"Besseball been berry goot to me"

By now all of you should know, I love baseball. I started watching pre-season Major League Baseball back in March, but the real games started on April 2, and I was right there to begin a season of watching.

There aren’t many familiar names who stay with one team. The Cubs—Chicago Cubs—are my favorite, but Yadier Molino has stayed with the St. Louis Cardinals long enough for me to remember him. He’s their catcher and a talented hitter.

When I got serious about following the Cubs, they had one player who stood out—Sammy Sosa. I remember the joke about his thick Dominican accent saying “Besseball been berry goot to me.” Yes, the financial rewards and star status were far from his roots in the Dominican Republic.

His father died when Sammy was very young, so he went to work selling oranges and shining shoes to help his mother support the family of six kids.

By the age of 15, Major League scouts wanted to sign him, but he was too young. At 16, in 1985, he was working out at the Toronto Blue Jays camp, and the Texas Rangers signed him. He made his Major League debut in 1989, hitting a home run. That was the first of many.

In March 1992, he joined the Cubs. In 1997 he met Mark McGwire. That’s when he signed a four-year contract with the Cubs for $42.5 million, and his home run hitting contest began with Mark McGwire.

That’s also when Sosa began answering one question from reporters, with the familiar phrase, “Besseball been berry goot to me.” I suppose it wasn’t politically correct to laugh at the phrase back then, and it certainly isn’t today, but everyone who laughed loved Sammy Sosa. And we followed the Cubs.

Our daughter very generously bought us the baseball package on satellite television. Now we have more baseball than we can watch.

For those of you who don’t follow baseball, I apologize and won’t mention the sport again until the World Series; I promise.