The first organized sport I played as a kid was baseball. Despite having decent hand-eye coordination and a bit of strength, I never was much of player during my Little League days.
I suspect a lot of it had to do with my left-handed confusion. I’m a lefty who was raised by two right-handers in an era in which left-handedness wasn’t encouraged. My kindergarten teacher, who was nearing retirement in 1974, often tried to get me to use my right hand when writing and drawing. So when I eventually got my first baseball glove, I wasn’t sure whether I should catch or throw with my dominant hand. I ended up being a mediocre right-throwing, right-hitting Little Leaguer.
But I still loved the game. I was especially fascinated with home runs that abruptly ended big games and won championships. When I decided to convert our basement into a sport room – or sports museum, as my children jokingly call it – I wanted to dedicate some space to some of baseball’s most magical home runs.
My “home run wall” features 10 iconic home-run photos, several of which I’ve gotten signed by writing to the home-run hitters, and in some cases, the pitchers who fell victim to those home runs.
Two of my favorite purchases are authenticated photos of the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Bill Mazerowski hitting a Game 7, 1960 World Series-winning home run and the New York Giants’ Bobby Thomson hitting the famous “Shot Heard ‘Round The World” game-winning home run in the 1951 World Series.
I also enjoy looking at a large photo signed by both New York Yankees’ shortstop Bucky Dent and Boston Red Sox pitcher Mike Torrez. Both of the signatures are big and bold. And Dent inscribed it with “I slayed the Green Monster.” His three-run home run in 1978 at Fenway Park ended up giving the Yankees a crucial victory on their way to winning the American League’s Eastern Division.
Another great home-run inscription is on a photo of Red Sox catcher Carlton Fisk hitting his game-winning home run in the 1975 World Series. “Stay Fair! Stay Fair!” he wrote on the photo of him waving as his longshot just stayed inside the foul pole at Fenway.
But my absolute favorite photo on my home run wall is of Joe Carter of the Toronto Blue Jays. His large blue signature adorns of photo of him joyfully rounding the bases after he hit a World Series-winning home run in 1993.
As a Western New York native who grew up in the late-1970s and 1980s rooting for the nearby Blue Jays, I was beyond thrilled to watch Carter’s shot. It gave me – a mediocre Little Leaguer – a chance to feel like a champion.
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