all know that it can be a nightmare to have an older sister setting high standards. She applied to six colleges when she was a senior at North and got into five. Her birthday gift to Sam was a framed copy of her rejection letter from Tufts. He loved that. It still has a special place of honor in his cluttered room.

  A few days after the birthday bash, Marilou and I went to North for "Back to School Night," another event where pathetic parents navigate the impossible corridors of the characterless building. Sam predicted we'd like his calculus teacher and sure enough, the guy was young and loved sports and told riddles. He had even run track at Boston College. Sam predicted that Mr. Wallace would be wearing a tie, but it was a ruse. The math man apparently liked to dress down. He'd written a slogan on his blackboard and I could hardly take my eyes off it the whole time he was talking. It read, "Somewhere in the world someone is training when you are not. When you face them, they will win."

  It reminded me of Larry Bird and his high school friend Beezer Carnes. Larry always talked about how he and his friends would go to the gym early, before school, and shoot free throws on their own. Beezer was too lazy and routinely skipped the sessions. Then one night, at the end of a game, Beezer missed a couple of free throws and lost an important game. Larry never said anything to Beezer. He just looked at him and they both knew. Anyway, I liked the math teacher.

  The physics teacher also seemed cool. He said one of Sam's home runs hit his car in third lot in the previous spring. He also said Sam showed interest in physics. It figured. There's lots of physics in baseball—the rotation of a curveball, the force of a wood bat going through the strike zone and connecting with a hard object traveling eighty-five miles an hour. Math and physics are interesting topics if you like to hit. Ted Williams could have told you that.

  Sam's business teacher seemed pleased to hear that Sam had poured his life's savings ($3,200) into 180 shares of JetBlue. This was not Sam's first foray into the market, nor was it his first time buying airline stock. The day after 9/11, when he was only 13 years old, Sam—with help from his stockbroker uncle Bill—put a couple of hundred bucks into American and United Airlines. Sam thought the stock most definitely would go up. Unfortunately, the stock tanked. He's pretty sure JetBlue will make things right and he's got a plan to dump if his initial losses reach $200. All this makes the Carroll School of Management at Boston College seem like a good idea.

  In mid-month we got the hot tub running, an annual autumn ritual. An expensive toy, the tub was purchased when the girls started high school and has been handy for kids in need of relaxation after preseason practices. Of course, there've been times when we wondered, "What were we thinking?" as teen girls in skimpy swimsuits came to visit Sam. When Sam was about 14, his sisters would tease him, saying, "Sam, those girls don't even like you. They're just coming over to use the hot tub!" His response went something like "What's your point?" I thought about getting him one of those Hugh Hefner smoking jackets, but everyone thought it was a dumb idea.
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  I got a form letter from my cousin Mickey and his wife. They'd started a scholarship fund in the memory of Michael. It read, in part, "How wonderful it was to watch Michael as he grew on the fields and playgrounds of Westford. It is easy to remember Michael's enthusiasm for sports and friends; to see his pride as he competed for Westford Academy and earned a scholarship to play college football. We have received many caring and supportive notes, including those from other school teams, athletes, and coaches. They serve to remind us that while our children compete on the field, they (and we) are part of a larger community that can pull together during difficult times ... As we drive through town and see children playing on the fields, it is easy to remember how Michael enjoyed his times playing sports. We should all cherish and nurture the enthusiasm that is childhood, and hug our kids just a bit more often."

  I sent a check the next day and made a note to myself to call Mickey. And to give Sam a big hug.

  Then came the official visit to Notre Dame.

  Sam had been reluctant about the whole thing. We all knew he liked Boston College, and it was almost as if he was afraid to go to South Bend because he might like it too much and that would make his decision more difficult. Just about every other school was off the table by this time. None of us knew the process would move this swiftly, but because Sam was a spring sport athlete, there was no more chance for college scouting. Like all the other baseball players, Sam's resumé was complete. Good thing he had had a strong junior year.

  Which brings us to the topic of showcases—moneymaking meat markets of high school players, where coaches allegedly show up and identify players they'll consider offering scholarships to. In this century, when you are a parent of a talented high school athlete, you write out a check for several hundred bucks and send your child to a showcase, hopefully somewhere near home. These things certainly didn't exist when Bill Shaughnessy was a high school baseball stud in Groton, Massachusetts. There was a guy in Groton who was supposed to be a baseball scout. He had white hair and seemed to be a million years old. I never saw him at one of Bill's games, and there was no professional contract waiting when Bill finished high school. It seemed to me that no one ever really scouted my big brother.

  Bill went away to tiny Nichols College in southeastern Massachusetts and played four strong seasons as a power-hitting corner-outfielder for the Bisons. When his college career was over, he got drafted ... by Uncle Sam. This was not exactly what he had in mind, but it was 1969 and the mandatory draft was in full bloom. Baseball bailed him out, however, and quite possibly saved his life. There were teams on the U.S. military bases and some general decided that he wanted Bill to play for his team in Germany, so William J. Shaughnessy Jr. rode out the Vietnam War playing outfield in Heidelberg. When his service was up, he went to spring training and tried out for the Phillies, but they knew he was already in his mid-twenties and wasn't worth signing.

  Was my brother good enough to play big league ball, or even minor league baseball? We'll never know. He'll never know. He's one of the hundreds of thousands of guys on couches and barstools who all believe they could have been contenders if only they'd gotten a fair shot. America is populated and sometimes plagued by these men. They are often the ones you hear screaming loudest from the bleachers at Little League or high school games. There are surveys to prove this. Posed with the question "If not for an injury or bad coaching or getting overlooked, could you have played professionally in the sport of your choice?" three-quarters of men will answer in the affirmative. And a lot of these men are the ones coaching your kids.

