{"id":225087,"date":"2018-04-27T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-04-27T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/life-as-a-padres-bat-boy\/"},"modified":"2018-04-27T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2018-04-27T07:00:00","slug":"life-as-a-padres-bat-boy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/life-as-a-padres-bat-boy\/","title":{"rendered":"Life as a Padres bat boy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Doug Curlee | Editor en general<\/p>\n

The March meeting of the La Mesa Rotary Club heard a story from one of their own members \u2014 a story many of them might have wished was their story.<\/p>\n

Rotarian Scott Elam of La Mesa is a husband, father, businessman \u2014 all-around good guy.<\/p>\n

But, you get the impression that, if he could go back to his 16th and 17th years, he\u2019d do it in a heartbeat.<\/p>\n

\"Life<\/a>
Scott Elam with a picture of himself as a teenage bat boy for the Padres (Foto por Doug Curlee)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For two summers, he got to be what innumerable kids would love to do: He got to be a bat boy for the San Diego Padres.<\/p>\n

How did he get that job?<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrote letters \u2014 lots of letters. I wrote 25 of them over a two-month period. I might have gotten the job because they figured I\u2019d never go away unless they hired me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hire him they did.<\/p>\n

For the 1984 World Series season, he was an alternate, and got to work about 20 games, mostly on day games and weekends, and filling in for full-time bat boys who couldn\u2019t make it to work. In 1985, he went full-time.<\/p>\n

That didn\u2019t matter so much, because he was in heaven \u2014 on a major league ballfield, working, and playing around, with bona fide major leaguers.<\/p>\n

Warming up players, fielding balls during batting practice, running errands, collecting signed baseballs from major leaguers that had been promised to supporters \u2014 all the while wearing a major league uniform.<\/p>\n

He was in heaven, and loving every minute of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou get to know the players, and most of them treated you as a friend and in a way, teammates. One of my favorites was Steve Garvey, who had been traded to the Padres from the Los Angeles Dodgers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elam remembers well Garvey\u2019s comment on the different brown, orange and white Padres uniforms. Garvey said, \u201cI used to look like an American flag. Now I look like a taco.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGarvey was nice, but very business-like,\u201d Elam remembers.<\/p>\n

\"Life<\/a>
Elam\u2019s collection of Padres memorabilia. (Photo by Doug Curlee)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of Elam\u2019s jobs was when Garvey broke a bat at the plate, he was to bring him two replacement bats to pick from. Most players who broke bats simply threw them aside to be thrown away. Not Garvey.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe always told me, \u2018Scotty, take this broken bat and put it in my locker.\u2019 Steve knew the value of his name, and he\u2019d donate those broken bats to charities to be used as fundraising tools.\u201d<\/p>\n

By 1985, Elam was a full-time bat boy for the club and he even got to go on a few road trips with the team.<\/p>\n

There were players he liked, and players that terrified him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI once had to ask Goose Gossage to sign some balls before a game. I walked up and asked, and Goose about took my head off. I quickly learned that Goose did not want to be bothered before a game. But after the game, he tracked me down and apologized over and over again. Turned out to be a good guy.<\/p>\n

\u201cGarry Templeton was one of the good guys. You could talk to him about anything, anytime.<\/p>\n

\u201cCarmelo Martinez and Andy Hawkins were other great guys. Some were not so nice, like Graig Nettles and Al Bumbry. But almost all the guys realized I had a job to do, and that job was to help them with whatever they needed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The bat boys had their own locker room and showers, but were in the clubhouse whenever they were not on the field.<\/p>\n

Did they get paid for living this dream? Not a lot. They got $15 per game, but they also got two tickets to every game they worked. That came in handy many times.<\/p>\n

Elam has made a whole PowerPoint presentation about his years, and it tells the story well.<\/p>\n

At the end of the day, would he do it all again?<\/p>\n

Does the sun come up in the East?<\/p>\n

\u2014 Doug Curlee is Editor at Large for the Mission Times Courier, sister publication of La Mesa Courier and has worked in print and broadcast journalism in San Diego for many moons. Reach him at doug@sdcnn.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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