A Reason to Roar Revisited

Back in '06, the first time we went down to Fort Wayne, Indiana:

As Ken drove down I-69 yesterday, John, Steve, and I rode along, talking about the upcoming week-end and the prospect of seeing future Tiger Cameron Maybin in action.

Okay, okay, let me back up just a little bit. Friday morning, The Sporting News arrived in the mailbox. It usually arrives on Wednesday, Thursday at the latest. Since it arrived Friday, I decided I would bring it along and read it on the road.

One article, A Reason to Roar, by Steven Douglas Losey, caught my eye. It was all about the Detroit Tigers and their return to relevance during the 2006 season.

One line, really caught my attention because I have been thinking it's about time to do something like this: "But the pitching, the best in the majors, that's the biggest. Humor me for a minute: I bought a '79 Vette on Ebay three months ago (my dream car), and I just had to put a Tigers plate on it. I picked DETTGRS. Maybe I should have gone with GRR8STAFF." A personalized license plate, not buying a Vette off of Ebay, sounds pretty cool. Anyway, we were cruising along I-69, when John said, "Hey, check out that license plate on that Vette, it said something like Detroit Tigers."

Quickly, and without drawing any attention, I grabbed the TSN and read the article to see if my memory served correct: yep, that car was the writer's car.

"Kenny, you have to slow back down. That guy wrote this article about the Tigers. We have to get him to stop."

"Yeah, right, Rick. Like he's going to stop."

"No, Ken, really, it says he bought the car on Ebay, a '79 Vette," John was helping the cause.

Ken didn't really want to stop, but I kept pushing ...

We finally convinced Ken that it might be cool to slow down and get the writer to stop. Slowing down and making sure he didn't get off on an exit was another thing entirely. But, after several minutes of manuevering, and driving unsafely slow (come on, this was a Vette were were waiting for) his car cruised up next to us.

I rolled the window down and showed him the magazine and shouted, "Pull over, we want to talk to you. Pull over!!!"

Steven, the writer, pulled over and was beaming. He was on a cell phone. He looked at us in disbelief.

"Hey, great article. Can you get out of the car and pose with us?"

"Sure guys. You guys are crazy. Really crazy," he replied.

He told us he was a rock writer normally, but had written the Tigers piece and hadn't seen it yet. I told him he couldn't have my copy, but I would appreciate it if he would sign it. He personalized it: "To Rick, Thanks for stopping the Vette ..."

Pretty cool. We talked for a few minutes, took pictures with him and the plate, and promised to send him copies of the pictures.

Really, I don't know who thought it was a pretty cool deal, him or us.

What are the odds, though, of driving down the road and seeing the car you had just read about about two hours earlier? What are the odds that the magazine would be a day or two late? I mean, I could have read the article Wednesday, watching the Tigers game and just told the guys when we saw the cool plate, "Hey, I'm not kidding, I read about that car the other day." It would have been another "Yeah, right, Rick moment."