A Perfect Day

Posted on May 10, 2010

Dallas Braden of the Oakland Athletics celebrates his perfect game with his grandmother Peggy Lindsey after the game between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Oakland Athletics on Sunday, May 9, 2010, at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, California. The Athletics defeated the Rays 4-0. (Photo by Brad Mangin/MLB Photos)

 

Yesterday was one of those special days at the ballpark that you can never predict, and when it is over you take awhile to soak it all in and wonder if that all really happened. Yes- Oakland Athletic’s left-handed pitcher Dallas Braden tossed a Perfect Game at the Tampa Bay Rays on a cool Mother’s Day afternoon at the Oakland Coliseum. 27 Rays went to the plate trying to get on base, and all 27 of them made an out, making Braden only the 19th pitcher in the history of baseball to achieve perfection on a big league diamond. Oh yeah, I was there to photograph this historic occasion.

I shot my first Major League game in April of 1987 while I was beginning my first newspaper internship as a photographer for the Contra Costa Times. I remember it like it was yesterday, only much has happened since that day. I shot the game with a Nikon F3 and a manual focus 600mm lens on a tripod from the inside first base position at the Oakland Coliseum as the Bash Brothers-led Oakland A’s hosted the California Angels. Since that day I have shot over 1,300 big league games and I had never photographed a no-hitter, let alone a perfect game.

The first time I ever flirted with a no-no was back in July of 1990 when I was on staff at The National Sports Daily. San Francisco Giants right-hander Scott Garrelts threw 8 2/3 hitless innings against the Cincinnati Reds on a sunny Sunday afternoon at Candlestick (see above). I was shooting color negative film with my Canon F-1 and hoping to witness history. Reds batter Hal Morris ruined my afternoon and delayed my chance to photograph history for 20 years when he lined a two-out single to right field ending Garrelts’s bid.

Many years went by since the Garrelts game. I missed Kevin Brown’s no-hitter against the Giants at The Stick in 1997. Curt Schilling came within one out in Oakland a few years ago before Shannon Stewart ruined that day with a soft single to right in the bottom of the ninth inning. I was beginning to wonder if I would ever have a chance to photograph a no-hitter.

I finally got to witness a no-hitter last year when I attended a Giants game in my season ticket box seats with good friends Robert Seale, Chris Covatta and Grover Sanschagrin (see above). Giants lefty Jonathan Sanchez no-hit the San Diego Padres. It was a glorious drunken night at the ballpark, one which the game was secondary as we all enjoyed a nice pre-game dinner and many beverages. Covatta wanted to leave in the 6th inning. I wouldn’t let him. Many friends wondered if I was upset that I did not have a chance to shoot the historic game. Not at all. I was enjoying a great night with friends. I enjoy being a fan. I still hoped that some day I would get the chance to shoot one of these things. After all, I shoot around 80 games a year, so my odds were good that I would eventually run into one.

My main assignment on Sunday was to shoot a ton of stock of the Tampa Bay Rays. They came to town the hottest team in baseball. They play in a dome stadium. It is rare to have the chance to get good pictures of them outdoors during the daytime. I also needed to shoot many pictures of the players using the special pink bats that are used all over Major League Baseball every season on Mother’s Day to raise awareness for breast cancer. I shot tons of pre-game of the Rays in the dugout with the pink bats, and eventually settled into the third base photo box in the second inning to begin shooting batting pictures in the nice and soft overcast light.

I did not even realize Braden was working on a no-hitter until there were two outs in the top of the 6th inning with Gabe Kapler at bat. Kapler finally popped up after a 12-pitch at bat and I quickly did some math. Kapler was the 18th batter to face Braden, and I did not remember any Ray base runners. Braden was working on a perfect game through six! I quickly moved over to the inside first base position, which is where I wanted to be to shoot a wide picture of Braden pitching in the 9th inning with the scoreboard in the background. Not all parks are built equally, and we photographers got the short end of the stick when the Coliseum put their new TINY scoreboard nine miles up in the sky when the Raiders moved back to Oakland in 1995. When a guy throws a no-hitter you must shoot a wide picture telling the story with the scoreboard showing all zeros. Unfortunately that picture in Oakland is not very fun to look at.

Braden made his way to the 9th inning unscathed and quickly retired the first two Rays. He then went to a 3-1 count on Kapler before the Rays batter grounded out to shortstop sending the sparse crowd of 12,228 into a frenzy. Braden jumped in the air on the infield grass and celebrated with his teammates. All of us photographers rushed onto the field hoping to make some nice pictures with our wide angle lenses. The best moment happened when Braden’s grandmother Peggy Lindsey came onto the field near the A’s dugout and embraced her grandson with all her might. Lindsey raised Braden in Stockton, California after his mom died at the age of 39 while he was in high school. Lindsey means the world to Braden and it was so fitting that he threw his perfecto on Mother’s Day with his grandmother in attendance.

This exhilarating and exhausting day turned into a long night of editing and captioning. By the time I went to bed I was so sick of looking at my pictures. I kept going through them hoping to find a great picture that I missed. Unfortunately I did not make any great pictures yesterday. I made a few good ones. The celebration shot that we all want of the pitcher going nuts looked best from first base, and that is where Carlos Avila Gonzalez of the San Francisco Chronicle and Oakland A’s team photographer Michael Zagaris were. They got the best pictures and should be commended for the terrific job they did recording history. Gonzalez’s image of Braden graces the cover of the Chronicle sports front today. The wonderful image that Zagaris made will be on the west coast regional cover of Sports Illustrated this week. I am so happy for these guys. They did a great job!

No matter what I do in the future this is one day I will always remember. What are the odds of witnessing a perfect game, let alone photographing one? Not very high. As I finish writing this blog entry I am watching a replay of yesterday’s game on COMCAST. The game is in the bottom of the 7th inning and Braden has yet to give up a base runner. Six more outs to go. I bet he gets it!