On Saturday afternoon, after the off day on Friday, a nervous, standing-room-only crowd that had filled the park an hour before the playing of the National Anthem watched the game go into extra innings with the two contenders tied at 1-1. Both teams had their best pitchers on the mound. Strangely, each had lost his shutout on an unearned run in the first inning. After that, sixteen consecutive goose eggs had gone up on the scoreboard.
Gregg was sitting in the dugout, charting the pitches. His goal was to pick up anything he could about the tendencies of the California hitters. Before the game started, he blew a kiss to Michelle who was in the owner’s box on the level occupied by the press corps. He had wanted her to watch the game on television from their apartment, especially since her doctor said that she could go into labor at any minute. But she insisted on being there. Gregg arranged for a limo to bring her to the park just before game time and to wait by the players’ entrance in case Michelle felt the need to get to the hospital. During the sixth inning, she sent word to him that she was tired and was having the driver take her home.
In the last of the tenth, with two out and the bases empty, the Royals shortstop swung late at a fastball and looped it down the right field line for a double. The Angels manager decided against giving an intentional walk to Lance English who had looked bad, striking out three times that day. On the first pitch, a slider that was low and outside the strike zone, English golfed at the ball and sent it on a line just over the glove of the leaping second baseman. The winning run scored easily, without a play at the plate. English was mobbed by his teammates, and the 46,000 fans stood and cheered until every Royals player left the field. After 161 games spanning almost six months, the two teams found themselves in a dead heat, exactly where they had been on Opening Day.
“Are you awake?” Gregg asked, as Michelle turned from her right side to her left, facing him.
“Yes,” she answered. She didn’t tell him she was feeling some pain and that she thought the contractions might have begun. “What are you doing up in the middle of the night?”
“Pitching to the Angels,” he told her.
She could see the digital clock on his night table. “It’s three-thirty,” she said. “You’ve got ten hours before the game starts. Get some sleep or you’ll be throwing marshmallows out there tomorrow.”
“Okay,” he mumbled, at the end of a deep yawn. “I’ll try.”
While Gregg dressed and made breakfast for himself in the morning, Michelle pretended to be asleep. She knew for certain that she was in labor and would have to go to the hospital, but didn’t want to worry him. It was his day to win the 300th game of his career and to bring a title to Kansas City.
She called to him when she sensed that he was ready to leave for the ballpark. Gregg sat down on her side of the bed. “Good luck, sweetheart,” she said. “This is the day you’ve been waiting for.”
“Thanks.” He leaned over and brushed her lips with a kiss. “I suppose there’s no way I can convince you to stay here and watch it on TV.”
“No way is right,” she answered, smiling. “In fact, I want to get there early and take care of some arrangements that have to be made for the playoffs with Toronto.” She winked at him and he smiled. “If you don’t see me in my box, I’ll be in the office. Call the limo, honey, and tell them to pick me up at ten.”
“It’s already nine-fifteen. Aren’t you going to eat something?”
“I’ll have time. I’m getting up right now.” She puckered her lips for him and raised her head off the pillow. He kissed her twice and then rested his cheek next to hers for a few seconds. When the limo arrived, the driver was disappointed to find out they weren’t going to Royals Stadium. Instead, at Michelle’s direction, he drove to Hospital Hill. She had already let her doctor know she was on the way.
During batting practice, Gregg loosened up in the outfield. He glanced toward the owner’s box every few minutes but it was empty. He figured Michelle was still in her office. As the starting time approached, some of the players stretched and did sprints while others were getting themselves ready in the clubhouse. Talbot left the dugout and looked up again for Michelle. He saw Don Aikens sitting in the box, talking to someone Gregg didn’t recognize. Ten minutes later, Johnny Fall, his catcher, put an arm around Gregg’s shoulder. “Let’s go, old man,” he said, “time to get loose.”
