Nostalgia

  My daughter thinks I am nostalgic. Too much so for her. She wonders how much I live in the present. 

While the present and the future both scare and excite me, I do have a soft spot for what took place in the past. This is especially true with sports.

She and I went to Lancaster, Pennsylvania this past Saturday to see my college baseball team play. I have a fond place in my heart for Franklin and Marshall baseball, having played on both the freshman and varsity teams. 

I follow all Diplomats sports teams—some closer than others. That is largely due to my having known a plethora of student-athletes on the teams (all male, until the advent of co-education in 1970) from 1969 to 1972.

I know that F&M has won 5 National titles—a lot for a small liberal arts college in Pennsylvania Dutch country, but pales in comparison with so many others on Division I, II and III levels. Walking through the gym and seeing the banners for the five trips to the Division III Final Four in basketball is a source of honor.  I watched those teams from afar, mostly by news releases, with visits to a variety of arenas which included a trip to Salem, Virginia to see Glenn Robinson’s team in the 1996 Final Four. 

Do I wish the Dips were reaching heights like they used to? Am I hopeful they can win a Centennial Conference title and play in the NCAA’s? Yes, Yes. And Yes. Which is why I will check out the schedule for 2024-25 when it is available, looking for dates I might head back to campus, when the team plays at Muhlenberg, the closest CC school to New Jersey, or it they make trip to the Garden State. I know I can watch the games on the computer, too. 

I was loyal and faithful when I would sneak away from my studies after dinner to watch the basketball team play. They were usually overmatched. Which is why when they win, like in the glory years under Robinson or this past season when the team went 20-7, I am joyful—even if I agonize during the videos. 

This is part of my heritage. I guess I bleed blue and white (even with the onset of black in the uniforms). I like wearing my F&M hat, courtesy of the current baseball coach and a game-worn jersey bearing my college number 25 when I see the baseball team play. 

It is why I gave a small donation in honor of the late Robert Curtis, who was the football coach who led the school back to respectability after a disastrous 1-8 season during my sophomore year. I contributed to naming the press box in his honor—a beautiful gesture for a great man. Every time I go on campus, I must enter Shadek Stadium, named for the great benefactor, football quarterback, baseball teammate and classmate, to see the plaque for those who contributed, and which includes my wife’s and my name. 

I never thought I would see a beautiful stadium on campus, in an area that which didn’t exist in my years there. The former football field sits vacant, used for the track which still encircles the field where so many Diplomat teams toiled. Heck, the baseball field I played on, part of the main campus when I patrolled right field, is long gone, with the present team playing on the Baker Campus, a decent car ride away. 

When I enter Mayser Gymnasium, besides reading the banners on the walls, I have such a sense of remembrance. All the times I slid on the wooden floor to practice my slide. Basketball games aplenty, including some NCAA contests. Wrestling, F&M’s sole DI sport, used to be sold out and noisy due to riotous nature of our students. 

And I remember all the musical acts which graced the stage—Linda Ronstadt; James Taylor together with Carol King; Santana; the Grateful Dead were among the great acts brought to Lancaster by the Student Union Board. Maybe that’s why my wife and I are seeing Gary Puckett and the Union Gap along with the Grassroots, the Brooklyn Bridge and Gary Lewis and the Playboys at the State Theater in New Brunswick. F&M gave me the impetus to see rock in smaller venues. I digress.

I don’t limit my nostalgia to just F&M. It can be Rutgers—I have watched and continue to follow a whole slew of sports, most importantly football, men’s basketball and baseball. How many times have I been at SHI Stadium (formerly just plain old Rutgers Stadium before the expansion) since my teens? I’ve seen Rutgers basketball as the home team in three venues—the College Avenue Gymnasium, Jersey Mike’s Arena a.k.a. the RAC, and Madison Square Garden, plus a few road games at Delaware, Cincinnati and Seton Hall. And I practiced catching fly balls on the old baseball field which had been swallowed up for football practice fields before migrating to the present location.

