Sunday, April 10, 2011

Terry Kennedy's Memory

Went down to Colorado Springs yesterday to catch the Sky Sox. It was nice to see my buddy Dan Karcher, the long-time radio play-by-play voice of the Sky Sox. The guy should be broadcasting Major League Baseball.
Anyway, Tucson Padres won the game 9-7 over the Sky Sox. Tucson jumped out to a 9-0 lead and held on for the win.
After the ballgame, I went into the Tucson locker room to say hi to Padres Manager Terry Kennedy.
I re-introduced myself and asked about something that happened 17-years ago. He remembered and his coaches found our conversation pretty funny.
In 1994, Kennedy was piloting the Vermont Expos of the NY-Penn League. I was broadcasting for the Hudson Valley Renegades and on this particular night at Dutchess Stadium, the Renegades beat the visiting Expos 3-1.
During my post-game show, I was looking at my scorebook, doing the scoring recap when a big blue spike stepped on my table and a huge, 6'4, 220 pound Kennedy was climbing through the window. He was madder than mad.
"Are you the guy on the speakers," he demanded to me?
He was looking for the P.A. guy and I was only too happy to point him towards Rick Zolzer the wise-ass P.A. announcer we had.
Apparently Zolzer forgot his mike was "on" and unflattering comments about one of Vermont's pitchers, Brady Frost, went out to the public. One of the comments was, "This guy's pitches aren't even breaking the speed limit!"
Kennedy was incensed and he went after Zolzer. All while I was doing play-by-play of the argument between the hulking and furious Kennedy and the "crapping his pants" P.A. douche.
The funniest part of all of this was when Kennedy exited the press box the same way he entered, through my window. As he made his way to the concourse behind home plate he was swarmed by autograph seekers. He stood there and signed autographs for 10-minutes!
Kennedy remembered the incident and was glad I reminded him of some of the details. He's a good guy and was a pretty good player in his day. I'd like to see him get a shot at managing in the big leagues some time soon.

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