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For the love of the game -- it's baseball

Five O'Clock Shadow

By Charles Deal | Special to the Record

Published: October 25, 2009

The scent of fresh new grass triggers a mechanism somewhat akin to that first love. You never forget it.

This something happens every spring, and it transcends that first case of puppy love.

What it is, is baseball!

Baseball has something in common with love. No matter how much that first affair of the heart hurt, you are never cured. You're sure to try it again.

Growing up in a baseball town was special. Those early Hickory Rebel teams — notably those in the old Outlaw League — were a mish-mash of former near-greats, many of them over the hill, some who drank themselves out of the game and a few who changed their names because of various past transgressions, including prison time.

There's a story I can't verify about a player who slid into third base and broke the half-pint bottle in his hip pocket.

I don't remember my first baseball game, but my dad loved to tell that story. In the course of the game a fight broke out, and some of the fans joined the players on the field.

The best-told story holds that I was knee-high to his six-feet-plus at the time. After watching my second game for some time, I tugged on his britches leg and inquired, "Daddy, when does the fight start?"

Years later, at the same ballpark, a fight broke out in the left-field bleachers. I had a premonition to look in on the fight. Four rednecks in their cups had taken on Dad, who was in pretty good shape and holding his own. In high school and in good shape, I jumped in to help.

After a few minutes, the four bully boys were crammed into one of those tiny ticket offices at the front gate, awaiting transport to Hickory's downtown lockup and a meeting in court with a judge.

When the Boys of Summer showed up in Hickory to begin a new season, it was a ritual for the girls to turn out in their most eye-catching finery. Players and girls were looking over each other. For local boys, it was a matter of protecting their turf against enormous odds. Suddenly the scent of envy and jealousy was greater than the newly-mown grass.

When the Rebels were in town, the world stopped in Hickory. Not even a prevailing breeze from the hog pens outside the fence in deep centerfield could drive us from the stands. The hogs, fed from scraps off the tables at the college, helped some people make ends meet.

After a time, it's reasonable to believe that some of the mystique of the old Rebels will rub off on the Crawdads and that splendid new ballpark, L.P. Frans Stadium. Their 16th season now history, the Crawdads will be back in springtime.

But no new love affair has the intensity of that first one. Ball players, girls and fans who have been there will understand.

Charles Deal is a former newspaper editor and publisher. Reach him at chazdeal@aol.com.