I can’t believe I did it, and even worse is I’m going to admit to it. For about the 1,200th time someone replayed the Kirk Gibson World Series home run from 1988, I got watery-eyed.

What the heck?

It’s not like it was the first couple hundred times to see it or the countless times I saw it in its entirety on ESPN Classic. You’ve got to admit there’s just something about that whole ordeal that makes you not only enjoy this time of year but enjoy the game of baseball overall.

Reasons I like baseball?

4For teaching me how to spell Bevacqua and Hernandez, realize the name Champ wasn’t so weird for a first name and Alan Wiggins is the most disappointing tale ever from the first postseason I can distinctively remember in 1984.

4For being able to rush home to tune into the radio to catch the final out of the first no-hitter ever to clinch a playoff spot when the Astros’ Mike Scott did it. During the days of people pulling for teams in the nearest proximity, I was fortunate enough just to catch the groundout to first live on the air.

4To be able to tip my hat to people who really have followed the Braves all their lives. ESPN and the Internet gave way to people picking their favorite teams at random, and before then people were afraid to admit they were Braves fans. Even when Dale Murphy couldn’t find the pitch down and away and Rick Mahler couldn’t find the strike zone, those people stuck it out.

4To know you really don’t have to be 6-4 or strong enough to bench press a refrigerator to excel in this game. Even a guy 5-6 and 170 pounds soaking wet can become a mainstay and even hit a game-winning home run to send the entire park into a frenzy.

4To be able to walk into Toronto’s home park and realize the place isn’t near as big as it looks on TV. Yet if you go right behind the backstop and look up to the upper deck in left, you have a new respect for Jose Canseco and his ability to hit a baseball a long, long way. Believe me, he crushed it.

4To feel in some way connected to the night Nolan Ryan struck out one of my high school buddy’s favorite players for No. 5,000 during the 1989 season and when he came home to talk about it. That friend died tragically four years later.

4To feel good knowing a retired principal and part-time obit clerk will one day leave us after not only taking in a game at every baseball park but recalling how she glowed talking about her trip to the Stadium the day Jim Abbott threw a no-hitter.

4To remember watching Game 6 instead of studying and at one moment thinking a home run at would end the entire World Series. Sure enough, Joe Carter ended it.

4To realize we’re watching something special every five days when Roger Clemens dominates batters who weren’t even born when he came into the majors. He’s just as dominating as that one night against the Mariners 19 years ago.

4To know that if a man with two bad legs, an educated guess and a will to win can not only win a game but spark his team to a World Championship, anything in this world is possible.

Adam Daigle

is sports editor of The Natchez Democrat. Reach him at (601) 445-3632 or at

adam.daigle@natchezdemocrat.com

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