THE FANS * Roly Poly Mickey Lolich * OCTOBER 1968
TIGERS ARE THE CHAMPS!A MCRFB Note: Bob Babbitt, future ‘Funk Brother’ and part-time bassist for Motown Records in 1968, was the name used by Robert Kreiner, who co-wrote this song. Bob Babbitt is playing on drums in this recording. Production arranged by Bob Babbitt.
A tribute to 1968 World Series 3 game winner Mickey Lolich, the single was released by Marquee Records in Detroit, late-October, 1968.
The Detroit Tigers Win The American League Pennant
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The Year of the Tiger — 1968? Well, yes. But it was more than that. Far more. It was the year of Detroit . . . when an entire community, an entire city, was caught up in the frenzy of a baseball team trying to win a pennant. Not just any team. Not just any pennant. This was special. This was a stricken city, a worried citizenry, which finally found itself bound together in a common goal.
Corny? Maybe so. We can be pretty cynical. We newspapermen, but there was no doubting the fervor or the fever of the people of our city as they tried mightily to pull the Tigers along to the American League pennant . . . their first pennant in 23 years. That’s a long time, 23 years. You can raise families and send them through college in 23 years. Some can go to war. Some can start raising families of their own. All this happened since the last time the Tigers won the American League pennant.
The mood of our city was anything but gay in the spring of 1968. The summer loomed ominously. The newspaper strike droned on and on . . . but something happened in the middle of 1968. You would pull up to the light at Woodward and Clairmount and the guy in the next car would have his radio tuned up. ” . . . Horton stepping in. Willie’s had two hits tonight.” Or you would pick your way through the mobs at Metropolitan Beach and even though you wouldn’t have a radio, you wouldn’t miss a pitch. ” . . . Stanley leading off second. Northrup off first — here’s the pitch from Katt.” Rouge Park . . . Belle Isle . . . the kitchens of the poshest restaurants in town . . . and those awful moments at the bottom of the Windsor Tunnel when you couldn’t pick up Ernie or Ray — and just when Bill Freehan got around to third base with the tying run. The stirring strains of “Go Get ‘Em, Tigers” everywhere.
A baseball team trying to win a pennant. Men playing a boy’ game. Well, yes. That’s the way it was in The Year of the Tiger — 1968. But it was a year I will never forget. It was a year when an entire community, an entire city, was caught up in the frenzy of a baseball team trying to win a pennant. For a moment I even forgot some of my worries.
Authored by Joe Falls, his commentary (as worded verbatim in its entirety here) was printed on the B-side of the LP cover, “The Year Of The Tiger ’68”. The album was presented by the National Bank of Detroit and offered exclusively through their NBD outlets in the Detroit area.
“The Year Of The Tiger ’68” was officially released to the public, Friday, October 11, 1968, the day after the Detroit Tigers won the 1968 World Series.
