Cleveland Rocks!

For the second straight Friday, we had a great baseball adventure! Back in the spring, old friend Brian Hendrickson reached out to the Cleveland Indians to see if they would do something for Jack. They very generously sent him a nice gift package including an autographed picture of manager Terry Francona in addition to a couple Indians t-shirts.

Jack and his new signed Carlos Carrasco jersey

We thought that this was very nice of them, but much to my surprise, Curtis Danburg, who is the team's Senior Director of Communications and (as best we can tell)  one of the nicest folks you could hope to find, followed that up with a phone call inviting Jack and our family to come to a game of our choosing. This Friday's game fit perfectly between chemo treatments, family travels, and heading off to college. It was also of great interest to Jack because it was an opportunity to see Albert Pujols, Jack's favorite player dating back to the days when Pujols played for the Cardinals and we were in St. Louis. In fact, it was in emulation of Pujols that Jack played first base and has always selected uniform number five when given a choice!

We arrived at the ballpark about 4:00, and Curtis met us with four Indians caps and a bag with two baseballs in it for Jack to get autographed. He then took us down to the field, where the Indians pitchers were tossing. Once they got done, he brought over Carlos Carrasco. "Cookie" (as he's known) has been one of the top pitchers in the American League the last five years, with an ERA of 3.27, averaging over ten strikeouts per nine innings pitched. Earlier this season though, he was feeling lethargic before ultimately being diagnosed with leukemia, just like Jack.

Cookie and Jack

It was a great encouragement for Jack to meet a big leaguer battling with leukemia, and working hard to get back on the field. As Carrasco put it, "I like to say that I may have cancer, but cancer doesn't have me."  

Carrasco gave Jack a signed jersey, and autographed both a baseball and a card that we brought to the game.

After meeting with Carrasco, we stayed down on the field while the visiting Los Angeles Angels took batting practice. This was a real treat not only because we got to see Pujols, but also becasue we got to see Mike Trout, who is generally considered the best baseball player in the world. The ball did indeed jump off his bat in a way that was different than other players!

After batting practice, we were able to get Jack a couple more autographs: Angels outfielder Justin Upton signed a card we brought and Caroline got Trout to sign a baseball.

Carrasco wearing Jack's bracelet
for the ceremonial "first pitch"

One unplanned surprise came when they announced that the young man throwing out the first pitch was a 19-year old who four months ago was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (just like Jack). The Indians appropriately had Carrasco catch the pitch, and we were heartened when we noticed that he was wearing the bright orange "WE STAND TOGETHER" bracelet that we had given him earlier in the day! 

The Indians provided us with wonderful seats and we thoroughly enjoyed the game as the home team won handily, but we also got to see the great Trout hit a home run in his first at bat. 

After the game, they had a fireworks show scheduled celebrating the 50th anniversary of Woodstock. As the game was winding down, we were commenting to one another as to how we were going do need to move because the overhang above us was going to obstruct our view. No sooner had we begun to discuss this than we received a text from Curtis asking if we were staying for the fireworks, and if we were, would we like to watch them from the visitors' dugout? Of course we were thrilled to take him up on the offer! It was a great show and a fabulous we to top off an unbelievable experience at the ballpark! 

In the dugout post-game for fireworks

Fireworks at Progressive Field

Mike Trout and Albert Pujols stride to the batting cage pre-game

Trout signs for Caroline

Mike Trout's autograph

Carlos Carrasco 59

 

Take Me Out to the Ballgame!

Last year when the Cardinals came to Detroit, Jack had a really neat experience when he got to meet Cardinals pitcher Adam Wainwright and Cardinals manager Mike Shildt. What made it even better in the eleven months since is the fact that Shildt has been very intentional in staying in touch with Jack, regularly checking up on Jack's progress via text or phone. He also told Jack that if he got back to St. Louis and wanted to come to a game, to let him know and he would hook up our family with tickets.

We had a wonderful week in St. Louis, spending time with family, getting to see and touch the Stanley Cup, seeing Footloose at The Muny, going to Grant's Farm, and eating at some of our favorite restaurants, including Imo's, a dinner with the extended Scribner clan at Rich and Charlie's, a dinner at Cunetto House of Pasta on The Hill, and (count 'em!) four trips to Ted Drewes.

Our favorite ballplayer chats with our favorite manager

In Jack's estimation though, we saved the best for last, going to the Cardinals game on Friday night. Mike told us to get there by 4pm and he arranged for us to have field passes to watch the Cardinals take batting practice. While we were watching, he took time to come over and talk to Jack and the family, and was very encouraging, as he always seems to be!

As a promotional giveaway, we each received a jersey from one of the 2004 NL Champion Cardinals who were being honored over the weekend. During the game, we were able to catch up with my childhood friend, Craig Korte, as well as longtime friend of our family, Zach Smith.

As for the game itself, it was a thriller. With the Cardinals trailing 3-2 in the bottom of the eighth, Paul Goldschmidt hit a three-run home run to put the good guys on top to stay!

We followed the game up with a late night visit to Ted Drewes. On our way back to Grandma's house, Jack commented that this was just about as close to a perfect day as possible. As his parents, and given the way the last fourteen months have gone, I'm sure you understand that this was music to our ears!

The Cardinals welcome the Scribners to the game!

LET'S GO BLUES!

I was at the Monday Night Miracle. I own a cinder block from the Old Barn on Oakland Ave. I was on hand when The Great Gretzky first hit the home ice wearing the Bluenote.

Senior year of high school, with my date in formal attire for our school dance, I took her to the Blues game instead. We saw Gino Cavallini get a hat trick, and got free Arby’s because the Blues scored six goals. By the way, she & I have now been married for almost 24 years.

