Yes, I accidentally ‘stole’ Derek Jeter’s plane seat.
That occurred in February 1997, and I wrote about it 13 years later. It was published in MLB Insiders Club Magazine,1 which, I believe, is now defunct. I’ve taken the liberty of reposting the story here.
When I saw Mr. Jeter walking towards me, I couldn’t believe my eyes. At that time, he was a second-year MLB player, and he was already a hero to many of us Yankees fans. The fall before that February, he hit an infamous home run to beat the Baltimore Orioles during the first game of the 1996 American League Championship series. That was the year when the Yankees upset the Atlanta Braves in the World Series.
You know the rest of the story when you read the reposting, but it was (and is still) shocking that Mr. Jeter had to sit with all of us regular passengers for a flight trip from Tampa to Detroit. It was not only because he was a star player but also because he’s a Hall of Famer as well as a current minority owner and the CEO of the Miami Marlins. It’s ironic because the Marlins, which started out as the Florida Marlins, defeated Mr. Jeter and his Yankees in the 2003 World Series. That was the only year during which Mr. Jeter and Curtis Pride, the other subject of my above publication, were teammates. Unfortunately, Mr. Pride was with the Yankees for a brief period of time before being released (he played four games and had only one hit, a home run against the hated Boston Red Sox).2,3
There was one time when I had hoped to watch Mr. Pride play during a game between the Yankees and the Detroit Tigers in the spring of 1997. David, a peer of mine, and I decided to play hooky from the Kresge Hearing Research Institute (KHRI) at the University of Michigan so that we could go to the Tigers Stadium for the game because we were (and still are) Yankees fans. However, Mr. Pride did not play in the game, which the Yankees won. He didn’t play for the Tigers as much as he did the previous year because he was hurt early in the season and his replacement (e.g., a rookie) had continued to play well late into the season, all but eliminating Mr. Pride’s opportunity to participate as an everyday player for the season. It was quite disappointing because he played very well for the Tigers the year before. Statistically, it was his best year.3
Concerned, I noticed Mr. Pride had been missing from the Tigers’ activities late into the season, and I wondered why. One day, I saw the announcement that Mitch Albom, a sports columnist at Detroit Press, would autograph his book Tuesdays with Morrie at a Barnes & Noble bookstore at the Briarwood Mall in Ann Arbor. I already had the book, but I thought perhaps Mr. Albom might have known more about Mr. Pride. So I went to the mall and met Mr. Albom there. He took time not only to autograph my book but also to inform me that the Boston Red Sox picked Mr. Pride up late in the season. I later learned that the Tigers released him in August 1997 before he joined the Red Sox.3
Since 2009, Mr. Pride has been the head baseball coach at Gallaudet University.4 Even though I’ve discussed Curtis Pride many times, I’ve had only one close encounter with Mr. Pride. I was a senior scientist at the newly established Molecular Genetics Laboratory at Gallaudet University from September 2008 to April 2009. Towards the end of my stay there, I saw Mr. Pride and his players on the baseball field. He was hired in late 2008, and I saw him coaching his players how to properly pick up a hit baseball with their gloves. Of course, anyone could catch a baseball, but Mr. Pride had played professional baseball for a long time and taught his players how to do so in a professional (or at least a proper) way. It was interesting to observe an oral deaf individual such as Mr. Pride trying to communicate with his players, who were experts in American Sign Language (ASL), but not in spoken English, and it was even more interesting that Mr. Pride repeatedly used a simple gesture (not even ASL) to explain to his players how to pick up and throw a baseball. He’d catch and pick up the ball with his glove with his right hand behind it, and lift it up to his chest. Then, he’d take the ball with his right hand and pretend to properly throw it. It seems so easy, but players, even very good ones, often forget the basic steps of fielding a ground ball on the field.
However, that’s not the close encounter I was talking about. One day, I was eating my lunch only a few feet away from Mr. Pride in the main cafeteria at Gallaudet, but I couldn’t bring myself to say hi to him. He’d probably think I’m a crazed fan if I had no other reason to meet him. I also didn’t want to be part of the reason that Mr. Pride might feel there were too many crazed fans at Gallaudet so that he would leave his job prematurely. No matter, he’s been there for over 10 years now.
I wrote twice to Mr. Pride, but he didn’t respond to me either time. I don’t remember why I wrote to him the first time, but I do recall the reason for my second time. The Association for Research in Otolaryngology conference (ARO; www.aro.org) was looking for a professional athlete with hearing loss to give a talk during the annual conference in Baltimore in February 2019. Keith, a professor at KHRI (who shares with me the same Ph.D. advisor, Dr. James Saunders at UPenn), was responsible to find one, and asked me if I knew anyone with hearing loss. I replied that I would contact Mr. Pride. So, I emailed him but didn’t hear from him. Eventually, Keith was able to contact Tamika Catchings, a women’s basketball great with hearing loss.5,6
I enjoyed several pleasant conversations with Ms. Catchings at ARO. When I first met her, I wasn’t sure how she would identify herself with regard to her hearing loss. So, I asked her a question using the ‘deaf’ identity. She corrected me by identifying herself as hard of hearing, which is fine with me – you may have read several of my blogs discussing how one could identify oneself with regard to hearing loss.7,8 We communicated in spoken English. She even autographed a basketball for my nephew Robby, who is wearing cochlear implants.
It’s remarkable that one thing led to another, which led to another. That is, my hearing loss started the whole thing, culminating in my career in Hearing Research plus encounters with Mr. Jeter and other professional athletes with hearing loss.
Postscript: In case one is confused about the geography of Florida, St. Petersburg Beach is about 45 minutes’ drive from the Tampa International Airport. My publication1 indicates St. Petersburg Beach, and my current blog says Tampa. Hence the potential confusion.
References
1Adler, H.J. (2010) Airborne with the Captain. MLB Insiders Club Magazine 3(3):6.
3Curtis Pride – Society for American Baseball Research (sabr.org)
4Curtis Pride Bio – Gallaudet (gallaudetathletics.com)
6Tamika Catchings | Speaker. Community Leader. Athlete.
Wonderful article/story, I recall you telling me about it years ago. I’m still jealous! Also on my bucket list because of you is a trip to North Dakota to see the museum dedicated to Maris.
The Roger Maris Museum is an enlarged window display at a mall in Fargo, North Dakota. How this museum was established is quite interesting — please see link: https://westacres.com/attractions/roger-maris-museum/.