JetHawks clipped

At Duke and Slim's, the employees talked JetHawks baseball all day. Nervously.

On another momentous day in the saga of Lancaster's California League franchise, the feeling this time was somehow different.

There was something to lose this time.

Shock numbed the finality of a season ended too soon in a 4-1 loss to the San Bernardino Stampede in the decisive fifth game of the California League's Southern Division Championship Series.

Always before, there was the innocence and wonder and more than a little awe when Ken Griffey Jr. hit the 14 Freeway, Joe Mays struck out a future World Series MVP twice and Juan Silvestre waked the echoes of Steve Bilko.

The JetHawks could do no wrong. Minor league baseball turned out to be a better investment than even its most outspoken proponents envisioned.

So when precious playoff momentum appeared to become Blood Alley's latest victim after successive setbacks in San Bernardino, purple-pinstriped passion remained undaunted.

"They're going to come into our park and win the Southern division championship? I don't think so,' " declared Bob Westhofer of Lancaster, a season ticket-holder since Day 1. "San Bernardino's what, 1-11 (here) this year? There's not a chance they're gonna take this."

Westhofer had been even more under the weather than the JetHawks offense Monday night. So his wife, Pat, dutifully represented the family on the road.

Still, there was anxiety. Up in the city skybox, city manager Jim Gilley had his fingers tightly crossed for Lancaster manager Mark Parent's team.

"All right, JetHawks, let's fly tonight!" yelled Pat, a 40-year Valley resident from White Fence Farms affectionately known at The Hangar as "Dingaling." A cowbell rang frenetically behind a voice left hoarse by the 15 innings of Game 4.

Patty Hadley was already dealing with one loss. Her daughter, Michelle, the longtime Hangar scoreboard operator, left for college in Arizona.

"If they lose, I will cry," she said. "I've never seen so much heart in a team. They're wonderful."

"I'm disappointed that more people didn't come out to support these guys," Bloom said, surveying the green acres of empty seats just a half-hour before the first pitch. "Where else can you bring a family of four for so little?

"Yet you always hear people say there's nothing to do in Lancaster."

Until next April, disbelief notwithstanding, that's the sad truth at The Hangar.

Uploaded September 13, 2000