The Colorful Montreal Expos

it is a city where one game one team one set of Heroes stand apart from all of us because for generations of us in Montreal hockey hasn't been just a sport it's been a way of life the Canadian haven't just been a franchise but a symbol what excellence can look like and names like rocket Rashard Jean Beliveau ki Lefler haven't just been stars but icons forever ingrained in history yet there was once a time when there were others names people knew the crown along the kid the hawk the rock and Pedro men who didn't wheel sticks and pucks a Batson pawns members of another team that captured the heart of the city in unforgettable ways the Expos are still alive in Montreal you just have to look a little harder to find them the Canadians were Lake lorry you the glorious somehow they were up here the Expos were of the people people called them in French no zamore our love's Montreal is a city of style of fashion of - miss team peeled - Montreal it was colorful it was alive and fans just loved the expose doing weird it was a weird franchise it wasn't like playing in Cleveland or Milwaukee or New York it always had that different vibe to it the mascot was weird the stadium is here two languages popcorn miss who fled hot dog she show it anyway that wad bonsoir all of it was weird but weird was great tricolor hats think about tricolor as you're saying what the heck is that they look like clowns out there I want to bear by air to think they look like clowns do I love in a city that's primarily French they had Oompa band I mean really who has own pop bands and I used to play song called the happy wanderer very vulgar da da da da 3 imagine 30,000 people singing that we were all laughing you know going like these people are crazy they'll come out in full house a lot of de la dee da ha all that stuff like that oh there we head to a man you had a dancer on top of the dugouts you know and every yeah you pee man we had no dances man even now when you get a small group of former Expos together these days the memories come flooding back I saw the fine my eyes lit up like a Christmas tree when I first saw the night life part well there's everybody yeah I can remember main occasion hey hey rook come on I didn't dream yeah we'll get a glass of milk it was fun the theme was fun cuz it if you build on winning you could have problems but if you build on having fun we had no problems there was no better atmosphere first of all they had these yellow seats and if you banging on those things the sound that came out was incredibly loud and also very annoying for the opposing team tough luck the little nuances the songs that they play the chicken that would come on the screen the food the poutine the hotdogs it was a charm to it they had a mascot for one year named Sookie the kids were afraid of him you look like a monster it looked like mr. Mets let's say mentally challenged cousin okay so they move on to another mascot yupi exclamation point what is you peed you know what is it is it a bear you know what is it time is called in third base umpire Bob Davidson is throwing you'll be out of the ball game I have never in my life seen a mascot of any major sports a team ejected from basically we've seen it all now yup he's been thrown out of the game only in Montreal it was something a little Mickey Mouse about those Expos but it was our Mickey it was utterly charming without being traditionally charming it was Montreal charming and plus we had a lot of fun personalities too Billy there are times where I thought he was he was a homeless guy Cromartie bunch of man Dawson and Raines Larry Walker and Moises Alou Pedro Pedro was one she's gonna go after him we got into a lot of fights I had to go holla one day let Paige up man you get these two the purpose you can hear the fans shouting Pedro Pedro fans very much took two guys who are colorful they didn't necessarily sweat off field escapades they didn't worry about any of that stuff Larry Walker sometimes you become the bartender and you start giving everybody that passed by on the street drinks drinks are on me and those moments were like so much fun I didn't want to let go those summers in Montreal he played nine season with the Expos number 49 Warren crow Marte more than a decade after their departure they are not forgotten even a few exhibition games can still trigger a familiar passion they fill the joint they put 97 thousand people in the stadium for two games 97 thousand people the next season in 2015 another 97 thousand people showed up we were singing Expo song as we were singing Valda rebelled rah and we were crying Gro man we were crying over the outpouring of emotion it was literally like seeing someone who you thought was dead and now all of a sudden ten years later blegh hey guess what I'm back long before the Montreal Expos there were the Montreal Royals a minor league club that became in 1939 the Dodgers triple-a farm team a host of legends would pass through that Royals clubhouse over the years but none more significant than a 27 year old Jackie Robinson who spent the 1946 season with the team one year before breaking major league baseball's color barrier Montreal is a baseball city so baseball has always been that but in 1960 the Royals folded which actually might have been the best thing for baseball in Montreal because major league baseball was expanding and the city was making a bid to get into the game we had a mayor mr. Chappell he wanted