What's the Big Deal About Opening Day?

I have a confession to make.  I have never ever attended an opening day game.  Call me cheap or what have you, but I never pulled the trigger and actually attended an opening day game.  The one time I landed opening day tickets was to a San Francisco Giants home game.  I promptly sold them for a hefty profit.  It makes me wonder what kind of fan I truly am.

I came close to attending a home opener in 1976.  My brother, friends and I landed Left Field Pavilion seats for April 12, 1976, against the Padres.  It turned out to be the one and only time I was absolutely drenched at Dodger Stadium.  The second time a game at Dodger Stadium was rained out.  We waited for three hours in the rain and finally left just before they called the game.  It was to be a nationally televised and I distinctly remember watching Tommy John get interviewed under an umbrella in front of the center field camera near the warning track.  I think it was Tony Kubek doing the interview, but I could be wrong.

Tommy John

We stood there in the unsheltered Pavilion arguing amongst ourselves whether to stay or go.  The guard at the exit had told us that if the game was played after we left, we’d not be reimbursed for our tickets.  Francis Friedman told me to wait it out, “We never get rained out, just one time in 14 years,” she said.  Half of our group wanted to stay and half wanted to go.  I just remember that my clothes were soaking wet and I was miserable.  We left and they called the game a few minutes later.

I guess if I was living in L.A., I would have definitely attended a home opener by now.  The opportunity just hasn’t occurred.  I mean, if you think about it, it’s just one of 162.  It is 0.061 % of the season.  It is so insignificant that I can’t really remember many meaningful opening day games.  Well, maybe a few come to mind.

                                                           AP Photo, E.J. Flynn

I remember when Kevin Brown faced Randy Johnson on opening day in 1999 and both of them got schalacked and Raul Mondesi had a game winning hit in extra innings.  I remember in 1977 how the excitement of opening day fanfare and pageantry had its air deflated like a popped balloon when Don Sutton gave up a homer to the Giant leadoff hitter, Gary Thomasson on the very first pitch.  As memorable as that was, before I looked it up I thought it was 1978 and that Ed Goodsen was the hitter.

My point is, opening day is really a bunch of hoopla with little significance.  Yes, I know that it is the birth of a new season.  Sometimes it has more of a “wow” factor because a new player acquired in the off-season makes their Dodger debut.  Orlando Hudson made a splash in his one Dodger season on opening day with a cycle.  So what’s so significant about the first cycle in 38 years?  

Orlando Hudson hits for the cycle on opening day, 2008.  (Photo by Jon Soo Hoo/Los Angeles Dodgers)

I’m not backing down from my stance.  Game number 1 is no different than game number 37, or 52, or 112.

There is the periodic new player that cracks the starting lineup that makes opening day a memorable one...like 1981, when Fernando was an emergency starter for the injured Jerry Reuss.  We know the rest, he reeled off eight consecutive wins and five shutouts at the beginning of the season.

Photo by Rob Brown, L.A. Herald Examiner

Yes, opening day has very little significance.  Unless of course a star player emerges with an amazing performance (like Fernando) and a mania develops that he and the fans ride all the way to a World Championship.

Phooey, opening day?  Big deal...

I gotta get me some tickets.