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Ron Robinson and the Most-Perfect Game

I take a lot of adept Reds memories. Most of united states of america do, I approximate.

I remember sitting on the floor in my living room, watching Eric Show give up THE Hit to Pete Rose. The REAL hit came a few days earlier in Chicago, but nobody knew information technology then and nosotros celebrated like we’d won the lottery. I screamed and so loud, our pet beagle, Murphy, had to leave his customary spot in the lord's day next to the door to get abroad from all the racket.

I was in attendance on Johnny Bench day in the early ‘80s when Bench hung up his spikes. The game was humdrum, but they gave a Johnny Bench handout at the gates to the offset X-thousand guests. I still recall how it looked, sitting in the corner of my room adjacent to the door. No amount of music posters, Chicago Bulls memorabilia from the ‘90s MJ teams, or hastily built bookshelves could supplant information technology from that place of honor.  I kept that handout stapled to my wall until I graduated high school and then I kept information technology with my baseball cards. I lost both information technology and the baseball game cards when my parent’due south basement flooded in 1998. So it goes. Bench was always my favorite player. I wore my baseball cap backwards from nascence in deference to him. I still do, fifty-fifty though I’m nearly 40 and I look weird when I do it. It merely feels wrong to clothing it right.

I attended nearly every Findlay Market, Opening Day parade in the ‘80s, and I got to stand behind habitation plate on opening solar day in 2004 when I worked at GABP every bit a beer vendor. Dick Cheney tossed out the first pitch. Information technology was a presidential election year (oh, to have Bush and Kerry to choose from again. #smh). We had to laissez passer through Hugger-mugger Service every fourth dimension nosotros got a new bucket of beer, which took forever, and since near of the people in that section were political donors who didn’t actually care most baseball game, none of them wanted to purchase booze. I made $30 that day, which was worse than whatsoever businessman’s special, including the rainy days. My friends Frank and Abe, twin brothers from my high school days, worked the upper decks and had a section of firefighters competing confronting a section of policemen to see who could drink the most. They each made over $1000 a piece, and laughed at me all the fashion to the parking garage after. I have never forgiven them for that.

Or Dick Cheney, for that affair.

Despite all that, my best Reds memory, other than sitting on the dorsum porch with my dad and Grandpa, listening to Marty and Joe on 700 WLW, of course, was when my picayune league team had first row blue seats at Riverfront in ‘88 the night Ron Robinson came within one pitch of throwing a perfect game.

The Reds were playing the Expos that day. It was ane of those clear blue days in May that brand you desire to stand up exterior, wait at the sky, and marvel at how much beauty there was in any management. My trivial league squad had first row bluish seats along the third base of operations line. Normally, they gave u.s.a. tickets for the nosebleed seats considering those were cheaper, but this fourth dimension we had seats correct there in the forepart row.

We got there early to watch batting practice and all of us well-nigh dove out of the stands, trying to catch the ball each time someone hit a grounder into foul territory. At one point, Ben Tilton, our starting third baseman, went caput-first over the bannister trying to take hold of a ball and we had to hold him by his legs to proceed him from falling. Chris Sabo, having seen the accident that nearly took place, ran over, handed Ben a ball, and warned us not to run a risk life and limb. â€Å"you guys see these things all the time,” he said. â€Å"There’s no sense killing yourself for it.”

Naturally, we redoubled our efforts from there.

The game started usually. Robinson retired the showtime iii Expos he faced in the top of the first, and Kal Daniels homered to give the Reds a one-0 lead. A man behind us had WLW on a portable radio and, as the Reds took the field for the inning intermission, Marty called the score.

â€Å"We head to the break, Expos zero and the Reds one.”

â€Å"The Reds won!” we screamed, giddy with excitement. â€Å"The Reds won!”

Things settled down from there, neither squad doing much for several innings. Riverfront stadium was an odd place for baseball. Looking back on it, I can’t imagine why I think of information technology so fondly. It was a concrete brick, situated in the middle of a mud pit on the banks of the Ohio River. The seats  pivoted to allow for both football game and baseball games, and y'all could meet the tracks in the outfield. I’ve been to many great stadiums since, and they all make Riverfront seem non-expert. Just back then, from the optics of my childhood, nada was better than walking effectually those gigantic concrete slabs to see the knee-crippling astroturf below, knowing that shortly, very before long, we’d get to encounter our favorite players alive and in-person. And it would be magical.

The Reds traded innings with the Expos the first hour or and so. Information technology wasn’t until near the fourth or fifth inning when Andy Bello, our starting pitcher, looked at the scoreboard and said, â€Å"Hey, look at that. Ronnie’s got a perfect game going!” The whole section turned, as if to somehow find a flaw in his reasoning. But the logic was impeccable. Ron Robinson, the Red’south number 4 starter that season, had himself a perfect game going.

There was no mode he’d keep information technology going, nosotros thought. He only had three strikeouts through 5 innings, and everyone seemed to be striking him hard. It just seemed that, wherever they hit it, there was someone there to catch it. Equally twilight turned to darkness and Chris Sabo put us up three-0 to end the 6th (we were minding our manners with the railings by then), we started to wonder if maybe, simply maybe, he’d pull this off.

