Homer Hawks? Lawk 'Em Up

Michael Cox

I hate home run vultures. They've annoyed me from the first time I set foot in a major-league ballpark. They fight over $9 balls so that they can get 'em signed (sometimes via kids) and sell 'em to the local sports card shop. They push each other, and often kids, aside as they track their prey. They stare down ushers who try to tell them to stay in their seats.

Then they put that home run ball in their pocket and get ready to try for the next one.

They are less than men.

Have you ever noticed that at minor-league parks, there's never a clot of grown men competing for homers like there are in the majors? That's because those balls are only worth $6, regardless of who hit them.

The ante has been upped even further in this Year of the Homer. People are stomping over their fellow man to get a McGwire or Sosa HR ball like it's one of Willy Wonka's golden tickets, turning that dark underbelly of the home run derby into a cautionary tale very much like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Sure, a few of the lucky folks, usually kids, have given back the home run balls for little more than some team gear. Tim Forneris, who caught Mac's number 62, had little choice: he works for the Cardinals. Besides, he's gotten a free Disney vacation and all the fame Warhol promised despite it all.

However, others weren't so altruistic...or were they just greedy? John Witt, who caught Sosa's 61st, apparently went directly to his friendly memorabilia dealer and sold the ball for $7.5K. Not a lot of money, you say? Nope, it isn't, making Witt doubly distasteful to me. Not courageous enough to give the ball to the man who hit it, he didn't even hold out for what the ball was really worth.

John Witt calls himself a "ball hawk." He catches balls day in and day out. Over 1,700 since the early '80s, by his own reckoning. He says he's unemployed. Some might say he makes his living (such as it is) catching and selling balls. And don't even ask about the guy who left Waveland Avenue with Sosa's number 62 - the police have been forced to investigate conflicting claims by grown men who wrestled for the prize.

Deni Allen caught McGwire's 60th dinger, and gave it back soon after in return for season tickets and gear worth thousands, and for a chance to take batting practice with the Cards. At the time, he said he wouldn't trade the experience for anything, but now, whether because of a change of heart or embarrassment at the ribbing of some friends, he wants more.

"The Cardinals have a wonderful opportunity that comes once in history to do the right thing," Allen told reporters. That "right thing" sounds suspiciously like opening the wallet and pulling out a wad of money.

Witt, on the other hand, was unrepentant. "It was my ball and my decision to sell it. If people want to call me greedy, that's their problem." You're wrong - it's my pleasure.

The main excuse given for this avarice is that players make so much - implying that there's some sort of gross inequity involved. Even the wire story that introduced me to Witt called the concept of returning a ball, "donations to a millionaire ballplayer." As we've covered on these pages before, you never hear of people boycotting films because of "overpaid millionaire actors," or refusing to watch Seinfeld because Jerry makes roughly three times what McGwire gets.

Yet still it doesn't hurt to ask for your "fair share" from the rich, rich ballplayer because you happened to be in the way, between that ball and Cooperstown. I'm here to tell you, you don't deserve any more than the guy who caught Richie Sexson's third home run, especially if you pushed aside fellow human beings to get it.

Fortunately, even with the mercenaries all around, the ball often bounces with some sort of guidance from fate. Wednesday night's Sosa homer number 63 was caught by Fabian Perez Mercado of Tijuana, Mexico, whose entire family kissed the orb before his 2-year-old son presented it to Sosa. Perez Mercado attended the game, as he often has, because he wanted to see a star Latin player, and was sitting in the seat next to the spot where the ball landed.

For braving the rugby scrum that formed around him, his family received some game-worn gear and some Padres playoff tickets, and had no regrets. Perez Mercado, was elated to meet Sosa, shouting, "Viva Dominican Republic! Viva Mexico! Viva baseball!"

I don't care if you think it's a cliche, or so much romantic bullshit, Perez Mercado, a bakery manager, knows that he's the rich man.

 

about the author

Michael Cox has personally avoided catching numerous home runs and foul balls in his baseball-watching career, thus avoiding thorny issues like payment or sore hands. Tell him you believe the latter more than the former at mc@strikethree.com.