Alex Box Memories

• Published: May 12, 2008 - Page: 9C - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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SUSAN LIPSEY
Baton Rouge
I am already tearing up when I just say the words “Alex Box.” I dread the last home game, as I know the memories, so many memories, will come flooding back as I look over the field, the fences, the stands, the dugout, the Intimidator sign — and remember the players and the teams who won our hearts over the past 25 years since the earliest days of the Skip Bertman era.

I became an obsessed fan over the years, keeping a meticulous scorebook game after game, taking the games so much to heart that I often missed family occasions and community events because I took my role as “No. 1 Fan” too seriously.

Some snippets of my wonderful memories in our beloved Alex Box:

• The entire coach’s committee members meeting in the coach’s office.
• Getting hooked on the game by watching Ben McDonald pitch his big hook curveball.
• Watching Patrick Coogan grow up over the years, sitting just a few seats away with his family — then becoming one of our great pitchers — and once striking out eight batters in a row!
• When LSU hosted the six-team regionals before the super regionals came into play.
• Never tiring of hearing Jim Hawthorne yelling on the radio, “Tigers Win! Tigers Win! And they’re going to Omaha!” (I had to have my earphones on to hear him say that when we would win the regionals!)
• Sitting next to Sandy Bertman, my dear friend, for 18 years with Skip as coach, paying court to everyone who walked up into the stands to say hello to her.
• Brandon Larson hitting 40 home runs in his one year as a player.
• “Gorilla Ball” — our team hitting a national-record 188 home runs one year.
• Wally Pontiff.
• “Hit the Wall, Pat (Garrity),” a pinch hitter, being remembered for one incredible hit in his career, which won a regional game.
• The fans “mooing” the great Lyle Mouton as he would walk up to the plate.
• The fans yelling “Ar - man-do RI -os” when he came up to bat.
• Scott Schultz breaking a season pitching record with 17 wins against the University of Maine on March 10, my birthday.
• When a fan gave the “K-Lady” her own painted wooden K’s to replace her paper ones.
• When Chris Guillot and Joy Hammett became our designated cheerleaders.
• Our Omaha-bound teams taking their victory laps around the field, high-fiving the hysterical fans.
• The slow paced, distinctive “Skip walk” as he’d walk out to the mound.
• When Steinberg’s Sports Center sponsored the fourth inning of every game.

VICKI M. CROCHET
Baton Rouge
As a 15-year season ticket holder I have many memories that I will treasure, but perhaps none as much as those surrounding my children. For them the baseball game was besides the point — The Box was their playground. My soon-to-be Catholic High graduate son Daniel was 4 years old when we got our tickets in Section A of the grandstand. He took many naps in his Batman sleeping bag, which we spread out on the floor between the seats. When Daniel wasn’t napping, he was at the playground playing cup ball or more likely, digging in the sand and collecting ants in his empty Coke cup. After climbing to the top of the playground equipment to wave at the train he would return to the bleachers — filthy, ant cup in hand, to be entertained by his bag of peanuts for the rest of the game!

For Daniel and me, the strains of “Put Me in, Coach” on the radio in the offseason made us long for The Box — just for different reasons!

Daniel’s sister Kate came along beginning in the 1998 season. I will never forget the day Daniel and his dad “lost” the then 2-year-old, deaf Kate at the playground! (She had decided to go to the ladies room on her own and casually returned in what we now know is her normal independent fashion — oblivious to the near panic she had caused). Kate, too, loved the playground but loved the frozen lemonade and all Box food more!

Although I am a devoted fan of the actual game — this “game within the game” will always come to my mind when I think of The Box.

BUD JOHNSON
Baton Rouge
My favorite memory of Alex Box Stadium is the SEC championship game with Auburn in 1961. Champions of the SEC West, LSU had won the first game of a best-of-three series at Auburn, 4-3, with Tigers’ ace Allen Smith getting the win. Lynn Amedee started for LSU in the second game and there was standing room only at The Box, one of two times I ever saw it filled in the ’60s. LSU and Ole Miss played to a full house in a doubleheader that season.

Amedee, whose swagger was bigger than his breaking ball, went the distance against Auburn in the second game — all 11 innings — and won, in spite of giving up three home runs.

Bobby Theriot’s single to center drove home John Bailey with the winning run and a 6-5 Tiger victory. It was LSU’s first SEC baseball championship since 1946. The Tigers had a 20-5 record overall and were 13-4 in the SEC. Smith finished the year 10-2 with a 1.54 ERA. Amedee was 6-1 with a 2.54 ERA.

Coach Raymond Didier provided sterling leadership in a fun-filled season.

The Tigers had an ecumenical roster. Amedee, outfielder Roy Winston, pitcher Lester Mitts and catcher Robbie Terrell had come to LSU to play football. Bailey, Smith, and second baseman Larry Edmondson came to Tigertown initially to play basketball. Pure baseball players such as Theriot, Hadley Smith, shortstop John Thomas, first baseman Jim Poche, catcher Frank Polozola, first baseman Frank Naff, pitcher Fred Southerland, catcher-outfielder Morris Summers, infielders Bruce Turner and Francis Genusa and third baseman Tommy Demont provided skill and depth at key positions. Didier blended this talented group into one of LSU’s most memorable champions in any sport.

Winston, a consensus All-America on the football field, provided one of the more memorable moments in Box history that season. To give college players an opportunity for a home run, LSU installed a “snow” fence as the outfield perimeter. In pursuit of a deeply hit ball to left, Winston ran right through the snow fence as he vainly tried to make the catch. It was a home run, but the Box Stadium crowd got a big kick out of Winston splattering the snow fence. It was the only time in Box Stadium history that laughter followed an opposing team’s home run.

Sadly, the Tigers did not represent LSU in the NCAA tournament. The LSU Board of Supervisors did not allow the Tigers to participate in postseason competition because of a racial segregation ruling. The LSU football team, after a 9-1 season that fall, got the Board to amend their position to participate in the Orange Bowl against an integrated Colorado team. Sixth months too late for an outstanding baseball team.