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« on: November 12, 2011, 11:40:29 am »
In 1979 I hated the Houston Astros because their games would interrupt "The Amazing Spider-Man" afternoon cartoon. Spidey could vanquish the likes of Doctor Octopus and Electro with ease, but those dreaded Astros would make him disappear. The web-slinger would sometimes be gone for three days in a row if the Astros had a series in Wrigley Field. Three whole days. An eternity for an eight-year-old.
I tried watching a game. It was more boring than church. So I'd just go pop wheelies and find obstacles to jump on my bike.
Then I got sick.
After the long days in the hospital, strict doctor's orders: take it easy and rest for a couple weeks. Trapped on a sofa for two weeks with three VHF and two UHF channels. When those damned Astros knocked Spidey off my screen again, I was too weak to get up off the sofa and turn the dial to another channel.
Terry Puhl led off the game with a home run. I dozed off. I woke later to see a high fly ball in the corner look like a home run. But this tall Astro jumped into the sky and somehow caught it. Then the announcer said that player had gone the whole season without making an error. A whole season of doing stuff like that without making an error? It was Terry Puhl again. That guy was amazing.
The next day, I wasn't so mad about Spidey being gone. Before the game started, the announcers explained that the Astros pitcher that day had a special way of pitching a baseball. Unlike everyone else, he would grip it with his fingernails. And when he threw it, the ball would dance in the air. This guy, Joe Niekro, he didn't look like an athlete. He looked like an old man. But much like Spider-Man, this guy had quirky abilities and seemed to win all the time.
After the end of my weeks of hospital and home rest, the family wanted to do anything for me as a special treat. I surprised them as much as myself when I said the only thing I wanted was an autographed baseball by Joe Niekro.
I started going to games. And over the next two years, I saw about fifteen of them. Those red box seats. Those orange mezzanine. Sometimes, if we didn't plan far enough ahead or it was a popular opponent, we'd go up in the nosebleed golden seats. And the funniest thing started happening. They won every single game I attended in person.
I wish we'd kept all the ticket stubs so I could know for sure how long my streak was going. It wasn't a Joe Dimaggio hit streak kind of number, but it was probably in the teens. By the end of the 1980 season, we were claiming it was twenty-seven games. Who knows, it might have been in that vicinity, but my father was a serial exaggerator. So I suspect it was more like fifteen.
There were some close calls. The Willie Stargell "We Are Family" Pirates were scary. They won the World Series in 1979. But, that year, I saw the Astros beat them. The mightily impressive Andre Dawson almost ended my streak by hitting a homerun late in a game and sending it to extra innings. But, those classic 80's Astros would always find a way to win. Enos Cabell, Jeff Leonard, Terry Puhl, Alan Ashby, Craig Reynolds, Art Howe, Denny Walling, Cesar Cedeno, and of course Jose Cruz.
Or, more accurately, Jose Cruuuuuuuz. Another Astro with what I perceived as a baseball version of super-powers. His primary attributes that contributed to this eight-year-old's awe was the fact that he ran so fast his baseball cap would fly off his head. And that he had the coolest batting stance routine in the league (well, second-coolest, after Stargell's signature helicopter-pump).
On gamedays, I felt like I was wearing a cloak of invincibility. Although I only went to one or two games a month, I talked about the streak every day for two years. And there was a miraculous phenomenon that fueled my confidence - James Rodney Richard.
A few months after my illness, the Astros finally managed for me to get an autographed photo of Joe Niekro and I got to meet him after a game. It was scary to see these players up close. I was afraid of them.
But the other major leaguers were afraid of James Rodney Richard.
J.R. Richard was six foot eight and threw a million miles of fire. When you're eight years old, you don't really understand everything about baseball. But I could see the fear in the opposing players' eyes. Especially the Los Angeles Dodgers, our primary rival.
J.R. had his own unbeaten streak. He never lost to the Dodgers. Those Dodgers were a classic team in baseball history, with matchups for the ages against the Reggie Jackson Yankees. They would even go on to win a World Series against those Yanks.
But they never beat J.R.
So I kept believing the impossible: that the Astros would always win when I went to see a game in person.
On July 30th, 1980, the mighty James Rodney Richard suffered a stroke and collapsed while practicing. A blood clot near the brain. He nearly died. His career was effectively ended.
The cloak of invincibility was gone.
But I kept going to games. And they kept winning.
In spite of the loss of the mighty J.R., they kept winning, and made it to the final game of the National League Championship series. One game away from going to the World Series.
I entered the Astrodome on October 12th, 1980. My streak was still intact. If it could only go one more game, we'd make it to the franchise's first World Series.
The game was a classic, and remained tied 7-7 after nine innings.
All-time major league hit leader Pete Rose said during the game, "It's a shame someone has to win this one."
In what is widely regarded as one of the most hard-fought National League Championships, with a majority of games being decided in extra innings, with a cumulative run total over the entire series of 20-19, in the tenth inning of a game that would send them to the World Series, I finally saw the Astros lose in person.
And that's when I became a true Astros fan.
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