I grew up loving Wayne Babych, Bernie Federko, Mike Liut. Then Brett Hull, Adam Oates & Brendan Shanahan. Later Al MacInnis, Chris Pronger & Keith Tkachuk. I’ve always wanted 🎶to be in that number when the Blues go marching in!🎶

My heart still aches over the Blues losing Scott Stevens and Wayne Gretzky. In fact, “Judge Houston” and “Mike Keenan” are swear words in my opinion. And speaking of broken hearts, infamous shots from Willi Plett & Steve Yzerman have done it to me as well. 🏒💔

Then the other night, as I was at the store here in Michigan, I happened to hear a familiar tune ringing in my ears. Was it just the voices in my head? Or perhaps it was a positive omen for the Blues that I actually heard them 🎶playing Gloria...🎶

My entire life, I have dreamed about the Blues winning the Stanley Cup. Tonight they have a chance to make my dreams come true...

In light of this all, I leave you with these three simple words: LET’S GO BLUES!!!

Jack's Baseball Journey

2007 Muckdog, Jack Scribner

It was the summer of 2006 when I graduated from seminary and we moved from St. Louis to Flint, Michigan. Though Jack was just getting ready for first grade, he was already firmly entrenched as a Cardinals fan, a fact that soon would be very important. 

Just two months after we arrived in Michigan, the Cardinals were in the midst of an improbable postseason run. That run would end up leading them to the World Series, and as fate would have it, they ended up facing none other than the favorite team of all our new friends and neighbors: the Detroit Tigers. When the Cardinals prevailed four games to two, we may have been the only happy family in town! And the cherry on top came just four days after that Series ended. All the kids came to school on Halloween wearing their costumes, and much to his buddies' chagrin, Jack was thrilled to show up for school dressed as his favorite player: Cardinals first baseman, Albert Pujols!

The following spring we signed him up for Little League. I helped coach along with the dad of one of Jack's classmates. The first two years of our Little League experience, all the teams were named after minor league teams. For that 2007 season, we were assigned the Batavia Muckdogs of the New York-Penn League. We, of course, knew nothing about the Muckdogs (other than that they had a cool name!), but when I did a little research, I found out that starting with that season (after nearly two decades of being a minor league affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies), they would be an affiliate of (you guessed it!) the St. Louis Cardinals!

Jack meets Cardinals manager, Mike Shildt

We, of course, thought it was cool that our team was in the Cardinals farm system. It wouldn't be until many years later that we would find out our favorite fact about the Muckdogs. The hitting coach in Batavia that year was a relatively unknown coach named Mike Shildt. So both he and Jack were Muckdogs in 2007! More than a decade later in July of 2018, Shildt would become a Major League manager when he took over mid-season for the Cardinals.

Just a couple months after Shildt received that promotion, the Cardinals visited the Tigers in Detroit. We had a friend who gave us a couple tickets to the Saturday night game, and another friend who arranged for the opportunity to meet Shildt before the game. He was incredibly generous with his time and compassion, and showed deep and genuine concern about Jack's prognosis. I can hardly commend him enough for his kindness to Jack, as they continue to stay in contact with each other to this day, with him regularly checking on Jack to see how things are progressing. Even if he weren't the manager of our favorite team, he'd be our favorite manager!

Little League Champ

Getting back to Little League, just as Jack's first season had a special Cardinals connection, so too did his final year of Little League. In our first five seasons we were the Batavia Muckdogs, the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers, the New York Mets, the Florida Marlins, and the Milwaukee Brewers. When Jack was twelve years old though, we finally got to be the team we'd always wanted to be. And even better (from my perspective, anyway) the uniforms we wore were the cool powder blue road jerseys that the Cardinals wore in 1982 when I was eleven years old and they won the World Series!

Jack batted cleanup all season long, mostly playing first base and pitcher, as our team had an undefeated regular season. We won easily in the first two rounds of the playoffs, but fell behind 8-1 early in the championship game. We pulled within one after three at 12-11, and poured it on to take a 19-14 lead into the final inning.

Our opponents rallied though, and Jack came in to pitch when our top pitcher reached his pitch limit for the game. With the score 19-18, there were two men out, the tying run was on base, and the pressure was on. What an exciting (and nerve-wracking) experience it was as Jack struck out the other team's number three hitter to secure the Grand Blanc Little League championship!

After our twelve year old Little League season, five of our players and all three coaches made the transition to travel ball. We held tryouts to fill out our roster and formed a 13u team called the Michigan Mudcats.

Father and son, coach and player

Between playing in the Greater Flint Baseball League, playing an average of four tournaments each summer, playing fall ball, and being in a winter hitting league, the Mudcats pretty much became a year-round part of our life for the next five years, and many of Jack's teammates would become his very best friends. We were committed to fostering a family atmosphere with the team, and I think we succeeded. Even as many other teams disbanded as kids got older, our team stuck together all the way throughout high school for the boys. And we were able to have a competitive team through the years too, as we were always in the running for our league title, and actually won a pair of tournaments in Jack's last two years!

In addition to playing for the Mudcats, Jack also played for the school team throughout middle school and high school. Each year in school ball, Jack seemed to get off to a slow start, and each year he battled back to finish the season strong. In fact, in his final regular season game of high school, he went 3 for 3, even as he was visibly exhausted as a result of what we would soon find out was leukemia. He also likely already had leukemia less than three weeks earlier when he became just the second player on his team that year to go deep.

 

I was always proud of how hard Jack worked at baseball, and the fact that difficult challenges seemed to just push him to work harder, when many others might simply have given up. The same resilience and toughness that Jack demonstrated over the years in the sport that he loves, he has displayed over the last year in his battle with leukemia. As such, I'm thankful not just for the joyful memories, but also for the lessons learned from the greatest game there is.