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Friday, May 31, 2002

By Jeffrey Cohan, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Baseball and sunshine harmonized in a seductive song yesterday, luring people away from their workaday lives to seats at PNC Park.

	Rege Allen from Mt. Lebanon Manor nursing home improvises a hat for a sunny day at PNC Park. (Steve Mellon, Post-Gazette)

The Pirates treated a mix of businesspeople and schoolchildren to an inspiring comeback, and a spring warmth eased the sting of a 9-8 loss to the Cubs.

What better way to spend a lunch hour? A really long lunch hour.

"I'm old. They can't fire me," said Pete Mahoney, 64, a construction company vice president who left the office to take in the game with three sons, a brother and a nephew.

"It's a nice hot, sunny day. We're watching baseball and drinking beer. What else is there?" said Mahoney, a McCandless resident.

Last year, the Pirates played only two weekday afternoon games after Opening Day. But fan surveys revealed an unmet demand for the so-called "businessman's specials," prompting the team to schedule four this year, including June 27 and Aug. 29.

Yesterday's paid attendance of 21,208 was the largest crowd of the four-game series with the Cubs.

"Generally, we draw better at night," Pirates spokesman Jim Trdinich said, despite this week's evidence to the contrary. "We know people are working."

Working?

One fan requested anonymity out of fear that his bosses would fire him if they knew he was watching a game instead of making sales calls.

"It's a nice day and I'm a big Cubs fan," he said, aware that his superiors probably wouldn't agree that justifies his absence.

Yesterday's affair could have been considered a "schoolchild's special," given the throngs of kids in the stands.

Remember when children had to ditch school to attend an afternoon weekday game?

Nowadays, schools actually bring their students to the ballpark by the busload. No need for truant officers to prowl the bleachers.

Teacher Nancy Hoffman brought her entire high school life-skills class to the game, all the way from St. Marys, Elk County, the hometown of Pirates reliever Joe Beimel.

Hoffman portrayed the trip as a learning experience.

"We're going to be using money, communication and social skills and learning safety in a big city."

The class hung a sign in the ballpark imploring the Pirates to "Let Joe Pitch." But apparently the letters weren't big enough to attract the attention of Manager Lloyd McClendon, who rested the left-hander yesterday.

Nobody in the ballpark could ignore the 115 students from Snyder Elementary School in Industry. Although they were tucked away in the top rows of the upper deck, far down the left field line, their enthusiastic chants of "Let's Go Pirates" carried across the ballpark as the home team mounted a three-run rally in the bottom of the 6th.

Sixth-grader Josh Tomei, 12, didn't mind the seats.

"It's great," he said. "You can see the entire city from here."

The Pirates had given tickets to the entire fifth and sixth grades at Snyder in honor of Tomei's award-winning essay on the virtues of Jackie Robinson. Scholastic Inc., the children's book publisher, sponsored the Jackie Robinson contest and the Hall of Famer's daughter, Sharon, traveled to Ohioville earlier this month to speak at Snyder.

But in the contest that mattered yesterday, the Pirates lost.

The three-hour affair started at 12:35 p.m., early enough for the fans to get ahead of rush-hour traffic after the game.

Unlike in the past, when fans' cars displaced Downtown office workers in North Side parking lots, the Pirates and city reserved the lots closest to Heinz Field for commuters yesterday. That seemed to strike the proper parking balance, Trdinich said.

"I didn't hear any complaints," he said.

Baseball. Sunshine. Leaving work. Missing class. Who could complain?

Maybe only the boss.