In the bullpen, Talbot lobbed the ball to Fall nine times. He threw the first one from 30 feet away and the last from the full pitching distance. Michelle’s continued absence from her seat bothered him. It was twenty minutes to game time.
“Hold on a minute, Johnny.” Gregg picked up the wall telephone inside the covered area where the relief pitchers sat during the game. He waited until someone in the Royals’ dugout answered. “It’s Talbot,” he said. “Let me speak to Foxy.”
“Whatsamatter?” the manager hollered into the phone a few seconds later. He had no prior experience in being calm, cool, and collected for big games.
“Foxy, I want you to call upstairs and see if my wife’s there. If anyone says she is, speak to her yourself just to make sure. If she’s not there, tell them to try our apartment. Let me know right away.”
“What’s the difference…”
“Just do it,” he said, and hung up.
Don Aikens told Foxy that he thought Michelle had decided not to come to the park. Two minutes later, Aikens rang the dugout and said she hadn’t answered the phone at home. Moore dialed the bullpen and gave Talbot the information.
“Tell Aikens to call Memorial Hospital and see if she checked in. Hurry up, Foxy.”
“Okay, okay, but keep throwin’ out there.”
As soon as he learned where Michelle was, Gregg ran in towards the dugout. He had his jacket over his shoulder. His manager saw him coming and met him out on the field. “What’s goin’ on?” he shouted, raising his hands in the air, next to his head.
“Michelle must be in labor. I’ve got to be with her.”
“Are you crazy? This game’s for the division. It could be hours before she delivers. It might be tonight or not even ’til tomorrow. Pitch the game and then go see her.”
“Sorry, Foxy, I can’t do it.” Gregg didn’t wait to hear the stream of profanities that flew out of his manager’s mouth. He ran through the clubhouse, stopping just long enough to trade his spikes for his loafers. In the players’ parking lot, he found the gate attendant.
“Get me a taxi, Freddy, fast,” he hollered. The surprised young man ran into the street and stopped the first cab he saw. Gregg raced over and jumped into the back seat.
“Do you know who I am?” he asked the driver. He took off his Royals cap.
The driver turned around and looked. “Sure, you’re Gregg Talbot. I had you in my cab a couple times when I drove for Black & White.”
“Okay. Take me to Memorial Hospital.” On the way, Gregg told him about Michelle and explained that he had no money on him to pay for the ride.
“No problem. It’s an honor for me. I’m one of your biggest fans; have been for years. Wait’ll I tell my wife and kids about this.”
“Never mind the honor.” Gregg looked at the name on the license posted in back. “This may be a round-trip, Solomon, and I’ll see you get paid for it. I want you to wait for me in the cab as close as you can park to the main entrance. Don’t leave unless someone comes out and tells you I said it was okay. You got it?”
“I hear you loud and clear.”
“Okay. Now turn on the game.”
By the time the taxi reached the hospital, the Angels had already scored twice in the first inning.
Gregg had to wait at the information desk for several minutes while the receptionist checked a patient’s record and gave the information to someone who had phoned in. She then misspelled “Talbot” the first time she entered the letters on her keyboard and said that Michelle wasn’t registered.
“I know she’s here,” he said. “Check it again.”
“
Is that “T-o-l-b-e-r-t?” she asked.
He corrected the spelling and moments later she told him that Michelle was on the seventh floor. All the while he was aware of people staring at him in his uniform and buzzing about who he was.
In the maternity ward, a heavyset nurse with a plain, round face and hair that was dyed closer to yellow than blonde, greeted him warmly. She confirmed that Michelle was in labor and pointed to the location of her room. When he went in, Gregg found the doctor standing by Michelle’s bed, encouraging her progress. She smiled as soon as she saw him approach. He told the doctor who he was, pulled a chair up next to the bed, and took his wife’s right hand in his.
The gynecologist looked to be about the same age as Gregg. “I’m Doctor Sanford,” he said. “I thought you were pitching today.”
