I won game seven of the World Series more times than Pete Rose ever thought about playing in the game.  I struck out the last batter with a fast ball low and away, on most occasions.  When I was feeling stick-worthy…not that often…I hit the shot heard round the newly minted 26 teams when Toronto and Seattle came into the league in 1976.  Or did they start play in 1977?  It was 1977.

I miss my childhood during the World Series.

I really do remember the Big Red Machine.  I was young, but, you must…well…you have no clue as to what a memory I have.  It is not always a blessing…but it is most of the time.  The Big Red Machine won the World Series in 1975 and 1976.  The first time I went into Fenway Park in Boston, I thought I would cry.  Perhaps I did get misty.  It is chronicled in one of my first posts here.  That is where the Reds played the Red Sox in the greatest World Series ever.

I have been fortunate enough to attend a few games at Wrigley Field too.  Fenway and Wrigley are the two most iconic baseball parks in America.

I miss my Uncle Paul and my Aunt Pupi.  They lived in Selma, Alabama.  Paul Hines was one of my mother’s five older brothers.  Every October in the 70s and most of 80s, around World Series time, they would come up to Indiana for a visit.  We would watch the World Series, talk, eat, have fun, and my Mother would take Aunt Pupi to Apple Acres near Bedford, Indiana to buy good apples.  Most of them would find their way into Aunt Pupi’s kitchen to be cooked and prepared like only she could.

I still relish baseball.  I wrote and recorded a song recently that alludes to the game.  I was a member…played first base…of an undefeated Little League team in 1979 in Brownstown, Indiana.  My trophy….only the winners got trophies in those days…is behind me as I type these words.

Me…I am rooting for the Cubs in this World Series.  And I am tired of talk about folks “jumping” on the Cub’s bandwagon.  I say that we have to root for someone and there are only two teams left.  I have been to Chicago.  I have been to Cleveland.  I like the city of Chicago better.  My favorite painting, “Nighthawks”, by Edward Hooper is at home at The Art Institute in Chicago.  I am ready to see it again.  The food in Chicago is better than it is in Cleveland.  And…I think the folks are nicer in Chicago.

I hope they get tonight’s World Series game in before it rains in Cleveland.  It is going on in the room next to me.  I have to swallow kind of hard to listen to Joe Buck call anything, but I am ready to watch some baseball.

Go Cubs!

Speaking the rights.

Danny Johnson