What is the most powerful baseball memory from your childhood?

[RFS62]

Like many others, I rode the train to Cincinnati for my first game as a kid. Yeah, steam power had been invented by then.

Walking through the portal and seeing that field for the first time was a religious experience to me. I'll never forget it. And I take a moment every time I walk into a big league park now just to gaze across the field as I first see it. It always reminds me of that first time.

Playing, I stole home against our most hated rivals in my final game against them my senior year in high school. Only time I ever tried it. I remember every second of it, from the decision to try, to timing his move on the first pitch with a walking lead, to the thrill of taking off the second he toed the rubber and started his motion.

[Cedric]

May 19th, 1990.

Day after my bday and my favorite player scrapes a game winning homer over the LF wall. 1-0 Reds win. Good ol' Paul.

[BoydsOfSummer]

May 19th, 1990.

Day after my bday and my favorite player scrapes a game winning homer over the LF wall. 1-0 Reds win. Good ol' Paul.

I was at that game, it was pretty cool. One of the more exciting games I can remember being at.

[thatcoolguy_22]

Fan:

I was 7 during the 1990 team. I remember watching the World Series with my parents and Running around the "bases" (ie around the house) after every homerun. My mom still brings it up from time to time.


Player:

First
Hitting my first ever home run in little league that happened to be in the semi final of the ga world series (we were not apart of the little league association yet). The cool part was that it was a grand slam in the bottom of the 6th or 7th (I don't remember how many innings we played) and we were down 2 runs to win the game. My dad still has it on VHS.

Second
Playing SS and catching a funny hop with my face, playing varsity ball my junior year of high school. First round of the playoffs and a liner hit in front of me. I took a step in and it took a bad bounce off a rock directly into my nose (broken) and knocked me unconscious. I woke up a few minutes/seconds later to see the coach, trainer and 2 team mates looking at me and I asked, "what time is it?"

[hebroncougar]

Going way back to my childhood, I can remember going to kid glove games against the Tigers for a couple of years with tickets from my knothole team. Walking across the Suspension Bridge was always cool. I can remember going to this game in high school: http://www.baseball-reference.com/bo...98807190.shtml, because the Reds scored 10 runs in the first inning, and Rijo hit a HR in the game as well.

[Falls City Beer]

Going way back to my childhood, I can remember going to kid glove games against the Tigers for a couple of years with tickets from my knothole team. Walking across the Brent Spence Bridge was always cool. I can remember going to this game in high school: http://www.baseball-reference.com/bo...98807190.shtml, because the Reds scored 10 runs in the first inning, and Rijo hit a HR in the game as well.

I noticed they had 28,000 on that Tuesday night game back in 1988. Stiflingly hot summer that year too. Pretty solid attendance for a team that was a game under .500 at the time.

[redsmetz]

I did recall my one singular moment, again in softball. I was playing catcher and I remember the batter got a hit. Our outfielder fielded it and hit the cut off man. I remember being amazed that we hit the cut off man (we weren't very good overall) and the guy turned and threw it to me at the plate. I fielded the ball as the runner slid hard into me, upending me as as I applied the tag and landed face first on the ground. I held the gloved ball up and the umpire declared him out.

I then turned towards the crowd and a friend in the stand said and she said something about I didn't look so good. Turns out my nose was broken and off to the hospital I went. Ended up having surgery a month later and the girl I was dating came up to the hospital to visit me and the rest is, as they say, history. She did say the following season she wasn't interested in me coming to the wedding with two black eyes again, so I should take it easy in the months before the wedding.

Turns out the player who upended me was the brother of a guy who came to our church. Some years ago when my son was starting at St. X, we were in some orientation and the women next to me had the same last name. I asked if she was related to our friend and she was. I then asked if her husband played softball and she said, no that was another brother-in-law. I told her the story and she said she'd have to bring it up at the next family gathering.

I saw some time later in the school year and she said she had brought it up and her brother-in-law took umbrage, said he'd been safe, etc. The nieces and nephews had a great time with him getting upset 20+ years later. I told her that the only person whose opinion counted said he was out.