to be able to have a stadium so he can bring the Olympics to Montreal and baseball was a way to do it munch has a huge huge underdog and against all odds Montreal gets big we all be proud of our montréal Expo there's only a few months left until the 1969 season is going to start but they don't have anywhere to play there's no stadium where are they gonna play their games we're having a wake in our office for the team that wouldn't be and there's a phone call from the mayor I went down to his office and there was a picture of Cherie Park a municipal park called Jerry park and dropo says we're gonna turn this into a major league baseball seat president of national league doesn't want to hear no and doesn't want to think about no just okay I believe you I'm afraid to mention the word problem because every time I mention it the mayor would say we have no problems we only have solutions night and day the city and the club labored to do the impossible to put into operation what has been called the most fantastic sports Enterprise Canadian is everything was rushed a rushed construction job through a cold tough winter and it was almost ready for the opening day game almost ready because they had installed all of the seats and night before their gonna play their first game they have to set up folding chairs chairs that the ballclub had rented from a funeral home basically the first general manager of the baseball team is unfolding chairs imagine Dave Dombrowski unfolding chairs at Fenway Park it was close but it was wonderful baseball has come to Montreal in a big way people of all ages are enjoying baseball and Jerry part the day after in London French papers the editor wrote days at school no zhamuhe the Expos we love you and that always stayed there are lovers Ellis Tate and in The Gazette look at Entourage rusty Staub his name was there in one day people loved us and we had a superhero rusty stop opening day they called him LaRoche an original Expo who endeared himself to the fans not just by making three all-star teams but by learning French rusty star was the star the expansion Expos needed to connect with their city the reason why I learned French was I felt kind of stupid not to be able to talk to a child I needed to be able to talk about baseball I need to talk about how to get around how to order at a restaurant and to be able to do those things it took on a whole new air with the people in Canada other than Jean Beliveau on the Montreal Canadiens he was this popular figure in the sea look on the launch LeGrande around Legrand or are here that's why they call him the grande the growl Roz was the first expose superstar but where he played was almost as colorful we've got a dandy coming up for you here tonight here at Jerry part I mean I hit somebody some of the idiosyncrasies at the ballpark we had a dancer we had a dancer Jerry Park guy ran up and down the seats and everybody cheered if he wasn't there I don't I don't know if they'd continue the game at the time they had uh charettes you're wearing go-go boots think of them they were very popular very popular however it was a major league ball part in name only and sundown was very very tough for the first victim the Sun would set right in the first baseman's eyes that's the fact that that really was almost dangerous I can remember the first baseman hit the deck and the pole rose up and landed in the stands that's when they realized they had to stop the game for 20 minutes each night realistically you got to say we're gonna finish last in our division if anybody looks at it in other way they're just kidding somebody the Expos lost a lot of games those first few seasons but fans have been ready for that what they weren't expecting was the 1972 trade of their beloved superstar that's the only time in my career I was ever caught on aware the it actually hurt I was stunned I was people couldn't really wrap their arms around it they felt while we lost one of our own and as things go on this kind of escalate if you had to look ahead and said what was going to happen the history of franchise now was it was always going to be like that and it was always going to be in peril as a result I met the people at Walt Disney we said okay so how do you operate a mascot the first thing they told us you must never take the head off of a mascot Cromartie Cromartie cooler he talked with putting that UB pseudo Oh everything I've talked won't be doing it got away delay and we looked at this room this you beam with the head off he's smoking cigarette so I look at it Harper look at me do it so I went on the top get my Beirut day he kind of got got going a little bit so I run down first base say we let it everybody's better okay okay so I got on second base take him a lead or get man you know anyone doing me go home coming off through the mid-70s the expose remained a middling plug unable to get above 500 but in the franchise's minor league system stars were beginning to develop and there were none brighter than the guy they called the kid you know how you got that name kid you know Gary's tearing up the hunt Roble and every day at dawn currents he will mess with Barry Flynn Barry foot was to catch you at that time and funny you hear about the kid got three hits heels down into play hey footie the kid went deep two-run shot every day resolves he with Carter gets your wittle cardigan sir and when he got here he didn't disappoint anybody Carter and every respect starts