It was 50 years ago today.

I was 11 years old, and my dad and I rode the subway from his parents' neighborhood in Brooklyn across Manhattan and up to the Bronx to see an Independence Day doubleheader between the Yankees and the Detroit Tigers. There were 74,246 fans at Yankee Stadium that day, and I remember to this day where we sat. We were in the second deck down the right-field line, where we could look down and see Roger Maris in right field and Mickey Mantle in center.

That Detroit team was one of the best in history <em>not</em> to win the pennant; indeed, the Tigers' 101 victories left them <em>eight</em> games behind what might have been the best team in baseball history at the end of the season. Frank Lary, who had a reputation as a "Yankee killer," pitched the Tigers to a 4-3, 10-inning victory in the first game, but Whitey Ford cruised to a 6-2 victory and the split in the second game. Ford, who improved his record to 15-2, would win 25 games and lose only four that year.

[caption id="attachment_1236" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Maris, batting, and Mantle in 1961"]<a href="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/yankee-stadium-006.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-1236" title="yankee-stadium-006" src="http://mikerappaport.net/onevoice/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/yankee-stadium-006-300x180.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="180" /></a>[/caption]

I didn't remember who had pitched that day -- I had to look it up -- but I did remember that Roger Maris hit his 31st home run on the way to his record 61 off Lary in the eighth inning.

It's funny. I don't remember a whole lot of holidays specifically anymore. I remember Thanksgiving 1974 for the horrible memory of Clint Longley's late-game touchdown pass that lifted the hated Dallas Cowboys over the Washington Redskins, but except  for that and Independence Day 1961, not so many memories have lasted.

I have a wonderful memory of Maris, of sitting in nearly empty stands in Gastonia, N.C., in August 1982, of watching his son Kevin play while I interviewed him.

He was dead at the age of 51 a little more than three years later.

Cancer.

When I'm asked to describe myself, I always say I love my wife, I love my kids and my granddaughter, my friends and family and I love baseball. It's that simple. I have numerous interests, but none of them will ever surpass my love of baseball. Nothing has ever provided me with as many memorable experiences as baseball, or introduced me to as many fascinating people.

I have interviewed Maris, Henry Aaron, Jim Palmer, Catfish Hunter, Boog Powell, Vida Blue, Pete Rose, Don Drysdale and numerous others one-on-one. I have covered minor-league teams managed by former big leaguers Lloyd Merritt, Tim Flannery and Marty Barrett. I had great relationships with all three, and one of the friendships that I treasure the most was with Walter Masterson, who pitched 15 seasons in the majors and died three years ago at age 87.

So many memories.

I remember swearing after the 1994-95 strike that if there was ever another one, I would never attend another ballgame for the rest of my life. It hasn't happened yet, but I don't think I could keep that promise. My grandfather loved baseball to the end of his life and so did my dad. I'm pretty sure I'll be exactly the same in that respect.

http://youtu.be/9mjgUK9UAzA

I wouldn't be so selfish as to say that when I die, I'd like it to be at a ballpark. It's kind of selfish to ask people to take your body somewhere. But I certainly wouldn't mind falling asleep for the last time with a game -- preferably late at night from the West Coast -- on the radio.

<em>Strike three, you're out?</em>

Not at all.

Safe at home.

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