BY CHRIS HAFT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Brian Johnson
|
SARASOTA, Fla. — Roger Angell didn't write the above passage. Neither did Peter Gammons, George Will or any of the other renowned pundits who rhapsodize so eloquently about baseball.
This was how Brian Johnson, a veteran of five major league seasons, began a public letter thanking fans of his former team, the San Francisco Giants, for their support during his relatively brief season-and-a-half with them. Johnson took the extraordinary step of presenting the letter in the form of a newspaper advertisement published in the San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News and Oakland Tribune.
Johnson, who signed with the Reds Jan. 11 after the Giants refused to offer him salary arbitration and made him a free agent, wouldn't say how much he paid for the ads, which ran in the papersFeb. 4. “It cost a pretty penny. But it was worth it,” he said Saturday at spring training.
What's not so secret is that besides securing a decent catcher who has hit 13 home runs in each of the past two seasons, the Reds also obtained an unusual professional athlete, one who revels in his sport and isn't afraid to share his joy with ordinary people.
The baseball dreams I remember best are the ones that I had as a boy playing in the tee-shirt leagues all summer, from dawn to dusk, always coming home with a couple of well-earned dirt stains and holes through the already-patched patches of my favorite blue jeans ...
Johnson, 31, rooted for all the San Francisco Bay Area teams while growing up in Oakland — even, as he said in his letter, the San Jose Earthquakes of the North American Soccer League.
But it broke his heart when one of his favorite players from any of those teams departed through a trade or free agency. What made it worse was that nobody ever said goodbye to the fans suitably enough.
“I kept looking in the paper for them to say something,” Johnson said. “I promised myself if I was ever in that situation, I would do it this way.”
Johnson fulfilled his vow after the San Diego Padres traded him to Detroit after the 1996 season. “I was there for three years and got connected to the community,” he said. His note of thanks ran in the letters-to-the-editor column of the Sunday paper, maximizing the exposure.
“It gives a nice closure to your time there,” Johnson said.
Johnson made the most of his time with the Giants after they obtained him in a July, 1997 trade. He hit 11 home runs the rest of that season, helping propel them to the National League West title. He joined the rich Giants-Dodgers history when his homer leading off the 12th inning defeated Los Angeles, 6-5, in a crucial stretch-drive game.
But baseball economics will overpower heroics and sentiment every time, and the Giants let him go.
Time for another letter. It was headlined “To The People of the Bay,” accompanied by a photo of a smiling, waving Johnson alongside his signature and the notation “#29 Cincinnati Reds — 1999.”
Each time I walk onto a Major League Baseball field I feel as if I am transported back to those Little League days, and it is an incredibly humbling, yet powerful, experience. I have played in every major league stadium, been a part of almost 800 games and over 7,000 innings, and I hope to play in many, many more. No matter what happens in my future, however, I know that nothing will ever be as special to me as playing back home and being a part of one of its championship teams.
With this letter I would like to say thank you for making my short stay in the Bay such a great experience; a gift ...
Johnson could have criticized the Giants for being cheap.
“I'm positive about pretty much everything,” he said. “I don't like to (gripe) and moan. I was grateful. Instead of looking at the situation like, "Dang. I'm not going to be playing there anymore,' it's more like, "Wow. I really appreciate playing there.'”
Johnson attended a friend's wedding in the Bay Area a few days after the Reds signed him. Hours before returning to his offseason home of Chicago, he visited a restaurant in Oakland's Jack London Square and poured his soul into his laptop: “Boom, it just came out.”
Some people wondered whether Johnson, who earned a political science degree from Stanford, wrote the text himself. The only help he needed was a little proofreading and input from his wife, Sarah, and a few other confidants.
“I've gotten that question quite a few times,” he said. “At first I was offended. But it's the whole jock syndrome. It's kind of surprising for someone to write something that's a little deeper than "give it your best shot' and "do the best we can' and things like that. I guess it's a compliment in a way, but it's kind of insulting, too.”
Said Johnson of joining the Reds: “I'm thrilled to be here. See, that's the thing. There isn't a team I could go to that I would be disappointed in. Because I'm a baseball fan.”
Never stop dreaming, be you young or old, because one can never tell which ones may just hold.
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