flourishing he's a terrific hitter he's got power and just become such a great defensive catcher had that smile had the curly hair he would always find the camera some of his teammates would call him lights because when the lights came on Gary Carter would appear in front of the camera he was the enthusiastic kid and people saw that love of the game and love for the city he just jumped right in and he was never shy to practice French you know even if he wasn't pronouncing it perfect it really gave the people there in Montreal I think just an extra love for him monoi Gary Carter Lucie bro days Expo Gary Carter was is the face of the expose he was the expose Carter was the new face of a franchise about to embark on a new era in a new hope Olympic Stadium though built for the Olympics was in many ways an upgrade from tiny Jerry Park but it was far from perfect you know welcome to the big Olin thing wow this is absolutely beautiful it was ugly just a big oval brick some people said it looked like a big spaceship had landed some other people weren't as kind and said it looked more like a toilet the Olympic Stadium was always cold who was concrete and it didn't have a roof the retractable roof is in a warehouse because they ran out of money this was the billion dollar boondoggle wasn't designed for baseball the big o was a dump it was a concrete elephant it was just it was nothing to be proud of but it was ours a unique new stadium was now embraced by a unique cast of characters who connected with Montreal in unpredictable ways you know we all had nicknames Rodney's got cool breeze and it was like jazz on the field watching Rodney Scott around the bases stealing third base when the catch would throw the ball back to the pitcher he saw that Little League the hawk Andre Dawson was one of those guys that had muscles coming from everywhere he had that look about him if you didn't know him you'll be afraid of space Billy was a brilliant guy a really smart pitcher but also somebody who is eccentric and just hard to read I'm not flaky at all it's the right-handed world that caused the problems and left-handers are just responding to it in 1979 the Expos had a winning season for the first time in their existence and suddenly expose baseball was instantly transformed into the most exciting thrilling party in town Olympics day became the place to be as soon as you actually entered the actual stadium they had oompah bands they had these German Oktoberfest kind of bands that were playing in the lobby really who has own pop bands and people loved it they used to play song called the happy wanderer the chorus is basically Valerie Valderrama that became the rally cry for the team thirty thousand of Canadian singing that in unison and then you had the score was pixelated it was strange and I had these weird messages huh if the opposing pitcher through at first base we had a chicken come on and not some sort of beautiful chicken it would be basically a cardboard cutout of a chicken into electronic form then it was a Cardinals lefty who one day decided if he could break the chicken record which I think was 11 my phone ringer is the chicken sound you were going to a game in that era especially from another city if you just zapped in from out of town you just sort of looked around what business what is what am i eating what is this beer what is this scoreboard what is this ban it was all completely foreign right down to the player announcements being in both languages this was unique to Montreux it was crazy man two languages French and English out there and flag-waving it started to know us a little bit waiting for it at the subway station for me 79 is really when they really realized what they had no one ever wanted to leave the party at Olympic Stadium and it was about to get even bigger we always come closer we couldn't get cross and we get to the bridge we couldn't cross the bridge one time we were closing 81 and I mean the city was electric that places a Montreal was on fire 1981 was a strange year in baseball history it was split up by a seven week long player strike a situation that led to two separate seasons the Expos won the second half of the season marking their first ever playoff appearance they defeated the Phillies in a five-game NLDS thanks to the championship series there was a cup of fans holding the Canadian flag I went over there and I got the flag and held the flag up I was really a proud Canadian at that time you know his Canada's turned it with Canada and for the first time a Canadian team like Canada against the United States we had a whole country behind the montreal expos were just three wins away from their first ever trip to the World Series the Expos and Dodgers split the first four games setting up a deciding fifth game to be played on a Monday in Montreal the first memory that I have ever was Blue Monday ah unfortunately it was October 19th 1981 seven years old the game went to the ninth inning tied 1-1 but then came a series of events that would forever define October 19th 1981 s Blue Monday with their closer hurt the expo sent their ace Steve Rogers to warm up in the bullpen the adrenaline was just pumping I was coming out of my ears because I wouldn't use doing that and they say you're gonna go in to start the inning I said okay right Steve Rogers is into the game and this a unusual position to see Steve in out of the bullpen Rogers would retire the first batter Steve Garvey of just one pitch