Tremendous time at the third Queens Baseball Conference at Katch Astoria. I am 3-for-3 in QBC and had plans to go to the one snowed out last year. This was the first time I was on a panel, thanks to Greg Prince. Bill Ryczek, Greg, and I were the anchorman panel to close out the event, commemorating the 50th anniversary of Tom Seaver’s debut season of 1967. I got a little worried when I saw that Greg and Bill had written remarks, but luckily I brought along a Seaver Danbury Mint statue (making its outside my laundry room debut) plus a copy of the latest edition of 100 Things Mets Fans Should Know and Do Before They Die, which has numerous Tom Seaver chapters to choose from. Greg assigned me the saddest Seaver day: June 15, 1977. I read chapter 13: “The Seaver Deal.” One person said he got misty during it.
Well, that made my day. So did getting a gift of a 1976 bicentennial patch from Mets memorabilia man Jessie Burke, winning a signed Ron Hunt ball in a silent auction from Scott Green’s Play at the Plate booth, jawing with old pal and uniform creator/historian Todd Radom, and meeting former MLB PR man Jeff Heckleman plus Mets pregame host Pete McCarthy. And of course old friends Sharon and Kevin Chapman, Arnold Dorman, Mets by the Numbers founder, author, and pal Jon Springer, Uni Watch’s Paul Lukas, Game of My Life New York Mets author Michael Garry, Mr. Met, and the organizers of the event, including Shannon Shark and Dan Twohig, who also aided in a couple of books of mine that came out last year. And there are other names I am too tired to drop. It was just a fantastic time. It always gets me geared up for the baseball season and to get back to work writing about baseball. I am still in the midst of a hiatus I have to take every few years to keep sane. There really is nothing like the Mets community—because anyone else would have given up on the whole thing long ago. But fans do not give up easy. Or forget. God bless ya!
