Tuesday, April 2, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.
IT WAS HIS third or fourth time in the batting cage and a last chance for a few repetitive swings in preparation for the upcoming game. Joe Carter, the 54th greatest home run hitter in the history of baseball with 327, was getting loose.
Within minutes he was feeling loose, too.
With a crash, bang, bam series of blasts, Carter mesmerized himself and anyone who cared to watch by easily launching one ball after another at or over Cashman Field's left-field wall. Although he left the cage in silence, not a word needed to be spoken. The wide smile he displayed toward those looking on in agog was weighted not only with satisfaction, but anticipation.
He knew this was a hitter's ballpark.
And Monday's atmospheric conditions were conducive to scoring, if not an out-and-out slugfest. Four of the game's first nine hits were home runs as the Toronto Blue Jays and Oakland Athletics played the first major-league game in a minor-league park in 40 years.
"The ball does carry here," Blue Jays manager Cito Gaston said in his typical understated style. Lacking a slide rule or the intricacies of trajectory, he still knew there were going to be some runs scored, especially with a 20 mph wind blowing out.
The fun-filled game went Toronto's way by a 9-6 score, with five homers hit in all, although Carter had to settle for an eighth-inning triple off the right-field barrier. The common denominator of the balls that cleared the wall: They were line drives, straight shots that stayed aloft and sped out of the park in pinball-machine fashion.
A's catcher Terry Steinbach hit one in the second inning that defied Newton's first law of physics, the ball going up only slightly without ever coming down. It cleared the wall by a whisker and, presumably, never came to rest until it reached the neighboring county. It had all the qualities of a comet.
The park's dimensions (328-433-328) are bandbox-like when the players are this good, let alone when the ball is really sailing. Outfielders played exceptionally deep, which enabled them to handle caroms off the wall and periodically hold hitters to singles on balls that are doubles in minor-league play. Toronto's Carlos Delgado and Oakland's Jason Giambi each settled for singles after hitting one off the wall on the fly, and neither had reason to be red-faced about it.
Actually, there were numerous stellar defensive plays, with a handful of gems and several other beautifully played examples of precision and expertise. For those who keep score and mark the exceptional defensive play with an asterisk, it was a night for the asterisk to abound. If nothing else, it was a reminder of just how often the superb play is commonplace at the game's highest level.
And for those with an appreciation of pitching, Toronto's Erik Hanson made it through seven innings and gave up only four hits.
No wonder Carter was smiling again when it was over. He and his teammates have today off in Las Vegas, plus another game here Wednesday.
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