Baseball Place: 15: Durham Athletic Park; and Baseball Place No. 15A: Durham Bulls Athletic Park

The editors at the Greensboro, N.C. newspaper sent me off to lunch with a couple reporters when I interviewed for a job there in 1999.

The reporters were both Northerners like me, and their role was to answer any questions that I might not feel comfortable asking the bosses, and fill me in about living in the area.

"There’s one thing you need to know," one of the reporters said, and did so in a tone that made me think bad news was to follow.

"NASCAR is big here. Like, really big," he said, as the other shook his head in sorrow.

Shudder.

But the bright side is that there are nine minor league teams in the state, and I had a free evening ahead of me once the interviews were over.

The Greensboro Bats were on the road, but the guys told me that just an hour east was Durham, home of the Durham Bulls of "Bull Durham" fame.


Josh Pahigian names The Durham Athletic Park, where the movie was filmed, as spot No. 15 in the 101 Baseball Places to See Before You Strike Out.

The tiny park still stands, but the team moved in to a larger stadium downtown in 1995. I didn’t feel comforable enough in the city to find both places, so:

Alternative Place No. 15A: Durham Bulls Athletic Park

The names are similar, but the parks are as different as cane be. The DAP was built in 1939 and sat 5,000, but that must be filling all the grassy areas, because the stands seem pretty small to me.


But the DBAP is a modern facility seating 10,000 for the now Triple-A Bulls. The brick park in intended to blend in with the surrounding American Tobacco Historic District, and a smoke stack with "Lucky Strike" written in white bricks rises beyond the third base stands.

Left field has a 35-foot wall dubbed "the Blue Monster" and atop it sits a larger recreation of the snorting "Hit the Bull, Win a Steak" sign from the movie.


The original is on display on the concourse.

I learned some cool things. The snorting bull was created for the movie — the DAP never had such a thing until then. And like most movie props, it wasn’t built to last.

Given the success of the "Bull Durham," I expected to see a lot of other movie-related items around the park.

Maybe a "Hit the Mascot" ball-tossing area or a "Paint Your Face Like a Mayan Lava Lizard" booth. But there was nothing.

I figured the team shop must have all kinds of things, even Bull Durham candlesticks to give as wedding presents.

But again, there was nothing. The team shop was pretty big, but nothing connected to the film was available.

Reporters are curious, so started asking questions.

"We really don’t do a lot with the movie," a clerk to told me. "It’s rated R. It’s not a family film. We think of ourselves of family entertainment."

Makes sense, and I enjoyed taking a seat in the stands. The Bulls were the Rays’ top farm club, and the Rochester Red Wings were affiliated with the Orioles. Durham won 11-5.

Randy Winn and Jose Guillen both homered for the Bulls, and Ed Galliard pitched. B.J. Ryan made what might have been his first appearance in the Orioles organization, having come over in a trade from the Reds two days prior.

I was a little disappointed I didn’t get over to the DAP, which still stands, and, according to reports, could soon be renovated for use as a training facility, college games and as a tourist site.

Greesnboro was a beautiful place and the people couldn’t have been nicer. I was offered the job, but had another offer that was better for the family. But I’m reminded of that lunch every time I pass the newsroom’s Coke vending machine — and it’s giant picture of late NASCAR diver Dale Earnhardt.

Candlesticks, canned Willie, Crenshaw and the rest of the Friday Five

Now that every baseball writer in the country has vented his spleen over the way the Mets fired Willie Randolph, can we move on?

Seriously, it’s like they were having a contest to out-outrage each other. And the main beefs didn’t have to do with whether Willie should have been booted. No. Their undies were in a bunch over the time of night and the distance from home.

Excuse me, sportswriters. Can you please tell me what is the acceptable time of day and distance from home to fire a manager?

I can deduce from the rantings that 3 a.m. East Coast time and 3,000 miles from New York is bad. So are we talking noon in Denver? Or 2 p.m. at a Sonic Burger in North Carolina? Maybe 10 a.m. at the White Castle near the Sunrise Mall?

Seriously, somebody out there deliver the guidelines because Mike Greenberg of ESPN radio is still worked up.

Two other managers got canned this week, but apparently the time and place of those firings met with the approval of the media, since spleens were left unvented.

Despite being distracted by the dismissal and the dissing, I am able to deliver a Deezo Friday Five in a relatively timely fashion.

1) So far, I like the Jerry Manuel era. He already has called Jose Reyes “she” because of his tantrum and said he’s like a “gangsta” threatening to “cut” players who don’t behave.

That means in two days, he’s delivered two interesting quotes, which is two more than what we heard from Willie during his 3.5 years on the job.



2) This week marks the 20th anniversary of “Bull Durham,” which, when you think about it, is a dumb title for a great movie. It’s like saying “Met New York” or “Empire Evil.”

SI.com interviewed director Ron Shelton about his favorite scene.

“Like most of the general public, I liked the meeting on the mound because I had to fight to keep it in the movie,” he said. “The studio kept saying the scene did not advance the plot. I said: 'There is no plot. It doesn't matter.' When we screened it for audiences, it was always the audience's favorite scene.”

Here’s the dialog:

(Larry jogs out to the mound to break up a players' conference)

Larry: Excuse me, but what the hell's going on out here?

Crash: Well, Nuke's scared because his eyelids are jammed and his old man's here. We need a live... is it a live rooster?