and Rodney Scott you would then face Ron say the adrenaline I didn't handle and I was mechanically just off a little bit balls behind say three and oh I was thinking the white pitches Gary and I were right in sync I just wasn't throwing this why not lifts a high fly ball left field reigns in the corner he's under and makes the catch on the warning track oh he gave it a ride the pitch to Ron Cey was a warning sign oh geez maybe he doesn't have it he's never done this before I remember feeling a pit in my stomach seeing that say fly ball with two down in the ninth Rick Monday stepped up to the plate I did not hit well against Steve Rogers in my career 167 is when I hit against e3 and won 3-1 if I miss I'm gonna miss low and away walk I just threw that ball so poorly Ted it ended up being Hein right over the middle of the plate I use the theory swing hard in case you happen to hit it here's the 3-1 pitch Shannon swung on fly ball centerfield I sought a swing I knew he made you know a good connection with it I should have felt I had a bead on it Dawson going back I saw Andre going back Dawson drifts back I thought I was gonna make a play right back at the warning track I hit the wall on to the warning track and he keeps carrying Dawson at the wall I got to the wall so I'm run out of room it's gone that ball is a home run oh my god that's the day I thought you had wings and I was really praying that you had ways I got back even though I was playing playing him to pool I got back I just didn't think of what care as far as it did to see the ball disappear with Dawson moving back was just a absolute kick to the gut and all of a sudden you could hear a pin drop we could hear the silence when can you hear silence Rogers taken day by Rick Monday it's his day of the week the saddest day in the history of sports immaterial the saddest day even when you relive it you still have that shunt stick why inside and you know it's like yeah when the expose failed to rally in the night the season ended in Blue Monday was officially born never again with the Montreal Expos ever comes so close to a World Series after that last I was made and I think myself Dawson and Cromartie sat on our bench for like about an hour after that game was over Rick Monday don't mention that name around here if you say the name Rick Monday that gets people pretty pissed off Rick Monday every time he came back to Montreal there was always someone to remind him you hit a home run and then first year coming back after that series Steve Yeager who was a catcher was my brother we went to dinner in Montreal and we sat down and were looking at the menu and we'd ordered a beverage and the manager of this restaurant comes over and he says gentlemen I have to ask you to leave you're not closing we just we just ordered it's like seven o'clock at night.i you know he said we don't want fights in here so we're not fighting group we're gonna order and have dinner because I'm worried about you but there's six guys back here that want to come over and start a fight with you please leave so we left and that's when I discovered the the Blue Monday and I discovered that the winners are long in Montreal and they don't forget anything I believe that if the expose had won the game it would still be a baseball franchise in Montreal because I'm convinced it would have gone on to beat the Yankees in the World Series the most remembered moment in the history of this franchise Rick Monday's home run Blue Monday is something that was bad for the Expos and if it had been something good there would have been something for the people to have held on to through dark times the firm he gives it into linear back to the Canadiens won the Stanley Cup in 1979 the last a foreign award and after that this great dynasty started splintering so there was room for a baseball team to capture the hearts of the city Montreal Expos in the early 80s were more popular than Montreal Canadians that's a fact that's not flying the sky thinking from hardcore baseball fans they were giving away 2,000 tickets again to fill the seats at the Montreal Forum in the early ages while the Expos were setting franchise attendance right the expose played fire wagon baseball in the way that Canadians of the 70s played fire wagon hockey people were going to games they were flocking the games it was a place to be celebrities at Donald Sutherland the prime minister these were regulars at Montreal Expo games players were very popular community wise very popular all these guys kind of hung out you know in Old Montreal and they were very accessible maybe a little too accessible but everybody partied in the 80s especially in a city like Montreal and for some members of the team partying meant turning to drugs the most notable example was the team's young star Tim Raines I remember having promised when I first got there you know doing all the partying things and stuff like that at the young age I mean I was 19 what happened was not really knowing the effects of what it would get me into I sort of went overboard and sonic got myself in trouble being an exciting City and so many you know good and bad things that can go on with that being out all time tonight hanging out partying here and there he was not nearly the player he was in 1982 after a fabulous 1981 when he was runner-up as the NL Rookie of the Year I took it upon myself to say you know if I'm gonna be as good as I can be I'm gonna need help Andre Dawson was one