It's still amazing to me that we hit cut off man.

[hebroncougar]

Not a childhood memory......but I saw a lot of people were mentioning high school ball, I coached a local Kentucky HS Team, and we beat the absolute best team I've ever seen (A team that finished as state winner with a 41-3 and I believe ranked #1 in the midwest region that year) 1-0 in a regular season game. We had our #2 against their #2 pitcher, we played flawless ball. One of my highlights of coaching over the 8 years of so that I coached. The kids played great, and I was extremely proud of them rising to the occasion.

[westofyou]

Stiflingly hot summer that year too.

Miserable summer, hot as all get out, no rain, and me stuck in Fairfax for 6 weeks.

[Falls City Beer]

Miserable summer, hot as all get out, no rain, and me stuck in Fairfax for 6 weeks.

The summer I met my wife--some pretty happy memories of that summer for me; I associate it with the heat, Warehouse: Songs and Stories, and cheap beer.

[princeton]

Playing, I stole home against our most hated rivals in my final game against them my senior year in high school. Only time I ever tried it. I remember every second of it, from the decision to try, to timing his move on the first pitch with a walking lead, to the thrill of taking off the second he toed the rubber and started his motion.

li'l princeton's team plays on the bigger field this spring, so they get to lead off. li'l princeton walked twice on Sunday, and both times proceeded to steal second, third, and home. pitcher was a lefty.

batter swung on the second play. the boy's future will include plastic surgery.

[westofyou]

The summer I met my wife--some pretty happy memories of that summer for me; I associate it with the heat, Warehouse: Songs and Stories, and cheap beer.

Me too.. kinda, I was wooing my wife at the expense of a summer in Berkeley. A couple highlights were the AS game and Spuds.

[M2]

On TV - Joe Morgan blooping a single off of Jim Burton in game 7 of the 1975 World Series, putting the universe into working order.

Live - Sitting next to the cannons in CF at the Vet and nearly going deaf when the Phillies would hit a home run.

Playing the game - My first stolen base, which I liked so much I immediately went on to steal my second base on the next pitch.

[GoReds33]

I have a couple more to add:

When I played knothole, I loved bunting. Stealing bases was easy, but to get a bunt down was pretty hard for me. I was leading off what I believe was the second inning, and decided now was the time for the perfect bunt. I squared around, and fouled the ball off my face. It hurt very badly, but I was a trooper. I got right back in and hit a double.

A more recent one was David Ross's walkoff. The Reds were still in contention that year, IIRC. There was a packed house of about 35,000 that night. I cannot remember what the event was, maybe fireworks, or Sean Casey figurines. It was something like that. However, the pitch prior, he fouled it back to the screen, and everybody was on their feet. Then he proceeded to launch it over the fence in center. I still see Jim Edmonds trying to climb that wall in center. It was a great moment.

[Root Down]

As a fan: The first Reds game I went to was in 1990 (I was in the third grade). I remember very distinctly my dad telling me that we could be watching a World Series Champion team. Sure enough later that year I remember watching the Reds sweep the series on TV. A few years later dad took me to an opening day game and I got to see the parade. That was a pretty memorable experience as well. After that, I remember all too well when my favorite player, Ken Griffey Jr., came to my favorite team.

As a player: I played through high school and had a lot of good memories from that, but the most powerful comes from little league. I was in a 9-10 year old league and was on the younger side of the age bracket at the time. I had been pitching throughout the year and was a little guy compared to the other kids. I was a lefty and threw real hard for my size but was kind of wild (accuracy came a few years later, after many hit batters ). But the game I remember most came in the end of year tournament. I came in to pitch relief for the last half of the game with a one run deficit. After one inning it started to rain. There was no lightening but there was more rain that night than I would play in for the rest of the 15 year span of my baseball years. It was a miracle I was able to get the ball over the plate and they wouldn't call the game because they would have to move the whole tournament back (wasn't going to happen). So we played in the downpour with mud puddles building up in the infield. I didn't give up any runs but we didn't score any more either, so it ended in a tough loss. Tough enough that I remember it still.