Sorry for writing you and asking for your autograph under false pretenses.

This was a long time ago. 1981 or 82, I think. My friend Chris Pack and I were ten or eleven years old, and deeply, totally obsessed with baseball. We collected cards, memorized statistics, perfected pantomime of our favorite players' pitching deliveries and batting stances—Dan Quisenberry's submarine sidearm, Cecil Cooper's low-slung crouch, Graig Nettles' rod-straight right leg. In the summer, we'd watch the Yankees on Channel 11 every night (the Mets on Channel 9 if the Yankees had an off day) and play our own games of Wiffle ball in my backyard—all day, everyday. The fence [...]