ANNALS OF COOPERSTOWN

At 72, He Ends His  Baseball Career

With Dignity – At Doubleday Field

Editor’s Note: Doug Davis, 72, of Windham, Maine, fulfilled a lifelong dream this fall:  At 72, he pitched from the mound in Cooperstown’s Doubleday Field.   This is republished from The Freeman’s Journal and Hometown Oneonta newspapers of Nov. 5-6.

By DOUG DAVIS • Special to AllOTSEGO.com

On Sunday, Oct. 11, on Doubleday Field, I played my last baseball game.

For years I’d wanted to play a game on Doubleday, but for insurance reasons or unavailability it never happened.

I’d been coming up for years to see friends I played for or with, inducted into the hall, and learned to love this town. It is Baseball Heaven.

Last year, I invited a friend of mine, who had never been here, to come up with his wife and share a fall weekend with us in your town.

We came up Columbus Day weekend, and enjoyed the Cooperstown experience.

On Saturday morning, my wife Deb was walking our puppy when she spotted a group of guys in their late 50s, early 60s loading their cars with baseball equipment, and they began to talk.

The subject got around to me and my buddy Gary, as she filled them in on my background. She asked if they ever needed players, and the fella told her that he would tell the manager about us, and he’d call us later that evening.

I was shocked, we got the call from Jack Galante. He is their manager. Jack had been coming up to Cooperstown for years to play ball. We met for about 15 minutes and he told me that he would love to have us join him next Columbus Day weekend 2015.

At my age I’d pretty much given up at ever fulfilling this dream, and here it was for the taking.

I actually got as nervous as a schoolboy, it had been almost 14 years since I had played, and I didn’t want to look like a fool, so I began going to the gym and strengthening my arm for my one last chance.

We got up here to Cooperstown on Friday, Oct. 9, and met some of the guys. We played a game in Milford on Saturday and I got a chance to feel a bit more at ease. I played first base, and hit the ball hard every time up, but the challenge would come the next day when I toed the mound on Doubleday.
I got up early on Sunday, pulled up my stirrups and put on my uniform.

Father Time is mean man, he steals your abilities, talents and even your looks, but he’ll leave you just enough to think you still can still recapture the past. But on this day, I will push him aside. He will not take this opportunity from me, not on this day, not on America’s ballfield.

Today I am 20-years-old, I will feel the sun on my wrinkled old face, and the grass under my feet, and I will prevail in spite of the odds.

Jack asked me to warm up down the left-field line, and in jest I asked my catcher if they had moved home plate back 10 feet. It felt that way.

When the game started, I almost felt reborn. I took the mound and I got the side out in order. When I got to the dugout I asked the guys not to speak with me because I was pitching a perfect game, they all laughed.

In the second and third innings there were a few errors behind me, and a few hits, as my pitch count went to around 70. As I completed the fourth inning, I knew that I could only go one more inning, and I asked Jack to get someone warmed up.

I walked back to the mound in the fifth and reality hit me. I was throwing the final pitches in the final game of my life.

I got the first two batters out on three pitches, and I didn’t want to throw to the next batter, because he could be my last.

I asked the ump if I could have a minute and he said sure. I walked to the back of the mound and took in this beautiful historic field, one final time.

I yelled over to Deb, “Well, this is it.” What I worked so hard for, what I had dreamed would happen, happened, and in a few minutes would be over.

One pitch, the batter grounds out to second and my baseball life had ended in a grand and wonderful fashion.

As I walked toward the dugout, all of the guys came out and formed a line.

Guys who were strangers 48 hours before, today were friends. They had found out from someone in my group that this was my swan song, and I got hugs and congratulations from all of them. There were even a few guys on the other team standing and applauding.

I was a mess. I ran over to Deb and grabbed her. She said, “I’m so proud of you” and that put me over the top. I ran around the back of the building and cried like a baby.

There is crying in baseball.

This was never about Winning or losing, ERAs or batting average, it was about this love I’ve always had for this game. It was somehow, at the age of 72, ending it with dignity.

I left everything in me on the ballfield, I was drained both emotionally and physically. I am so grateful for this opportunity Cooperstown was responsible for. I am just one of the millions of stories connected to baseball and this town.

One of the millions who loved and played this game.

And in a few minutes would be over.
One pitch, the batter grounds out to second and my baseball life had ended in a grand and wonderful fashion.

As I walked toward the dugout, all of the guys came out and formed a line.

Guys who were strangers 48 hours before, today were friends. They had found out from someone in my group that this was my swan song, and I got hugs and congratulations from all of them. There were even a few guys on the other team standing and applauding.

I was a mess. I ran over to Deb and grabbed her. She said, “I’m so proud of you” and that put me over the top. I ran around the back of the building and cried like a baby.

There is crying in baseball.

This was never about Winning or losing, ERAs or batting average, it was about this love I’ve always had for this game. It was somehow, at the age of 72, ending it with dignity.

I left everything in me on the ballfield, I was drained both emotionally and physically. I am so grateful for this opportunity Cooperstown was responsible for. I am just one of the millions of stories connected to baseball and this town.

One of the millions who loved and played this game.