of those guys that was more like a straight and narrow guy but one day I went to him I say man you know I want to be like you and he said it's gonna be okay he kind of showed me the way Tim Raines was special and I got to develop a very very special and close bond with Timmy me and Andre I became the best of friends even to this day you know who the best of friends he named his son Andre and I made me his his Godfather and he was born on the same day so we celebrated the same birthday if I had to sing a lot one person to say that they had the biggest influence on my career it would definitely be Andre Dawson despite rains developing into a perennial all-star with the help of Dawson team gradually retreated back to mediocrity in the mid 1980s that team should have won more it should have won they had a great team but even amid the disappointment there was always one players to the part which made it all the more shocking when the face of the franchise the kid was dealt away after the 1984 season it was almost like what you know they trade Gary Carter Wow I would say that was the second heartbreaking situation when rusty left he was just as heartbreaking as when Gary though those two trades heard the expose you can't imagine how Andre Dawson and Tim Raines would be the next ones to go it was the end of an era an era that fans would always remember fondly a memory embodied on a September afternoon in 1992 long after his prime the kid who had signed with the expose for that season came to the plate for what would be his final at-bat in the majors it was the last day of the last home stand there and he you know his both his knees were shot shoulder I mean he was hurt and top to bottom we were kidding around before the game and I said I knew that you were probably hobbling a little bit I'm gonna cheat in and I'm gonna throw you out don't hit the ball to me on the right field because I'm not gonna give you a hit I'm not gonna let you get it here you just want to end on the high note if you possibly can he came up and I looked at him and I said you know what I'm gonna follow the plan just to see if I can get him to look out here and he'd nodded he tipped his cap and I cheated in and what does he do we hitch the ball in the gap in right-center now I gotta take off cuz it's over my head and I look back and I just shook my head and I said I tried you and you rose to the occasion it was the storybook ending we look back in 94 the team was destined I mean it just felt like like we don't win I think you had that good mix you had yet the guy had the magic man at the front there Philippe yeah you see okay I mean blue nickimja 718 you ain't gonna tell me how to manage crew when you talk about the 1994 season the first major move of that offseason was they traded delino deshields for a young pitcher a string bean with 146 pounds named Pedro Martinez he strikes out the side they had the best outfield in baseball Larry Walker marquise grissom Moises Alou the unity that we had in that team was so so impressive my god could we could we do everything together the most memorable moment of that season came on a late June night when the Expos faced the mighty Braves the turning point of that season was cliff Floyd hitting a home run against God Maddox anyway networth bourgeois Eddie but see Floyd Floyd Floyd when I hit that ball I went numb I know afterwards the club became owners like great matters absolutely destroy the locker room that night you don't hit home runs against God that moment led us to believe that we could be mattered in the Atlanta Braves we could beat everybody else they had the best record in baseball and they had opened up a six-game lead on the second-place Atlanta Braves in the National League and then disaster struck sad we had to leave this way but sometimes you gotta do what you have to do all of a sudden we have that I brought stuff it left us all with an empty feeling I just felt like man that was our chance to win a championship so you know and and and and it took it away and I and I always be somewhere in a dark place cuz that when that season ended because of the strike I sat down at home and I made notes on this piece of paper listing the players the record and the date because I think it was the death knell of baseball in Montreal but the strike brought on by the many money problems baseball had was at least in one respect a fitting way for the Expos to get undercut because it was money or more precisely the lack of it that was starting to threaten the team's existence they still have this great team all they have to do is literally nothing just status quo just make sure that this team takes the field next year and they decide within the course of three days basically get rid of everybody get rid of marquise grissom trade him get rid of Kenny Hill get rid of John wetland Larry Walker come on you couldn't had a better guy and he had to walk because they couldn't afford to pay him local owners would argue that they were in survival mode and they just had to tread water but you got a win okay we knew they couldn't keep everybody but you could have kept two of these guys the idea of expose University is you would serve four years as an expo when you graduate then you're on to other things Pedro Martinez in 1997 strikes out three hundred and five batters and has a one point nine zero er a let's go trade him every year wasn't paid Cox I mean the nucleus it was right there you're actually developing