{"id":167,"date":"2007-06-12T17:31:16","date_gmt":"2007-06-13T00:31:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.remarc.com\/craig\/?p=167"},"modified":"2007-06-12T17:31:16","modified_gmt":"2007-06-13T00:31:16","slug":"anniversaries-gardening-and-otherwise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/?p=167","title":{"rendered":"Anniversaries, gardening and otherwise"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Dock<\/a>Some folks see June 12 on the calendar and they think, that’s the anniversary of the launch of GardenRant<\/a>. (I sent good wishes and some music<\/a> to get the hippie chicks dancing.) But the GR women share that anniversary with the that of the greatest feat in baseball history<\/strong>, if not all of athletics.<\/p>\n

27 years ago today, June 12, 1970, Dock Ellis<\/a> of the Pittsburgh Pirates pitched a no hitter<\/strong> against the San Diego Padres while he claims he was tripping on LSD<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Long story short: Dock was partying and got his days mixed up and took acid around noon, only to discover he was to pitch that night. (Keven McAlester tells the whole story<\/a> artfully in the Dallas Observer.)<\/p>\n

All my personal experience with Dock’s drug of choice comes\u00c2\u00a0only\u00c2\u00a0from reading. But I believe him based on his quote:<\/p>\n

Sometimes the ball looked like a beach ball. Sometimes it looked like a dot.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sure, he was more wild than usual, walking 8 and hitting a couple of batters. But you gotta admit, that had to be one wild trip.<\/p>\n

The happy ending: Dock cleaned up his act and is now a prison drug counselor. In addition to sharing part of his name with this blog, if you listed his name as it might appear on a roster — last name first, first initial — it spells out the chemical that got the whole story started: Ellis, D.<\/p>\n

Needless to say, he got an article in High Times<\/a> magazine. But his accomplishment is also celebrated in a song by Chuck Brodsky<\/a>, whose Casey-at-the-bat style lyrics are enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame, not far from here:<\/p>\n

Dock Ellis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s No-No<\/strong><\/p>\n

Listen (mp3)<\/a><\/p>\n

Go buy Chuck’s Baseball Ballads<\/a> CD<\/p>\n

It was a lovely summer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s morning
\nAn off-day in LA
\nSo thought one Dock Ellis
\nAs he would later say
\nHis girlfriend read the paper
\nShe said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Dock, this can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be right…
\nIt says here that you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re pitching
\nIn San Diego tonight\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Got to get you to the airport\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\nAnd so off Dock Ellis flew
\nHis legs were a little bit wobbly
\nAnd the rest of him was too
\nTook a taxi to the ballpark
\nAn hour before the game
\nGave some half-assed explanation
\nFound the locker with his name<\/p>\n

Time came to go on out there
\nDown the corridor
\nThe walls were a little bit wavy
\nThere were ripples in the floor
\nHe went out to the bullpen
\nTo do a bunch of stretches
\nLoosen up a little
\nThrow his warm-up pitches<\/p>\n

All rose for the national anthem
\nPeople took off their hats
\nFireworks were exploding
\nThe cokes were already going flat
\nDock was back there in the dugout
\nSo many things to watch
\nSome players spit tobacco juice
\nOthers grabbed their crotch<\/p>\n

The umpire hollered, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Play Ball!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\nAnd so it came to be
\nDock\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Pirates batted first
\nAnd when they went down 1-2-3
\nDock\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s catcher put his mask on
\nAnd he handed Dock the ball
\nIt was 327 feet
\nTo the right & left field walls<\/p>\n

The Pirates took the field then
\nAnd Dock stood on the rubber
\nHe bounced a couple of pitches
\nAnd then he bounced a couple others
\nYou might say about that day
\nHe looked a little wild
\nThe lead-off batter trembled
\nNobody knew why Dock Ellis smiled<\/p>\n

You walk 8 and you hit a guy
\nThe things that people shout…
\nEspecially your manager
\nBut he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t take Dock out
\nDock found himself a rythym
\nAnd a crazy little spin
\nAmazing things would happen
\nWhen Dock Ellis zeroed in<\/p>\n

Sometimes he saw the catcher
\nSometimes he did not
\nSometimes he held a beach balll
\nOther times it was a dot
\nDock was tossing comets
\nThat were leaving trails of glitter
\nAt the 7th inning stretch
\nHe still had a no-hitter<\/p>\n

So he turned to Cash, his buddy
\nSaid, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I got a no-no going\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\nSpeaking the unspeakable
\nHe went back out there throwing
\nBottom of the ninth
\n& He stood high upon the mound
\n3 more outs to go
\nHe\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d have his name in Cooperstown<\/p>\n

First up was Cannizzaro
\nWho flied out to Alou
\nKelly grounded out for Dean
\nThe shortstop yelled, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s two\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\nIt must\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been a mad house
\nThe fans upon their feet
\nThe littler ones among them
\nStanding on their seats<\/p>\n

Next up would\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been Herbel
\nBut Spezio pinch-hit
\nHe took a 3rd strike looking
\nAnd officially, that was it
\nIt was a lovely summer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s morning
\nAn off-day in LA
\nSo thought one Dock Ellis
\nAs he would later say<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some folks see June 12 on the calendar and they think, that’s the anniversary of the launch of GardenRant. (I sent good wishes and some music to get the hippie chicks dancing.) But the GR women share that anniversary with the that of the greatest feat in baseball history, if not all of athletics. 27 … Continue reading “Anniversaries, gardening and otherwise”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-167","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meta","category-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ellishollow.remarc.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}