Ode to Gary Carter via OLD BLOG

February 16th, 2012 Heather Kovar Posted in Heather Kovar | No Comments »

Tonight I was having a look back at some of my old blog postings- and actually laughing at one about baseball. It’s from 2006- back when I guess I thought blog posts were supposed to be as long as possible.
Click here- this post went into extra innings as I seem to throw out every bit of the very little knowledge I have of baseball. I finally make a call back to my early mention of Pete Rose. However I’m not sure how many people possibly stuck around for the end.
But for me it brought back memories of my time reporting from Cooperstown- and as I was reminiscing about the Hall of Fame, I got an email alert – breaking news–
Hall of Fame catcher Gary Carter has died. He had brain cancer.

Strange feeling.

But then I realized- Gary Carter!
Correct me Mets and Red Sox Fans if I’m wrong- but hearing his name brought you back to the 1986 World Series.
The Mets won- Gary Carter was a Met.
We’ll forgive him for going into the Hall of Fame as an Expo. (He wanted half Expo/half Met.)

And please forgive me for continuing to write this- but somehow it seems Gary Carter is connected to every random baseball posting I made in the post I was just writing about. (Okay, so probably not really- but I’m about to look it up and see what I can come up with. It’s how I learn.)
My blog post starts out with my constant writing about whether people in southwestern Connecticut should be a Met, Yankee or Red Sox fan.
Gary Carter was a Met from 1985 to 1989. Yankee fans love to hate Red Sox fans; but there is also a huge cross town rivalry of Mets/Yankees.
I’m sure Met and Yankee fans banded together to cheer on Carter as the Mets won that 1986 World Series against the Red Sox. In game four he hit two home runs in Boston.

AND…. (skip down a bit in my blog- I’ll come back to the Cooperstown writing & Cracker Jack.)
I write of how I’ve cheered for the Astros for 30 years and was lucky to go to the Astrodome.
Just so happens- in 1986- the Mets beat the Houston Astros to go to the World Series. NL East Champions New York Mets versus NL West Champions Houston Astros.
Carter was up to bat and hit a RBI single to win Game 5. He also had some hits in Game 6- at the ASTRODOME- in that famous game that lasted 16 innings.

When I wrote my blog I guess I didn’t know about that 1986 between the Mets and Astros, because I only mention that the Astros almost went to the World Series in 1980 but lost to the Phillies. But I think I mentioned Phillies because I was trying to name stadiums I’d been to before they were replaced. I was trying to make my rantings news! The approval to build a new Yankee stadium was recent headlines.

But back to Gary Carter and my old blog post.
After writing about Astros/Phillies I have a picture of me with the Bridgeport Bluefish mascot and my closing line is
“The Bridgeport Bluefish play their home opener against the Long Island Ducks May 3rd at 7:05 pm. See you there!”

Had you gone to any Long Island/ Bridgeport games in 2009, you probably would have seen Gary Carter. He was the manager of the Ducks for that year.
The Ducks mascot is called “QuackerJack.”
I wrote about Cracker Jacks briefly replaced by Crunch N Munch at the old Yankee stadium. (Okay- so this one is a stretch:)
Moving on…. back to the Phillies. In 1981 as an Expo, Carter helped beat defending champs Philadelphia Phillies in the playoffs.
And I mentioned Pete Rose a few times in my blog- in 1981 Pete Rose played for the Phillies.
In 1975, Carter made his first All Star Appearance as a defensive replacement for Pete Rose.
In 1984, both Carter and Rose played for the Expos. The both left the Expos after the 1984 season. Carter returned for the 1992 season.

Okay- I realize I could have written about any team and drawn parallels. But at least now I know a little more about the man called “KID” who was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2003 and died February 16, 2012.