“I thought so, too,” Gregg chuckled, “but then my boss here changed the plan.” He took one of the towels from the night table and wiped Michelle’s forehead. “How’s she doing?”
“Terrific,” Sanford answered. “An hour at the most and I think it’ll be over. She took her time getting here.”
“What’s the score, Gregg?” Michelle asked. “Who’s pitching?”
“Woodard,” he said. He didn’t have to explain that Woodard was throwing on just two days’ rest. She knew that. “Foxy probably just hopes to get a few innings out of him. There was no score when I got out of the cab,” he lied.
Michelle started to say something but was interrupted by another long contraction. As soon as it subsided she told him that he should have stayed at the park. “The game’s more important,” she said.
“Wrong, honey. Being here with you is what counts. Besides, I’d have gotten creamed out there with you and the baby on my mind.”
“If we lose, the fans won’t ever forgive you,” she said. She paused, then forced a smile. “I’d probably have to trade you to the National League.”
A half hour later Sanford called for an attendant to take Michelle to the delivery room. “Do you want to come and watch the show?” he asked Gregg.
“No, he doesn’t,” Michelle said. “He’d faint if he were there.”
“She’s right,” Gregg said. “Tell me where to wait.”
Sanford told him exactly where to go and promised to bring him the news as soon as the baby was born. Gregg held on to Michelle’s hand while the attendant wheeled the bed to the elevator. Just before the door opened, he wiped her forehead again and kissed her. “Do a good job,” he said.
Gregg wasn’t sure how long he had been pacing the corridor before Doctor Sanford was suddenly there, congratulating him, letting him know it was a boy. “Nine pounds, seven ounces,” he said. “Michelle will be back in the room in about five minutes. You can go see her and the baby. She said to tell you she wants to know the score of the game.”
He had tried to put the game out of his mind while he waited. There was a TV set in the small lounge at the end of the corridor. No one else was in there, but he hadn’t turned it on. Now, he returned to the lounge and watched long enough to learn that the Angels were leading 4-3 and batting in the fifth inning.
Michelle was already in the room when Gregg got there. He couldn’t hold back the tears when he saw her lying there, her head propped up on the pillows, holding their son. He kissed both of them. “You did terrific,” he said.
She smiled. “He looks like a football player,” she told him. “What about the game? Who’s winning?”
“The Angels are up 4-3 in the fifth and threatening. Ray’s still in there.”
“Then you get out of here and go back to the ballpark. Foxy will need you, and I certainly don’t. I’ll be asleep in ten minutes.”
He didn’t argue with her. “You’re right. I may still get a chance to pitch before it’s over. Maybe even win it for little Wayne here.”
Michelle looked at him and he could see the tears coming into her eyes. “We never once talked about naming him that,” she said. “How did you know?”
“It couldn’t be anything else. None of this would have happened if it weren’t for your uncle. We both owe him an awful lot.”
Solomon gave him the ride of his life back to Royals Stadium. Kansas City was at bat, in the fifth inning, when Gregg emerged from the clubhouse tunnel into the dugout. Foxy called time immediately and ordered him out to the bullpen. The fans stood and began clapping their hands as Gregg jogged across the outfield. A minute later, news of the baby’s birth appeared on the giant scoreboard. Gregg’s presence seemed to ignite a spark in the team, and two Royals came home with the runs that tied the score at five before the side was retired.
Ray Woodard had thrown 95 pitches in five innings and was exhausted. The Kansas City rally gave Gregg just enough time to get loose. Foxy Moore called the bullpen and told the coach to send Talbot in. Walking toward the mound, Gregg suddenly knew that this was the last chance he’d have to reach his goal. He was 40 years old, and new responsibilities had been thrust upon him. He was certain that he’d no longer have the desire to spend days or weeks playing baseball in other cities around the country, away from his new family. He realized that when the season was over he’d never play another major-league game again. This was it; do or die.
Foxy met him on the mound and handed him the ball. “How do you feel?”