  In 2006, being "overlooked" can no longer be an excuse. Professional scouting is far more extensive and sophisticated than it was forty years ago. There is video and Internet and news coverage that did not exist in my youth. And there are the showcases, where all the talented young players get to show their wares.

  Sam went to his first showcase when he was 15, and attended about a dozen of them before he was a senior in high school. The drill was fairly standard. Players were timed in the 60-yard dash then sent to defensive stations where they fielded and made throws. Hitters were given six to ten batting practice swings. Then they played games, sometimes with simulated rules—always stacked to illuminate the strengths and weaknesses of the pitcher. Every hitter starts with a 1-1 count.

  Parents could often be seen filming these tryouts, or charting pitches from the stands, but the only people who mattered really were the college and pro scouts—carrying stopwatches, wearing sunglasses and ball caps pulled down over their eyes, quietly taking notes. Sam was not a showcase animal. He was faster than most players, running a 6.9 as his best time, but there were plenty of kids considerably faster. Sam's arm was below average, and many of the scouts would take him off their lists when they saw his lame throws from the outfield. He was saved by his bat speed, which appeared to make him a potential Division I prospect. Scouts did not consider performance at the showcases, only tools. You could strike out, as long as you looked good striking out.

  After writing yet another multi-hundred-dollar check to enroll Sam in another one of these events, I told him, "Sam, if none of the schools want you after all this, it'll mean you truly suck. You're certainly never going to be able to say, 'I could have been great, but nobody ever saw me.' "

  "Thanks, Dad," Sam mumbled, smiling.

  I could tease him about it because we both knew there were schools already interested.

  Notre Dame assistant coach Terry Rooney called almost every week until the visit. Only 31 years old, Rooney seemed to love Notre Dame more than any man alive. He used a lot of exclamation points in his e-mails. He and the rest of the ND staff were fastidious about NCAA regulations and potential violations. The rules state that coaches can make only one phone contact per week (yet they can text message anytime they want). In one instance, I called Rooney, left a number, and got no return call. When I reached him later in the day, he explained that he had been unable to call me back even though he knew I was home waiting, because he had talked to Sam the night before. Another ND assistant told me that they faced a $25,000 fine if they were caught breaking any NCAA rules. "That's almost as much as we make," he added.

  We went to Notre Dame ("Don't bump into any cows," BC's Hughes advised Sam on the eve of the visit) on the weekend of October 14, which happened to be the weekend that the Irish were playing USC. It's a rivalry on a par with Army-Navy, Texas-Oklahoma, or Michigan–Ohio State, but in 2005 it was bigger than usual because the Irish were in the early days of an exciting new era under head coach Charlie Weis, while the Trojans were two-time defending national champs, boasting two Heisman trophy winners, and working on a twenty-seven-game winning streak.

  In other words, not a bad weekend to bring recruits to campus.

  I was already in Chicago, working the American League Championship Series between the White Sox and Angels, so I rented a car and picked up Sam and Marilou at O'Hare just before noon on Friday. The tollway road toward Indiana was clogged with construction and trucks, and it took us three hours to make the 120-mile trip. Looking at Sam in the rearview mirror of the Avis Buick ("Sweet ride, Dad," was his opening salute at O'Hare), I envisioned a cartoon bubble over his head with the words, "I can walk to BC from home in twenty minutes. Why would I want to go through all of this just to go play baseball in college?"

  After we paid our final toll, Sam called the coach and said we would meet them at the field in about ten minutes. Then I pulled over so he could change into his official recruiting outfit: black polo shirt and khakis.

  We pulled into beautiful Frank Eck Stadium, not far from the 80,000-seat bowl where the Irish would play Southern Cal the next day. Head coach Paul Mainieri was there to shake hands, and two of his assistants handed us papers we would need for the weekend. Then they walked us into an indoor batting cage adjacent to the stadium. Sam was told that he could hit here anytime he wanted. He'd have a pass code to open the door, and the building was always open to the baseball players
only. I pictured Sam walking through the darkness to the facility at 3 A.M. after striking out a couple of times earlier in the day.

  The clubhouse was better equipped than most minor league clubhouses. There was a big-screen television, and all the players had their own stalls. In Mainieri's office, somebody had made a great effort to show off Notre Dame's baseball uniforms and equipment. It looked like something you'd see in the window of a sporting goods store. Adidas is the official supplier of all Notre Dame teams, and one can see that the enormous popularity of the football program has been very good for all other sports. The vast spread of sporting goods was ridiculous: seven varieties of hats, a series of different-colored uniform tops and warm-up jackets. Gloves by Rawlings—with players' names sewn into the leather. Bats by Louisville Slugger. Letter jackets. Rings.

  "You'll get all of this," said the coach.

  These guys had it down. Perfect weather. The biggest college football game of the year. Incredible facilities and school garb. They'd even arranged to have the wind blowing out to right field. At 330 feet down the line, it didn't look like too much of a poke.

  On our tour, we were accompanied by four other recruits and their parents. After eating sandwiches and conversing a bit with the coaches, we went into the football stadium where 42,000 were gathering for perhaps the largest collegiate pep rally in American history. The master of ceremonies was Dan Ruettiger, AKA "Rudy" of motion picture fame. Joe Montana, Tim Brown, and Chris Zorich spoke. Rudy was pretty animated. The ND baseball players thought he might have been tailgating a day early. I wondered what he does for a living now. When he fills out his tax forms and gets to the box labeled "occupation," does he write "Rudy"?

  They took us to dinner at a place called Parisi's. Watching the coach and his wife make their way through the restaurant reminded me of Ray Liotta entering the nightclub through the kitchen in Goodfellas. These people knew everybody. This was a coach who was never leaving Notre Dame. That was for sure.