to whatever you want at that organization to be you can only stop and think if you want to talk about the what-ifs in baseball history Jeter and Posada and Mariano Rivera and Bernie Williams on those guys maybe they're not legends because the Expos are kicking their butt every year in the World Series financial issues has in fact been entering franchise for years multiple ownership groups and a failed attempt to move the team into a new downtown ballpark left the club's future in doubt then in 2001 owner Jeffrey Loria sold the Expos to Major League Baseball all that along with dwindling attendance made it seem like only a matter of time before the franchise would be relocated kind of preparing myself for the worst and every night lasts forever 2004 would be the Expos final season of Montreal 35 years after the club was born it was time to say goodbye it was emotional I was sitting close down the first baseline as a fan with my dad I remember leaning back and somebody I knew in the row behind me ended up taking a picture there's no joy in my face at a baseball game Major League Baseball here in Montreal months later there would be a final farewell to Montreal and their fans it would come from the most famous graduate of expose University I would like to share this with the people in Montreal that that I'm not gonna have a team anymore I'm sure the scene was played out living rooms all over my trail with just tears streaming down I saw myself as a champion 94 I just could never celebrate it so I wanted to share it with the people that I thought deserve to actually have that opportunity my my ring is with them too you go back to that moment with Pedro and there's so much love in that moment then if and when we do get a team back I'll always think that was like the first initial spark it was a sad day around Major League Baseball on Thursday as hall-of-famer Gary Carter died at the age of 57 we lose a pretty good one a good guy and a great player today way too early Gary Carter was never just another baseball hero in another baseball town he was a figure who revealed to Montreal all that an iconic sports star could be everybody had their moment with kid you know everybody had that one moment where he was kind to them or they saw him in public and he did something exceptionally kind that no other athletes would do so when Carter passed away in 2012 it reminded many Expos fans of a time that once was and a time that perhaps could be again when Gary Carter passed it really woke people up and got people really emotional and really nostalgic about the expose me let me shoot these ones I do a lot of treatments are not you're in Vermont see don't send email to Gary Carter you don't have words for Get Rid card or you can do a smile when you hear his name that's how I want to remember Gary when the kid passed away I said no no something's wrong here you got to get them back I would make Gary happy for sure Gary be smiling down in heaven about it he'd love to have a team back there there's some finished business here that's what it amounts to we had a point now the whole world knows montreal wants their expose back we have the media behind us Major League Baseball knows what we're trying to do now I would never say there isn't a chance of expanding in Canada Montreal is a great city and I do think that the showing surrounding the exhibition games is an impressive indication of interest like a good son that always returns home whose finds I think 1-0 should have his team returned to Montreux once we get this team back which we will get this team back we get this nice beautiful 35,000 seat stadium there's gonna be a couple of statues out front one of them gonna be here is gonna be a Gary Carter I guarantee you that in truth there's no certainty that Major League Baseball will return to the city what is certain is that the Expos and their colorful history remain in the hearts of the people of mantri it's not nostalgia it's not just memories it's DNA it's truly part of us look at all the players that pass through Montreal Gary Carter Andre Dawson Larry walk rusty Staub Vladimir Guerrero Pedro Martinez there is special they were good and I hope people recall that baseball may come back to our city one day it may not this April like most April's here sports fans will be thinking about their hockey team and the Stanley Cup but long ago and not so long ago when April came there was another game in town and the ones who knew about that colorful truly unique team will continue to know the expose the team the players the memories are still alive and always will be you just have to remember to look to find them my name is Anakin Slade I'm hip-hop artist from Montreal huge expose fan and I actually wrote a sort of eulogy to the team a nice age got the springtime who's real bad can't help of eminence about the trade pH we had I remember photo day eighty three summer dance still have the pic of me my possible brother I remember all-star game Bob and strong 39,000 fans looking on I remember tears at the kids last game stood right behind him as the anthem played I remember singing Valerie now the raw old free wild card race last hurrah I'm missing Montreal ball ten years on sometimes you think of what you've got tool it's darling

Channel: Expos Classics

Views: 125,788

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Id: BUh35g-qFmQ

Length: 44min 49sec (2689 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 19 2016