Tim Raines hitting a liner to left to start off the seventh, and Hubie Brooks lined out to first to end the inning. Ii more to go, and it was all anyone could talk about. None of u.s.a. could recollect anyone having thrown a perfect game before. 1 of the dads said something about Sandy Koufax in the ‘60s, and another kid, who was an Indians fan for some strange reason, mentioned Len Barker merely, for about of us, a perfect game was unimaginable. Only Hall-of-Famers similar Nolan Ryan or Doc Gooden (we thought at the time) did something like this. Not bottom of the rotation starters similar Ron Robinson.

Robinson blew through the 8th inning, coercing Tim Wallach and the Big Cat, Andres Galarraga, to gound out and line out respectively. The Reds went down in order in the bottom of the inning so rapidly it seemed like they wanted to just get the particulars out of the way so we could all become to the Real contest. Ron Robinson took the mound in the top of the ninth inning, having retired 24 straight Expos. Iii men, the lesser of the Expos batting order, stood between him and greatness.

The whole stadium stood and cheered equally he started. Mike Fitzgerald hit a grounder to curt that Barry gloved and whipped to first in plenty of fourth dimension. Proficient, nosotros idea. It’south best he hit information technology in that location and not to someone like Paul O’Neil, who’d likely have dropped the ball and ended this affair before it got started. One down. Ii to go. Nosotros stood on our seats instinctively and screamed like wild animals, waiting for what was to come up.

Tim Foley hit a fly brawl to Eric Davis in center and we all gasped, certain this would exist our undoing. From where nosotros saturday in the blue seats, the ball looked similar it would surely crest the wall in center. But Eric flew to his left and caught the ball with ease. Sometimes it’due south easy to meet how people could compare him to Willie Mays. He was never every bit dandy as Mays consistently, but he had flashes of luminescence that made you promise against hope for more.

The final at-bat. Cadet Rodgers took out the Expos starter, Pascual Perez, who himself had pitched well, going 8 innings, hit out 4, replacing him with pinch hitter Wallace Johnson. â€Å"Wallace who?” nosotros asked, joking that no middling replacement such equally this could stand up in the fashion of history equally it unfolded before the states.

Ron got behind 3-0, but battled back. He threw a strike and we cheered â€Å"TWO TWO TWO,” and we’re going wild, similar Lord of the Flies, except no one’s trying to cut anyone’s head off. A foul back behind home plate and we cheered again. â€Å"One ONE ONE!”

It’southward strange, the fashion moments stick with you. I can all the same smell the operating room where my first son was built-in. I can still hear the sound of my wife’s voice the moment she said that, yes, she would marry me. I tin can still feel weight of the bat in my easily the moment I connected on a line drive to left to win the little league All-Star game a yr after Ron Robinson’s brush with excellence. And I can still experience the buzz of excitement as what seemed like the whole city stood on its seat, cheering, screaming, willing strike 3 as Ron Robinson reared dorsum and released his final pitch.

Only.

Strike three didn’t come. Wallace Johnson hitting a line drive into curt left, merely in front of Kal Daniels. You could see the expect of defeat on Robinson’southward face as he knew with certainly he’d come THIS close to his dreams, and watched them castor past him.

Then we cheered again, louder this time. Because greatness doesn’t always mean completing what you ready out to do. Sometimes you lot can fall short and nevertheless be dandy. That nighttime, Ron Robinson was, for 1 shining moment, the greatest pitcher in all of major league baseball game, and no one could take information technology away from him.

That moment was short-lived, of course. Tim Raines came up next  and hit a homerun to right-left-center field, according to Joe Nuxhall, and just like that Tommy Helms brought in John Franco to finish the job. Which he did. The Reds won 3-2, and nosotros all went dwelling house happy. Tom Browning would throw an actual perfect game afterwards that season, cementing himself in Reds history for all eternity.

That was nice, but I remember Ron Robinson's near-perfect game the best. Probably because I was there, but also considering I have an analogousness for people who come close and fall short. I don't know why.

I don’t know if whatever of my friends recollect that night as well as I practice. I haven’t spoken to anyone from my trivial league team in probably 20 years. I become dorsum to it every at present and once again. I thought of it a lot in the early 2000’s when the Reds were mired in flavour after flavour of less than mediocrity. I went dorsum to it again in 2010 when Jay Bruce hit the homerun that put the Reds into the playoffs for the first fourth dimension in what felt like forever. I imagine GABP was electric in much the aforementioned style Riverfront was for me all those years ago.

I become back to information technology now, as the Reds struggle through the beginnings of what may be an extended period of rebuilding. Our team has been through this before. Many times. We’ve had proficient times and bad, and we ever come up back effectually again later a while if you give us enough time. At that place are plenty memories to sustain the states while we wait for what’southward to come.

And sometimes, when you least expect it, a phenomenon happens. If you proceed your eyes open and if you’re lucky, you lot might become to experience all the joy that comes with it.

Source: https://www.redlegnation.com/2016/07/14/ron-robinson-and-the-near-perfect-game/

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