June 13th 2003
It was a Friday if I recall correctly.
It started out as typical summer day in Yorktown, lazing around not doing shit. I forgot how it all started, I think a bunch of my friends came over my house looking for something to do. Somebody mentioned that we should get tickets for the Yankee game that night. Roger Clemens was looking for his 300th victory, and they were playing the Cardinals and it would be Tino Martinez’s first trip back to the Bronx after he was given the boot.
Me and my friend Isaac were the only ones who were enthusiastic about the idea and decided to pursue it. My other friends Miles and Radcliff, who were at my house, were in too much of a stoned, dulled out state from sleeping over my friend Seth’s house the night before and waking and baking in the morning, so as most stoners would be they weren’t too pepped up about the idea of having to move, or even think for that matter.
Isaac and I didn’t want to go with just the two of us, and neither of us had a car to drive, so we got the idea to call our friend Valenzuela, whose life revolves around the Yankees, to see if he wanted to go.
We knew that all Valenzuela had to do was pick up his phone and he’d be down to go. This is the same kid who would either miss hours of work or not show up at all just to play a pick up baseball game, we knew he’d be down, he might even miss his own mother’s funeral for a chance to see Clemens win his 300th.
Valenzuela was down to go and also to drive, everything was set in stone so far, it was going to be Isaac, Valenzuela, our friend Rich, and I going. Now we had a plan and a ride, but we also needed to get some brew and … oh yeah, tickets.
We were dropped off by Radcliff to Valenzuela’s house where we met him and Rich, after that we made a quick stop off to buy some 12’s of Natty light and we were off to the Bronx. We guzzled down brews the whole way down, and when we got outside the stadium, Isaac and I went out to check if we could find some scalpers because the game had sold out. We found some common street hustlers who peddled us four bleacher seats for 120 dollars. Not a good deal, but hey, at least we were gonna see the game. After we got the tickets we parked in a garage and swilled down the rest of our brews, except for the ones we were currently drinking.
As we marched down towards the bleacher section of the stadium some guy selling t-shirts informed me and Isaac to finish our beers because cops are all over the next block. So we pounded our beers quickly and some black guy saw Isaac finish his real fast and said, “OH SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT!!” Not important, but funny nonetheless.
I don’t remember much about the game except that it was the rowdiest and best section I ever sat in. We sat way in the front row of the bleacher section, which weren’t even close to being our seats, and we were about 8 feet away from Jim Edmonds, the centerfielder for St. Louis.
We heckled the shit out of Edmonds, mercilessly, everything from fucking his mother and sister, to calling him a piece of shit Angels in the outfield Disney motherfucker. I remember the funniest shit was when Edmonds made a bad play on the ball and it hit right near the top of the wall by where we were sitting. After he threw the ball in we leaned over the edge and were screaming right in his face and it must have really pissed him off, because he looked us right in our eyes and shook his head as if to say “fucking asshole New York fans”.
Clemens pitched a good game until the 8th inning and was taken out for Mariano Rivera. Mariano finished the game out and we had been there to witness the 300th win of Roger Clemens career, it was a pretty cool moment. After filing out of the stadium we were all in good spirits, as of much of the people filing out that night.
Little did we know the Bronx was not done with us just yet.
Leaving the stadium would be a whole different ordeal, and one wrong turn changed the course of everything that happened that night. Somewhere along the way we were supposed to find the Major Deegan Expressway, but instead Valenzuela somehow lead us into the heart of the ghetto in the south Bronx. It seemed like every turn we made was making our chance of survival more and more slim. At one point I got out and went into a bodega that was blasting Spanish music, to ask them if they knew how to get back to the Deegan. They seemed to have no idea what I was talking about, so we were still screwed.
So, we got back into Valenzuela’s car and it seemed like he was trying to best figure out a way of how to get back by the way he was driving. After about 10 minutes of making all sorts of weird turns, Valenzuela said “I have no IDEA where I am hahaha.”
