45 years ago Tiger Stadium Monday Night Baseball with the Bird were you there?

[Hamtragedy]

I was there. It was Family Night, which was the promotion that year on Monday Nights, and the games started half an hour earlier. I was nine, but remember my dad would take us [[my sister and brother, my mom may have gone to this one) to those Family Night games, mostly because the Bird pitched those nights, and the owner was trying to put butts in the seats.

I saw him a few times that year, but this one's memorable, as it was the Yankees. Mickey Rivers played center and hit lead-off, but I remember him from a previous game when we were sitting in the lower bleachers in right and someone poured beer on his bald head [[i remember the splashing) from the upper porch as he chased one to the warning track. But more importantly Ron Leflore hit lead-off for the Tigers and was hitting about .330 and had a ton of stolen bases.

Then there was the Bird. The crowd was wild. I still have my program from this game and stopped keeping score somewhere in the sixth because there was so much going on. I even scrawled the attendance on the score sheet after they announced it. I remember walking down the ramps to the bathrooms with my little brother who had a big "The Bird is the Word" button on that seemed to dwarf his t-shirt. I still have that button in a box somewhere.

My dad knew these were somewhat magical games, [[a guy talking to the baseball and grooming the mound from his knees) and made a point to bring us to them, and as kids we all rant and raved about Mark Fidrych. I had seen Eddie Giaccomin pitch a 8-0 shut-out for the Red Wings in Olympia not long before and the crowd was wild that night too, so to me I was lucking out on wild Detroit crowds, thinking that was somewhat normal too.

That game stuck with me though as he beat the Yankees. He made the All-Star team. I got his Topps rookie card in a pack from Cunninghams in Grandland shopping center and Gr. River and Fenkell, and carried it around till it was all dog-eared. And later we followed the Bird heavily, even thru the injuries [[he was scheduled to pitch the second game of the Disco Demolition Night double-header in Comiskey Park a couple years later, but the Sox forfeit that one, since center field was piled a mile high with burning vinyl).

Then I flipped thru the channels one night about 20 years ago after coming home from the bar in Hamtramck and this very game was on ESPN Classics, and it all came back to me, although I had never forgotten it. It was played last year during the lockdown too, but the film seemed to become really grainy over the years. Bob Uecker is the color guy and he brings back all the details. It's worth a watch.