Johnny & Jude (One Sixty-Two: Day 116)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day One Hundred Sixteen: Johnny Damon, Detroit Tigers

For most of my 5-year-old’s life, she has asked my wife and me to sing her to sleep. It’s one of the most fulfilling moments of our day with Chelsea, as we kneel beside her bed and whisper a lullaby or love song to her. It typically takes just a couple of songs before her eyes close, her breathing grows heavier, and she drifts off into dreamland.

The songs we choose vary: My wife’s favorites include “You Are My Sunshine” as well as Laurie Berkner’s “Moon Moon Moon.” Mine include “Rainbow Connection” and “Oh! Susanna.” While the standards work like a charm for Chelsea, I’ve also incorporated some more modern songs into the bedtime rituals. The Beatles work well with this, as “Here Comes the Sun” and “Hey Jude” fit quite nicely into the mix. Chelsea has responded well to them so far, to her father’s delight.

“Hey Jude” is one of my favorite songs in the world, so it’s been sung and played in our house quite a bit over the years. My 8-year-old, Katie, is well aware of the song. And as you grow older, you remember more of the parts to your parents’ favorite songs. Then, when you’re placed in a bunk bed with your little sister and you hear your dad singing one of those songs to her, there’s a tendency to want to sing along.

This takes us to the evening a few weeks ago when, in the darkness of bedtime, I had reached the famous fade-out coda of “Hey Jude.” In a near whisper, I sang it: “Na na na, na-na na na / Na-na na na, hey Jude,” in the best Beatles-lullaby voice I could muster. But from the top bunk, I suddenly heard Katie chime in with a raspy: “Jude, Jude, a-Judey, Judey, Judey, Judey.”

In Katie’s mind, the song now includes McCartney’s ad-lib vocal fireworks in between the refrain. She has learned the benefits of adding a little sparkle to a song. The refrain is soothing and fun as is, but McCartney’s joyful screams turn a marvelous melody into a dynamic celebration. And really, what’s wrong with that? Even as she drifted off to sleep, Katie still found the energy for a little shout.

Tonight in the South Bronx, the New York Yankees hosted the Detroit Tigers for the first time this season. That’s particularly notable since this year’s Tigers feature a gentleman named Johnny Damon in their lineup. For four years, Damon was the spark inside a button-down Yankees lineup while men such as Hideki Matsui, Jorge Posada, Derek Jeter and Mark Teixeira brought stability and no-nonsense execution to the team. Damon waved to the crowd and bantered with the fans in left field. He gave tons of interviews with reporters and never took the field without a hop in his step. As the team evolved, players such as Nick Swisher and A.J. Burnett brought their own quirkiness to the pinstripes, and the Yankees began to incorporate more of Damon’s fun into all that success. By 2009, they were a pie-in-the-face group of champions.

Johnny Damon didn’t re-sign with the Yankees this past winter; he’s a Tiger now. As he stepped up to bat for the first time tonight, the New York fans gave Damon a warm welcome back to the stadium. They remembered all the spark, and all the “Judeys” he brought to the fade-out. They know that Johnny Damon took a glad song and made it better. So they let him into their hearts, and that hasn’t changed with his new uniform.

You don’t need to know a lot about baseball or music to know joy when you see or hear it. Sometimes, it even makes you sing out loud as you fall asleep.