ATLANTA, April 13 -- The stories, now, can be chuckled about, for they are in the past. The guys who didn't get apartments in the city in which they played, because they were only going to be there 60 nights a year. No sense paying rent for a place in which you'll rarely sleep. The crowds that showed up, so small that players could sit in the dugout and finish counting heads by the top of the third. The road trip that began in Montreal, went to Miami, turned back north to Philadelphia, crossed part of the Atlantic to play what was loosely called a "homestand" in Puerto Rico, followed by -- naturally -- a West Coast swing, beginning in Seattle.
"And we had to stop for fuel in Atlanta," pitcher Joey Eischen said. "By the time we got off the plane, we were delirious. We were talking about hunting moose and whether we'd see a bear. We could hardly stand."
Head groundskeeper Jimmy Rodgers puts the finishing touches on the RFK Stadium field in preparation for the sold-out Nationals-Diamondbacks game.
(Preston Keres -- The Washington Post)
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The most itinerant team in baseball history is due to wake up Thursday morning, rub its collective eyes, look out the window and say, finally, "This is where we belong." Many lifelong Washingtonians and those who have adopted the nation's capital as their home have longed for baseball's return since it departed in 1971. But for the members of the Washington Nationals who will take the field at RFK Stadium Thursday evening -- facing the Arizona Diamondbacks in the first regular season game in the District in 34 years -- there is no overstating what it will mean to be in front of more than 45,000 people, a human welcome mat lying across their brand-new front doorstep.
"It's hard to say exactly what it'll mean," catcher Brian Schneider said earlier this spring. "You just know it'll mean something. New uniforms, new fans, new team, new city. I feel like I got traded. It's all for the best -- for everybody in here."
They don't know the city. Many aren't yet sure where they'll live. The restaurants and roads, barbers and bars, tailors and taxis -- they're all foreign to these guys. It matters not at all.
"Not only is it 81 games in one place," said Tony Siegle, the club's assistant general manager, "but it's 81 games at home -- in the true definition of the word."
Very few baseball players these days take up full-time residence in the cities in which they play. Their careers are too transient, what with free agency and the possibility of a trade hanging over nearly everyone's head at any moment.
But the return of baseball to Washington gives the new Nationals a security many of them have never known. They have dealt with the distracting and frivolous issues of their mere existence for so long, they hardly know how to react to such a new situation. Major League Baseball purchased the Montreal Expos in 2002, fully intending to eliminate the team after the season. Instead, it stayed alive, but scheduled 22 games in 2003 and 22 more the following year at Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Thus, the legendary stretches away from Montreal, such as the aforementioned trip in May and June of 2003, when they played 22 games in a 24-day stretch, all away from Montreal.
"We never wanted to make excuses about it," outfielder Brad Wilkerson said, "but it wasn't easy."
Now, this. Thursday night's festivities will be unlike anything the club saw in Montreal. President Bush will throw out the first pitch. Former Washington Senators will take the field. Commissioner Bud Selig will be in the stands. A full-scale Washington event.
Frank Robinson, the Nationals manager, has been in baseball for nearly half a century. Home openers, as special as each one is, tend to run together after a while.
Not this one.
"I've never been in a place where an area that looks so enthusiastically forward to the team itself coming out of spring training the first day," Robinson said. "Opening Day is always a special occasion as far as the crowds and the excitement. But this is going to be an even more special day because of the circumstances of this ballclub, and the first game in 34 years [in Washington]. There's a lot of adrenaline, a lot of enthusiasm locked up that's going to be unlocked on Thursday."
That, too, will be true for the players. As if this team needed more reasons to be homesick, it is the only one of the 30 major league clubs that has yet to play a game at home. The reason is simple: Baseball and team officials wanted as much time as possible to prepare RFK Stadium, which only began undergoing renovations in January.
"You want to get teams home early," said Katy Feeney, baseball's vice president in charge of scheduling. "But we've had cases with a new ballpark or a reconfigured ballpark that we've started teams on the road for three straight series."
Yet in a strange way, the opening road trip -- which concluded with an 11-4 victory Wednesday afternoon at Atlanta -- allowed the fans in Washington to get a feel for this team before it settled into its new digs. Projected by nearly everyone to finish last in the National League East, it played like a last-place club in only three innings during the trip, and ended up winning five of the nine games.
"It's very difficult to go on a nine-game road trip against the Braves, the Marlins, and the Phillies -- the three best teams in the division," General Manager Jim Bowden said. "That's a tough way to start the year, home or road. That's a tough schedule, and these guys are fighting. They didn't start the year 1-8."
Far from it. Yet as much as the Nationals are looking forward to Thursday night's festivities, they realize the buzz and the crowd won't be an everyday occurrence. The true measure will come Saturday night, when the series resumes, and throughout the rest of the seven-game homestand.
"I think that's the big test, to see what we have after Opening Day," Robinson said. He recalled one Opening Day in Cleveland, at old Municipal Stadium, the 74,000-seat "Mistake by the Lake." A huge crowd came for the opener. The next day? "Ten thousand people," Robinson said. "That was a sight."
At some level, though, the crowds are secondary. The most important aspects of it all will be the unpacked suitcases, the cars in the garage, the mail with no forwarding address.
"When we go back home, put our stuff in our closet and really can concentrate and play games," second baseman Jose Vidro said, "this team's going to be good. I like what we take to the ballpark every day. You'll see."
