A Very Special Moment

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The start of the baseball playoffs is a special time for a baseball fan — no matter which teams are playing.

It's been particularly special for fans in north Texas the last couple of years because the Texas Rangers have been participants in the postseason, advancing to their first–ever World Series last year.

But what happened at The Ballpark in Arlington yesterday was extraordinary, touching beyond words.

Cooper Stone, the young son of the firefighter who fell to his death at The Ballpark in July, threw out the first pitch with his mother and Nolan Ryan watching on.

Being in the playoffs is becoming something of a regular thing for the Rangers — at least for the last couple of years — and a lot of people around here hope that appearing in the World Series is going to become a habit as well.

But no one around here wants to repeat what happened on that evening nearly three months ago when Cooper's dad, Shannon Stone, tumbled headfirst over the railing.

It was a traumatic moment for a lot of people around here, whether they follow the Rangers, whether they care about sports, whether they saw it happen. I haven't heard it mentioned much lately, but it never seems to be far from anyone's thoughts.

Surely, that night back in July when his father fell to his death was a traumatic one for Cooper. My understanding is that yesterday was the first time he has been at The Ballpark since that tragic night, and his mother spoke of the occasion as almost an act of closure, which, I suppose, it was.

It was also an act of closure for the people who live in this area. I didn't see Cooper's pitch, but I heard from many people who did — and almost all spoke of the healing effect it had on them.

If the Rangers return to the World Series, I hope they will invite Cooper and his mother to return to The Ballpark. But that might be easier said than done. The Rangers, who were almost never shut out at home this season, lost their divisional series opener with Tampa Bay, 9–0.

Presidential Pitch

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They played the major league baseball All–Star Game last night.

When I was growing up, it was a rare opportunity to see the best players that baseball had to offer. We didn't have televised games on numerous channels every night of the week because we didn't have cable. We got to see one game a week — two, on rare occasions — via the "Game of the Week" on Saturday afternoons.

It was special because, in those days, you just knew that the players you saw in the All–Star Game would end up in the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., some day. Maybe it was because I was a young boy who avidly collected baseball cards and didn't have adult worries, like finding a job or a place to live or being able to put food on the table, but I knew the starting lineups of just about every major league club (there were fewer of them in those days).

Today I know the names of a handful of players in the majors, and the rest of them sound like minor leaguers to me, even though most of them probably aren't.

But, whether the players in the All–Star Game were truly worthy of ending up in Cooperstown or they were just being rewarded for a great season, one thing is certain in my memory. I remember the next–day reports on the game actually being about the game.

Not about whoever threw out the ceremonial first pitch.

That is not the case, apparently, in 2009.

Numerous blogs that I have seen today asserted that, based on his pitching form (and, presumably, the "mom jeans" he wore), Barack Obama "throws like a girl." You can judge for yourself, I guess. I have attached the video of his pitch to this post, but I can't really reach a conclusion from Fox's camera angle.

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The assertion that I would take issue with, though, is Carol Lee's claim at Politico.com that Obama "checked a signature presidential tradition off his list" with his pitch last night.

Throwing out the first pitch at an All–Star Game is hardly a "presidential tradition." Presidents seldom throw out the first pitch at the All–Star Game, as one of Lee's former employers, the New York Times, reported last weekend.

Before last night, Gerald Ford was the last president to throw out the first pitch at an All–Star Game back in 1976, the year of America's Bicentennial. Perhaps in honor of the occasion, Ford threw out two first pitches, one with each hand. Or perhaps it was a way to show how inclusive he believed himself to be. At the time, Ford was involved in a heated campaign for the GOP nomination with Ronald Reagan.

In fact, if there is anything resembling a "presidential tradition" of throwing out the ceremonial first pitch at a baseball game, it is at the season opener. Every president from William Howard Taft to George W. Bush threw out the ceremonial first pitch at a season–opening game. Obama did not do so this year because he was attending the G–8 summit in Europe. Vice President Joe Biden threw out the first pitch instead.

I suspect that, aside from the obvious political differences, much of the negative reaction to Obama's pitching form was more the result of a comparison to George W. Bush's first pitch at the World Series that followed the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. That pitch, most observers felt, was a strike.

Oh, and by the way — the American League beat the National League again, 4–3.