August 18, 2000

Exactly what you'd expect. When we reached him, Bill Lee had just returned from Montreal, after a taping of his baseball oriented television show, "Answers From Space." He was out of breath from all the running around. In about a week's time, the Spaceman had trekked around western Massachusetts, the Smoky Mountains, and parts of Florida, and was getting ready for a trip to Cuba.

A one man barnstormer, Lee free agents himself out as an instructor, manager, motivational speaker, and of course, as player, a "ringer" really. He plays some first and a little center field, and bats himself cleanup whenever the hell he feels like it.

Says the skipper: "When you manage the ball club, you start when you want to, and you bat fourth all the time. It's good work if you can get it."

Lee won a couple of rings this past year, in the Men's Senior Baseball League (MSBL) Over 50 Championships, in Arizona, and down in Florida, in the Roy Hobbs Championships.

"We're 20 years past our prime. You know, it's tough to get those wheelchairs up and down the line."

He still follows his old teams, the Montreal Expos and Boston Red Sox, hates the Dodgers, and he'd "like to see the Giants come back from the dead."

When asked about his fondest baseball memory, Spaceman says without hesitation: "1975 World Series."

Lee's career highlights include an All-Star appearance in 1973, successive 17 win seasons in '73, '74 and '75, and of course everybody's favorite Series. He pitched well in both his starts against the Reds, and chipped in with a single, but did not get a decision.

Now Paramount is working on a Woody Harrelson produced film version of his book, "The Wrong Stuff," which Lee hopes will attract the interest of director Ron Shelton. When anchored near his home in Craftsbury, Vermont, the Spaceman volunteers his name and his time to cancer research, for the Boston-based Jimmy Fund.

Howard Cole

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