“Like winning the division.” Gregg began rubbing up the ball. “Sorry I had to run out on you like that.”
The manager took off his cap and worked his fingers through the dark, sweaty hair that surrounded his expanding baldness.
“That’s okay,” he said. “You ain’t the first guy to do it, though I never seen anyone take off in the middle of his warm-ups. Besides, if I got on your case for what you did, it wouldn’t help me too much with the owner, would it?” Moore slapped Gregg on his butt. “Congratulations, old man. Now pitch like hell.”
And he did. Gregg threw four perfect innings, retiring twelve Angels in a row, striking out five of them. With two out in the bottom of the eighth, Lance English paid the biggest dividend on the deal Michelle engineered to bring him to Kansas City, hitting his second home run of the game. It was a bullet that just cleared the left field wall and knocked in what proved to be the winning run.
In the ninth inning, the overflow crowd in the ballpark was on its feet even before Talbot left the dugout and walked to the mound. He knew what had to be done, and wouldn’t allow the nervousness he felt when he started his warm-ups to take control. He was determined to keep the Angels from getting back into the game. The first two California hitters each bit on curve balls breaking inside to them and popped out to the infield. The fans throughout the stadium clapped their hands in a rhythmic tempo and roared on every pitch. Gregg thrived on their enthusiasm and ended it with a flourish, striking out the Angels’ last hope on four pitches.
He had to see the sports coverage on TV that night to know for certain what happened when the game ended. They watched together from Michelle’s hospital room and laughed at the sight of his jumping high into the air several times before he was mobbed by his teammates and hidden for minutes under a growing pile of ecstatic bodies. The cameras zoomed in on the scoreboard’s message, spelled out in giant letters that seemed to rock back and forth while multi-colored fireworks burst all around them: ROYALS WIN — 300 FOR TALBOT.
“What a day,” he said, turning to his wife.
Michelle moved her finger around his eyes and nose. “Who would have dreamed that we’d each get what we wanted on the same day?”
“Actually,” he corrected her, “we each got both of the things we wanted on the same day; little Wayne and a big victory.”
“You’re right,” she answered. She was quiet for a minute and then asked, “Do you think we’ll beat Toronto, Gregg?”
“Of course we will. How else will I be able to tell this little Kansas City Kid when he grows up how it felt to pitch in the World Series?” He watched her face light up, seeing again how beautiful she was. “And we’ll win that,
too. I can’t think of a better time to call it quits than after playing on a world championship ball club.”
She reached for his pitching hand and held it in both of hers. “Is that a final decision, no matter what happens?”
“Absolutely. It’s been on my mind a lot lately. This was it, whether or not I got number 300 today. I made the decision even before I almost suffocated at the bottom of that pile.” He laughed. “Yup. it’s time to find something else to do with the rest of my life.”
“I think you’re right,” Michelle said. “And from the point of view of the owner and president of the Kansas City Royals who’s going to have to spend a lot of time at home with her son, I’d like to interest you in the job of team vice president that I intend to fill.” She squeezed his hand. “It’s a good position,” she continued. “I had it myself when Wayne was here. It doesn’t pay anything like what a 300-game winner would get, but if he had to, a guy could support his wife and baby on it.”
Gregg got up and walked to the foot of the bed. He folded his arms in front of him, bent forward slightly, and gave Michelle a very inquisitive look. “I’m almost afraid to ask,” he said in a mock-serious tone of voice, “but what is it I have to do in return this time?”
He continued the act for several seconds, until Michelle began to laugh. And then he laughed uproariously himself, unable to stop, while he returned to the chair by her side.
•
THE SHORT END OF IMMORTALITY
•
“Statistics are used much like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support, not illumination.”
—Vin Scully
YOU WANT TO know how I feel about it, Larry? Bottom line, I think it stinks. It’s sure as hell depressing, I’ll tell you that. All those sportswriters out there who supposedly know what they’re talking about but can’t see the big picture when it comes to voting for the Hall of Fame.
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