(Jose nods)

Crash: We need a live rooster to take the curse off Jose's glove and nobody seems to know what to get Millie or Jimmy for their wedding present.

Crash: Is that about right? [the players nod] We're dealing with a lot of shit.

Larry: Okay, well, uh... candlesticks always make a nice gift, and uh, maybe you could find out where she's registered and maybe a place-setting or maybe a silverware pattern. Okay, let's get two! Go get 'em.

Brilliant! But I would have asked him about the title.


3) Sidewalk chalk. My daughter likes rules. She’s destined to be a dorm R.A., if not the person overseeing the R.A. program, running it with an iron fist.

She was understandably outraged when someone in our neighborhood decided to walk their dog and allowed them to make a No. 2 deposit on our grass without scooping it up.

She proceeded to take a break from drawing otters on my driveway to offer on the sidewalk what we shall call “constructive criticism” to dog walkers, in graphic detail.

And the big block party is this weekend, when most of the neighborhood will be setting their folding chairs near that sidewalk.

Could be worse. There were no drawings of dead baby barn swallows. But we now have new rules about acceptable uses of sidewalk chalk.



4) My favorite part of the block party is the “extreme” bocce game.

The equipment is the same, but this isn’t the kind of thing you see in the parks with old guys gently rolling balls on small, flat courts.

In those games, someone rolls a small white ball called a jack. Then players roll larger balls at it, getting points for coming close to the jack.

In extreme bocce, you throw the jack overhand in any direction, with the entire neighborhood serving as the court. Backyards, front yards, across streets — it’s all in play. Someone’s flowerbed usually gets a little mussed up, but as long as nobody breaks a window, it’s all good. We praise each other for our difficult placements and yell "extreme!" whenever someone's petitunas are endangered.



5) This week’s Hidden iPod Gem harkens back to my days as a desk aide in the Nassau Community College Student Union.

Typically, my duties including wearing a gray smock-like shirt, answering an occasional question and helping with whatever events were scheduled for that evening. Some day I’ll tell you the story about helping Dr. Ruth with her projector.

But one fun part was being around when bands came in for their soundchecks. Marshall Crenshaw was in during his “Field Day” tour, warmed up by playing “Someday, Someway,” which was neat, and “Whenever You’re on My Mind,” which was and is one of my favorite songs.

Crenshaw fans bemoan the “Field Day” mix, saying the drums are too high, vocal too low and everything else too muddy. That may be. But I still love “Whenever...”

Here's a clip of him singing it recently in a place that looks like the Student Ballroom look like a career highpoint.

The Major-Leaguer, the Actor and the Truth

He was getting the knuckler!

Will and I were so into Wiffle Ball that we carried a ball and bat in our trunks at all times. You never know when you’ll come across a great place for a game.

We had one of those moments in Chicago in 1990. We were excited to be in town to cover the historic final game at Comiskey Park and arrived the day before because we snagged tickets for the final night game as well.

With some time on our hands before the game, we headed to Wrigley Field to check out the souvenir shops. To our great glee, we discovered a perfect strike zone painted on stadium wall along Waveland Avenue.
Will delivers to the alleged Major-Leaguer.

We were happily breaking off curves like Greg Maddux from the center of the street when two guys came up to us, amazed that we would be playing Wiffle Ball alongside Wrigley Field.

They wanted to play, and when we hesitated they tried to impress us. One was tall and stocky, and claimed to have a cup of coffee with the 1987 World Champion Minnesota Twins, even flashed what appeared to be a championship ring. The other was slender and dark, and claimed to be an actor with a role in "Bull Durham."

Reporters are skeptical by nature, of course.

I didn’t recognize the name of the guy who claimed to be a former Twin. I had a pretty good knowledge of major leaguers since baseball card companies at the time issued extensive sets that included just about every player in the bigs as well as even minor prospects from the minors.
I'm taking this guy deep!

And Will is a walking baseball encyclopedia. In fact, if there was a contradiction between Will and the official baseball encyclopedia, I’d believe Will. And he didn’t recognize the name, either.

The guy did have a 1987 Twins ring, but that didn’t necessarily mean he was a player. Teams give rings to a lot of employees.

The other guy claimed to be an infielder in "Bull Durham," one of the guys on the mound when one of Nuke’s eyelids is clogged, Jose needs a live chicken to sacrifice and no one knows what to get Jimmy and Millie for their wedding. "Candle sticks," of course, was coach Larry Hockett’s answer.

The guy had the lines down pat, and we didn’t have any photos from the movie in hand for comparison purposes.

This was a little icky. It seemed like the kind of lines guys would be spouting trying to pick up girls over a bottle of Bud at the Cubby Bear after the game.

We told them we were in town for the final Comiskey games — a very big deal, the hottest ticket in town — and they didn’t seem to believe us, either.
No roof-top spectators for our big game.

Will and I exchanged some skeptical glances. It’s not like we could openly debate this in front of them. Lacking proof, we decided to let them play. We even took some photos — just in case they were legit. Although I must say the alleged Major-Leaguer couldn’t hit my nasty Wiffle knuckleball, making his claim that much more dubious. Note the photo, the knuckler is on the way!

After playing for a while, the guys moved on, presumably to hoist those brews at the Cubby Bear.

"What do you think, were they telling the truth?" I asked Will.

"Who knows," Will replied. "They may be lying. But we know for sure that we really are going to the final game at Comiskey!"