Then there’s the New York Yankees. The first team I rooted for was the team from the Bronx. I haven’t looked back. 

You always remember your first love. Baseball—particularly New York Yankees baseball. As a boy growing up in Highland Park, the games were freely available on WPIX, Channel 11 in New York—The Daily News station. Plus there was tremendous newspaper coverage from the beat writers and columnists who populated the numerous NYC publications and the local New Brunswick newspaper, The Home News.

I would watch numerous games in our bottom floor den, the coolest room in a mostly un-air conditioned house, with a huge industrial fan cooling us down on hot Summer days and nights. It didn’t matter if the Yankees were home or in Detroit, Cleveland, Boston or Baltimore. My attention was focused on the heroes of my youth. I patterned my batting after them, learning to switch hit like Mickey Mantle or Tom Tresh. And I wanted to play outfield like Mantle because it looked so cool. 

My faith never wavered—through the lean years, the renaissance of the 1970’s and then the time of the Core Four starring Derek Jeter. I trekked to Shea Stadium when the old Stadium was deemed unsafe. I have sat everywhere except the bleachers—perhaps out of fear of the rabid nature of the fans. Lol. 

Now there is a new group of stars—Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, Gerrit Cole, Anthony Volpe. I still am transfixed watching the Yankees on YES or the myriad other outlets which alternately carry the games. I shudder when Clay Holmes comes in to close the game out—as good as he is, Holmes is simply not Mariano Rivera, the greatest closer ever. 

Yankees games make April to October must see TV. Which coincides with my obsession with the New York Jets. It will be 48 years this fall when my sister and I began our odyssey of having season tickets to a New York pro football team. Because you have to be committed to watch the Jets, winners of only one Super Bowl, which happened in 1970 for the 1969 season.

The agony of watching the Jets blunders was more than Lady, our beloved Shetland Sheepdog, could take. When I would have that regular outburst over the team screwing up once more, she would join with full-throated barking either in support of my emotional trauma or letting me know how berserk I was. 

Yet I am readying for another season, even after the terrible disappointment of the injury to our QB with the distorted views still fresh in my mind. It is my fervent hope Aaron Rodgers will rock my TV set and my seats inside Met Life Stadium this fall leading the Jets to the promised land. Perhaps my dog did have it right as to how delusional I am.

To a lesser extent, hockey has a hold on me. I have had shares of tickets to see the Rangers and Devils, and I have travelled to Canada and a few U.S arenas to see the players “shoot that puck, score that goal.”

Let me not forget the NBA—I have optimistically followed the Knicks and Nets since my childhood and early teens. I became enthralled with the Golden State Warriors led by Steph Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson. It was predictable that the dynasty would end ignominiously in the NBA backwater of Sacramento, where a revenge-seeking younger and stronger team eliminated the Warriors. I have seen the same things happen to the Lakers, Celtics and Bulls dynasties. 

And I have a soft spot for the Philadelphia 76’ers. I saw my only NBA Championship game in 1967 at Convention Hall. I have been to the Spectrum and Wells Fargo Center. I even pulled for the Sixers to down Miami in the play-in round, albeit letting them face my beloved Knicks who I will be rooting hard for. 

I have seen a lot of sports in my time. A ton on TV and a good number of games in person. While I long for a rebirth by some of my favorite teams, based largely on past performances which I cherished, I look forward to the time when they are winners in the present so I can exalt in my joy. 

So forgive me if, with the cold, gusty and persistent wind in Lancaster when the Diplomats hosted Muhlenberg, I thought of my catch versus York in April, 1969, when the chilly wind blew in so much that I caught the ball sprawled by the infield grass after sprinting in from left field. Or how a Yankees win on a Saturday afternoon was like many a game I attended at the Stadium and the radiant feeling of sharing in the victory in my own way, or how downcast I was after a loss. 

For me, nostalgia has its place in the present and in the future.