Thursday, September 18, 2008

At the Old Ballgame

For many years, Tom Dreesen has been one of those lucky Cubs fans who get to lead the faithful in singing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” at Wrigley Field.

“Once, I threw 100 one-dollar bills into the crowd and shouted, ‘Have a beer on Harry Caray!’” Dreesen says. “The next day, some radio guy said I’d been throwing 20s and 50s, and sure enough, people started calling in saying they’d gotten one of the fifties. I wasn’t about to tell anyone I had been that charitable.”

Wednesday night, Dreesen was back at the ballpark where, after he had led the capacity crowd in the song as the Cubs played Milwaukee, he threw nothing more remarkable into the crowd than an autographed hat.

His partner Tim Reid looked on, and waved for the television camera when it was turned his way in the broadcast booth, as Dreesen chatted about their book with Pat Hughes and Ron Santo on the radio and Len Casper and Bob Brenly on television.

Tom told Hughes some stories from the book and riffed on his old pal Santo, whom he hopes will finally, finally, be voted into the baseball Hall of Fame this year. “It was so great to see Ron and his wife Vicky walking arm in arm down Michigan Avenue last night,” Tom said. “Of course, the reason he was holding onto her arm was so she couldn’t go into any of the stores.”

Santo turned out to be a big fan of WKRP in Cincinnati and he and Tim chatted about the show during a pitching change. Later on television, Brenly asked Tom if he and Tim really were the only black and white comedy team ever. “We were until McCain and Obama came along,” Tom said,

Tom was delighted to be able to say hello to his old pal Bob Uecker, the Brewers’ broadcaster with whom he was a guest on Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show a number of times. “Great guy,” Tom said of Uecker. “He was one of the few people who could crack Johnny up. He would just come unglued at some of the stuff Bob said.”

“Hey, I just saw you singing,” one Cubs fan yelled at Tom as he and Tim made their way down through the stands afterwards. “Who are you?”

“Brad Pitt,” Dreesen said.

“Wait, ‘Sister, Sister,’” a young woman shouted at Tim. “‘Venus Flytrap,’” said her father sitting next to her. “I can usually tell by their age which show they remember me from,” Tim said after posing for pictures with the Wrigley Field infield in the background with a number of young fans.

The only downside to the evening was the final score—Brewers 6, Cubs 2. “They’re still going to the World Series,” Tom said. “Just once, I’d like to sing during the seventh-inning stretch while that was going on.”

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