Box Score from My First Baseball Game, Boston @ California, 6/13/73

I was not a member of the La Habra, California Boys' Club but had friends who were, and one night in June of 1973, when I was nine years old, I was invited along with several other boys to attend the first baseball game of my life, Boston Red Sox vs. California Angels at Anaheim Stadium. We had a black and white television at home and I watched as much baseball as I could; now, the thing I remember most vividly inside Angel Stadium that evening was my first glimpse of the grass, and how beautifully green it was, the most beautiful green I'd ever seen.

There is a website (www.retrosheet.org) doing the Lord's work - it has information on all baseball teams, players, trades, rule changes and a million other things INCLUDING complete box scores back into the 50s (and some even further back than that). So it occurred to me a couple of years ago that I could find the box score for the first game I'd ever been to, and I've attached a link to it here.

Wednesday, June 13th, 1973 - California Angels 7, Boston Red Sox 5 (@Anaheim)

As someone who has now been watching baseball for 40 seasons, a couple of things stood out for me which I'd like to share. And, of course, should you care to track down the box score for a game you attended in the way distant past and share that here, well, I'd love to talk about it (Jim Ciulik - THIS MEANS YOU!).

First, with regard to the Red Sox -

• I was a Tigers' fan then (and now - more on that in the next post) and didn't really understand the concept of the National League; I was somehow unaware there was another team to the west of us in Los Angeles (though that would change in 1974 when the Dodgers went to the World Series). I wound up becoming a big Dodgers' fan in 1976, and as a teenager my favorite Dodger was Reggie Smith, and here's Reggie batting second in the first game I ever attended.
• Fisk behind the plate, Yaz at 1B. Enough said, really.
• Cepeda at DH; 1974 would be his final year.
• Tommy Harper in LF.
  
• Aparacio at SS; 1973 would be his final year.
• And, just starting out, Dwight Evans in his first full season.

And, for the Angels -

• Sandy Alomar at 2B. His boys Robbie and Sandy Jr. played major league ball and they're both retired now.
• Frank Robinson at DH. Enough said redux.
• Behind the plate Jeff Torborg who, of course, went on to be a fairly successful major league manager for a number of years, and then a television analyst (and caught two of Nolan Ryan's no-hitters, as I recall).
  

IBL:mm