It seemed like we had been driving around in circles in the ghetto. After about 20 minutes of this I had given up and rested my head against the window . There hadn’t been a word spoke in a long time until I heard a collective “OH SHIT!” and then one loud “SMASH!”
My head flung into the back of the Passenger seat.
Valenzuela had plowed right through a stop sign and smashed right into the driver side door of a brand new looking in Chrysler in a crazy tight intersection in the heart of the Bronx’s ghetto.
We were clearly in a bad situation. We had really fucked up the car we hit, and crushed Natty light cans were littered all over the car. We knew whoever it was that was about to open the door and step out of this vehicle was going to be scary, but the only thing we didn’t know was HOW scary he would actually be.
The door opened and a HUGE Dominican guy stepped out of the car looking stunned.
At first Valenzuela hesitated to get out of the car, as we all watched this 6’4” 260 pound mammoth emerge from his vehicle. I remember seeing that the guy we hit’s girlfriend balling her eyes out in the passenger seat and thinking “HOLY SHIT” to myself. Valenzuela got out of the car eventually and we all watched in silence at them discussing the incident. They exchanged cell phone numbers and that was it, the guy seemed very adamant about not going through insurance Valenzuela said. From this point on I’m going to let Valenzuela explain his perspective of this event, because it gets 10 times funnier from here on.
So I go home the night of accident and tell my dad the story and tell him that we don’t have to worry about it because the guy wasn’t gonna do anything, ‘cause he didn’t even want to call the cops and didn’t want to go through insurance. He was probably a drug dealer or his car was stolen or something. But my dad insists on going down there.
I knew it was a bad idea.
The next day at like noon we met a couple of blocks away from the scene of the accident because he didn’t want us to go to his house. It was just him and one of his friends.
So we get there and he tells my dad that he wants 400 hundred dollars. My dad says “fuck that,” he wants to call the cops. The guy really doesn’t want to call the cops at all. The guys name is Alex by the way.
So then Alex’s friend tries to get tough with my dad. He gets in his face and tells him that he has to pay the money. My dad gives him a little shove and tells him to get out of his face. The guy approaches my dad again and my dad punches him right in the face. The guy is stunned...my dad gets in the guys face and tells him that he will "knock him the fuck out."
There’s more. Meanwhile...Alex walks over to me and tells me that my dad is out of control and that I should calm him down before he gets his friends. I agree with him. I try to pull my dad away and calm him down, he says "fuck that" and starts calling the guy all kinds of names then he goes after him again and smacks his head. The guy tries to retaliate by karate kicking my dad, my dad chuckles and calls the guy a faggot then he grabs his cell phone and says he’s gonna call the cops.
The guys get scared and go into the car and try to leave. My dad says "where the fuck do you think you're going," as they begin to drive away, and then my dad hangs onto the passenger door and tries to pull the guy out of the window while they are speeding down the street.
Eventually he lets go and comes running back and he says he is gonna call the cops and proceeds to do so.
A little bit after the incident I got a call from Alex and he stated "you and your dad are not gonna make it out of the Bronx alive...I’m getting all of my friends right now and we are gonna kill you.”
Something told me at that point that we should get the hell out of there.
I tell my dad about the phone call. He says... "Fuck that...they ain’t gonna do shit....were gonna wait right here...let those fuckers come back".
I couldn’t believe my ears.
I realized that my dad had gone insane.
I wanted to get the hell out of there and he wanted to wait around for the guys to come back. A classic old black man walks up to me and says "I saw the whole thing...they gonna kill you" or something like that.
I beg my dad once again. He says no.
So I said, "fine...you wait here...I'm gonna walk down the block into that supermarket."
I wait in there for 5 minutes finally my dad comes and says “ok lets go.” I was pissed. I scolded him the whole way home like I was the father and he was the son, and that’s it.
So what did we learn today folks, hmm? Well, the main lesson should be always know how to exit Yankee Stadium properly if you are ever planning on seeing a game, and if you do get lost in the ghetto be aware of stop signs because one single slip up could put you in a world of shit. See you next time. PEACCEEEEE.
Questions or comments? E-mail Bryan at ItsByrne@hotmail.com
