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The Nashua Pride, reigning
champions of the Can-Am League,
made good on their promise of free general admission for all of 2008 to the
1422 fans who attended the final home game of 2007 (which was also Dollar
Night). About 500 jumped through the requisite hoops, and the Pride duly
issued badge number 253 to their premier uninvited mascot, making him one of
the team's certified freeloaders.
On 28-May, the Pride celebrated the first birthday of Stitches, a generic baseball with arms and legs. The club's other two mascots appeared, as did a dozen mascots from other sports franchises and businesses. Spike crashed the party and was quickly mistaken for a Pride representative by other mascots on their way up to the gate. (On-field emcee Jessica was puzzled that there was no dog on her clipboard, but adapted.) Spike again helped drag the infield at the end of the 5th inning, but his efforts to recruit an all-mascot drag crew failed, as the invited mascots were bound to Jessica's script. However, they were apparently union hands, so Spike had the sparse crowd to himself from the 6th inning on.
Another game, on 22-Aug, quickly ceased to capture the interest of Pride fans. Aided by dogservant Bob "Bluto" Ducharme, Spike the Dog reappeared just in time for the mid-game dragging of the infield, and to shake everyone's hand, to greet General Manager Chris Hall and pose for his relatives while Hall muttered something about legal liability, and then to borrow a motorized wheelchair and recklessly careen up and down the corridor.
The mayor of Lynn replaced the defunct North Shore Spirit by recruiting the
Holyoke franchise of the NECBL
college summer league, which became the
North Shore Navigators.
Suddenly, the notorious resistance to an uninvited mascot from the nineties
was gone--new owner Phil Rosenfield was eager for a visit from the mascot from
two franchises ago. So Spike the Dog returned to Fraser Field on 28-Jun for
the first time in nearly five years. He spent an hour before the game leaning
on a fire plug and, when cars approached, straightening up as though startled
and waving. He got a hundred people to honk horns and a minimum of obscene
gestures and shouts. In the game, he assisted Chomps the Navigator Alligator
and a cow from Chick-Fil-A. They let him win a 100-meter dash from the Navs'
bullpen.
The Navs' announcer--John Kane, the venerable former voice of the
Massachusetts Mad Dogs--was delighted to see Spike the Dog again, and used his
microphone to explain the mascot's history to fans. Rosenfield was enthused
that Spike the Dog induced a dozen fans to talk about the history of baseball
at Fraser. Spike, of course, didn't change any minds but simply identified
people who had attended for an entire decade. Bob Keaney, official historian
for the Spirit, who had turned the souvenir store into a veritable museum by
plastering the walls with scrapbook material, got new photos from the visit,
including Spike the Dog visiting the third-base coaching box just before play
resumed. Manager Jason Falcon said Spike the Dog reminded him of his days
playing at Fraser for the Mad Dogs and matching wills against their manager,
George Scott.
