Comments on: A Buck Story

By: robustyoungsoul

robustyoungsoul — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 12:48:15 +0000

Joe,

You should link this excerpt from your “Books” tab or something so that it is easy to find. Everyone I send this passage to ends up buying a book (or at least SAYING they’re going to buy one… if they don’t I’ll buy some and hand them out).

By: Robb

Robb — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 02:50:49 +0000

Joe, I’ve enjoyed your Buck stories for years now, and cannot wait to read the book (steadily moving up my to-do list, I swear). Nearly every time I read or hear one of these anecdotes, I get a lump in my throat. Buck was…is…a beautiful, gracious human being, and no one has illuminated this fact better than you have. I’m sure I speak for many when I say thank you.

On a lighter note, my girlfriend got hit by a line drive at a T-Bones game a few years ago. Bounced right off her knee and left a nasty bruise. Embarassingly enough, the ball found a perfect trajectory between my outstretched hand and the oversized glove of the woman sitting next to us. The T-Bones staff handled it with class, by the way, making sure my girlfriend was okay and even giving her a complimentary bag of peanuts! I’d like to see them do that at a big league game…

By: lisa

lisa — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 17:20:28 +0000

some of us can’t AFFORD to take all our kids to ball games and you can’t take just one without the others you know.

so IF i even caught a foul ball, i would take it home for MY kids. i care more about them than i do some other kid who actually gets to GO to the game

By: Nick

Nick — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 19:20:21 +0000

I must say growing up in Houston as a kid I was a victim of this. One night in the old dome my dad and my two brothers were sitting in the mezzanine behind home plate. Anyway, there was man by himself in a suit with a glove sitting in our area. We had a foul ball hit near us and bounced around. This guy grabbed it before either me or my brothers could get to it. No big deal. The next inning or so I had one hit directly at me. As I was preparing reach out and “attempt” to catch the ball, a glove comes from out of nowhere and snags it. The man then calmly sits back down in his seat with his two foul balls and refuses to acknowledge us. That moment is probably the maddest I have ever seen my dad at a baseball game. Needless to say the moral of my story is that I remember how that moment felt and I always give the ball to the kid. (Always being the couple of times I have actually caught a ball and had the chance to do it)

(By the way, recently read the book and loved it.)

By: Taylor

Taylor — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 20:21:25 +0000

I was at a Yankee game sitting in the right field bleachers and the opposing team hit a home run. A kid sitting near me ended up with the ball (I don’t remember if he caught it on the fly, the bounce or just picked it up) and all the fans around us starting yelling at him to throw it back onto the field. He clearly wanted to keep it and was feeling a lot of pressure to throw it back. I told him not to listen to them that if he wanted to keep the ball he should keep it. He kept it and everyone eventually shut up (maybe I looked pissed off). Also it always annoyed me that Yankee fans started copying Cubs fans by throwing the ball back onto the field for opposing HRs. They never did it when I was a kid (late 7o’s – 80’s).

By: Brian

Brian — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 19:50:05 +0000

That’s torn it; I’m buying the book.

By: Jacob

Jacob — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 17:52:56 +0000

Since I forgot it above, here’s the end to that parenthetical…: )

By: Jacob

Jacob — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 17:51:39 +0000

I read it to my wife and I then had to go back to the beginning and read the rest of the book to her.

So, ‘Ambiguity,’ this just struck me as odd. I’m almost afraid to ask, but why couldn’t she just read it for herself…?

The Buck O’Neil excerpts are always great. I need to buy the book. But, I’m broke, so I’ll keep looking for a used copy at Myopic here in Chicago…

And you give the ball to the kid. Period. Buck’s viewpoint is awesome, and maybe he’s right. But, you give the ball to the kid. We used to go see the Charleston Wheelers (at the time Charleston, WV’s low-A Red’s affiliate). We’d try to catch foul balls, even knew the best place to stand. But we never succeeded, as some faster, stronger adult always either beat us to the ball, or took it out of our hands. That adult would always be waiting by the clubhouse exit for an autograph, right alongside us (the kids who forked over way too much $$$ for an authentic Wheeler’s ball. Lame. Though I did get Dan Wilson’s autograph.

By: Tom

Tom — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 16:59:10 +0000

Let’s not let our “what to do with the baseball?” debate obscure the over-arching point of the passage, as it relates to Buck (that said, the ball goes to the kid).

Loved the passage, and I too am a freeloader no more – just placed my Amazon order.

By: Creston

Creston — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 16:54:43 +0000

If you catch a ball and there’s a kid within arm’s reach of you, you have to give it up. That’s simple baseball law. The amount of pleasure you’d get as an adult of having caught a ball is infinitesimal compared to the joy of a kid bringing a ball home from an actual game.

Plus, it’s a lot more cred too.

Compare “I caught a ball at a game, it’s on display in my entertainment center now!”

to “I caught a ball at a game, then gave it to this cute little four year old girl, whose face lit up like a Christmas tree.”

Guaranteed that the latter gets you more attention from the opposite sex too!

I was at a Rangers game not long after that whole fiasco happened with the idiot laying out across a bench to catch a ball, while bashing a kid in the head as he did so. Only to be sitting there with a smug expression on his fat face as the kid’s mother berated him. (something for which, I might add, he got royally ROASTED on the internet.)

Another idiot went after a ball and basically snatched it OUT of a kid’s glove just as the kid caught it. He didn’t hurt the kid, but he was still being a royal (bleep).

The amount of booing this idiot had to endure was marvelous. Once the hotdogs started landing on him, he decided to make a quick exit in shame, still clutching the ball to his wife-beater clad chest.

Way to go there champ! At least you caught a ball! Be sure to tell all your redneck friends about how you stole it from a kid.

Fortunately about ten minutes later another foul ball was hit in our general area and the guy who caught that went over and gave it to the kid who’d gotten robbed earlier.

Some people in this world are just pathetic.